Galthreadain.

Though we've gone our separate ways

and our journey together has ended,

you were singularly important to the continuation of this story

and your contributions and inspirations will not be forgotten or ignored.

This is where the dreams become reality.

Destruction is upon us.

27

Gohan weaved through the crowd in the hallway, avoiding his classmates as he stuffed his books into his bag without much care for their integrity. Final bell had only rung seconds ago, but it always seemed that the other students were as eager to leave as he was, which meant moving at their speed. It was frustrating as hell having to reign in his power so frequently lately, but he'd been doing it for years now and practice gave him the tolerance to put up with most anything these days.

He tried to skirt around one of the thick-set jocks only to bump into a girl who'd been trying to do the same. He didn't feel it at all but she was knocked on her butt, course books hitting the ground and loose pages of notes falling from slack pages. The half-saiyan grunted, checked his battered old watch, and knelt down to quickly scoop up the books and papers. Holding them in one hand, he took hold of her wrist and levered her back onto her feet. He'd seen her in a few of his classes, but she hardly ever said a word to the other students and only answered questions when teachers picked her directly. She often kept her long, black hair loose and partly over her face which probably didn't help with seeing the board in addition to the large-frame glasses she wore. He honestly couldn't remember ever hearing her name before.

"Here. Sorry about that." He held out her gathered items for her, but she hesitated, staring up at him with a bewildered, almost panicky expression. He realized that she was slouching, making her seem even smaller than she already was. "Take them, I'm sorry," he reiterated, putting a little more command into his tone. She responded to that, jumping slightly as if shocked before accepting her stuff, never breaking eye-contact.

Weird girl, but Gohan had never stopped to give his time to thinking about all the abnormal people he'd met, and now was no different. With a parting wave over his shoulder he was back to maneuvering his way through the hallway. With his schedule, there just wasn't much time for niceties that didn't really matter; not when most people were so talkative and could trap him in menial conversations.

Leaving Orange Star High, he made his way at a quick pace towards Metro Junction, the hover-train terminus for the entire city. He wasn't catching a train – just picking something up from his rented locker there: a small duffel that had his clothes for his other activities in the city. He would have brought them to school with him, but there was no guarantee that somebody wouldn't stick their nose in his property. Even teachers were reprehensible sneaks who would leverage their position and power to get their way. But this didn't concern him so long as they let him be, and he needed to keep as low a profile as he could to avoid their attentions.

Leaving Metro immediately after getting his stuff, he walked a few blocks until the street crowd was thin enough for him to slip into an alley. Setting the duffel on the lid of a trashcan, he unzipped it and pulled his school vest and shirt off, tucking them into a side of the carrier, replacing them with a dark gray tank-top and plain white shirt. He pulled off his shoes and socks and then kicked his pants off, black athletic shorts already underneath them, and tucked all of them in alongside the other clothes. Lastly, he extracted a pair of sparring gloves and a bandanna, both dark green. He sniffed the bandanna before wrapping it around the lower half of his face, making sure it was still clean enough not to distract him. He glanced at the other, near identical clothes still in the bag, noting that his current set was the only one not splotched with blood. Some of them had already browned. He wrinkled his nose and resolved to get some more tops on his way home today.

Zipping the duffel closed and jamming it into his backpack on top of his school supplies, he swung it onto his shoulders and jumped with ease up to the roof of the northward building making up the alley. He knew precisely where to go from here, having made the trip dozens of times now, and set off across the rooftops, nothing more than a blur to anybody who might happen to look up.

But, like what was frequent in this city, sirens soon broke out nearby. Gunfire was also audible, so there wasn't any denying that there was more than just an auto accident. Gohan stopped to consult his watch again; he had time enough to make a quick detour, but he couldn't stick around. Changing direction, he made for the noises, moving even faster now though it did risk making a clamor of his own to alert people.

In no time at all, he was standing at the edge of a retail building looking down as two police cruisers gave chase to a dingy looking hover-car which was swerving erratically. He might have suspected a drunk driver if a man-tiger hadn't leaned out from the passenger side door and opened fire on the police with an automatic rifle. His aim was poor due to the driver's 'evasive maneuvers', but several bullet holes appeared in the bonnet of the nearest police car, causing the engine to make a terrible noise and gush oily smoke, obscuring the windshield and subsequently causing it to plow blindly into a pedestrian car parked off to the side.

