The Horse with No Name
And we will all go together when we go
What a comforting fact that is to know
Universal bereavement -
An inspiring achievement!
Yes, we all will go together when we go
We'll All Go Together When We Go
by Tom Lehrer
Chapter Fifty-Two
In God we Trust
Goku hadn't known what to expect. Only once before has he relied on Gohan's power in relevance to loss, in the face of peril and malevolence, and so appropriately that had resulted in him sacrificing himself to Cell and being absent from Earth for seven long years. He'd gambled and only half won. Cell was defeated but that came with a price.
The coin has once more been flipped.
That's how he thinks of it. This price. This coin. Gohan's emotions come with the same odds of flipping one. Around and around, spinning, Goku will never know how it will land. Heads or tails? It could be the chance to achieve greatness or equally it could lead all to ruin.
Goku had witnessed arrogance in the face of Cell. He's witnessed heartbreak after Roarg's death.
Now, he witnesses true desolation. Despair.
The beast possessing his son is hunched over Haed, fingers cleaved into flesh and burying ever deeper as he tears the other god into two equally horrifying mounds of meat. Haed doesn't scream. There is no reaction, as though he knew that this was his fate all along. Gohan however does scream and in such an animalistic manner that he now barely resembles a human at all.
Goku doesn't move to stop him. How can he deny Gohan vengeance when this is so much better than the alternative dead-eyed creature that had refused to mourn? Monster or god, Gohan's now recognizing the situation through the veil he wrapped around himself. Yes, he does hurt. Goku sees that, and he wants to make the pain stop but he knows there is nothing he can do to until Gohan has felt it out.
So he stands there and does nothing, which is so much harder than anything else he's ever done before. Doing nothing is too much for him. It has Goku twitch as he watches his son pulverise the man who ruined everything.
Eventually, Goku does step forward. He bypasses the golden light his son emits but only when Gohan's done with his kill.
His mouth sets into a grimace. Haed, or rather, what's left of him has been contorted into a pile of mush, of crushed bones and congealed bloody gunk that has completely overwhelmed the remainder of his robes. Above this, Gohan's shaking, and panting with fury as opposed to exhaustion.
There's consideration as Goku's hand quivers between them. Should he touch him? Is it safe? Will—? Just as Goku braves reaching out, Gohan whips around, snatching the hand and taking it in a vice grip with filthy, red fingers.
He breathes in harsh rasps, his predator-like eyes wild with bloodlust; pooled gold filling the whites entirely and giving off a spine-chilling effect. A royal haemorrhage.
Goku doesn't move and Gohan seems unsure what to do next.
Trying to make the decision for his son, Goku slowly but surely brings another hand upwards. He goes to place it on the shoulder in a natural, affectionate gesture. But before he's able to, there's a crunch. His indisposed hand has been chewed into a mess of splintered bones by its captor. Goku inhales through the pain, attempting to pull away, but Gohan isn't finished. A famished madness distorts his disposition with such… such anger that Goku gets frostbite.
It's…
Mindless.
Monstrous.
How could Goku have defended against what comes next? The environment itself seems to distort around Gohan's arm, splintering like snapped bark as the punch aims true; the sheer power enough to ignite the air (as dry as it is) with electricity. Goku dives, agonized. The blood that shoots through both nostrils is analogous to spewing, broken faucets.
He's punched again and then yet another time, but by the third, Goku's got his wits about him and has pulled free of his captor. He avoids the next bout of assault in a wet, metallic-tasting existence that desperately has Goku want to wipe his face. He hasn't the time. Instead, Goku attempts to change the route of the fight by putting in distance between them. But Gohan is ravenous for blood.
Distance or not, this will not stop this beast.
He bares his teeth wildly, blood and sweet splaying. Hands come together in a tell-tale picture. Goku soars in retreat.
Khlōros.
It skewers out with forked lightning, its bolts sizzling, green and as angry as the person summoning them. Danger, Goku's mind supplies with responding fear. He needs to escape this. He needs to use Instant Transmission. The swiftness of this Khlōros makes it near impossible however. He wouldn't know where to go from here and away from the blast that swallows all.
Damn it! Where the hell is Gohan getting all this energy from anyway?
Why won't he tire?
Khlōros soon spirals in ambition of Goku and he's left to make his choice of how to act with not a lot of time at all. When the wasteland colours green and drains the world of saturation, Goku only then chances Instant Transmission.
But it seems Gohan had counted on it. He's behind Goku already, using Goku's shock against him and interlocking their arms together. Goku's a prisoner once more and worst of all in the face of this. Khlōros' heat isn't like that of the Kamehameha Wave or the Spirit Bomb; even being within its parameter has your lungs set ablaze. He breathes in its fiery humidity, the fury lodging itself in his throat.
The reflection of green bleaches all out.
Gohan's tense but ready. There's a thrumming of excitement from him, entirely unhinged. He may take some damage but nothing compared to what will happen to his meat shield.
Khlōros encroaches.
And with sudden inspiration, Goku's knows what to do. He pulls against Gohan's arms, fusing them ever tighter, and then at the very last second, he bends down, flipping Gohan to face the wrath of his own energy. Finally Khlōros hits, and the burning has Goku scream. It's as if thousands of hot pokers are being plunged into his body all at once, and they drag – so torturously slowly – through his skin, before discharging with electrocuting bolts of ki that overwhelm him completely.
Goku feels like he's being eaten alive.
The green whites out. And the explosion that follows is deafening. Goku's at the centre of all of it. His ears probably hurt but what's that compared to everything else? The claps of thunder could be whispers, the wind even quieter.
Falling.
That's what's happening now. Goku's… falling.
He knows it to be true because he next registers landing with a hard thud. He coughs, doing so again into his bad hand as he attempts to scramble up. He trips over his own aching bones.
That… had been horrible. And he hadn't even taken the brunt of it.
Fittingly, Gohan lands next, somehow far more collected than Goku despite facing Khlōros directly. That's not to say that Gohan isn't a mess. Whilst it's not easy to tell whose blood is whose, Gohan at least sports some visible burns up and along his arms. Most of his shirt has burned away, revealing red, angry-looking marks that have already started bruise.
It so turns out the best way in beating Gohan is to turn his own over-powered attacks back on him.
Great.
Easy.
Gohan marches, golden eyes cindering.
Okay. Not easy.
Gohan splutters out a wet, angry scream and before Goku realizes which way is up, he's on his back with Gohan atop him, hands coiled around his neck. There's no pretence. Gohan is strangling him.
Under the pressure, Goku can't stop the natural reaction of gasping for air. It makes everything worse and panic blankets over him. Time starts jilting, visions of Gohan's mania interweaves with dark intervals of passing out. Goku reaches for Gohan's hands, his arms, his face – his uninhabited eyes – yet nothing deters him and Goku truly starts to believe his head will shatter from the pressure.
Nothing comes to mind of what to do.
"G—n…" Even his voice fails him, mouth filling with tears and sticky saliva that drools freely from one corner of his lips.
An eternity passes and Goku suffers throughout it all.
He hasn't the power, he knows that, he can only… only… The edges of his world darken. His arms limply fall, his head loiters.
Then he gasps.
Gone are the hands around his throat and instead he's subjected to a punch in the gut. Immediately, Goku rolls over and vomits up bile; snot and tears and whatever else that comes out in hoarse sobs, yet Gohan is unremitting. He takes Goku by the front of his hair and drags him up onto his feet, coming face to face, barely a few inches difference in height.
Goku can't properly see. His eyes feel ruined, like his brain had just been juiced through his eye sockets, leaving a narrow, dark world with only mute madness staring back.
Gohan seems unable to use words, his fury so boundless that it's beyond them.
You die when I say you die.
That's what he'd say.
Goku somehow musters up the strength to punch him yet it's akin to paper slapping a boulder. The second attempt fares even worse and Goku skids into the steel of his son's chest. An elbow cracks down mid-back.
Maybe the strangulation was a calculated move on Gohan's behalf because Goku can't even talk Gohan down now. His words leave him as croaks. Even as Gohan drags him, face first, through the chasm of sharp-edged rock faces, Goku cannot will his voice to return. He can only accept the torture silently.
