Sweat droplets were falling to the ground as if it was lightly raining in a localized area, the sound of an object cutting through the air could be heard and if someone's eyes were trained well enough they would be able to track the high speed movements of Gohan as he punched and kicked in the air as he had been since dawn.
He'd ignored the argument of his mother demanding he go back to school as he took off deeper into the woods near his house. His fight with Lady Beerus the day before had taught him much and that wasn't even touching on the intimate experience they shared. He'd learned that he'd gotten so much weaker over the years and that had to be corrected.
But he'd also found that power far above his own existed and he had to get stronger so that he could be a match for Lady Beerus when she next returned to Earth.
At present though Gohan was doing his best to ignore the bald monk watching him. "You could at least say hello," Krillin sighed as he'd been observing Gohan for the last few hours and he spoke up once there was a lull in his training.
Gohan lowered himself to the forest floor and ran a hand through his damp hair. "Hey Krillin what's up?" he asked even though he knew why Krillin was here.
"Chi-Chi called," Krillin started to say before holding up his hand as he could tell Gohan was about to start defending himself when he didn't have to. "Hang on, I'm not on her side. But I'm also not on yours. I want to talk to you," Krillin admitted as he patted the ground next to him.
Gohan reluctantly came over and rested next to the monk. "Now, I'm not going to make you stop or anything, but I'm worried about you."
"Just because I lost a-," Gohan started to get frustrated.
"Dude, it's not that," Krillin said, cutting off the half-saiyan's rant. "If getting your ass handed to you was enough to make you drop everything in your life and dedicate it to training then I'd have been stronger than your dad by now." Krillin chuckled for a moment. "So I know it's not about that."
Gohan bit his lip as he felt foolish for jumping to conclusions especially with the man who made time to befriend him even though he was his father's friend first. "Something else happened between you and Beerus. You don't have to tell me what it was, but I need to know if this is healthy for you?"
"I, she…" Gohan curled up a bit as talking about this was almost as naughty as doing it. "She took my virginity," Gohan admitted with a soft smile as he remembered the feeling of their bodies together in the heat of passion.
"Woah, she RAPED you!" Krillin shot up in a panic, not expecting that to come out of Gohan's mouth. "Holy shit that explains so much. My god, dude, we are here to help you." He said as he was going to be there for Gohan in this difficult time.
"No!" Gohan panicked at how Krillin had gotten the wrong idea. "God no, she didn't… it was," Gohan looked at the ground. "I don't know, one minute we were fighting and then well, things just..."
"Okay dude, take a breath," Krillin suggested as he sat down across from Gohan. "Tell me what happened."
"Are you just going to tell my mom?" Gohan asked before he started his story as he'd really hate for that to get back to his mother.
"Swear on my life I won't," Krillin raised his hand to try and get Gohan to believe he wouldn't tell this to Chi-Chi. Gohan snorted a laugh before Krillin pouted. After a few seconds Krillin laughed along with the half-saiyan. "Fine, I guess it doesn't mean much if I've already gone through two of them."
"No no, it's fine," Gohan said as he laid back against a tree. "We were in a department store and I was using every technique I knew, nothing was working, she was too strong, too powerful, too… amazing," Gohan quietly added as he continued his tale.
"Man you got it bad," Krillin rested on his elbows as he listened to Gohan tell him how things had gone at the mall. "Ehh who am I to judge though," Krillin smiled. "I got one look at Eighteen and I was smitten."
"So you get why I'm doing this?" Gohan asked, hoping Krillin understood why he was so focused on getting stronger.
Krillin nodded as he did get it. "I don't really like it though." Krillin admitted as he knew this probably wasn't healthy for him. "But it's your choice and I'm going to support it, because I know you. And you are a good kid Gohan." Krillin stretched as he stood up. "I promise I won't tell your mom," Krillin smiled as he floated off. 'But I am going to talk to Piccolo about this.' He thought to himself as he needed another opinion.
"And he fucked the Goddess of Destruction?!" Piccolo shouted in amazement at the story Krillin had relayed to him when he came by.
