"Alright, you've shown your new technique, it's time I show you mine!" Goku straightened his stance out and pumped his clenched fists by his hips. Chayote's body twitched as she had almost surrendered to the instinct to attack her opponent as he opened up. The sudden escalation in Ki which transpired in Goku's system convinced her not to.
Lightning crackled down from top to bottom of Goku's body. Chayote maintained her defensive fighting stance in anticipation of Goku's technique. As more and more seconds passed, the green and yellow jolts of lightning passing up and down the boy's body began to amp up in intensity and, likely, in voltage too.
"N-No way!" Muten Roshi quaked in his boots.
"What's the matter, did they see you hanging around in the contestant area?" Krillin squinted at the old man.
"This technique… He cannot possibly be able to use it, then again… Maybe Son Gohan picked it up after a while…" Roshi stared at a blank point in space while sweat broke through on his face. "Either way, to think that he would teach his grandson that! Didn't he know how reckless Son Goku was!?"
"Huh? What is this technique?" Yamcha wondered, even Tenshinhan found his sights wandering onto Muten Roshi as he described this fearsome technique.
"It's a deadly maneuver that is easily capable of deciding most battles. Because of how dangerous and lethal it is, I don't like to use it that often…" Muten Roshi explained. "Even if I ever wanted to defeat someone as skilled as Son Gohan, I would only need to use this technique once!"
"Wow! Goku's grandpa taught him that? Then again, he is using it against Chayote, if anyone can survive it, it's her…" Krillin pointed out.
"Bankoku Bikkuri Sho!" Goku extended both his palms outward, unleashing a cracking lightning blast that traveled in the shape of a wide electrical field which connected to the user via a concentrated beam of lightning energy.
Chayote jumped up to where she thought she was high enough. It was foolish for Goku to attack her with actual electricity, at least without any prior setup for the move. He should have known that lightning posed little of a challenge in terms of speed. The jolts of Bankoku Bikkuri Sho passed through the area where Chayote stood previously and then dissolved just a few steps from the nearest audience member who was beginning to feel a bit uneasy.
"Heh, got you now!" Goku smirked and winded up his fist, taking it to the skies himself.
"What? That technique was the setup?" Chayote grunted. He got her, in the air she couldn't quite maintain her defensive martial arts stance, at least she shouldn't have been able to. By simply stopping herself in mid-air via the flight technique, Chayote could regain her footing by using the air itself as a proper footing. Goku threw what seemed like a hundred and twenty punches in one second and he found most of them hitting blocks while a few more missed their mark.
Chayote flipped over her head, delivering an overhead kick to Goku's head and sending him crashing down hard enough to further mess up the tiles of the ring. By now it looked like a devastated city after a round of brutal aerial raids. Goku sat up and returned to his feet, stroking his head while wincing in pain the entire time.
"You're holding back." Chayote landed in front of him. "This is about how much power you had back when you fought Raditz, there is no way that your power level stayed the same for three whole years."
"Heh, you've noticed…" Goku laughed out. "I guess you really did pick up the slack in martial arts. Alright, to be honest, I really was holding back a bit. Up until now I was fighting using my fun-strength, you see… Ever since I fought Raditz, I found myself unable to go all out against anyone so I'm fighting using the amount of power that seems the most fun."
"No way! He has to be bluffing!" Tenshinhan's jaw went open. He must have felt a false sense of security after he and his freak third eye managed to keep track of the two Saiyans duking it out. Finding out that even one's full, awakened and meditated self was just almost keeping up with both potential finalists pulled the rug from right out of his feet.
Goku placed his arms by his hit, a burst of Ki left his body, blasting upward in an intense shine of crystal-clear aura while his hair and his turtle gi rustled in the rushing air pressure. A crystalline shine passed through Goku's eyes too as his Ki just kept on rising, seemingly to no end. No. It had an end, he was quite ordinary, it was just that Chayote had adjusted her measurement scale to measure up Earthlings and Goku had far transcended his fake Earthling self he identified with.