Thankfully, he's finally tossed aside and Goku finds solace for a moment, choosing to roll onto his back as he hacks and gags on the air.
It's not even a fight. Not anymore.
Gohan straddles him once again and Goku gazes up and at the beast he encouraged.
Is this how Cell felt all those years ago?
The rage manifests into a smirk, the type that could make even someone like Gohan ugly. He wants to play with his food. He wants to hurt. Haed was not enough to quell the wicked desire for revenge.
Goku can understand that.
This obsession.
You got it from me, he wants to communicate.
He'd felt it too, with Rixas. Back when he thought Rixas had killed Gohan, nothing would have been enough to satisfy Goku's murderous desires.
Goku reaches out his hand once more and this time he manages to feel his son beneath his fingers, the cool skin of his cheek. Gohan's darkness doesn't shift, the smirk remains. Yet, in complete contrast, Gohan actually leans into the hand. Affectionate. Playful almost.
Goku hisses.
He suffers the familiar bite of a blade and then the surface level incision that traces circles into Goku's chest with theoretical exploration.
A flip of the coin, Goku contemplates as the point starts to delve deeper somewhere just below his heart. And on one side, madness…
But then Gohan stops, so suddenly at that. His ki blade disintegrates and his attention draws somewhere over Goku's head. Curiousity has Goku endeavour a glance, though he sees very little and hasn't the position to dislodge Gohan from his station. As fate has it however, Goku needn't to as Gohan himself retreats onto the back foot. He stumbles, clutching his chest.
Something's wrong.
Goku uses the time to organize himself. He gets up, spits up a lodging of red phlegm, and uses a nearby wall to support himself as he chances a better look at whatever Gohan's looking at.
Oh. He sees it. There. Coming closer. What are they…?
Are they leaves?
They are!
Yes, golden ones. As they course above, some fizzle, eaten up by their own spitting embers.
What are they? Why is—?
"ARGH!"
Gohan is a puddle of limbs. He's so suddenly broken. He's writhing on the floor. Panting.
It's everything Goku's already witnessed but for some reason this time it feels off, as though it's coming from an entirely different trigger as opposed to the Almighty within. Is it them – the leaves? More of these leaves drift overhead, striking in contrast to the darkness of Hell with out of place splendour; it would be beautiful if not for the agony they seemingly inflict upon his son. There are so many… like little butterflies of flittering gold.
As much as Goku feels guilty over the matter, the situation has provided him a moment reprieve away from Gohan. He massages his throat and catches his breath as he observes.
"Please!" he hears Gohan beg what Goku presumes to the Almighty. "NO! DON'T!"
It's another instance where Goku is unsure of what to do. This time, he keeps a healthy distance to recollect some energy, admittedly at a complete loss as the sky alights with majestic foliage. They could be millions of stars, lanterns perhaps, coming together in a swirling cloud above.
"DON'T!"
Gohan is on his feet now and shrieking at the sky, his golden aura noticeably dimmer than Goku's yet seen. Still apprehensive after last time, Goku curls around the edge of the rockery. He either remains unnoticed or so far removed from Gohan's radar that he may as well be invisible.
"PLEASE!" Gohan cries, breaking into a gush of Lanit-Tongue, words barely decipherable from one to the next. Goku balks at Gohan's next wail if only because he reverts back to Common. "DON'T LEAVE ME!"
His heart hammers.
Who? Goku? No. Not him.
Who else?
No way.
The Almighty…?
Does Goku dare hope?
Someone's done something. Something big. An attack of some kind. He considers who could still be operating in Hell.
Well, there's only one person who could have done something like this.
The Supreme Kai.
And he'd been up to something with Zamasu… Goku remembers now. Yes! Is this it – his plan? Are they saving Gohan from the Almighty?
Pity starts to stain the thrill of hope when there's another scream. It warps into a soundless contortion of horror as the leaves finally reach Gohan's aura.
Gohan…
Like ink running in water, the colour drains from Gohan in an eddying, thinning stream that glides up and towards the burning leaves. His gold loses saturation, the whites of his eyes return and his skin sheds that divine hue that differentiated him from any mortal transformation. Strangely, Gohan's hair doesn't return to black but instead adopts a girlish pink, his eyes newly matching but wracked in a deep anguish that make them appear lifeless.
When the last of the leaves die, Gohan collapses to his knees, utterly stricken.
The sky is dark once more save for the dragon, which glows in the backdrop behind, completely obscuring the fact that Gohan now has a golden, circular ring floating above his head.
A halo… like Goku – mortal, regular Goku – had when he'd died.
He supposes this could only mean one thing, yet he's unsure what to do with this revelation.
Against logic or sanity, Goku takes a tentative step towards his son.
He's shaking, now on all fours with his fingers cutting sharp indents into the ground. The energy – so pink – spits like oil in a frying pan, hotly snapping at Goku as he bravely comes to a stop in front of him. His breathing hitches when his attention snaps onto Goku, anger still present enough to inspire Goku to take a step back.
Gohan's voice is barely above a whisper. "What have you done?"
"N'thing," Goku forces out, throat still utterly shredded.
"It's gone! What have you done?!"
"'Don't… know."
"I can't hear them, I can't, nothing, I can't—" Gohan tells him with a manic twist to his words, high-pitched and devastated as he lowers his head into a bow. "I… it's so quiet. I…"
He vomits.
There's an excess of undigested blood, indicating how likely it is that Gohan's more injured than he's letting on. When Goku goes to lower down to Gohan's level in a bid to offer yet another olive branch, his son quickly stumbles awkwardly onto two feet, nearly tripping in the process.
"'S'over," Goku presses, hand to larynx. "G'han…"
It's an upsetting display. Gohan looks around the devastation as though newly discovering it, staring at Haed's remains, the luminosity of the dragon balls, before then locking onto the dragon with complicated, shiny eyes that seem to be doing the maths of the situation.
"S'okay…"
Gohan's stare next rakes over Goku and the brutal bruising that must circulate his neck. There isn't time for kind words, Goku can't force his voice. Not that it matters. The way Gohan looks at his own hands tells him there isn't enough comfort in the world he could offer him right now.
"The Almighty… It's gone," he breathes, sounding like he doesn't believe it.
Goku nods. "You're …free."
"…Free."
"S'right."
The hum of the dragon above reminds Goku of its patience. Perhaps now it's best they put it to rest. Unless, perhaps, they could use it to wish back the others, Quell maybe? When he goes to say as much to Gohan as best he can, the words turn to ash.
He's staring at the dragon again, a very particular glint present.
"G'han…"
The ignorance unsettles Goku and so he tries again, only to be ignored until he goes to spin his son to attention. With impressive step, Gohan avoids him with a twist of the shoulder. He proceeds to approach the dragon, still equipped with the same determination that's been prevalent since the start of all this.
"Wha'?"
There are several steps to reach what Goku would consider the wishing point, the raised ledge best used to communicate with the dragon. Goku chases him up those stairs, past Gohan before coming to a standstill as to block further passage.
"Move," Gohan orders.
It's then that Goku comprehends – with a dull thud of horror in his stomach – that nothing has changed; Gohan still intends to follow through on this, on Revelation.
But… But the Almighty is gone. The influence burned up with all those leaves, right? Is there prolonged after-effects? Is there some of it left? Why would—?
A good punch follows.
Goku should be used to the sensation by now. It knocks him off the stairway and induces the regular flavour of copper when his head bounces against the floor.
It would be so easy to close his eyes, he appreciates.
Goku's suddenly so tired.
Concussion, comes the realization. Not good. He needs to get up.
Faster to get him to move than any alarm however is hearing Gohan's boot steps tap against stone stairs. It sets a fire in him. He can't let this happen, not when he's this close to stopping him. So Goku uses his precious, limited pool of energy and executes Instant Transmission to directly appear in front of Gohan, kicking him at the earliest possible opportunity.
Gohan's response is sloppy at best. He attempts defence but Goku is unyielding. The back and forth is probably both of their weakest today in terms of performance. Without Gohan's heightened power from the Almighty, they seem to match one another fairly equally. Whatever this form of Gohan's is doesn't cut it compared to the last, though it still feels like a super saiyan transformation of some kind, still godly to a point if only now it feels more similar to Goku's transformation than to anything else.