"Yeah, well he says he did, but I think in that situation consent was a bit dubious," Krillin shrugged as he saw it as a bit more complex than simply fucking. "He just turned eighteen and I'm not really sure he understood what he was getting himself into."
"Does he ever?" Piccolo shrugged as while he was concerned about the situation he felt that the earthlings might be overblowing it. "I mean, after all the times he's been kidnapped, nearly killed and seen his friends and family killed in front of him. When have we ever made any attempts to decide if it was proper to bring a child along?"
"Okay when you put it like that it makes me feel very concerned that we never thought to do anything for his mental health," Krillin said thoughtfully as he realized that for a kid to go through all that for years and years likely did a number on him. He was actually thinking how amazing it was that Gohan hadn't snapped before this point with everything put on his shoulders.
"But I get that you earthlings can get really hung up on the whole sex thing," Piccolo smirked as he wanted to try and lighten the mood a bit.
Krillin tossed his hands up in protest. "Hey, just because we all don't reproduce by laying eggs doesn't give you the moral high ground."
Piccolo grinned before he realized something that they tended to overlook with Gohan. "Well he's also not just an earthling, it's possible that being half-saiyan might mean his brain works differently," Piccolo suggested as that might explain why Gohan was better equipped to handle situations that he found himself in, since even growing up on Earth, the way his body would react to things wouldn't be the same as either an earthling or a saiyan.
"And the only one who would be able to give us insight to that would be..." Krillin trailed off as he didn't want to go talk to Vegeta today.
Vegeta blinked after hearing Krillin explain to him and Bulma what Gohan had told him. He promptly got up off the couch and walked out of the room. He couldn't believe that is what happened yesterday. Not that he was accusing the bald one of making what he just told them up, Vegeta just couldn't allow himself to believe that is what transpired.
"Jeez," Bulma whistled appreciatively. "Gohan got his cherry popped. And you're worried he's what?"
Krillin shrugged. "I don't really know to be honest." He'd hoped that either Vegeta or Bulma could fill in the gaps for him. "I'm not going to try and claim that him developing feelings for someone who was or is a destructive force is wrong. It'd be hypocritical of the both of us on that front," as both him and his old friend had married people who were once considered evil, even if Vegeta was still questionable at times.
"But you aren't sure about how this was his first time with a woman and how that might be affecting his thinking on what he needs to do," Bulma nodded as she came to the same conclusion. "Well, I mean, she sort of set him up with the chance of a repeat if or when she comes back," not really believing what she was saying either. "We could maybe see about getting him to date some other girls." Offering that as a possible suggestion.
"Yeah well he dropped out of high school so it's not likely that we'll be able to convince him to go back after this," Krillin pointed out the folly of trying to force Gohan to give up what he was doing. "So unless we can find some other willing girls that wouldn't mind having to compete with training for his attention then," Krillin shrugged as he didn't think there were too many young girls like that and they wouldn't even really know where to start looking for them.
Bulma leaned back and pondered on anyone she knew. "Well I did get some internships from some university students, I could maybe nudge them Gohan's way and see if anything happens," considering that they would only be a few years older than him so it shouldn't be a problem. "I mean Gohan's a fit enough young man, they probably wouldn't complain," she said out loud as she couldn't imagine many of the women who come to Capsule Corp would turn down someone in Gohan's shape. "If not them I have a few decent looking employees I could maybe send hints about needing to spend time with Gohan."
"Isn't that really unethical though?" Krillin questioned what Bulma was suggesting, since she was their boss and if it would be right for her to abuse that position and power over her female workers just to see how Gohan reacted.
The blue haired woman shrugged at the inquiry. "I dunno, I gave up on ethics years ago, probably had something to do with all the times we've nearly died. It's not so bad, some of them even know Gohan after all the times he'd come by, so they got to know him when he was a cute little kid and maybe that'll make them more inclined to do things with him."
"See when you put it like that, it almost sounds like we were grooming him," Krillin accused Bulma's very dubious proposal of being a dubious proposal.
