I forgot to mention it in the last chapter, so I'll mention it now, I decided to give Vegeta his fight against 19 last minute since I figured it'd just be mean for the first time Vegeta gets to show off his Super Sayaininess was to immediately get steamrolled by 18
Korst: I also kept Future SIGoahn in first person because technically speaking, it's still SIGohan
thewittywhy: There are two main reasons Future SIGohan is here, I shall make comedy a third.
As for Raditz. He has accepted his surroundings. He copes through snark
Slayer76: You may sit upon a throne of lies but that does not mean I must listen. Demonic Piercing Light Murdering Gun is the true name. The dub changed it for ease and censorship. Even as a child I found the name dumb. At least the original name has a certain edge lord charm that fits early Edge Lord Piccolo
SoralTheSol: Unfortunately that would imply she knows where Cell is hiding, which she has no way of knowing any more than Present SIGohan
Man, giving Vegeta the opportunity to look cool was a mistake. Now he's all arrogant about being the first person to destroy an Android.
First one to let one get away too!
Oh sure, the fight was pretty cool, not that I'd ever admit as such out loud, but it was also over-dramatized. Like congrats. You made an Android afraid. Then you immediately killed it which you could have done earlier.
Ripping off its hands so it couldn't absorb energy was a nice touch I will admit.
Never out loud, however.
He did a fair job at bluffing out Gero, but letting Gero run away was annoying.
Then he just demanded a bean and flew off on his own.
I don't even know why I'm complaining. This is what I wanted to happen. Gero still needs to wake up 17 and 18. And we needed to be there when it happened, for the initial contact with the three, once the two woke up 16.
And also the K18 setup but admittedly that is less important. Technically. In the grand scheme.
It's still very important though.
We were obviously under instruction, by Piccolo, not to engage with the Android alone.
Piccolo, Krillin, Nappa, and I were searching on our own. Chiaotzu went with Tien, and Ocari decided to follow Raditz around.
Better than either of them being alone I guess.
I kept my head on a swivel as I searched. I placed myself standing on a rock in the relative open so he couldn't sneak up on me, and much like before I kept my senses open to detect and lowering Ki signatures.
Vegeta decided to be an idiot and try to blow up the area. I'm fairly certain he knew we were there. Fortunately or unfortunately, Gero ran out to absorb the energy.
Fortunately, because we didn't get blown up.
Unfortunately, because Vegeta then failed to catch him as he escaped back into the rocks with the now added energy.
Even if I were to give him the benefit of the doubt thinking he might have tried to lure Gero out, he did an awful job at executing it.
So, back on the search then. Back on the head swivel and monitoring Ki signatures.
It was probably due to that that by the time Piccolo telepathically called for help, I had already cleared half the distance towards him.
I kicked Gero in the head, sending him spiraling away from his former position of clinging to Piccolo's back in a way that prevented him from breaking free.
"Gohan, tha-"
Piccolo didn't get a chance to finish the phrase before I was rushing towards Gero. Was it smart, no. Let's say I was successful in injuring him, and that led him to being unable to wake 17 and 18 somehow. That'd be very bad. At that moment, however, I didn't really care.
I just really hated Gero. It was his fault literally any of this happened. He created the Androids. He creates Cell. If he weren't here I wouldn't have to worry about anything until Buu. And whatever movies might happen because apparently, that's a thing.
However, considering the grand scheme whatever, it's probably a good thing I only managed to get a few hits in before being grabbed by the arm.
"Precocious little thing, aren't you?" Gero sneered as I felt a tingling pull through my arm, like something was tugging on my bones and veins, turning it numb as I felt a drain on my Ki.
A green arm shot into my vision, cleaning slicing through the arm holding my arm.
Piccolo then kneed Gero into a rock face.
"Well that was uncharacteristically violent of you," Piccolo noted, turning back to me, "are you alright?"
I made a small noise as I nodded, trying to shake away the tingling in my arm to no avail.
Man, that was going to be annoying if it didn't go away soon.