It could be the same. This transformation is so similar a reflection of Goku's own.
Still, Gohan proves to be faster. An especially nasty backhand submerges Goku back into his usual grave of dirt. This time Gohan doesn't allow Goku to rise. He straddles him much like he'd done earlier, thankfully not strangling him but instead smashing a furled fist downwards. Goku shouldn't feel relief but he does, along with the shattering in his jaw… Still, it's far from Gohan's worst attack today.
That can't be said for the next.
Which only hurts more out of sentiment than anything else.
"Kamehame—ha!"
The blue devours Goku and his skin cinders with a taste he's most used to delivering himself. When was the last time this'd been used against him? And by who at that? Goten, Gohan? It must have been years ago now, until today.
The shock of it winds Goku, giving way for Gohan's next flurry of blasts. Yellow spheres charge at him in a flock, each an assault their own and hammering Goku without a single miss. The final one at least only grazes him during the escape of cavern he'd been sentenced to.
As such, another Kamehameha pierces from the darkness, confirming Goku's belief that Gohan is about as drained as Goku is. He's avoiding physicality and relying on energy, his strength when compared to Goku. It's made even easier when the Kamehameha must be one of the simplest and least draining for Gohan to perform.
"I won't be stopped!"
Goku cuts into the dirt throughout the block against the Kamehameha. Teeth grit, he propels it aside, hoping to catch Gohan as he disappears and reappears to Goku's left. But Gohan out-manoeuvres him; he spins, jumping above the wave and using the momentum to kick Goku fiercely across the head.
As a result, Goku shoots backwards at whirlwind speed and the hill he strikes detonates, rubble turning into rainfall before grating into ash. His left goes momentarily numb but he can't afford it the attention. He can't stop now. When he rises from the tomb, Gohan is already upon him, hands together and building yet more dangerous, sizzling radiance that burns even brighter than usual due to the contrast to the darkness of the rock fall.
The environment offers no solace, there's nowhere to hide, nothing to use as a shield, no place to retreat to. Flesh pealed and bloodied, his arms lift shakily; he can only block, so he does so once again, wincing in anticipation for when the energy flies.
Yet it never reaches him.
There's an explosion to Goku's right.
What? How'd it veered so off course? Gohan on the other hand doesn't look confused, he looks frustrated. The reason why is quickly apparent.
…Yes!
Piccolo hovers nearby. He has two fingers lingering, his policy position after detonating his Special Beam Cannon. The shadow of smoke indicates that it indeed had been the perpetrator to knock Gohan's attack.
Goku sighs in relief, breath hot through the strain of a grin. Never before has he been so grateful for back-up.
Comparatively, Gohan looks less than pleased. He practically sags in realization that he has yet another opponent to face, though it doesn't stop him. In the aggressive style Goku's come to expect, Gohan moves first and throws more blasts that slice through the air far faster than Piccolo could ever dream to.
Goku has to use Instant Transmission the second he reaches Piccolo, reappearing directly behind Gohan if only because that's the first energy he latched onto. There are mines awaiting them, the very same Quell had warned them of earlier, and they ignite, popping clean of their translucent shells and exploding devastatingly. Gohan must be counting on being able to take the hit better than Goku and Piccolo as he would have known he was going to be caught in the friendly fire. All three surge backwards, two one way and Gohan the other, cracking stone when they land and by doing so shaking the entire domain.
The world is framed by looming black.
It's all getting darker…
I… I'm so tired.
If he closed his eyes, just for a mo—
There's a slap.
Above, an appropriately singed Piccolo lowers his hand.
"Son! Don't you dare! You can either sleep or die after all this but not a second before, got it?"
"Ahh? Th' leaves…" Goku caws.
"Leaves?"
"In… sky."
Piccolo looks at him for an extended period of time, particularly at his neck and chest, and then at the countless burns discolouring his skin. "He's done a real number on you," he comprehends, "But what counts is that you held him off long enough for us to perform the ritual. It was supposed to strip him of his godhood and disconnect him from the Almighty but... Why is he still…? He shouldn't be able to communicate with the Almighty at all now. Did something go wrong?"
Goku shakes his head.
"Oh." Piccolo understands immediately, that this is Gohan's choice. Not Mori's, not the Almighty's. Gohan's. "I see."
"…G'ten?"
Goku's fears are confirmed when his friend inclines a head towards the nearby mountain scape and in the direction of where all the leaves had come from.
"Where's Rixas? Quell?"
Even if Goku could speak clearly he wouldn't have the words, though Piccolo is quick on the uptake once more. "That explains the explosion we felt earlier."
"Rixas s'okay," Goku forces out, "Over there. Passed out… Haed's dead."
"Well, that's something at least."
Gohan doesn't allow the debriefing to continue. It would be Goku's luck that Gohan goes for him first, the bullet-like, yellow ki dedicated to cooking up and along his back in the exact place he'd been earlier wounded. It seems to be done on purpose since Gohan prioritizes attacking Goku's hand (a strange choice if not for the earlier breakage).
Breathing out through his nose, Goku swallows his pain when Gohan manages to twist his wrist into a knot. In reprieve for this, Goku uses the proximity to crack a punch with his spare, stronger fist. There's an exchange for some time, far too fast and far too skilled for Piccolo to become involved in. Gohan does take the opportunity to whip out at Piccolo when he can, trusting his catalogue of ki techniques to do what he cannot physically (with how Goku accosts him). The energy regains its usual bite and Piccolo's left charred by the end of the exchange, though nothing compared to either Goku or Gohan's peppered injuries.
Surely… It's only time until one of them drops… and then it'll be game over.
I need to keep going. I've gotta' outlast him. That's it by this point; it's just about who can keep their head above water.
Gohan skids a great distance, gripping at his chest. He comes to a standstill in a large clearing that's flat and framed by boulders, leaving him with little space to exercise within. The dragon suspends over him, just above the stairway.
Goku awkwardly lands one side, Piccolo the other.
And then, beautifully… there's a miracle.
Gohan squares his shoulders, noticing luck turn against him.
"Rixas."
He's been extradited.
When a person is ejected from a country and stripped of their citizenship, one might suggest a loss of identity, perhaps even a loss of pathway. Where is home now? How does one stay connected to their roots, to their loved ones? What is left for them? What is next?
Gohan is no longer tied to the Almighty. Though he worries not about the next, but about the if. He worries about if this is all possible now that he's without his greatest ally.
His chest aches.
And Gohan suffers. The great bite of loneliness that came from his deportation has weakened him – leaving him unable to sprint and forcing him to crawl through the mud and brambles without his Holy Super Saiyan transformation. And whatever this transformation is that he's been left with is inadequate. It's slower, less powerful. When he dispels energy it doesn't reach a fraction of the power it once did. Within him, there's an empty grave, one that's been unearthed and is now missing whatever was buried there so deeply and perfectly before. A part of his soul, perhaps. Is that possible? Did they steal his soul?
Is that why everything is so fucking horrible now?
The world is dismally unsaturated. It's ugly. It's painful and wrong and Gohan doesn't give a fuck about existing in something so foul. He hates it all.
There's nothing left here. His Almighty is gone. Quell is dead. Rixas will be dead soon enough. Gohan might as well finish what he started here and allow the next reign of Gods of Revelation to take the mantle.
Dying will be easy. He's close to death already. Everlasting death too, or so he guesses after catching a glimpse of the halo above his own head. So long as he makes his wish before that happens then it'll all be worth it, even his disconnection from the Almighty, even the mounting bodies, the slaughter… Gohan's already committed so much evil in the name of this.
Yet…
He pants, eyes dragging over Piccolo and his father.
They did this to him.
This evil. This unforgivable evil.
They stole his holy shrine. For when this is all over and he is ashes, where will he go? Not to the Almighty, not to be with Quell. He'll disappear. He'll be a memory of a visionary, of a violent god who changed everything and ceased to exist even in his predestined resting place. One day, they will read of this moment likely retold by a creature of oracle. They will learn about the demise within Universe Seven by He who achieved the Revelation…
Haed had been right. This existence is ugly and even if the best amongst us are to suffer the worst, what does that mean for the rest?