Gohan had seen enough. Jumping high into the air, he pivoted at the arc of his jump and rocketed back down, a burst of ki augmenting him enough to create a sonic boom in his wake. His fist sheared into the hood of the criminals' car, tearing into and through metal with minimal resistance. He held back from puncturing all the way through, halting his blow just over halfway through the inner workings of the machine. The titanic strength coupled with the car's own momentum sent it flipping into the air over Gohan's head like a coin. It went a ways down the street before it crashed back into the asphalt, landing upside down first but tumbling wildly afterwards. It finally came to rest on its side against a now crooked light pole, underside showing itself like a felled beast and several varieties of liquids escaping it.

Leaping back onto the rooftop, Gohan scanned the damage. He couldn't see any injured civilians, and both cops had gotten out of the totaled cruiser fairly well off. He sensed that one of the criminals had died almost immediately in the crash, probably the tiger gunman, and the other's signature was wavering. If he wasn't taken to a hospital in the next ten or so minutes he was definitely not going to make it.

But Gohan had done his part and went back on his way, zipping across the tops of buildings in a direct line to his destination. There weren't any more distractions along the way, though he would probably have ignored them if there had been any. Even so, he barely made it to the warehouse on time. It was way off in the western reaches of the city, where the urban development gave way to abandoned industrial centers and lonely municipal plants. This particular building had been one of hundreds like it, receiving import traffic from other cities back before Capsule Corp had made travel and transport technologies to render large trucks obsolete.

There was a service entrance where workers would have filed in and out of when the main bay doors were shut, but now it had a slot cut out at eye-level and was barricaded from the inside to prevent any normal man from ever being able to knock it down. Gohan banged on it in a simple pattern. One-two. One-two. One-two-three. The slot opened up for a moment, a pair of eyes squinting out from the other side.

"Ey, kid, you almost didn't make it in time." The slot closed and a heavy sounding bolt was shifted before the door opened up, the bouncer ushering him in. Gohan nodded and walked past him into the third crowd of the day, but this one was far different to the others. Seedy looking men and women wearing cheap clothes and smelling even cheaper, pressed together and shouting to be heard over the ruckus of everybody else shouting to be heard. Money was being freely waved about in fanned bunches, trying to get the attention of various bookies who were making their way through the people with lock boxes and notebooks for taking names. Several TV monitors were bolted onto the walls, the small screens showing what was happening at the center of the floor.

Made from tall sections of fence and 'padded' with copious amounts of cardboard, the arena was as crude as it was minimal, but it was entirely adequate for the purpose of the fights it contained. Hardly any rules and totally random match ups, the fights were hyped up slug-fests between people of any possible fighting background looking to make good money at the expense of their opponents health. Some died, but it was almost always due to a medical issue and not deliberate, though there were exceptions...

Gohan shouldered through the throng of rabble, far less concerned about sticking out here. As people recognized him by his now customary look, he started to get cheers and encouragement from all the people who had put money down on "Saiyaman", and jeers and threats from those who'd wagered against him. He didn't pay them any mind. This was usual here, and he'd learned not to even give any of them attention or else they might try to make him offers that muddied the waters.

Kazden, the proprietor of the warehouse's many gatherings, was standing by the door to the arena, watching as a bear backhanded a man wearing boxing gloves into the wall of the ring. The boxer stirred, but didn't stand back up. The crowd either cheered or booed depending which competitor they'd been riding, and didn't at all care that two men with a simple stretcher had to collect the boxer to get him out of the ring. The bear postured for a few moments, leather vest tight as it held in some of his muscle and less of his fat, before he was beckoned out by Kazden. He would receive his winnings later, when collections had been made, and he'd likely spend that time in the backrooms icing his injuries and chewing on pain medicine.

"Alright kid," Kazden addressed Gohan while a few other men replaced the torn up cardboard in the ring in preparation of the next fight, "needed to spice things up tonight so you'll be going against a group again. It's like last time, except that all three of them are from the same monastery, so they'll actually be working together to bring you down. You ready?"

