Chapter 1

A Mysterious Transformation

As dawn broke on Mt. Paozu, sunlight filtered through the window, beaming down on the face of a small boy laid beneath it. Rousing only enough to register the light, the boy swiftly turned on his side and curled up pulling his blanket up over his head to keep the light at bay. Leaving only his spiky black mane visible above the frayed threads of his quilt. He remained in that position for a few moments, then at last yielded to the break of day and tossed back his blanket with a sigh as he groggily climbed from his bed, yawning and stretching as he began to make his way towards the bathroom. As he shambled along, sleep still heavy in his mind, a brown monkey tail lazily waved behind him, keeping him steady as he went.

Stepping into his small restroom, the boy wasted no time in brushing his teeth, then splashed water on his face to wake himself up. He emerged a moment later, then moved to throw on his clothes, a loose blue set of robes, slid on his shoes, before rushing out to the sitting area of his home where a transparent orange ball of sorts sat upon a purple cushion with a gold trim. It already stood out from the rest of the room, however its most notable characteristics were the four red stars gleaming within. As though beckoned by the strange orb, the boy paused and bowed his head slightly before he began to as though it were a person.

"Morning Grandpa," he said, lifting his head after a moment or two. "Today's gonna be a big day, I can feel it. It's finally spring, so that means all the big fish are gonna be moving upstream now! Just thinking about it makes me super hungry!" the young boy stated, patting his stomach with gusto before picking up a small red wooden rod sheathed within a leather casing and sliding it's sling over his head so that the casing rested upon his back. "I can't wait to see what I catch this time. You wait here until I get back!"

Sparing a quick glance back, the boy departed the small house a large grin plastered on his face as he took off down the path toward the upper hills of the mountainside, leaving a trail of dust behind him. His first stop was a small well, dug close to the house, where he pulled up a bucket of water. When it reached the top, he grabbed the handle of the bucket, lifted it and used the ladle to take a large sip from the pale. Satisfied, he dropped it back down into the well, returned back to the trail leading to the river.

It was a good half hour walk between the small hut and the nearby river, but at the pace the unusual child set, this journey took under a quarter of that time. The orange and red streaks of dawn were only just beginning to fade into the blue sky when he reached the bank. Scanning along the stream's shoreline for signs of his prey he finally found what he was looking for, and jogged a few paces upstream, where he then began to do something quite unusual. Facing away from the stream, he sat down, allowing his tail to dip deep into the water of the stream. He closed his eyes, waiting for the telltale sensation that would indicate his plan had worked.

Sitting still for a short while he began to feel a sharp tug on his tail. Immediately he pulled his tail out of the water, and with it came a large blue fish. The fish was roughly the size of the young boy's head if you included his hair, which any sensible person would. Making the fish smaller in comparison to most of the fish he'd caught in this stream, however the boy looked at the fish with excitement, nonetheless. It was still food. So with that in mind, the boy moved the fish to where it couldn't get back into the water and stuck his tail back into the stream. After all, he had much larger fish to fry if all went according to plan.

This pattern would repeat this process for the next hour. Over and over again he would attempt for the large fish, and yet he would always pull a small fish out instead of the one he was aiming for. It wasn't until his twenty-third attempt that things appeared to turn up. It seemed, at first, just like all the others. The weight he yanked from the water was no different from those before it (the boy was beginning to think he was wrong about bigger fish having arrived), but then it hit him. And by "it" he assumed it was the fish. It was a heavy weight after all, so maybe he'd just misjudged its weight when he threw it over his head. That was until the weight made a very unfishlike groan. The boy opened his eyes. No, the fish he'd pulled was where it should've been, on the pile. And the groaning was from his left…

A small boy lay there, dazed and clutching his head, much to the other boy's confusion. It'd been awhile since he'd seen another person, not since his grandpa had been stomped by the giant monster, and this one had a tail like him! Did that mean the other kid was also a boy? He thought that's what his grandpa had said set boys and girls (the latter of which he'd never seen himself) apart.

Wasting no time after coming to this conclusion, he then bent down to examine the newcomer closer. This was a new experience. No one had come to these parts of the woods, since… well ever. Even when his grandpa was around no one else had ever been seen in the area. The only things that he knew about them, were the stories that his Grandpa told him. But those were just stories, as distant as the monster that came with the full moon. This was something else, and for once he found himself quite unsure of what to do.

The boy in front of him hadn't seemed to have noticed him yet, and was intent on clutching his head for some reason. Taking a second, the young man began to look over this strange visitor. Before him was a figure of similar stature, but whose pale limbs seemed thin, similar to that of a wolf he once saw that was too weak to catch prey of its own. Malnourished, though that is not the word that came to his mind. It was hard to get a good look at his face while he was clutching it, but the boy's mahogany shaded hair seemed to spike as much as his own did, though it parted in the middle. He was almost familiar, but not quite. It felt like it wasn't that he should recognize him, but that they were tied in some way, though he couldn't quite grasp how. It was odd, like he had forgotten some key detail.