Gohan holds his gaze upon the man who was supposed to love him most of all, who conspired with the Kai to have Gohan purged of his holiness. Slowly, Gohan had begun to realise that he wasn't meant to simply change everything. He was meant to destroy it.
Everything has an end, and once that's achieved then a new beginning can be created. No-one will know, no-one will hurt. The wish will be painless. Gohan is not cruel after all. There will be nobody left to behind to grieve. They'll all go together when they go.
Ironically, the other side will never know what they are fighting for. They will never know that this has extended beyond that of energy. That they're scrambling for their right to live.
Gohan wonders, in a strange off-thought, if Majin Buu had been created for this very reason, if his Majin roots had been tied to some sort of smothered desire within Famis to cleanse. After all, Majin Buu had been the last creature crazed enough to chase this feat, except Gohan is taking it a step further. Why stop with the mortals when the Gods are as equally guilty of sin?
He swallows an empty laugh.
Gohan is an equal opportunity killer.
If it's not laughter, its tears and Gohan has already shed so many.
But then…
Then everything becomes worse and as such, that dour amusement dies as fast as it'd reared its head.
"Rixas," he realizes, is advancing upon their party of three. A corpse as much as the rest of them.
He collapses to his knees and Father is the one to capture him before he bites the dirt, but Gohan can see that Rixas doesn't want to be touched. He's pushing Father away. The only fight left in him is not physical. He has come to say his piece and then die in battle like Quell, or perchance succumb to his wounds and fall into a dreamless, unknowing sleep.
"Mori…"
Hands reach out to him, unfurling in the air and so desperate to have Gohan in them. The Almighty has lost two children today, Rixas two brothers.
"Please," he gasps in Lanit-Tongue. "Mori, come here, please, I… I can't… Quell… You…"
Not even the dragon balls can bring someone back from the Almighty.
Gohan remains strong. "He's dead."
Rixas doesn't even try to hold it in. He barks out a sad, pitiful noise Gohan understands too well. His father stumbles backwards when Rixas crushes a fist into the dirt.
"I don't care anymore…" Rixas finally manages through a quagmire of tears, "Do your Revelation but just don't leave me. Please. Mori."
He's submissive and beaten. Gohan stares at the husk.
"Everyone else is dead. I cannot lose you," he continues wetly with watery, golden almonds that shine far brighter than Gohan's. Why does he need to worry about being alone? He is still connected to the Almighty, Gohan notices jealously. When he dies he will return to Quell and Famis.
It will be Gohan who will be alone. In the Void of Passing perhaps. Hadn't that been his excuse when he was on Earth? How funny. Haed's right once more. Life is a circle, except… circles are never ending.
Revelation will reshape that. A circle will be no more.
"Baby brother…" Rixas grounds his nails into the filth, his head bowed. He's devastated and starving for affection – for reassurance – and for love.
The Gods of Revelation have been known to love fiercely. Gohan loves fiercely. That's what the problem has been all along. This is the double-edged blade Mori equipped with the reincarnation; with power came the need to use it to protect others. He'd given Gohan the reins to finish this, but didn't why he foresee this? The sled had been doomed from the start.
"I can't feel you through our Connection," Rixas says, "But so long as you're alive…"
"For now."
His brother grits his teeth, the excessive of saliva hissing.
Gohan trudges best he can towards Rixas, ignoring both his father and Piccolo without being foolish enough to provide them an opening. When he kneels down on one leg, Piccolo actually drags his father backwards and out of Gohan's peripheral. They're apparently sentimental enough to give Gohan and Rixas their space. How reckless, he considers. Gohan could slit Rixas' throat right now and they'd not have the speed or the power to stop him. Are they relying on Rixas to talk some sense into him? If only they could understand his words now.
Rixas' hands bunch into Gohan's frayed shirt.
"Don't go," he grovels. "I love you."
Gohan rests a hand atop the shaking ones so close to where his heart should be. "I love you too, Rixas," he returns, determined not to yet break. He pauses, considering how to next proceed. "But don't worry. You won't be alone. When I'm done here, you'll be whole again. A new life beyond this."
Sad and confused, Rixas looks up at him. "Mori?"
The smile Gohan gives him feels foreign after so long. "Give them my love, brother."
Panic. "What do—?"
The fear could be dangerous, re-energizing possibly, and facing three when two is already difficult enough could be the turn not in his favour.
Rixas' retreat comes all too late. Gohan strikes at the carotid nerve on the neck. This returns Rixas to his slumber, contorting him into a slump against Gohan's chest where he breathes quietly, free of this. Gently lowering him against a boulder, Gohan takes the opportunity to feel atop his hip and the loop around his waist. It's here where unclips as many bails as time allows.
And then he savours the image of his brother.
His best friend.
Goodbye.
"Gohan, talk to u—"
Gohan swings around, making use of the bails and the throwing knives attached to them. His father dodges but that leaves Piccolo in his shadow, vulnerable when all three do indeed cut into green, bruising flesh, the velocity of the throw enough to project him backwards. Gohan has a fourth shuriken but his father grapples it free by bashing Gohan's hand against an opposing rock wall. In turn, Gohan head butts him.
A white shock of pain sends Gohan light-headed. It's like head butting katchin, he thinks viciously, stumbling in ambition of balance.
From behind, Gohan hears it. "Special Beam Cannon!"
He only avoids it by a fraction, but that leaves him open to the next pitfall.
"Solar FLARE!"
Gohan growls, his hands unwittingly shooting up to shelter his burning, blinded eyes. He's never been a recipient until now so he never realized how much it stings, or how dry and hot it is. He refuses to wilt into his heat however. When he dies it will be once his ambition has been achieved and not a moment sooner!
Gohan will become nothing only then.
There's no surprise when he's punched. It doesn't even hurt. The shock of hitting the ground has Gohan swallow a gulp of air. Blindly, he tries to get his bearings, his hands tracing circles quickly in the air and along the ground in anticipation for an attack.
Oh. Sharp.
He feels something on the floor.
It's a blade. One of Rixas' shuriken.
He throws it when he feels the movement in the air. There's a nearby squelch of metal hitting meat followed by Piccolo's rough, guttural grunt.
"Piccolo!" he hears his father shout.
Gohan still can't see but his other senses are sharp enough to navigate backwards.
"Take it out!" his father demands, "Quickly! That's what killed Quell—"
There's a chill. What had Gohan thrown? It wouldn't have been the shuriken that took his brother's li— Gohan breathes hard, chest constricting. Everything feels smaller. The blindness doesn't help. In the white all he can envision is his brother's lifeless face. His hand loosening in his hair, his eyes dimming…
Gohan slaps a fist against his temple. No, he can't do this to himself. Not now when he's so close.
His wish… Gohan needs to make his wish.
Beyond, there's a wet crunch. The sound of tearing flesh. Piccolo must have removed whatever limb Gohan had managed to bury the blade into.
This is his chance.
His world still a snowy haze, Gohan brings both hands together in the direction of sound.
"Ka… me…"
It's not one of the fast equivalents.
"ha… me…"
The last time he made one of this calibre…
"HAAAAAAAAAA!"
His father died.
The energy drains out through Gohan's arm blood through a needle. By the Almighty, Gohan suffers for it. It exhausts him so suddenly that he feels his transformation dissolve away as a sacrifice to strengthen of the attack. Beads of sweat collect in his eyes. If this fails then Gohan will be in hot water. Throwing out a blind Kamehameha Wave is a terrible idea but the desperation depleted him of any other solutions. Only weak logic remained. A Kamehameha Wave worked before and it'll work now. It has to.
Ultimately, the blindness does begin to ease and blue begins to border his vision, the energy itself so incandescent that it could have been mistaken for Solar Flare.
Gohan screams.
Blue crashes in waves... until it eventually trickles into spit.
When it's over, Gohan sinks to his knees, winded. His Super Saiyan God transformation has indeed simmered away. There's no coloured tint to his skin, the soft, faux divinity of the ascension now but an echo. His aura has shrunken. He's been reduced to his base form.