"We weren't though, we just over the years trained him in a specific way for specific tasks, like the saiyans and the androids. Okay now I see it," Bulma realized that they did groom Gohan over the years, but for the purposes of combat. "Oh wow, we did a number on him didn't we?" She whistled thoughtfully as they had effectively turned a child into a weapon.
"Yeah!" Krillin sadly shook his head at how things had gotten crazy in the last decade. "That's why I also wanted Vegeta's input on this."
"Speaking of, where did he go?" Bulma looked around the room as she remembered that the saiyan had left the room a while ago. "Trunks?" Bulma called out to her son. "Have you seen your father lately?"
"Oh he went super saiyan and flew off, it was towards Goten's house," the young purple haired child answered after he came to find out what his mother wanted.
"Uhh," Krillin's eye twitched at that information. "Why do you think he did that?" He cringed as he hoped it was just a coincidence that Vegeta was likely primed for a fight.
"You had sex with the woman who ordered the destruction of our entire species!" Vegeta roared as he continued his barrage against Gohan. The forest Gohan had been training in was being devastated and lit ablaze by the powerful attacks the two fighters were exchanging. "You traitor," Vegeta accused the half-saiyan.
"Fuck you Vegeta, I never knew the saiyans until Raditz showed up and if everyone else was like him, Nappa or you, it was probably a good thing they were wiped out," Gohan retorted as he knew that would rile up the saiyan.
Vegeta exploded out a massive beam of ki that he swept over the area obliterating mountains. "Even Kakarot wasn't such an idiot to throw himself at the first whore he found," Vegeta slammed his fists down sending Gohan into a crevice before launching a ball of ki to blow it up.
Gohan appeared behind Vegeta and backhanded him towards a lake. "If you remember the first whore my dad met was YOUR WIFE!" Gohan shouted before he rushed forward and tackled Vegeta into the water.
Vegeta felt his rage rise even higher as he exploded his ki outward which evaporated the lake, with fish flopping around and steam rising from the ground. "Bulma isn't a whore!" Vegeta screamed as he ploughed into Gohan gripping the young man around the throat and trying to choke the life out of him.
Gohan responded by attempting to gouge out Vegeta's eyes. "Neither is Lady Beerus," Gohan wheezed as he felt his thumb dig into Vegeta's skin as blood dropped onto his face. Vegeta recoiled from the pain as he loosened his death grip enough that Gohan could knee him with enough force in the groin to dislodge the man from his position. "Kamehameha," Gohan shouted as he fired the blast of blue energy at Vegeta who was impacted and blasted into the muck of the lake bed.
"Never talk about Lady Beerus like that again," Gohan huffed as he rubbed his throat that was feeling incredibly sore from nearly having his neck broken.
Vegeta's reply was a galick gun that came from the ground and slammed into Gohan's shoulder sending him careening out of the area and into the burning forest behind him. Gohan barely had time to roll out of the way as sparks were flying off Vegeta's body as he'd kicked it up to his ascended form. "That murderer used you," Vegeta panted as he stared down his opponent.
"She chose me," Gohan retorted as sparks began to crackle around his own aura. "So what if she had a hand in blowing up your planet. How many species did you genocide for Frieza huh? You're so much like him," Gohan hissed as he wiped the blood from his mouth.
"I am nothing like that monster," Vegeta growled as he'd never felt such anger at being compared to Frieza.
Gohan laughed at the denial. "Really, you didn't get sick enjoyment out of torturing weaker species than you, never once considered ruling the galaxy with an iron fist. You both wanted immortality from the Dragon Balls. You would never have even considering loving Bulma or your son if you hadn't been smacked down by my dad all those years ago and even then, you continually fuck things up."
"You're such a failure that you let Cell achieve his perfect form because of a petty grudge with my dad about who was stronger, you got your son killed because you're a pathetic, egotistical failure, who is only alive because better men didn't have the heart to put you down like the rabid animal that you are."