Gohan simply nodded and dropped his bag down by the side of the arena – nobody was going to steal it from him, not here. He walked through the gate and went to the far wall, leaning against it as he checked the straps on his gloves. Except for two fights he'd thrown early on in his career, he was practically unbeaten in this ring and the excitement to see what would finally dethrone him brought people back every single time his name was brought up and his take was sufficiently inflated. All he had to do was make it look good, take plenty of hits and be sure to get plenty of blood on his shirt before taking it off when 'things got serious'. It was a production for him, but so long as he held himself back as much as he could he might actually get a margin of training out of it, not to mention the prize money.

The three former monks filed into the arena, spreading out to surround him while giving each other space. They looked well trained, so this would look good. The closer he made the fight seem, the more people wanted to come back next time – simple as that. Kazden valued him as a draw and had given him pointers on how to excite the crowd.

He pushed away from the fence wall and rolled his shoulders, ready to start this charade. Knocking his fists together, he assumed a simple stance, giving the three monks ample opportunity to exploit his openings. As one of them jumped in with a stylized flip-kick, Gohan allowed himself a grin.

Goku hesitated for a moment, but then his hands went into action – pulling bottles off of the shelf and splashing out rivulets of the liquids inside into the squat mug he was working with. The assortment of different flavors sat a bit unappealingly at the bottom - a mishmash of browns, whites and deep gold – before he took up the carafe of blisteringly hot coffee that was a fusion of multiple different blends and carefully poured it in, dexterously keeping a swirl motion with his wrist to make sure that the contents got mixed up evenly.

When the beverage had nearly reached the lip of the mug, the saiyan barista set the carafe aside and pulled open the mini-fridge under the counter and extracted a tray of small ice-cubes. Twisting the plastic frame to loosen the ice, he plucked several and slipped them into the coffee, watching them melt rapidly until they had disappeared completely. He took a straw from a pocket on his apron especially for them and stirred the drink just four times with it – conscious not to disturb the mixture anymore than it was. With all of that finally done, he turned around and placed the mug on the counter in front of his customer.

Tapping a nail against the red earthenware, Piccolo quirked a brow at the excited Goku,a smirk of his own tugging at his mouth. "I thought I told you before that I didn't want any of the over-sugared crap."

"Yeah, you did, but you always get the same thing here! It's time you tried something new and branched out a bit; see if you might actually like some of this 'crap.'" Goku pointed at the cup with pride. "That's my own personal signature drink! I call it the Senzu, since it can perk you right up, no matter how bad you feel."

"Hmph, quite the name to live up to, then." Piccolo picked the cup up by the handle and brought it up to blow across the surface a few times before taking a sip. He considered it for a beat before taking another sip. "Still really sweet for my taste, but I can at least see the appeal. And it certainly has a punch behind all that sugar." A third sip, then he put it back down on the coaster. "You certainly can make 'em fast."

"Pretty much half the reason I can keep this job. I'm not the greatest at making drinks yet, but if I can at least make them satisfactory and meet any order faster than anyone else then my boss is pretty happy. I'm actually hoping that I can learn how to make those pictures with a cream drizzle soon. Some of the guys here can make really cool stuff, like flowers or animals."

Piccolo chuckled. "That's the first time I ever heard somebody calling flowers 'cool'." He took another, slightly larger sip of his Senzu. "Anyways, about what I wanted to talk to you about: it seems like they're holding a World Martial Arts Tournament a few weeks from now. I wasn't going to pay it any heed, but Dende tells me that Tien, Chioutzou and Yamcha all plan to enter, so I think it might actually be worthwhile to join them and see if there's any challenge to be had there."

Goku had lit up at the word tournament, eyes wide and grin barely contained. "Gohan actually brought it up just the other day! He told me that he's going to sign up, and I already asked if I could have the day off so I could join in as well!"

"Looks like I hardly even needed to come here. I guess I'll sign up too – wouldn't want you saiyans thinking you don't have any competition." Goku laughed and rubbed the back of his head, just as he always did when somebody mentioned fighting at his level and he didn't believe they could but was polite enough not to say so out loud. But he'd spent too much time in the company of Piccolo for that tick to go unnoticed. "And don't think that I don't have any new tricks to use against you. If we get matched up, then you can be sure to have a real fight on your hands."