For a short time, Gohan can only hear the hum of the dragon's power and his own laboured breathing. Rocks clack against one another only when he attempts to stabilize himself. There's a continued stagger when he does finally rise, like a series of tics that disrupts his path over crumbled rubble. The debris has mounted and it's awkward to navigate, making Gohan trip several times as he slowly makes his way to the hovering dragon.
His father and Piccolo must be buried under it. Dead perhaps because he senses neither of them. His father wouldn't have had time for that blasted Instant Transmission. He would have been agonizing over Piccolo at the time, Gohan's sure of it.
Yet, that doesn't mean he's alone.
At the base of the stairs to the dragon, the Supreme Kai awaits him.
"You," Gohan breathes out.
Damn it! Why are there so many fucking worms in his way? Why can't it be simple? Why must they test him?
He slaps a hand against his temple, breathing hard.
Won't they let him die in peace? Why can't he just do right by the universe?
"I am sorry," Shin opens with, "What you must think of me for doing what I just did to you."
So he's the one who stole Gohan's Almighty…
Gohan swallows his rage, still panting, still bleeding. "I spared you so many times," he reminds him, furious at his own kindness, "I gave you multiple chances because I believed in you."
The Supreme Kai offers a strained smile. "It was generous of you."
"Yet you showed why the gods should never trust your kind! Even the best of you…"
"We are individuals," he returns softly, the golden heat of power radiating from behind and making him appear grander than he is. "I don't serve the Kai because I am myself a kai. I serve the Kai because the institution is my instrument to do what is right, Lord Mori. It so happens to be led by the kais, and whilst many of my friends are kais, my loyalty has always been not to them but to justice."
Gohan advances up a step. "And still, you refused me. I am justice."
Shin holds Gohan's gaze, expression still so patient and intent on not angering Gohan.
"Revelation is cast by those biased to the Almighty. It is difficult to support when mania is so often the driving power behind it."
"Do I look manic now?"
"You look tired, my lord."
That much is true. Gohan laughs, the tone high-pitched and foreign.
"You are not serving Revelation by doing this," Shin elaborates, "Not when you have been released from the shackles of the Almighty. You take no power from its source. This wish you make now… you make as a lost soul, as an ambling, spectral echo of what you once were. Does that give you the right, my lord? Or even, are you even Lord Mori now? How much of you can be called Lord Mori and how much can be called Gohan Son?"
"None of you have been listening," Gohan returns, his throat a knot "In the end, it doesn't matter who I am. What matters is the result… I will save you all by changing the eternal tide. I will save you all from yourselves."
"What do you mean?"
Gohan laughs again because it's a ludicrous thing to explain. How he believes in the dream of the man who slaughtered his brother…
His heart shakes in his chest.
And he remembers.
The blade had been a poker through Quell's chest, red and in gesture of Gohan. He remembers seeing it drink in Quell's life, he remembers it disappearing back into its fleshy home, and he remembers thinking how quick it'd all been.
"My lord—!"
Gohan bites on his own hand to stop himself breaking. Soon. He will not have to fight these emotions that are trying to infiltrate him.
"Gohan," the Supreme Kai pushes, "Please elaborate—" His words die when Gohan meets his eyes, the fear so obvious, so saccharine now that Gohan can enjoy the sensation from someone else that isn't Quell. "This is not what you want," the fool dares to say, as though Gohan has ever wanted anything else – as though Gohan had not existed for this moment alone.
Closing words are difficult. He instead gives him a smile, his weapon. "Good game, Shin... But as you so pointed out; I am tired, and before I take my long, eternal rest, I have a wish to make… "
"No, wait—"
"Goodbye."
He sends a shockwave of energy towards the kai. The Supreme Kai isn't strong by any stretch of the word, not compared to the fighters he faced today, so he descends into the depth of the debris. If luck should have it, he won't be getting up again.
Gohan takes another step. His path is clear.
The royal might of the dragon welcomes him, the expectant stare sending a jolt of excitement straight to Gohan's heart.
"GOHAAAAAAN!"
He stops.
When will this end? Why won't they just let him make his fucking wish? Gohan hisses, coiling where he stands to come face to face with the most stubborn, ridiculous idiot to challenge him thus far.
Goten stands there, the rubble his mountain.
Father's Power Pole in hand and pointed out in gesture of him, his face twisted to suit numerous diverse emotions but none of them resembling fear. He glares down at Gohan, his simple earthling clothing dirt-smeared but none the less bright against the wasteland surrounding them. He's bright. Like a star.
Like Dad.
Gohan truly faces him, overwhelmed by the shock of it.
"I won't let you do this!" the child – Gohan's little brother – roars, having the audacity to look so much like the hero. Gohan's reminded of his book collection, of the knights who save the princess from the evil, malicious villain.
"…It's too late," Gohan finally manages through near cemented lips, "This is it, Goten. The only one who remains… is me."
"And me."
"Don't be imprudent. You have no power."
Goten doesn't flinch. "And you look about ready to drop dead."
"This much is true but you are no fighter, Goten."
"But there's no one else." He's using Gohan's words against him. "What you're doing is wrong and I can't stand by and let that happen. I know I can't match you but I've gotta' try or everyone will lose what I've already lost – and I wish that on nobody, Gohan! It's horrible and it's wrong and I'll—"
"You foolish boy," Gohan admonishes, "I will kill you."
"Then kill me!"
The Power Pole juts out, admittedly surprising Gohan and smacking him in the face and onto his back. He slides down several steps until he manages to catch his footing. Goten even looks shocked by the pole's actions, but as Gohan once told Goten all those months ago, a weapons acts not of its own accord but its user's.
Gohan stands, raising his hand and capturing the extension of the pole when it comes for him once more. He uses it as leverage when Goten recalls it, hijacking the free ride and immediately punching Goten across the face when he lands.
Goten spins into the debris, spluttering.
"They're all dead," Gohan tells him, "What makes you think I won't kill you too?"
His brother looks over his shoulder back him, lip bloody and already swollen. Gohan snags him upwards by that bright, hideous top and really grounds in how much the villain he has become. If Goten is the hero then that leaves Gohan's role as the foil, right? The dastardly bastard who takes pleasure in hurting.
"If everyone else is dead, Goten, then think about Trunks' fate. Do you think I spared him?"
Goten goes slack. "You're lying," he whispers after a beat of silence. "YOU'RE LYING!"
The Power Pole takes its third and final shot. Gohan snatches the retched thing and throws it in lieu of the dragon. He hits Goten again for daring to use it against him, and then he hits him once more because that stupid, shocked face is angering him. It's the same face another teenaged idiot made before he died mere feet from under Gohan's nose.
Goten coughs out a wad of blood. He's on all fours, giving ample opportunity for Gohan to give him a swift kick in the stomach. His brother whines, withdrawing in on himself and rolling onto his side.
He's crying, not from the pain, no. For Trunks. Maybe for Gohan too. For his situation.
Gohan kneels down over him, and although isn't sure at first eventually settles a hand on Goten's head. After all this will be the last time they will speak. If he can afford kindness for one brother then why not the other?
"Oh, Goten…"
The boy whines.
So Gohan's fingers splay in black knotted straw to ease him. "You're brave to face me like this," he praises lowly, "You've grown so much."
Goten groans, still clutching his gut.
"I'm not happy you're here… but I am happy to see you a final time."
"G'haaaaan…"
"And I'm impressed," he admits gravelly, "Throughout all this, you were the real dark horse, Goten, you were the one I should have watched more. You were the first to suspect something afoul with me, you thwarted my Zealites, you found your way to the Estate, you conspired with Rixas for my dragon ball… You, you, you…
"You're strong in spite of having no energy, you're bright and resourceful. And you've always achieved what you set out to do yet you still doubt yourself… I'll never understand that."
Gohan hums, contemplative. Then, he leans down, planting a kiss at the base of the hairline.
"I love you, Goten."
"G'haaaan! N-n… Please!"
Gohan stands to attention, limping. The dragon is further away now but not far. His ruined body can make it the distance, even if he'll have to drag himself.
