Disclaimer – I don't own it. If I did, I would fill a pool with money and swim in it like Scrooge McDuck.

A/N: tsk tsk. I am such a bad little fanfic author. This chapter had been halfway done for like four months! But now it's complete and out for your reading pleasure!

p.s. I changed the rating from T to M. It's basically because I drop the 'f' bomb several times throughout this story, so M is probably more of an appropriate rating.

Convalescence

"That's impossible."

"No. It's not impossible. It's completely feasible. And actually, Goku, it's a little something called reality."

Goku looked up at Bulma from his seat on the bed. "I'm recovering from amnesia. Aren't you supposed to be nice to me?"

"You know, what? Fuck being nice, Goku. Being nice only gets you so far." She replied, with a scowl.

"Bulma,"

"Look Goku, I could sugar-coat everything for you, or I can tell you everything straight out." She took a look at her watch. "If you want to remain in your fairytale life, then far be it from me to pull you out of it." She turned and faced him, her face stern. "But let me tell you something. This person, this hero, this fictional character you made up for yourself… it's just that. Fiction. What you actually are, is this larger than life badass who doesn't take no for an answer, and right now you're being a pussy."

Goku stared at Bulma, his brow furrowed. "Jeez."

"Goku," Bulma sat at the end of the bed, a few feet away from Goku. "If you want Chichi. Go get her."

He picked out his nicest suit. He wasn't what you would call vain, but Goku had to admit he did look pretty damn nice. The slacks were tailored and cut him just at the right points. He put on a white collard shirt, but took a miss on the tie. He wanted to impress her.

Bulma drove him to her house. She kept giving him nervous glances, while simultaneously trying not to hit oncoming traffic. They pulled up at her house, and without a word, Goku got out of the car.

He held a bouquet of flowers in his hand, because he had this nagging feeling that someone had once told him never to arrive to someone else's house empty-handed.

Goku took a deep breath as he heard Bulma's car drive away. He looked at the house in front of him. The grass was cut, recently even. There were patches of flowers near the house. Even at dusk, their colors seemed to pop. The black door sat in between walls of ivory, begging Goku to knock on it.

He swallowed the lump in his throat, walked up the sidewalk and knocked on the door.

He heard a scurry of activity. The door opened.

The last thing Goku saw, an angry fist had collided with his face. As he welcomed the blackness that surrounded him, he heard an angry growl and someone yelled 'Dammit Karkarott!'

V-v-v-v-v-v-v-V

He was awake before he opened his eyes. He listened hard to the activity around him. He swallowed thickly. Please let me be home. He opened his eyes and saw a patch of blue fabric to a couch he didn't recognize. He closed his eyes again. Please let me be home. He heard footsteps and heavy breathing. He felt a face near him, and he opened his eyes a bit to see.

Goten backed away quickly when Goku opened his eyes. Goku looked at his surroundings. His heart sunk. He didn't recognize anything. This wasn't home. It wasn't a dream.

"Mom!" Goten screamed and ran out of the room. Goku licked his dry lips and tried to sit up.

He felt a hand on his back that helped him sit upright. He looked up. Chichi was avoiding his gaze. She held an ice pack. It seemed like she was looking at every inch of skin around his eye, but not directly into it.

"It's not swelling." She murmured. She brought the icepack down on his left eye, clouding his vision. "That's good." She didn't look him in the eye.

"What happened?" Goku asked her.

"Hold this on your eye." She started to remove the ice pack. Goku's hand flew up to it, catching hers in the process. Chichi closed her eyes as he held her hand to the ice pack. "Let go." She whispered, her eyes opening and staring at a spot on the wall. She wouldn't look at him.

"Chichi,"

"Please." Her voice was barely above a whisper, but Goku heard her loud and clear.

"Unhand her, you filthy swine." The voice was cold and unfeeling. And as Goku looked up, he realized it belonged to Vegeta.

The short man was leaning in the doorway, black eyes glaring at Goku, snarling.

Goku did as he was told, but not before giving Vegeta a hard stare of his own. Goku turned to Chichi. "I'm assuming this isn't good."

"Good?" Vegeta spat incredulously. "Nothing you ever do is good, Kakarott. And I swear if you touch my sister one more time, I won't knock you out, I'll kill you."

Goku's mouth fell open and he looked from Chichi to Vegeta. He gulped. "Sis… Sister?"

Chichi wiped her hands on her pants. "Goku, this is my step-brother, Vegeta."

"We've met." Vegeta hissed.

"Would you give us a moment?" Chichi asked, turning her gaze to Vegeta. "Please." She added.

Vegeta gave Goku an intimidating glare as he left the room.

Neither Goku nor Chichi said anything for a very long moment.

"I had flowers," Goku looked around the blue couch that was absent of any sort of flowers. "I don't know where they went, but I brought you flowers."

"They're probably outside. Vegeta hit you before you could go much anywhere."

"Oh."

Their conversation died. Goku sat, trying to rack his brain for something to say.

"What were you doing here?" Chichi asked. She slowly came to the couch and sat on the opposite end, leaving a few feet in between them.

"Well, I wanted to give you flowers." He turned his head and saw she wasn't looking at him. "And I wanted to tell you that I was going to fight for you."

She looked at him, surprise and pain etched on her pretty face. He turned away from her.

"If there's a fight, if there's a competition, I want to be in it. I know now, that my life with you was a dream. But," he stopped for a moment, trying hard to make the right words come out. Chichi watched him with baited breath. "It may have been a dream. But it's possible." He looked at her again. "It's possible to have that life with you. I want that life back."