After about a minute of observing, the conscious boy finally realized that the other's wounds probably weren't going to go away in a moment, and he should probably help. Which was another conundrum. In his life in isolation, he had plenty of experience hunting, cooking, or killing other beings, but never helping. Which forced him to rely on what he remembered from the times his grandpa had taken care of him. How did that work again?

It had something to do with laying in bed and wrapping the place that hurts. Something like that. Either way the first thing that he needed to do was get the other boy to his home

"Don't worry. I'll help you," he said to the boy laying on the ground while walking towards him. He bent down and wrapped his arms around him, then lifted the mahogany haired boy over his head and onto his left shoulder. Then with a quick tug to make sure he had the other secured onto his shoulder, he looked over to his left and saw the fish that he had pulled out before the collision. He stopped for a minute before deciding to walk over to it. Wrapping his right arm around the other boy's waist, he then quickly grabbed the fish tail with his left hand. And with that he jumped up and ran for his house at a blazing pace, leaving nothing but a trail of dust and two marks in the soil. A large space of land from the fish he was dragging and with this trail was a set of four finger sized lines that seemed to follow the cloud. Something, or rather someone, must have been dragging behind him. He however didn't seem to notice, but that someone would when they woke up.

It was a short trip, much shorter than the trip down to the stream. He seemed to have made good time. Honestly, he would have been impressed with himself if he'd thought about it. That idea was far from his mind at the moment, as a certain someone seemed to hold his focus.

Once the young boy had made it to his small abode, he walked over to a small pile of logs and laid the human sized fish out in between the pile of logs and what seemed to be an old cooking pit without much thought. And with that he quickly turned around, narrowly avoiding a collision with the aforementioned pile of logs. The other on his shoulder however wasn't so lucky. With a loud thwack the still unconscious boy's head made contact with the pile. The boy that was carrying him did not seem to notice however, or at least gave no indication.

It was when he finally stepped back into his house that the poor boy's body was finally let down by the other. Thinking back upon what his grandfather had done for him when he had been hurt, the darker haired boy disappeared from the vicinity of the other for a moment, returning with a roll of bandages. He got to work quickly, but not knowing where exactly they were supposed to be placed, decided to be better safe than sorry and wrap his unconscious guest's body in its entirety. Having started at the bottom, it was just as he had covered the boy's nose that he finally began to move.

Frantically, he began tearing at the bindings he suddenly found himself in (much to his confusion). Or, he would have done that, had his arms not been binded earlier. The figure began wriggling violently and making muffled shouts, which finally alerted the other that he should perhaps do something.

"You're awake!" he remarked as he peeled enough bandages so that his guest could respond, "the bandages worked even faster than I thought they would!"

His guest wasn't all too impressed by the introduction. "Bandages? If you were looking for ironic ways to kill me, there's plenty of more effective methods. As soon as I break out of these things…"

"Oh, I guess I could let you out if you're already healed. Grandpa always made me wear mine for longer, so I wasn't sure."

Oblivious to the bound boy's violent struggle, his darker haired host quickly unraveled what he had just set, exposing the attire of the boy underneath, muddied from his dragging back. The newly freed boy didn't seem to notice this, himself preoccupied with springing to his feet and taking a step back from the other, cautiously.

"Where am I, who are you?" he began, "and this Grandpa you mentioned, are there others with you?"

"Oh! I forgot!" replied the other, "I'm Goku, this is my home, and my Grandpa died a while back. Who are you?"

The newcomer seemed taken aback by the question. "Who am I? I'm… I'm…" It was at this point he began to take note of himself. The mud and sand on his clothes, his unkempt hair, the tail at his side. The last of which stopped him for a moment, almost as if he'd never seen it before. "I, uh, don't know."

"You don't know who you are? How's that work?"

"It doesn't. I… I can't remember anything." he said, his voice straining as the revelation struck him. His mind began to wander as the situation sunk in.

He didn't know who he was. His name was gone entirely, his identity missing. Things that should have been common knowledge felt like a blur as he struggled to even grasp what was going on. He was in a strange place with another boy who had just nearly killed him with bandages of all things. His name was gone, and along with it any hope of finding out who he was. To make matters worse, he felt very different from what he believed he should feel.

"Something feels off, but I can't even grasp what it is," he mumbled. His mind was starting to go into a panic. His breathing turned frantic as he tried to move away from the other boy, taking a step back as his eyes darted across the room, squinting at the sunlight streaming in through an open window, his unusually pale limbs shifting into a tighter position defensively.

Goku was confused now. He'd never heard of someone losing their memory before. Then again, he only knew what his Grandpa had told him, so he guessed there were a few things he hadn't got the chance to learn. "Do you at least remember your name?"

The other raised an eyebrow at him, "Is that not obvious? I don't remember anything."

"Oh yeah," Goku chuckled, rubbing a hand behind his hair sheepishly, "I guess I should've thought of that. Well, is there anything you'd like to be called?"

"Me? I…" the other boy paused, considering the idea. It was a good point, actually. If he couldn't remember his actual name, he'd still need to go by something. "No, I can't think of anything." he replied, his voice downtrodden by his response.