Yet when he goes, a weight encircles his waist from behind and Gohan soon feels the heat of his brother's face pressed against his back.
"W-Wait, please," he cries into Gohan's tailbone. "I just… I… Before you do it… just… talk to me a minute… please."
Gohan has limited minutes. He goes to peel away the fingers from his waist but they take hold of him too. "Please."
"Goten…"
"I'm s'rry," Goten tells him, "For Earth… and for n-not seeing you as a person. You were right. I'm sorry. Just… I wanted to be you. And… they wanted that too, Mum and Dad, and if you go now, Gohan, who will…?"
In spite of his gut, Gohan turns back around and crouches low into the rocks and remaining sand. "Goten," he breathes, sweeping a hand back through the teenager's hair. "They love you."
"No… Growing up, I knew it. You… you're the only one who saw me for me."
Gohan stares at the earnestness of it. His eyes heat.
"I could say the same about you," he admits to his brother. "Back on Earth, you were the only one to notice I was… pretending."
Goten sobs in acknowledgement, wiping his bloodied nose along his sleeve.
"I wish you never left me," he goes on to say, "I know you didn't have a choice, not really, but I still can't help resenting being left alone. You dying… was the worst thing to ever happen to me."
It's hard to have a response to that, so they sit in silence as Gohan feels the weight of his body grow heavier by the second. He knows he's on a timer but leaving like this… It's harder than it should be.
Dark, harrowed eyes await something from him.
"Goten," he says stickily, lowly, "Before… you…" He swallows, finding the truth harder to reveal than it is to gut and kill a man. "Goten, before you were born, back after Dad died… I'd been very sad. I didn't understand why he'd want to be away from me or you or Mum despite his reasoning being adequate enough at the time. It got into my head that it was me. I'd caused Cell to kill him after all. I held a level of responsibility in his death.
"And after training for all those years beforehand…" He sighs. "I'd started really young, much like you, but there'd been this pressure, Goten, all the time, a sensation that at any point an enemy would come to Earth and kill everyone. The saiyans, the androids, Cell... One after the other, always a threat, always a purpose…
"At the same time I lost Dad I also didn't need to train anymore, not like before. There was no looming threat. No promised bad guy. On the same day that Dad died I also lost that purpose, my reason to be."
Gohan rolls his lips, looking far beyond and over Goten's head.
"You need that, right… a purpose?" Goten urges.
"Yes."
"And… that was me when I was born?"
"…Yes." Gohan wipes at his eye, "Mum was just as desperate for the distraction, mind. We both kind of threw ourselves into raising you. I used to take you most of the time because Mum was busy with so much already with the house and her piano lessons, and well, I just loved doing it anyway. I've always loved little kids.
"Yes…You were my purpose for a long time, until Dad came home. Until I died."
"But then you came back again."
"Yes."
Goten's hand is clammy in his.
"I bet you would have been a really good dad," he then tells Gohan, "You were to me."
Gohan stares at his brother for such a long time that Hell might as well not exist around them, that they could be home together on Earth and under the stars as they would have been when Gohan last stayed there.
Then it's ruined.
There's an arm snaked around his throat. Gohan chokes on it and then on the realization that this entire fucking conversation had been not without trickery. Goten doesn't look shocked at seeing their father choking him out. In fact, he looks relieved, as though his plan of stalling Gohan had worked.
Damn it! If Gohan had just looked back towards the dragon just once or put some effort into sensing his surroundings instead of lowering his guard for this child, then he wouldn't be feeling his limbs grow aspic.
Gohan thinks quickly. There's only so long he'll manage until he passes out, then it'll all be over. He doesn't fight back against his father. Instead, he raises a weak palm high in direction of Goten, cultivating his dregs of energy. It isn't much but it'll be enough to finish him.
Shining white shimmers like a blade.
His father seems to understand the situation. The noose around Gohan's neck loosens. He's seen enough now to know that Gohan is not bluffing. It's like a game of Rock, Paper, Scissors and they've all pulled a draw, with both Gohan and his father's time limit hanging above their heads. He feels his father's heart hammer at speed, his arms are unstable in their hook and much like Gohan, his transformation has deserted him, leaving him the weakest he's yet been.
"Do it, Dad!" Goten snaps at him.
Gohan doesn't respond. Neither does their father.
"Dad!"
"Release me," Gohan demands in a measured whisper. "Or I'll do it."
"If you let him go then it's over!"
Gohan feels the vibration of frustration from his shoulders. His father growls, head digging into Gohan's back painfully. When the grip begins to loosen, victory looms ever closer. Goten cries out when Dad unhooks has hands, yet Gohan won't give them reprieve. That balled energy can't go to waste. He orbits the light, snatching up his father's black hair and burying the fire into his face.
"Dad!"
There is no explosion, though his father does crumble backwards and down into the mound of dirt. He skids to a stop, unmoving.
"Gohan, you—!"
He kicks Goten down to join him, unable to look at the manipulative brat a second longer. This has gotten out of hand. This has strayed too far.
Nobody will ruin this.
He paces in reach of his wish.
They'd been so close.
Goten'd thought after the ritual that maybe Gohan would have regained his senses, that he would have realized that everything's turned out crazy and so many people have senselessly died for this. But when Goten saw him dispose of the Supreme Kai like that he knew that the plan hadn't worked. That Gohan still desired Revelation more than anything else. He's desperate for it. Manic. There'd been hunger gleaming in those golden, frightening eyes.
So he'd tried appealing to Gohan's nurturing nature. It never failed in the past and it didn't fail here. After spotting his dad emerging from the debris, he'd known he needed to keep Gohan busy at least a few minutes. So he'd talked, begged even. He'd used the truth as a weapon just to prolong Gohan's attention onto him.
It'd worked. Somehow, Dad had managed to capture him. But Gohan's adaptable and cruel enough to use Goten against their father, and that he did.
Your son or your power?
That was the unspoken question. And Dad had chosen him. Goten. Dad had chosen him over what he loves more than anything else. He lives for fighting. Ki is his method of expression in the same way that paintbrushes are Goten's. Yet, he chose Goten. The second son. The one Goten believed he loved less.
Goten stutters out a sob.
Dad…
He's managed to crawl over to him.
"D-Don't close your eyes," Goten tells him, pulling at the raggedy scrap of gi that's coming lose. It tears in his hand and Goten forces himself to push at his dad's mess of a chest. There are deep gouges that look horrifically tender. They're really raised, looking so red and enflamed that it could be confused for a bleed. There's plenty of that too. Blood. Dad's sitting in a puddle of it; most of it a halo around his head and neck as if to emphasize the blackened thumbprints pressing into his throat.
His eyes are shut but twitching. Goten taps his cheeks. "C'mon… Not yet. Get up!"
"Go…ten…"
"D-Dad. Stay with me."
He takes his dad's hand when it's offered to him.
"You… did well," Dad praises, scratchy, "I'm proud."
It's whiplash. Gohan had just said the same thing. The memory makes Goten want to stand up and drag his father up into fighting position. They can't go out like this.
"'M sorry..." Dad's looking at him, dark eyes exhausted. "I think… I'm done."
"We can't let Gohan do this—"
"S'over…"
"No, it's not! Get up!"
Somehow, he manages to strain his dad onto his feet but it doesn't take more than a moment until he has to sling him over his back. It's fine. He just needs some rest. Then he'll be able to take Gohan down and it'll be over. Gohan will come home.
There's struggle in getting his father over the minefield of rubble. He has to continuously shuffle him higher throughout the journey to the stairs, slipping several times and forcing himself to push on despite wanting nothing more than to sit down and cry.
When the stairs come into focus, as does Gohan's back. He's already conversing with the dragon.
"NO!" Goten screams, blood flying amongst the spittle. "Dad! Get up! Do something!"
But he's slumped over Goten's back, long gone to the world. Slow, shallow breathes make Goten feel cold, as though he'll never be happy again, his final hope slowly dying whilst he himself has the power to do nothing.