"Alright, let's see what you've really got." Chayote raised her arms up and tried preparing for anything. A disturbing worry that Goku would leave her in the dust and totally blitz her couldn't stop bothering her but it was impossible. Still, even blocking all of his strikes before hurt as if she had taken them, with his current level of strength… Could Goku really push her to the edge of her abilities?
A rough and hairy whack shocked Chayote, it made her flinch and close her eyes. Goku had smacked her with his tail. His tail! He was playing with her and he still approached her sooner than she could react to his bottom nearly slamming into her face. The female Saiyan tried lowering her guard, a simple attempted read on her opponent's movements suggested that he'd gun for her abdomen and he did, it was just that Chayote was too slow again.
"Amazing! Simply spectacular! Contestant Goku had acquired a sort of second wind and is now striking back at Chayote! Danger! Contestant Chayote is approaching the edge of the ring!" the announcer simply roared out into his microphone. It didn't matter to the audience that they couldn't see Goku's hands move, that as far as they've seen him, his arms had completely disappeared because they couldn't register them move at all. Chayote knew they've perceived it that way because she perceived it similarly.
Just as Chayote opened her eyes back up and mustered up some sort of resolve to come back at the unstoppable little monster, Goku slid underneath her spread legs onto the other side, right by the edge of the ring and delivered an uppercut that sent her further toward the center of the ring. Everything whited out for a second, it was only once she felt the gentle yet chilly breeze brushing by her cheek and noticed the ethereal fluff of the clouds underneath her did Chayote realize she was up in the sky. Goku sent her flying past the clouds with a single uppercut!
The newly established underdog Saiyan stretched her limbs out and stopped her flight. Instead of diving back down, Chayote took a moment to clutch at her burning ribs and take a small breather to regain feeling in her numbed out jaw. Yes. This was the kind of power that would finally help her power up! The kind of power that could have driven her close to death. Leave it to the only Saiyan in this part of the galaxy to manage this.
"You pushed me back… Didn't want this fight to end by a ring out, I presume?" Chayote wondered after emerging from the clouds and landing right in front of Goku who looked aptly content with his performance.
"No. I knew you'd be expecting me to hit you from the front, try and ring you out so I knew you'd be ready for me attacking you this way. I don't want this to end at all, to be honest, seeing you take all of that makes me wonder if you've got what it takes to push back…" Goku shook his head. Smile not for a split-second leaving his face.
"I'm wondering about that myself…" Chayote changed her stance again, spreading her legs out while raising her arms up and bending them outward. A mixture between the Turtle School standard stance and the stance she and Devil Man developed. In a way, it was the best of each of the two ancient siblings. Baba wasn't one for hand-to-hand martial arts but Devil Man served as her proxy.
The pair flickered and sent a cascade of crashing shockwaves, splitting the tiles of the ring apart some more, leaving cracks that totally devastated and ripped them off of the layer of dirt underneath. The ring announcer wobbled on his feet but had to surrender to the washing away wave of air that sent him tumbling back and off of the ring. The spectators covered up their ears and braced, covering up their lower bodies underneath the protective walls separating the ring and the outside area from the spectator area.
"T-This is incredible, Ten-san! If he had used this power against me, I'd have been a goner," Chiaotzu broke a drop of sweat without breaking his featureless, doll-like expression.
"No. Your psychic powers made all the difference in your fight, they'd have bought you enough time for a few good shots." Tenshinhan comforted his friend. He was only half-lying. He knew the pain a martial artist felt when they found out that their proudest bout was against a handicapped opponent far beyond their capabilities, someone they had no right sharing a ring with and while Chiaotzu was not entirely in such a situation with Goku, it was his psychic powers and not his martial arts that brought him to that level.
"I'd have lost still…" Chiaotzu mumbled.
"It's because you're still green. You make mistakes in the middle of the fight and squander your advantages. We'll work on that after the tournament together, Chiaotzu." Tenshinhan smirked at the little ghoulish fighter before turning his eyes back at possibly the most illuminating match he would ever witness in his entire life.