Chichi's lips parted in surprise. Her chest rose and fell and her eyes widened. She turned away from him.

"I don't know if that's possible anymore, Goku."

"Let me try."

She looked at him.

"Please, just … let me try." He was pleading now.

"Ok."

v-v-v-v-v

Goku held the ice pack to his eye as he reached for the door handle of Chichi's house.

"Kakarott."

He turned and saw Vegeta, looking stern behind him.

"They say you've forgotten everything."

Goku was immediately defensive. "Yeah. That's right."

"Well apparently you haven't forgotten to hurt my sister."

"Let her make her own choices, Vegeta." The disdain in his voice was foreign to him, but somehow it felt right. He let the words flow out and liked the way they seemed to puncture Vegeta's pride.

"The last time she made her own choices, she had another one of your bastards. She can't be trusted to make her own choices when you're involved."

"Scared of competition?" Goku let the insult spill out of his mouth without realizing what he meant. Vegeta straightened.

"I've knocked you out before, Kakarott. I will do it again." Vegeta narrowed his eyes and looked Goku up and down. He scoffed. "It wouldn't take much effort."

Pictures filtered through Goku's mind like he watching a projector.

Goku looked up. "Vegeta." He nodded his greeting and added a smirk as the shorter man walked into the room.

"Kakarott." Vegeta returned, without making eye contact. He looked at Chichi. "If you're going to bring this overgrown monkey into the house, make him take a shower."

"Vegeta," Chichi's voice was calming, but had an edge of warning to it and she sat down next to Goku on the couch. Goku smirked and put an arm around her.

Vegeta said nothing, but stared the couple on the couch. "Done anything useful, lately, Kakarott? You know, father any bastard children?"

"Vegeta!" Chichi looked hurt.

Goky rolled his eyes and pretended to be unaffected by any of Vegeta's comments. "No, it's fine Chichi." He looked at the shorter man. "You know, we've been out of high school for some time, Vegeta. You can stop calling me Kakarott anytime you want."

"What's wrong, Kakarott? You don't like the nickname the football team gave you?" Vegeta was smiling, sneering at him.

"I just don't have much respect for the football team." Goku looked at him. "I mean, they let you on, so they obviously don't have a height requirement." Goku's smiled widened as he saw the sadistic smile slide off of Vegeta's face. "I don't really take an insult from a troupe of midgets very seriously."

Vegeta's fists balled up. "You don't want to mess with me, Kakarott."

"Why, cause you knock people out for a living? How great, Vegeta. I make money, with a real job."

"Being a professional boxer is a real job, you idiot."

"Oh yeah? Well, if you call dancing around a ring with a guy all day a job, then yeah. I guess you are definitely a professional homosexual."

Vegeta would have lunged at him if Chichi hadn't stood up. "I think we should leave, Goku."

Goku smirked. "Yeah. Let's go."

Vegeta watched with interest as Goku looked wildly around the room and held on to the wall. His eyes eventually darted to Vegeta.

"You're a boxer." He stated.

Vegeta scoffed. "Welcome back to Earth, Kakarott."

Goku straightened and grabbed the door handle. "I'm going to fight for her, Vegeta." He opened the door and started to walk out.

"You'll have to fight me first, Kakarott. I've stood by and watched you fuck up too many times."

Goku turned. "I'll fight you. I'll fight you for her. She's worth it."

Vegeta said nothing and closed the door.

V-v-v-v-v-v-v-V

Goku had just sat down on his own bed when he heard a knock on the door. He wearily walked to the front of his apartment and opened it.

Bulma stood, wide-eyed and hopeful. "So?"

"So?"

"What happened?" The blue haired beauty walked into the apartment and sat down on the couch as if he had invited her in. She looked up at him as he closed the door. "Oh shit!"

"What?"

"Your eye!"

"Yeah." Goku sat down on a chair across from the couch. "You know, I know I'm new to all of this…" he looked up at her. "But you could have warned me that Vegeta was probably going to punch my lights out."

Bulma looked sheepish. "I didn't think he was going to be there. I'm sorry. He's usually training or touring. He's a boxer, you know."

"No kidding."

Bulma looked at his eye. "You want some ice for that?"

"No, it's fine."

She leaned back on the couch. "So, you ran into Vegeta. Did you even get to see Chichi?"

"Yeah."

Bulma rolled her eyes. "Well I'm glad you haven't forgotten your conversational skills. You still know how to keep a gal entertained."

Goku looked up as if he was roused from a dream. "Sorry. I was just thinking."

"So, why don't you tell me what happened?"

"Well, Vegeta punched me, and he knocked me out. Before I could even talk to her. So, next thing I know, I wake up inside the house on a couch. She gave me some ice. And I told her that I wanted a shot. I told her I wanted her back."

Bulma looked at him interestedly. "And?"

"She agreed. She told me I could fight for her."

Bulma pounded her fist on the couch and smiled. "That's great!"

"Yeah." Goku breathed and hung his head. "Now I just have to get past Vegeta, her fiancé and the fact that my oldest son hates me."

She smiled. "What, you aren't up for the challenge?"

He looked up and saw her smirk. It spread to him and small smile broke onto his face. "Bulma, I live for a challenge."

She nodded happily. "Absolutely."

V-v-v-v-v-v-v-v-V

There it is guys and dolls. Gloves are off, most all of my characters are introduced. Now we get into it!

Thanks for sticking it out!