I glanced around to see that everyone else had gathered in the area.
I could practically see the gears turning in Gero's head as he looked between us, Vegeta, and his now nonexistent hand.
"I feel like we over-prepared for this," Piccolo commented.
I sensed a vaguely familiar power coming close, wait, no I felt two? One of them I could place as Trunks but the other, I've never felt anything like it.
Sure enough, Trunks soon showed up and was saying something, but was too far away to hear. That probably wouldn't have mattered though since my focus was centered on the person next to him.
It was a teenage girl. Probably a similar age to Trunks. She had brown hair in a pixie cut. She wore a dark jacket, grey shirt, and dark blue jeans.
She was completely and totally unrecognizable to me.
I drifted closer. It probably helps ease the confusion that we already figured these weren't the same Androids he- they- knew, but no one knew why that changed.
Still, my focus remained on the girl. Who was she? She obviously wasn't from canon, but where did she come from? Was she some random girl Future me picked up and took care of? I don't see why should would come to the past then.
Maybe, Raditz had a kid in the future timeline? That could make sense. It'd explain why she was here but not in canon. But then would that mean she wouldn't exist in this timeline? I'm pretty certain Raditz wasn't with anybody now and if the timelines changed that, well that wouldn't be very nice.
Well, Trunks was pretty concerned about himself not being born so I can't see him risking someone close to him not being born, especially before we knew that the timelines wouldn't affect each other, so maybe it's not that either.
I turned at the sound of a flying car.
And the blue-haired woman waving in the driver's seat was also, very recognizable.
Bulma's showing up took the previous confusion and multiplied it.
"And now the woman's here!"
"What? Bulma? The Little Prince?!"
"The fuck are you doing here?!"
"Did she bring ME?!"
Without another word Gero swung his arm around, creating a shockwave of a blast that covered the area.
It was more blinding than having any risk of injury, especially at the distance that we were. For Bulma though, it was more of a concern, considering it doesn't take much, comparatively speaking, to destroy pretty much any vehicle really.
As the light faded and the dust settled it was clear Trunks had that covered however, having caught his mother and Baby Trunks. The girl was also close by.
In an instant, Nappa was also there, hovering as much as ever.
Gero, however, was nowhere to be seen.
We all gathered around Bulma on the ground, both to regroup and to make sure she was ok.
Vegeta was still in the air searching for Gero in vain.
Trunks looked up at him and glared.
Before anyone else could move, he darted into the air to confront his father. I can only assume it was about him not caring about Bulma or Baby Trunks, but they were too far away to hear.
The girl was looking at Bulma and Baby Trunks, who was still being hovered over by Nappa.
Bulma rocked Baby Trunks in her arms, trying to calm him down from crying.
"So, that old guy was one of those Androids?" She asked, before cooing back at Baby Trunks again.
"Well I think that Android was Dr. Gero," she stated, before turning her voice to a coo for the baby, "yes he was. He was Dr. Gero, wasn't he?" Baby Trunks calmed at the tone.
Bulma turned back to us, "yeah, I've seen pictures of him. All old scientists know each other and what do you know, my dad's an old scientist. Seems like he's changed a lot since then though."
"HEY!" Krillin called up to those still looking in the air, "BULMA SAYS THE ANDROID WAS DR GERO!"
That caught the rest of their attention and soon everyone was on the ground.
"How could you possibly know a thing like that?"
"I know what I saw, Vegeta! A picture of that old Guy and underneath it in big bold letters said Doc-tor Ge-ro," Bulma enunciated each syllable to emphasize the point.
And Baby Trunks was crying again.
"What do you have to say for yourself boy? Everything you've told to us has been lies! You said Dr. Gero was destroyed by the Androids he created! You said nothing about him turning himself into an Android!" Vegeta demanded.
"Don't you yell at him!" I snapped back, because it was the farthest thing from fair of him.
"I- didn't know, the timeline must have changed."
"Which we talked about being a possibility before any of this started," Piccolo stated, "you'd know that if you were here on time."