The two old rivals grinned at each other, both now anticipating their first fight since the last tournament they had entered. It would be a curious thing indeed if they ended up fighting where they had once been bitter enemies. Destiny had an odd way of echoing itself, sometimes.

At Capsule Corp, the news of the upcoming Martial Arts Tournament had already made the rounds and Trunks was busy practicing to be in top form. He had never been in a competition like it before, but his mom had told him stories of Goku and Piccolo from years ago, when they had barely been adults and were already fighting for the fate of the world, and he wasn't going to let them outdo him when he was way more powerful than they had ever been in the old days.

Bulma had also told him about some of the others that had fought with Goku, like Yamcha, but also a few he had never met before, like Tien, Chioutzou and Krillin. They had seemed to be a pretty close group, but only when the Earth was in danger, and most of them hadn't been seen for years - not since his father had died.

He had been told the truth of his Dad's absence early on, and the fact of it no longer made him feel sad anymore, but he always wondered about what the man had really been like. His mom said that he had been a cold man who secretly had a bigger heart than he would ever allow you to know. Uncle Goku had said that Vegeta had been incredibly driven and was unstoppable when he put his mind to something. Almost in contrast, Piccolo had told him in confidence that Vegeta hadn't always been a good person and had done some bad things before he was Trunk's Dad, which was always going to be a part of his character.

To the boy, he couldn't really put these different accounts into the same mental picture of what his Dad must have been like, and would often switch between thinking of him as a quiet but kind man and somebody who was scary to be around and wasn't always helping for the greater good. It was confusing, and contradictory, so his father remained a mystery to him.

But the one thing they had all agreed on was that Vegeta had been incredibly proud and was a great warrior. Upholding the tradition of being a terrific fighter had felt like the right way of getting closer to the idea of his father; fighting seemed to be what had connected all the disparate warriors in the first place.

Goku had often told him and Goten that bettering yourself was always the goal of a martial artist, whether it was physical, mental or both. To seek new heights was an unending journey of strength and control that the elder Saiyan had been following his entire life. Trunks liked to believe that his Dad was similar and would be proud of him if he got strong enough – strong enough to carry the label of 'saiyan'.

Also, he was pretty sure that his Dad would want him to beat Goten in the tournament, all things considered.

A ways above Capsule Corp, an abrupt and startling blue flash got the kid's attention. He shielded his eyes with a hand and squinted up into the sky, trying to figure out what had caused the disturbance. It took only a moment to make out the descending oval shape of the time machine, no doubt piloted by the future version of Trunks. Trunks the younger excitedly waved up at him, running across the lawn to meet up with him when he landed. It had been years since the time-traveler had last visited, and him showing up now was perfect since it meant that he could also join the tournament! This was going to be super fun after all!

The pygmy-like warlock Babidi slowly waved his hands over the surface of his magical orb, perceiving places far away from the relative peace of his ship as it sped through the void of space. He had been doing his research on Earth and was positively gleeful with what he had found: enormously powerful warriors who he could siphon dry for his purposes. What would have normally taken years could quite probably be achieved in bare days if what he'd seen was an accurate gauge.

He began to chuckle to himself, but that very quickly gave way to him throwing his head back and laughing at the top of his lungs. It was like they wanted him to fulfill his destiny of being the supreme ruler of the Universe!

"Soon," he rasped, eyes wide with a deep-seated madness. "So very soon, now."

AN: Quantity over quality for the time being.

I saw the Broly movie just before I started this chapter, just to show how long I let it sit unfinished, and I must say that that movie was an absolute blast! Maybe a few too many uncomfortable close-ups of people's eyeballs and uvulas, but overall an awesome addition to the franchise (Gogeta best fusion confirmed!).

That said, I will be using precisely nothing from it. I believe you can probably tell why. This is also strictly a DBZ story, not a Super one, so I wouldn't even be writing up to the time of the movie anyway. There was one thing that was said in the movie that I'll be including, but it overlaps with something previously established and was already going to effect the story.

And I am terrible at casual Piccolo, it seems. I was hoping I could make Cupper's a pseudo-hangout for some of the characters, but I realized just now that that veers directly into sitcom territory, so don't worry about ever going back there. Maybe I'll...maybe I'll blow it up, or something. Barista Goku was a stupid idea.