Goten finds it in himself to jog the stairs. Dad bounces with each step, still none the wiser. Blood leaks hotly and all his wounds have probably been irritated yet Goten doesn't stop. They can't. If they stop then there's no one else. Dad would want him to fight, right? He'll die if he has to – like Trunks and probably Piccolo and everyone else who got in Gohan's way. They all tried. They all wanted to help.
When those furious golden eyes lock onto them there's nothing anyone can do to help. A deer in the headlights, Goten's legs become uncooperative. It's awful.
There's a twitch.
And Goten realizes that Gohan's gone weird again. He smacks a hand against his head, furrowing his brow into frustration and cracking all the dried blood amassed there.
"Gohan… You're not… ri—"
"Just stay DOWN!"
Gohan kicks them from the stairs, growling. Dad cushions his fall and Goten presses against him when Gohan comes to loom above, hand poised above as the bringer of death. Nothing happens except for an occasional spark between his fingertips.
"D-Damn it," Gohan snarls. "COME ON!"
He screams and finally an orb of blotchy, unsymmetrical energy formulates.
"Don't!" Goten shouts up at him, "We're your family!"
Gohan lifts his chin, hiding his expression. "Please. Just die."
He presses the ball forward.
The sluggish, torturous voyage of the ball does not give Goten the time to escape but it does give him the time for his body to tense in fear, for the lump in his throat to retch out as a wet, terrified wail. He holds his dad. Dying hadn't been scary the first time because he'd been asleep. But now…
His eyes squeeze shut.
Silence, except the whirring energy of the dragon.
It lingers until…
There's laughter.
It's Gohan, and now he's wheezing; a vacant, unnerving sound, urging Goten to open his eyes to see what – or rather, who – is enough to push Gohan over the edge like this.
"You are cockroaches," Gohan complains wetly, still somewhere between devastation and delight. Teetering. Unhinged and so unbalanced that when he charges down the steps he can't contain the frenzied giggles.
The shadow cast over Goten doesn't react.
"Look at yourself, Gohan. There's nothing left of you."
Goten whimpers from the relief.
Vegeta.
Is this a test of Gohan's patience or of his lacking virtue? He already knows how evil he is so why does he over and over have to put these people down? Why won't they stay where he buries them? Why won't they die?
Vegeta.
Vegeta.
Oh, it started as a rumble in his chest but soon enough he laughs, and he laughs and laughs because this is ridiculous. How fate savours his misfortune. Gohan refuses to be finished off by this cruel, small-minded excuse of a warrior.
"Look at yourself, Gohan… There's nothing left of you."
The haughty attitude has Gohan sober remarkably fast. He sucks in a deep breath, eyeing Vegeta with immense distaste and taking in the state he's allowed himself to get into. Burns stripe up and along his bare chest, the wounds blistering. Pus has already begun to mar them with yellow, oozing shells that make him look all the more monstrous. He's entirely cooked, smell and all.
Gohan knows the outcome of Khlōros when he sees it. This is how the more privileged bodies appear once the smoke has cleared. The worst simply disintegrate. So it begs the question; how did Vegeta survive it when no-one else has been able to?
Ah.
Oh, he understands. Vegeta didn't survive it at all. Much like Gohan, there is a halo above his head and circling the spike of his hair. He must have died during the assault on the Last One and then spawned where he already was, in the exact place he would have been sentenced to anyway: Hell. Gohan can envision it now. Vegeta regaining his sense of self after the monster's destruction just to then continue to suffer the wrath of Khlōros' fury, only now without the shield of Haed's creature.
This is fortunate. Had Vegeta been deposited anywhere else then quite possibly he would have regained his usual power and would have been able to take Gohan down now.
Alas, that is not the case.
Gohan observes the other saiyan and how he holds onto his wounds, how he pants. He's as useless as the rest of them.
"Why are you here?" Gohan asks, "You know you're no match for me."
Vegeta sneers.
"For Trunks?" he goads because fuck him for interrupting Gohan. Fuck all of them. "Are you aiming for revenge, Vegeta?"
"Don't you get it, boy?" he spits, "Just because we're weaker doesn't mean we will just let someone like you win. You're a lost soul, a coward that's never changed. Don't think I don't see that." There's a snarl like some rabid mutt. "You're just some brat hiding behind ridiculous statements of grandeur. Taunting me with my own son's murder? Really, Gohan. Remember who you're dealing with."
"I know you very well," Gohan enlightens him, overcoming his exhaustion from the heat of hatred, "You're rich for calling me a coward."
"You want to purge mortals of their power because you're scared of what they'll do with it. What part of that doesn't scream cowardice?"
Gohan bites his lip.
Revelation will be a wish more than that.
"I'll never forgive you for what you did to my son," Vegeta continues, "How you still walk around with the air that you're doing the right thing… it sickens me. But I actually feel pity for you, Gohan. Somehow, I imagine you've persuaded yourself that you're doing the right thing, that you were justified in murdering all these people – that you're good — is that right?"
"Everyone is good in their own eyes. One just has to decide where their definition of good falls," Gohan tightly returns. There's a pillar to his right and he leans against it, aching. "Though should I remind you of the billions you've slayed? Had you still been active during my purge then I would have buried you alive."
"Instead you murder my son."
"Perhaps you should have taken better care of him."
Vegeta suffocates on his own sudden fury, collapsing down onto his knees with indignant spluttering that warms Gohan's stomach. His wounds will claim him just as it will claim the others, like it will claim Gohan should he not hurry along with his wish. Whatever hole Vegeta crawled out of, he should return to it and await his demise quietly.
But then, Vegeta utters two very quiet words.
"…You're right."
Gohan's eyebrows soar to his hairline.
Oh.
He stares at Gohan with an anchor of guilt, with shame.
"Yes, well…" Gohan mulls over his next words. "You never know the value of a moment until it becomes a memory. Like a ghoul, you fed on negativity, and this is what pushed him aside and forced him to seek your approval through partaking in reckless, violent fights. You only have yourself to blame."
"Don't you think I know that?! Do you think that I'm not sorry?!"
The surprise has Gohan cough into his hand. Blood. He turns to take the steps up to the dragon, his body is failing—
"Wait, I'm not done!"
Gohan is.
"I have no interest in suffering your tripe, Vegeta."
"Please!" he calls out, that being enough to stop Gohan in his tracks again. Had he just heard right? "Gohan… just listen to what I have to say… please."
Swaying, Gohan releases a sigh. He owes Vegeta nothing.
Another step is taken up the staircase.
"Gohan!" he then hears Goten gasp, voice shocked as opposed to scared. It's curiousity that has Gohan return a look over his shoulder, and a glance is all it takes before he spins from the horror of the image.
"Please," Vegeta repeats, still on his knees, bowing.
"W-What are you doing?"
"I'm begging, you impertinent brat," Vegeta seethes, "What does it look like? Listen to me. Before you make that stupid wish I deserve to be heard. Please at least honour me that."
Gohan laughs from the incredulity of it. "You're joking. After everything…"
Vegeta's eyes are blackened pinpricks, lit by a fire. "Especially after everything."
Trunks…
Several precious seconds trickle by before Gohan allows himself yet another foolish kindness. "Get to it then," he snaps, "Spit it out."
Vegeta staggers back up to his feet, thank the Almighty. There's a spotty breath taken, and although despite being many a stair lower than Gohan, he doesn't wilt. He doesn't look like a man who just sacrificed his pride to the person he likely hates most of all.
"By doing your Revelation, Gohan, you sentence me and millions others to ruin," he opens with. As expected… a typical self-centred complaint. "Tch! You look down on me even now because you don't understand – you never have because you've always hated your saiyan heritage! – And because of that you think fighting is beneath you despite drawing your strength from it. You don't understand the love for power we have, the love for the freedom to grow ourselves—"
"At the detriment of others."
"In spite of others!" Vegeta bites back, "As long as I've existed, the Saiyan people have been regarded as slaves. The same can be said for my father and his father, and perhaps even his father before him. Kings over people who have been everlastingly pressing back against oppressors who sought to use us as warriors in whatever politics they served. But we were never truly controlled. They could never break us. We were too strong, too powerful… too wilful. Should we have been stripped of our manna then perhaps we would have fallen in line."