Chayote's knee dug into Goku's back, finally, her hit broke through Goku's iron-bar body and bent his back out, exposing his front for a good ax-handle slam that sent him crashing and bouncing back down. Goku's body rebounded off of the busted ring and headed for a ring out before Chayote flickered right behind it and sent it rolling to the other side with a stiff football kick to his side.
"Y-You saved me now…" Goku wiped his bruised face off of the dirt that he had gathered and the sweat that he'd worked up fighting Chayote.
"Nonsense, you'd have used some outlandish technique to keep yourself from ringing out." Chayote dismissed the idea. "I saw a chance to kick you for free while your attention was focused on staying in the fight and I took it. I guess my full power is enough to keep up with you, at least."
"Guess so…" Goku stood up and took his wide open, hands down and legs spread at shoulder-width stance from after he trained with Korin. Was his body at such poor shape that he couldn't raise his hands up or did he see some other benefits in this flawed stance?
"Alright, here comes my strongest technique!" Chayote smirked and wound up her right hand by her hip, almost like she was preparing to unleash a one-handed Kamehameha but her palm was clenched up into a fist. She would have to adapt it a little bit, if she used it as is, she'd send Goku flying far off to the Papaya Island and then have it detonate there, it would blow off the whole southern chunk of the world if she didn't care about proper Ki control or at least the whole Papaya Island, if she channeled it right.
"Bring it!" Goku smacked his chest with his palms without breaking his madman stance.
"Is he trying to get himself beat up? What a fool…" Chayote thought to herself. "Tournament fights aren't very good for trying to drive yourself to the edge for a Zenkai power-up."
Her body flew forward straight like a speeding javelin. Instead of throwing her right fist which she had winded up, Chayote slid across the ground with a kick that should have tripped her opponent up. One half that led to this choice was because Goku knew she'd come for his front, for his core, that was why he took this stance and that's where all of his Ki would be focused on. A good hit at open shins might have broken his legs outright but that wasn't what Chayote was looking for either.
Goku's image flickered and dispersed. Just an afterimage! That was why he taunted her like that by leaving himself wide open because he intended to use the Afterimage Technique no matter what Chayote threw at him and she got hooked on it like a complete newbie!
"Not gonna get away like that!" Chayote yelled out and threw her right fist with a punch that only hit thin air. After the punch concluded, her palm open to unleash all of the Ki she held pent up inside that right cross into a singular beam that would be nowhere near as effective as Lima Spear would have been if delivered point-blank but it would have had to do.
"Kamehameha!" Goku yelled out, thrusting his hands out and discharging an emergency Kamehameha that could not have carried the same amount of Ki that a properly charged Kamehameha would have but the fact that he generated one in an emergency scenario on the fly and generated it all at once was a feat of itself. Chayote's violet Ki blast clashed and struggled against Goku's Kamehameha, each one taking an inch over the other before being pushed back an inch back.
"Mine's stronger!" Goku roared as he pushed his hands into the blast, as if putting all of his own physical force to help his Kamehameha gobble up Chayote's Lima Spear and envelop her completely while the female Saiyan was on her knees and in too awkward of a position to be able to dodge the backlash of the beam struggle at all. Goku's feet were at just the right position, firmly on the ground and perfect for utilizing all of his otherworldly strength optimally whereas Chayote struggled from a compromised position.
"We really shouldn't be here, Chayote…" Omatto, an ever fearful little Saiyan boy cried out.
"What are you talking about, that's where they're holding all the training tools!" Chayote turned back at the boy who had a nasty tendency to piss her off with how aghast he always was at everything. For someone to be in her gang of two, he sure did second-guess every brilliant idea she had.
"Yeah but… Those pack some serious voltage! The warriors train with them in between trips, I bet they're not even calibrated to our measly power levels…" Omatto whimpered.