"Question," the girl started, before turning to Trunks, "do we really have to keep dancing around your name? You've already been born so there's no issue right?"
"I- well no, I guess not," Trunks kinda glanced over at Vegeta.
"Great! Trunks, Trunks," she said, pointing at the Future variety then at the Baby one, "ok, back on topic now."
"That, makes an odd amount of sense actually," Tien commented.
"Kinda wild but, I guess there weren't that many options…" Krillin followed.
Bulma seemed stuck in a cycle of looking down at Baby Trunks and up at Future Trunks.
Vegeta, at least his existential crisis was internal this time.
"Who are you?" I blurted, then immediately regretted it because that sounded rude.
The girl looked down at me, "oh, I'm- actually I don't think I've actually been born yet, I probably shouldn't say my name?" She looked over to Trunks, who also didn't seem to know.
Bulma finally shook herself from the pattern, seeming to put it aside for the moment, "Well, how much younger are you?"
"About a year," the girl shrugged.
"Well then, odds are you've already been conceived, Trunks here is ten months old after all."
The girl hummed to herself, "it should probably be fine then… well, my name is Clover, I trained with Trunks, anything else is classified because I say so," she decided.
That, didn't really help much. Her name was nice since I didn't have to call her "the girl" anymore, but it still doesn't do much in saying who she was.
It's a plant based name so that's kinda Sayain like? I'm mean, clovers aren't a vegetable, but I'm pretty sure they're eatable at least. It's not like any other Sayain hybrid has any particularly Sayain like name.
Or maybe she's just from a family that chose a plant based naming scheme for some reason. There are worse naming schemes in this world.
"So if Dr. Gero ran off, could he be going to wake up the other two Androids? The two from your timeline?" Piccolo finally asked, putting us back on the correct topic.
"Yeah, probably, that's what my teacher thought at least. She tends to have a good instinct about these things."
"Your teacher is here too?"
"Yeah, she, went somewhere else, didn't say why, and she still isn't back yet," he almost seemed frustrated by the last point.
"Before anything else, we should probably get a description of the Androids, that way there's no confusing them this time."
"Right. Androids 17 and 18. Android 18 is designed to look like a beautiful girl with blond hair. Android 17 is a boy with long dark hair and an orange scarf."
"Two corrections," Clover cut in, "teacher thinks those two might be more like cyborgs than Androids, they've bled when injured she's said, so they wouldn't really be designed to look like anything, they just look like that. Correction two, they both pretty."
"It doesn't matter what they are! They seek only to destroy, they're ruthless!"
"Just saying. If I didn't correct you, our teacher would have, so better to get it over with now."
"Do these two absorb energy like the other two?" Man, how would we ever stay on topic without Piccolo here to course correct?
"What? No. These two don't need to. Their energy reserves are infinite."
"That's ridiculous! They'd have to run out of energy sometime!"
"Hate to agree with the prince, but yeah, that doesn't make any sense," Raditz reluctantly agreed.
"We're just sharing what we know. We know they have infinite energy, we don't know how. If they didn't have infinite energy, our teacher would have been able to take care of them by now."
"Well maybe, your supposed teacher just isn't as strong as you think she is," Vegeta sneered back, "why else would she have run away when the fighting started?"
"She didn't run away! She just, said she had something else to do.." Trunks defended.
"Something better than fighting your world-ending Androids? Sounds to me like you're lying to yourself, boy."
Clover put a hand on Trunks's shoulder and pulled him away.
"Question, where's Goku? He should be here right?"
"Well, he came down with that weird heart virus. It came a lot later than Trunks said it would. Yamcha took him back to get the medicine."
"Even that's changed? What else then?"
"What matter now is stopping Dr. Gero from waking those other two then," Piccolo decided.
Vegeta turned to Bulma, "Woman! Do you know where Dr. Gero's laboratory is?"
Baby Trunks started crying again.
"Egh! Every time you come near Trunks he starts crying again! Hey now, daddy's not gonna scare you with that ugly face of his anymore. No he's not! No he's not!"