"Without your manna you would have never been turned into slaves in the first place."
"Tch. Do we deserve to be stripped of something that is so inherently woven into Saiyan culture because some lords became greedy? Is that fair, Gohan?"
"No, but it's right."
Vegeta clicks his tongue, breathing hard. "It is our right to protest those above us. And to do that we need power, we need ki. If you take that then we'll all have to fall in line just as those lords expected us to. Is that what you want, hmm – as a god? To have the mortals at your mercy? Has that been your true intention all along?"
The accusation throws Gohan. The pillar is yet again grasped. "No! I want peace, not servants."
"By doing this you are broadening the gap between us mortals and the gods. We'll never be able to contest anything again."
"But we'll never give up!" Goten adds in a raw, urgent promise, squeezing at their father's arm draped around his neck. "Like now. You may be stronger than all of us, Gohan, but we won't just let you have your way and decide for us just 'cause you're scared of our energy!"
"A coward," Vegeta reiterates.
"You've not seen what I've seen," Gohan defends, "The wicked—" And then he remembers, if someone would understand then it would be Vegeta, a perpetrator to so many of the crimes that inspired Gohan to take this route in the first place.
"If you do this there is no going back. You will weaken us into becoming subservient prisoners to your most precious divine, to the Kai who's fucked up time and time again."
That won't be a problem, Gohan thinks, not with his ambition.
The wish he could make.
What he should make.
True Revelation – because the universe is evil.
This man here is evil. He is the worst of the worst.
"We deserve our power," Vegeta adds, his body finally tiring so much so that he returns to his knees. "We deserve our right to protest. Just because you are a god… it does not give you absolute control over us!"
Gohan stares, mouth dry. He listens for the Almighty's advice but in its place, silence.
"You might as well be stealing our right to breathe!"
"D-Don't be ridiculous," Gohan returns, "That is hardly relatable."
"That's because you don't understand something outside of your own belief system!" Vegeta forces out, "Our ki is our life force and you want us to be disconnected from that."
Like how Gohan was disconnected from his Almighty.
Never before has he felt so naked and alone.
"You've always been sensitive," he breathes out, "I call this a fault but the others see something positive about it, I suppose. Irrespective, with this outlook of yours, I know what's out there must have hurt you. Scared you, perhaps. You're still young enough and green enough to be upset by the reality of the universe."
Gohan feels his mouth set into a thin line. "Vegeta."
"What I'm saying is you must have been affected a lot," comes the growl, him sliding ever lower as his own exhaustion becomes him. He wills himself to shout. "A-And that I'm not thick-skulled enough to ignore that! You want it to change, right? That's what all this is for? Change?
"Then give us a chance… let us do it."
Gohan leans down. "What? How?"
Vegeta's eyes have become half-lidded as he continues to slump. "Before you strip us of our power… please, give us the opportunity to change ourselves. Don't deny us mortals our pride or our autonomy. Please… Let us do our own… Revelation."
Gohan's brow furrows and he repeats himself, incredulous. "What?"
When Vegeta doesn't reply, Gohan calls his name. How dare he ignore him? What's he even saying? "What do you even mean by that? Oi, Vegeta—!"
"I think… he's passed out," Goten informs him.
The silence following is overwhelming. Goten watches him as though he's looking at something he's never seen before, a flitter of something hopeful across the eyes as Gohan tries to digest Vegeta's ridiculous last words.
"Please… Let us do our own… Revelation."
This is the worst of the worst, he reminds himself, before then turning to Goten and their father, two of what Gohan would consider the best of the best. Haed had talked of even the purest of this universe, the Upperworld, being reaped, so what does that mean for the worst? Gohan had assumed that suggested a lack of hope, yet talking to Vegeta suggested otherwise.
He is brimming with desire, Gohan reflects, to do better. It burns him with frustration.
"You only have yourself to blame," Gohan had needled in terms of Trunks.
"Don't you think I know that?! Do you think that I'm not sorry?!"
Gohan remembers Vegeta in a very different light growing up. The cruelties. The evilness. The bloodlust upon torturing Gohan's beloved father. But Gohan also recalls another side. They'd been allies for years, protecting the Earth and quietly holding respect for one another even as Gohan's powered dwindled after the Cell Games. He'd pushed Gohan to be better, and when Gohan hadn't been good enough he'd been the one to step up next to his father and defeat even Majin Buu. He'd been reliable. Not good, but better.
A horrible man nonetheless but still so much better than what he had once been.
A lifeless, hateful stone budding into a flower.
Changed.
Gohan rubs his eyes and along the wetness that's gathered there.
"Gohan…"
He wants to speak to Quell or the Almighty or even Mori. Someone who might be able to make this easier.
"I'm so confused," he admits in a whisper.
Tired tears pour down both cheeks. So suddenly the idea of Haed's Revelation makes Gohan frightened, especially with how close he'd come to asking the dragon to perform it without even talking with his Almighty or Quell. Now, the idea to cleanse the universe (with all its ugly and beauty) sends a piercing panic directly to his chest.
Does he want it? Does he not? The fog that's made things so much simpler is thinning and all it reveals is pain.
Gohan doubles over, nauseous.
Really, the clouds are parting, and it is true that he cannot think clearly yet, but at least he feels some of the sun on his skin. It burns but it's something.
God. Good God…
Vegeta, the name anchors so many instances; so many times Gohan had wanted to forget after he consumed the sandstone. It ignites memory after memory, connecting so many people and occasions until Gohan remembers what it was like to live and fail as a mortal.
He remembers what it is like to fight as one too, to protect his family and friends; the simplicities of existence and the magnificence of the small day-to-day joys that came despite looming androids, aliens or whatever else. There'd been something wonderful in having the strength to protect.
That's all Gohan wants to do… even now.
He wants to protect them, all of them, everyone. He wants them all to be okay. He wants… no more hurt, that's all.
That's why he doesn't want them to have their energy, that's all. Not to make servants, not to strip them of their independence or disconnect them from something so humanly them. He just wants to stop the hurt. Does that make him a coward? He supposes so because he is scared for them.
He was always scared for them, no more so than when he brought down the warlords or soldiers that had that hungry, manic glee about what they did to their victims. He was scared for the children he saw defiled. He was scared for the innocents without a home. He was scared for his family. His friends.
His brothers…
Through the thinning miasma, Gohan realizes he's quite possibly scared even now.
There's a sob.
"It's okay, Gohan," he hears his baby brother soothe. "It's all right…"
It's not though. Gohan will never be all right, never again. But that's fine because this isn't about him anyway.
He feels the weight of the situation.
Revelation, not only in its splendour, but in its responsibility awaits him.
Gohan covers his mouth. He swallows the bile and then the tears, turning in steed of the steps. There's no turning back this time.
"Gohan!" Goten calls after him. "Come back!"
But Gohan knows what he must do now.
The dragon is finally in reach and Gohan threads his fingers through its divinity. The gold washes over pale, bloodied fingers.
"GOHAN!"
He looks back at the mortals, eyes holding over each of the survivors.
Father… Goten… and yes even Vegeta.
It's time. Finally…
To everyone who I stepped on to get to this point, I'm sorry.
His hands throw upwards and a great beam of golden light is bestowed over him.
This… is Revelation!
The dragon balls disperse into Hell's obsidian, the dragon sealed until summoned once more by one fortunate enough to have collected all Seven. Beneath the golden ashes of this divine beast, Gohan Son collapses with his duty now complete.
His wish has been granted.
For a long time after his story has ended, Gohan sits alone.
The fog clears and suddenly everything is all too much. Revelation becomes a goal achieved and what purpose he had bleeds out alongside his wounds.
He weeps.
For what more is there for the soldier at the end of his war?
Over time, slow taps along the stairs – within the darkness – remind him of the world he allowed to live, of the thrum of life that has survived a secretive evil that Gohan shared with no-one else.
It comes to a stop. An impermanent silence once more.
Then, warmth.
God, how he knows that he doesn't deserve it when those familiar arms loop around his neck. But he allows himself to be drawn in, to be firm against the calming of his father's heartbeat.
It's here that he lets go.
His duty has been served.