Vegeta stared quietly at Gohan after hearing those words. "So…" Vegeta swallowed loudly. "You really think I killed my own son for my pride?" He'd been wracked with anger and guilt at himself over how the Cell situation spiraled out of control. To be told to his face that it was his fault and that he was a failure because of it, brought all those feelings and thoughts to the forefront of his mind.
"I think your pride is the only thing you've ever cared about and this has nothing to do with Lady Beerus," Gohan replied flatly to Vegeta. "After all these years you never once tried to gather the Dragon Balls to revive the saiyan race. When Dende took immortality out of Shenron, you didn't consider using them for anything else, because only yourself and your petty desires mattered and if something didn't get it for you, you turned away from it."
Vegeta powered down to his base form and turned away from Gohan. "I hate you," he said before taking off into the sky.
Gohan waited a while before he could no longer feel Vegeta's power before falling to the ground exhausted.
"So we all felt that right?" Yamcha asked as they all had gathered on The Lookout when they sensed Vegeta and Gohan fighting each other.
Tien smacked Yamcha upside his head. "No shit we felt that. The bigger question is who else felt it too? We just had some crazy powerful goddess show up because Gohan's power woke her up. Who knows what attention this might bring to earth now?" Genuinely concerned about that as they were made well aware with Beerus' arrival that their fights could be felt galaxies away.
"Do we know what that was about?" Chiaotzu asked timidly. "Gohan and Vegeta normally stay away from each other unless we're all at Capsule Corp right?"
"I tried to contact Vegeta telepathically, he told me to go screw myself, as if that were possible," Dende said as he opened his eyes. "Gohan isn't responding at all though."
"We might need to get the dragon balls together again to fix the damage those two did," Piccolo suggested to the groans of the group.
"But we did that yesterday and it takes all day," Yamcha whined as he didn't want to go flying around looking for the orbs again so soon.
Dende shook his head at the idea of the Eternal Dragon being summoned. "It would be pointless, there are too many earthlings arriving to survey the damage that using Shenron to undo the destruction would be too noticeable."
Gohan finally made his way home to find his mother sitting in the kitchen crying. "Mom?"
"Gohan?" Chi-Chi wiped the tears from her eyes. She sighed and looked at the dinner table. She felt so incredibly tired and old at the moment.
"What's wrong?"
"You, that's what's wrong, I don't know what to do with you," Chi-Chi answered honestly. "I don't like you going out and being like your father, so I try and try to get you to go to school and have a life that isn't reliant on tournament winnings and whatever your grandpa can send us every month."
"But it's what I want to do," Gohan said as he didn't want to give up now.
Chi-Chi shook her head. "That's not how you were years ago, you hated the violence. You only trained because you thought that your father would get strong enough to take care of things." Chi-Chi recalled how much of a struggle it was to get her son to learn anything when he was always trying to be like his father but she could also see how he didn't like fighting either. "What changed, you have to help me understand why my sweet little boy wants to fight so much now?"
"Because of Lady Beerus mom, she's..." Gohan held back some of the words he wanted to use to describe the goddess who plagued his every thought.
With a heavy sigh Chi-Chi shook her head. "So that's how it is then?" realizing what her son was going through, he was lovestruck and there wasn't anything she could reasonably do to take that out of him. "Gohan, you're my baby boy, I love you, and if… if you want to train and get stronger just so that when you meet this Beerus lady again you can impress her. I guess I have to support you, you're a man now and you need to be able to make your own decisions." Chi-Chi rested her hands gently on her son's shoulders.
"Thanks mom, it really means a lot to me that you're willing to let me do this, instead of fighting me on it," Gohan smiled as he'd hate for this to be another argument between them.
She gave him a moment before angrily grabbing his ear and pulling on it. "But that doesn't excuse you and Vegeta for blowing up the entire mountain range. What is wrong with you two?!" Chi-Chi shouted as she could feel the shaking from all the way over there. "Worse still the forest is on fire and who knows the extent of the damage you two caused by firing those ki blasts all over the place."