He couldn't even come up with a name. "How will I have any hope of finding my way back home if I can't even come up with a name?" He thought, his mind only seemed to tear into him more as he chastised himself.

"Great, I have just the name then! Goku interrupted, as cheerful as ever.

"Wait, really?" the boy questioned,his thought pattern being destroyed by this strange black haired boy again.

Yep, I think I have the perfect name!" he spoke his smile only seeming to grow sharper as he continued. "It felt like you fell out of the sky when you landed on me, so why don't we call you that?"

The other boy remained silent for a moment contemplating it. It was surprisingly a good name considering the low bar the other boy had already set. Then he spoke again.

"Sky? That's… not bad actually. I guess you can call me that then."

Goku grinned, "Great, glad to meet you then! I'm Goku"

"You already said that." he responded, his voice deadpanned as he looked at the young goku in front of him, his eyes looking directly at his companion with a look of bewilderment.

"Oh, right."

They lapsed into an awkward silence for a moment, the newly dubbed Sky scanning his surroundings. Glancing around the room, his eyes finally landed upon the only reflective surface within it: an orange orb resting upon a cushion. He approached it, looking at himself. Something about what he saw felt off, though he wasn't quite sure what.

"What is this orb thing?" he asked, still peering at the strange orb in confusion. He was missing something, he was sure of it now. The orb looked familiar to him, but he couldn't quite place his finger on it.

"Oh that, that's my Grandpa!" The boy replied without a second thought

"Your… 'dead' Grandpa?" He asked, his voice filled with incredulousness. Was this kid trying to pull his leg?

"Yep."

"You mean to tell me that this strange orb thing is your grandpa?"

"Yep, sure is!" The boy replied with overwhelming sincerity, not faltering for a second.

"Oh…" Now Sky was even more confused. "What? How does that work?"

"That's easy. He gave it to me awhile ago, and the night he disappeared the last thing I saw was a bright shining ball, before he disappeared." The boy seemed to pause for a moment, remaining quiet for a brief moment before continuing. "The next thing I knew was that when I opened my eyes the ball was right in front of me." His voice seemed to slightly dim at this point. He looked away from the other boy for a brief moment, seeming to contemplate what to say next. He slowly inhaled then continued.

"After that he quit speaking to me. He must still be mad at me for staying up so late." The boy then turned back to Sky, a look of deep thought crossed his face. Then it quickly changed to that of determination as he walked closer." Ever since then I have been hoping to find a reason to make him talk to me again. Which is why I was at the stream for so long. I wanted to catch the largest fish I could. I thought that might make him talk to me again." His voice only seemed to rise in excitement as he spoke.

"Ah, you know…" Sky began, bewildered by the turn the conservation had taken, "That doesn't sound right, but I don't know enough about, well, anything, to say otherwise." He said, slightly unsure of where to go from there.

Before anything else could be said, Goku's stomach growled. He laughed, rubbing it. "Oh yeah, I was just about to make lunch when you landed on me! Come on outside, let's eat."

He left the room without waiting, leaving Sky inside to contemplate. There was something else about the orange ball, something that had only just dawned on him. It was… well, his reflection actually. Everything about him seemed wrong. His hair had turned a dark red and stood on end, wholly different from what he felt it had been. His face seemed a lot sharper than what he could remember. None of what he was seeing seemed to make any sense. The long furry tail protruded from his backside served as a prime example. Everything about the furry appendage felt alien, distinct from how his mind envisioned himself, and yet he couldn't explain why. He was amnesiac, helpless to understand what he once was, or who he once was.

He was a stranger in the wrong body, an enigma that couldn't even explain why he was one, and now his only hope was this other kid who seemed, somehow, to know less about the world than he did. Naturally this did nothing to stall his growing alarm as he paced around the room, holding his head in pain. What could have possibly happened to him to make him this way? Who was he before he met Goku, and why couldn't he remember anything? This only served to escalate his frustration. Desperate, the amnesiac almost cried out, but deep down he knew that it wouldn't solve anything.

Sky sighed. All he could really do was contemplate where he could go from here. Or, he would have had a certain someone not interrupted his train of thought.

"Hey, the fish is ready!" Goku's voice seemed to permeate the entire room as the sky halted his movements. What was that boy's problem? It was as if he couldn't understand that he just wanted to be left alone. Part of him wanted to yell back a crude response, but before that a certain noise growled at him.

"Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrr"

Sky's stomach seemed to think differently, and he blushed in embarrassment. Well, Goku wasn't all that bad. And besides, he was getting pretty hungry himself. So, trying not to wince as the sunlight seemed to sear his skin, he stepped outside to join his newfound companion, wholly unaware that this meeting would be the start of his grand adventure.

Author's Note: Credit to my coauthors The Beast of the Cursed Mask and Vontage-116 for editing. This is a remake of a much older story of mine (and by remake, I mean I took the original concept, shook out all the garbage I wrote the last time, and started completely from scratch). Cover image is from when I googled time gear, that's about all I know about it.