Ah yes. The universal joy. Making fun of Vegeta. Everyone can enjoy that. Well, except Vegeta of course.
"Would you forget about the blasted child for one minute and tell me where the damn lab is!?"
"Oh Gero's lab? Let's see, I think I've read that it was in a cave just outside of North City."
"The Android was escaping on foot, so we might be able to cut him off and beat him there," Vegeta smirked.
"So, we might be able to find his lab first and destroy those two before he can wake them up," Piccolo determined.
"I would never do something that cowardly! I will fight those Androids myself," Vegeta announced, much to the dismay of Trunks.
"What? No! You can't just go underestimating them! If you do you'll-"
"I'll what?" Vegeta interrupted.
"You'll be killed just like you were in my timeline! We should do it Piccolo's way!"
Vegeta held Trunks's gaze for a moment, before smirking and flying off.
Trunks cut him off again.
"Please, if you really want to fight them, then we have to wait for Goku! That's the only way we could-"
"I do not need Kakarot's help! I am more than strong enough myself! Now out of my way!" With that Vegeta was gone, a trail of energy vaguely visible behind him.
Trunks followed after. Clover glanced back at Bulma and Baby Trunks, who was now laughing at Nappa making funny faces at him, before following after Trunks.
The second Trunks was gone Bulma started looking down at Baby Trunks again, holding him out to look at him and back up in the direction Future Trunks left.
"Wow guys! Can you believe it! And here I was concerned that Trunks might grow up to look like his dad! Wow! I met him two years before he was even born! Wild!"
Bulma paused, "hey, I'm gonna have to get Trunks home, but that Gero Android totaled my plane."
"What, you didn't bring any spares? You could fit a dozen of them in a capsule case," Raditz questioned.
"Well sorry I didn't plan to get blown up from the sky today. That still doesn't solve the problem though."
Ocari sighed, "I will take you home Miss Bulma. I'm probably least needed here anyway."
"Oh thank you Ocari, such a sweet boy."
"I still do not think the Androids should be hurt before they do something wrong though," he noted before turning back to help Bulma gather what remained of her belongings.
Whether or not anyone would consider his words, was unknown.
At Piccolo's order, we took off in the same direction as Vegeta did.
…
…
…
I landed by the edge of the forest, scanning for any surrounding Ki. I felt what I remembered to be Yamcha's. A faint flickering that must have been Goku's, and, Chichi's….
Yamcha was the only one who could sense energy at the moment, and I doubt he was actively searching, but still, I suppressed my power down as I approached the house.
Coming to my old window, I, sure enough, found it unlocked. Out in the middle of nowhere where there was no way anyone could break in, there was no point in locking it. It was a tough habit to break, but it had helped in sneaking away and getting back in when needed.
I frowned as I heard Goku shouting in pain. Sure, I never got to the point of seeing him as a father, but I still liked him. Like as a person. He was nice. And, it's a shame the first time I hear from him getting back here was him in pain.
I climbed through the window and felt an odd nostalgia at the room. I picked up the Terriermon plush from my bed. I still had mine, of course, but this one was much newer. Softer.
I carefully placed it back where I found it.
That wasn't really why I was here. I looked around the room, searching for a suitable hiding place. Chichi wasn't likely to look around here, but just in case, I can't exactly leave this out in the open.
Let's see, under the pillow would be too easy to find, and in the pillow case would be too easy to not notice.
A Digimon DVD case would be pretty much guaranteed to be opened eventually, but probably not particularly soon.
I turned to the desk in the room. The drawer would be too obvious. A book might work, as long as it was one that Chichi wouldn't look through, but that'd have the same issue as the DBS case.
I suppose a sketchbook would do. Mini-me would be likely to find it there and Chichi probably wouldn't look. As an extra precaution there was a seal that required more Ki than Chichi had to open, but even seeing it would probably be suspicious to her so best to avoid it entirely.
As silently as I came, I left the room.