"Vegeta started it though mom," Gohan said as he defended himself.
Raising an eyebrow. "Oh and you didn't do anything to take it further then?"
Rubbing a hand on the back of his head. "I mean…" He quietly said as he looked anywhere but at his mother.
"Now we need to get the dragon balls and have Shenron fix this before anyone notices," Chi-Chi tossed up her hands.
"Uh mom?" Goten stuck his head out of his room. "There are a lot of people outside." Commenting on how he watched cars pull up towards their house.
"What?" Chi-Chi and Gohan said in confusion as they looked towards a window to find that yes, many people were coming up towards their house. It seemed as if emergency services had arrived on the scene.
"Gohan?" Chi-Chi looked to her eldest son.
Gohan in turn held his hands up. "I don't know why they're here," answering her unsaid accusation honestly.
"Hello, is anyone in there?" a loud voice called out. "We're here to rescue you," the voice said as they pounded on the door. Gohan hurried over and opened it before they knocked it down and saw that there were firemen standing outside his home.
"Son are you alright?" the man said as he got a look at the bruised, burnt and battered young man standing in front of him.
"Ye-yeah?" Gohan nodded in confusion. "What's uh, what's up?" Resting himself against the doorframe wondering why they had gotten these visitors.
"Do you not see the fire?!" the fireman said as he pointed into the distance where a massive plume of smoke was rising into the air. "We're evacuating the region, you and your family need to come with us," the fireman waved his hands as he wanted the Son family to follow them to the waiting emergency vehicles.
Gohan looked at the inferno in what used to be the forest and mountains near his home and he realized how much destruction he'd caused with his fight against Vegeta. "Oh, wow, oops," Gohan gulped as he now got why his mom was so mad at him, he'd really not taken any care to prevent unnecessary damage. "I think we'd be fine," Gohan scratched his cheek as he didn't really want to abandon his home just over a little forest fire, especially if they were just going to use the dragon balls to fix it.
"No way, that fire is spreading fast. So you and your family need to evacuate, we have orders to get everyone out of here," the fireman said as he pulled Gohan along.
"M-mom?!" Gohan called out as he was being manhandled and herded towards a vehicle.
With a sigh, Chi-Chi gathered up some of her cherished belongings and exited her home holding Goten's hand as she walked towards the rescue crew. She knew that fighting this would only cause problems and wouldn't be worth the effort since Shenron would just fix it all anyway. "We'll stay with Bulma for a few days while this dies down," Chi-Chi said as she got into the back of the car next to her eldest son.
Gohan bit his lip. "I think it might be for the best if me and Vegeta had some space for the time being. So I'll see if Piccolo and Dende will let me stay with them."
"I don't like you hanging around him you know," Chi-Chi said, even after all these years she still had some lingering distrust for the son of the Demon King. She also knew it wasn't entirely fair but considering the impression he and his father had left on her, it wasn't something that was going to go away for a long time.
"Well I could see if Master Roshi will put me up," Gohan shrugged as Kame House tended to have some extra rooms if you needed them.
"Tell Dende I said hi," Chi-Chi quickly said as she would rather her son be around the man who abducted him as a child than the old pervert who would corrupt her sweet baby boy. Not if he was also dealing with his feelings for this Beerus woman, that could only lead to disaster.
He knew his mother wouldn't like that idea of him spending unsupervised time around Master Roshi and when he was at the Lookout he could take advantage of Piccolo's wisdom to get stronger and there was also one other benefit to spending time on the Lookout.
"You can't be serious," Piccolo said as he and Gohan stood in front of the Hyperbolic Time Chamber.
"I am, I've gotten so out of shape from not training and I need to be stronger when Lady Beerus returns." Gohan said as he opened the door. "So are you coming or not?"
Piccolo grumbled as he didn't want to spend a whole year in the time chamber when he didn't see a need to do so, but he also didn't want to leave Gohan alone for that long either. He followed the half-saiyan brat into the chamber and shut the door behind them.