Omatto was such a dumbass. Sometimes Chayote wondered why she even hung out with him and took him to every cool place she wasn't meant to be in. Though whenever her intent of ditching the loser began digging into her sides, Chayote recalled that nobody else hung around with her and there was nobody else whom she could persuade to be her underling like she could do with Omatto.
"You'll get us killed, I'm telling Instructor Yuca!" Omatto clenched up and froze in place, digging his chin into his own chest as if attempting to harden up his entire, puny body.
"That's what you said when we took the pod-rail slide last time. Both of us are clearly still alive!" Chayote turned back at her underling who chose a really lousy time to grow a spine. She probably should have paid closer attention to the buttons she was mashing atop of the battle-bot interface but if Omatto ratted her out, ratting himself out in the process too but it never stopped him, she'd get in trouble again.
"I told you again and again that rail was meant for space pods, we collided with a space pod on our way down because of that! I spent two days inside of a healing tank." Omatto's whiny voice spread like a foul odor across the dark warehouse.
"Listen, how exactly are you supposed to get stronger if you don't train?" Chayote gestured in an inquisitive motion.
"Well… Why can't you just do Instructor Yuca's exercises that she gives you, you always run off or slack off doing them, why don't you start with the little stuff before transitioning to murder robots that hardened world conquerors use?" Omatto pulled on his hair. One of these days he'd lose it all, Chayote was certain. Even before reaching ten years of age the sides of his hair were already hanging awkwardly from all the pulling he's doing.
"That stuff's way too softcore! If we do the same stuff everyone's doing, we'll never get ahead of everyone else. We need to take a shortcut to catch up, then keep taking it, again and again, to show everyone that we can be as strong as the elites too!" Chayote clenched her fist out, her eyes burning with determination for imagined limitless strength she could already feel herself accumulating by having these battle-bots drive her to the brink of death over and over again until she was able to blow her class away, even Instructor Yuca herself, with a single punch.
Omatto laughed out like he had heard the most amazing joke he's ever heard in his entire life.
"Okay… Well… Maybe not as strong as the elites but… We can still be the strongest low-class warriors in history!" Chayote could see Omatto's fear faltering. He had Saiyan blood in him, as little and irrelevant of a part of him as it was, this would be how she'd get him.
"Oh, fine…" he sighed. "You'll get us both killed one day anyway, may as well hurry up and spare us the torment of regenerating from all the much better ideas you'll have in the future…"
By the time Chayote turned back to calibrate the battle-bot to a lower power level it was too late, the patterns over its body were lighting up and the light penetrated into Chayote's eyes like a pillow filled with needles sprouting into her face, rending her every pore and blinding her until there was nothing but the red light. And heat… So much heat…
"Contestant Chayote has been ringed out!" the announcer yelled out. "Amazing, Contestant Son Goku won the semi-finals match and proceeds to the finals!"
Chayote felt the damp but soft blades of grass passing through her fingers, she was laying down on the grass for a while now. The chill of the evening wind biting at her exposed skin through her tattered clothes was only the second testament that she was alive, the first one was the pain resonating through her muscles and the one granted by her injuries.
So she lost this time… Too bad, she'd have loved to leave Earth from a more solid position as its ultimate, undisputed champion of martial arts. Then again, maybe getting beaten by another Saiyan wasn't that bad?
Author's Note: Actually I had the fight between Chayote and Goku extending into the third chapter, entering a stage where both of them were winded and on their last legs and it'd have been just a brutal slobber-knocker for a whole chapter through, no techniques or fancy martial arts. The ending would have been the same though but... I kind of wanted to fight off my worse urges. I've always loved chapters that lasted well past their welcome and so I've always written them going into anywhere from two to five chapters and while I am fully aware that's not an attribute of a great writer, I just really love long and excessive fights (hence why I'm writing a Dragon Ball fanfic, I guess :D).
I'll do my best not to give in to my worst urges, I can't make any more concrete promises than this but... I can promise to at least try :)