After a few months in the chamber, Gohan was content in the knowledge that he'd manage to reclaim the power that he'd lost. "It's still not enough," Gohan said as he could tell that he was nowhere near strong enough to pose a respectable challenge for Lady Beerus.
"You're only the strongest person I have ever sensed," Piccolo muttered as he meditated off to the side, he couldn't keep up with the saiyan anymore after his power grew in leaps and bounds.
"But Lady Beerus is still stronger than this," Gohan said with an annoyed tone as he kept pushing himself to try and get more power, power he could feel was there.
"Gohan eventually we need to talk about what happened between you and the Goddess of Destruction."
"No we don't." Gohan shouted as over the weeks in the chamber Piccolo had repeatedly tried to broach the subject of his intimacy with Lady Beerus. "I love her."
"You don't even know what love is Gohan!" Piccolo raised his voice to match the saiyans. "You can't know what love is because we fucked you up."
"I'm not fucked up!" Gohan screamed as his power rippled through the air.
Piccolo put his feet on the floor and came over to Gohan's side. "You are, we took a four year old CHILD and turned him into a weapon. After killing your father in front of you, I kidnapped you for a year with the sole purpose of using you to help me take over the world and that only failed because you then got to watch Vegeta's subordinate slaughter us."
"It wasn't that bad." Gohan denied that what he experienced was unhealthy for him.
"You never had a chance to grieve Gohan," Piccolo slammed his fist into Gohan's face, for all the good that it did. "Because after all that, you were sent off into space and subjected to horrors the likes of which had never been seen on Earth."
"So what if I had my neck snapped by one of the Ginyu Force, so what if I had nightmares of watching Krillin explode or Frieza winning. I got over it," Gohan shoved Piccolo away from him. He did not want to be psychoanalysed right now.
The aged Namekian growled in frustration at how hard headed Gohan was being. "You repressed it, because after Namek you weren't allowed to do anything for a year but study. And then even that normalcy was ripped away from you by a time traveler who told us about a bleak future where we either trained or died. That wasn't a choice for you, it was an ultimatum that cost you so much."
"We won that though," Gohan turned and tried to block out Piccolo's words. He didn't want to hear it, he knew they were right though. Which made it all the more painful to hear.
Piccolo grabbed Gohan's arms and forcefully pulled them away from his head. "Did we? How much did we have to sacrifice just to survive that? You're dad died again and I don't think you ever got over that."
"Because I haven't!" Gohan screamed. "I didn't get over it because I killed him, if I just took care of Cell the moment the fight started then dad would still be alive and he would have been there for me, for us. When mom gave birth to Goten, when she was too tired to do anything and I had to try and cook enough food for everyone because he was just a baby and needed to eat and I just wanted him to stop crying. When Goten would get sick and I had to fly to Bulma to get medicine because he was running a temperature and when mom put him in the bathtub he just kept screaming."
"I didn't know what to do Piccolo, I've been trying to hold it together and then when Lady Beerus showed up everything was normal again," Gohan cried as tears rolled down his cheeks. "The world was in danger and I was forced to fight and it all made sense again, that was what I was used to Piccolo. I don't know how to not fight anymore. The last few years have been so fucking awful being cooped up in a house trying and failing to be a big brother."
Piccolo wrapped his arms around the distraught young man. "I'm sorry Gohan, I'm sorry we did this to you. That we took away your chance to be normal."
"We should never have put that on a child to constantly train and fight. Everyone else was at least ten years older than you when they got involved, they were better equipped to handle this, to turn it off."
"I don't know how to turn it off Piccolo." Gohan whimpered, it was undignified for him to do this, to be weak. "I just feel like I have to fight and train all the time. I feel like I'm going insane."
"It's okay Gohan," Piccolo softly said. "We're your friends and we want to help you, you deserve at least that much."
"I just, she did things to me."
"Krillin told me." Piccolo responded with a soft chuckle as he recalled the conversation he had with the monk previously.
"Not just the sex, Lady Beerus, she gave me a goal." Gohan sighed as he figured that Piccolo wouldn't get it. "If I got strong enough when she came around the next time, I could fight her again. It's what I needed, a purpose. Mom was trying to just send me to school so I can get a job, that's not a purpose that's existing."
"We'll talk with her, we can find a solution to work on getting you used to not having to fight and train all the time," Piccolo offered. "It didn't help you when we just cut you off after the fight was done. We never gave you ways to cope with what you went through."
"You mean it?" Gohan asked hopefully. "You guys can help me not feel so… caged."
Piccolo gave the young saiyan a smile. "Yeah runt, I mean it. Besides, we already have one brooding Saiyan, we don't need two of them."
Gohan wiped his face as he laughed. "You just couldn't resist could you?"
"I have been waiting months to use that line." Piccolo shrugged as he had spent some of his time meditating to come up with sick one liners to use.
When the two stepped out of the Time Chamber after a year, to the outside world only a single day had passed. "Gohan, you just get some rest," Piccolo nudged the young man towards one of the rooms he could take a nap in. "I'll go to Capsule Corp and have a talk with your mom and Bulma to work something out."
"Okay Piccolo," Gohan nodded as he headed down the hall.
"So you think that we need to do stuff to reintegrate Gohan back into society?" Bulma said as she set down her drink, she and the others had been called to Capsule Corp to discuss the situation since Piccolo had told them he had spent a year in the Time Chamber with the young man.
The Namekian shook his head firmly. "Not reintegrate, that implies Gohan was ever a part of society to begin with. He's never been around people his own age. He's never had to act like anything other than what we made him."
Eighteen had been thinking carefully on what the green man had told them all. "Then it's probably a good thing he never went to high school. If it's just as bad as I remember it then he'd have snapped and probably blown it up if he was that on edge." She felt sympathy for the young man that had stopped Cell and knew that if he was having these wild mood swings he could be a potential threat that could destroy the world without realizing it.
"Yeah forcing him to pretend to be normal, that'd be rough," Yamcha agreed with the blonde android's assessment. "Man I feel like shit for never thinking about how all this must have been messing with his head as he grew up though."
"We didn't think of it because we just thought of him as part of the group, like he was the same as us," Tien frowned as it was painfully clear where they had made a mistake with the young siayan.
Chi-Chi had been sniffling into a tissue as Piccolo told them about the confrontations in the Time Chamber, of which there had been many over the remaining months, but they weren't as bad as the first time. "He's really been hurting that much and never said anything?"
Piccolo sadly nodded. "Yeah, the runt has been through the wringer all his life and as much as I hate to say it, Lady Beerus might have been the best thing to happen to him in years."
"So we besides getting him used to being around other people, we also need to help him train for when she comes back because that sounded like his number one goal to me." Master Roshi said calmly. There were times for his perverted schtick and times to be serious and this was definitely the latter. "Well, I know a few techniques that I never got around to teaching Goku or Krillin.
"The Mafuba?" Piccolo raised an eyebrow as that was one of the techniques that he knew of.
"That would be one of them," Master Roshi stroked his beard as he contemplated on his three hundred years of wisdom to impart into his most powerful student to date.
"I'll have him come around to do some part time work here at Capsule Corp, that would put him around other people in a more controlled environment, plus some of the employees are aware of the whole Saiyan slash ki situation so he wouldn't have to keep it all under wraps when he's here," Bulma offered as working for her might be one of the only places he can interact with people outside their close circle of friends without having to put on a disguise to not expose himself.
"Hey, can I weigh in on this?" King Kai's voice said, suddenly filling the room.
"King Kai? How do you know about this?" Yamcha questioned when Otherworld had gotten word of Gohan's trouble.
"Well when Lady Beerus woke up and came around my neck of the cosmos, I took it upon myself to find out why she headed to Earth." the kai answered Yamcha's question. "Goku's just been sitting in a corner the last two days thinking. Supreme Kai almighty it's terrifying that I said that."
"Goku's there?" Chi-Chi gasped as she had figured her husband would have passed on already since he said he wasn't planning on coming back.
"Yeah, he's been training with me for the past few years," King Kai answered. "Now normally we don't let the dead talk to the living all that much because of the rules and junk but anything involving the Goddess of Destruction and I can make an excuse to bend them."
A few moments of silence hung in the air before they could hear Goku's voice. "Hey everyone," Goku said with his normal happy go lucky attitude. "I really messed up staying dead this time didn't I?"
"You think?!" everyone in the room shouted at Goku.
"Okay jeez, I'm sorry. I didn't think that Gohan would take it this badly, but I don't have an excuse. I'm his dad, I should have done better to get to know him so I could have maybe seen he was having these problems." Goku admitted that understanding people was not something he was good at. "What can I do to help?"
"You could come back?" Krillin suggested.
"We'd have to get the Namekian dragon balls for that though," Piccolo shook his head at the idea of reviving Goku at the moment. "And we don't know where Namek is right now or have a way to get there that doesn't take months and months, I think it might be for the best if we took care of this ourselves."
"Well, if it helps with Gohan trying to get stronger, I'm working on a form beyond an ascended saiyan," Goku chimed in. "It's not easy to do and I can't keep it going for very long, but that would at least be something for him to work towards."
"That could be a goal for him to start on to keep his focus between learning any techniques he hasn't already picked up," Tien nodded as that seemed like a good place to begin with regards to Gohan.
"I'm learning another technique from some Metamorans called the fusion dance, but it takes two people, so I don't think it'd really work right now, with me not being there," Goku said, his voice sounding disappointed that he couldn't think of anything else to help at the moment. "Oh maybe I can ask the other kais if they have ways to help train Gohan. I'm sure if they knew it was so he could fight this Beerus lady they'd be glad to help," Goku said as his voice faded.
King Kai's voice took over after a moment. "Goku wait, you can't just, sorry, I have to go stop that idiot." King Kai stopped projecting his thoughts to the group as he needed to keep it under wraps that Lady Beerus had her eye on a planet in his quadrant.
"So we have half a plan, that's better than what we normally got," Yamcha said with a goofy grin, his comment earned him some angry glares. "Yeesh, just trying to lighten the mood."
"Well I just spent a year with Gohan in the time chamber, so how about he comes over to Capsule Corp tomorrow and you get him set up working with some people," Piccolo suggested to Bulma since getting him integrated would be easier now than waiting. With that said there wasn't much else for everyone to do but hope that they could offer Gohan the support he needed all these years.
"Soon Dabura," Babidi cackled to his henchman. "I felt an incredible surge of energy from this galaxy, in less than a year's time we should have what we need to awaken the great Majin Buu." The short wizard's spaceship was sailing through the stars, towards the source of power his magic was able to find.
Author's Notes: So beyond the awkward first chapter loading issue, that I hope is now resolved. I wanted to try something with this chapter that I haven't seen in a lot of other people's works before and that was to address the issue of Gohan essentially being a child soldier and after every threat was gone, he was ultimately just put away until they needed him again. Where as the other fighters were all adults and could make their own decisions, Gohan had always been a child and subject to the decisions of everyone else. He couldn't just take a spaceship like Vegeta and fly off, he couldn't go to forests like Tien and disappear for years at a time.
I think that's something that never really got touched on in the context of DBZ and I feel like it was a mistake to never explore how Gohan's half-human/half-saiyan biology must have been playing hell on him for years, especially as he was going through puberty and all that. So in some ways Gohan in this chapter felt inconsistent, but I also feel that's more natural since he's a young man and is struggling with what he wants, needs and thinks he has to do that he's all over the place.
So for that I wanted to try and have the gang go out of their way to try and help Gohan because without exposing everything to some psychiatrist, he'd likely be considered crazy and they know that's not what Gohan needs now.
Additionally, that little line at the end for Babidi I think was needed to explain how the wizard learned 5,000,000 years after Buu was sealed where the egg was. Because in canon he just showed up one day, at least now this fills in that plot hole using a detail I brought up a few times.