The Budoukai Takes Shape!
Over the course of an hour or two, the hundred or so entrants to the Tenkaichi Budoukai were whittled down to eight finalists: Goku, Krillin, Yamcha, the purple-haired Taijutsu fighter Ranfan, the Dragon-Beast Giran, the repulsive Bacterian, the stony Namu, and the enigmatic Jackie Chun. After each of them drew their number, the eight made their way out of the zoo that was the elimination area and out onto the main stage in the open air as the crowd cheered wildly. Everyone waved and shuffled away from Bacterian. This was even more people than before! But they were outside so it didn't bother Goku as much as when they were all in the one building together.
"Ladies and gentlemen!" cried the blonde-haired young announcer as he sprinted into the ring, full of energy. Goku already liked him. She hoped they'd get to be friends! "Welcome to the 21st Tenkaichi Budoukai!" The crowd roared in response. Bulma, Blonde Launch, and Puar were all pressed up at the front row and watching eagerly.
"Go Yamcha!" Bulma and Puar cheered in unison and pushed against Launch as they waved their arms.
"Kick some butt, guys!" Launch shouted at Goku and Krillin. A giant board was wheeled out that displayed the formats for the final stage of the tournament.
"It will be," the announcer shouted, gesturing wildly with plenty of exuberance, "Son Goku," she waved excitedly and jumped up and down "versus Ranfan!" Ranfan winked and blew the crowd a kiss. "Yamcha," he flexed and posed and grinned like an idiot "versus Namu!" He barely moved his head in a nod. "Krillin," he grinned and waved but not nearly as energetically as Goku "versus Giran!" The dragon-man roared and spread his wings as Krillin stopped smiling. "And Jackie Chun," he nodded silently with just barely more movement than Namu "versus Bacterian!" The giant man scratched his stomach and burped. "What an exciting collection of fighters, ladies and gentlemen!" he said aloud. 'What a gaggle of circus freaks,' he thought to himself. He was all set to get off the stage when Goku reached up and tugged at his suit jacket. He stopped and looked down at her.
"'Scuse me," she said, "What's your name?" the announcer blinked behind his sunglasses. No one had actually asked his name before. People usually didn't care. It had been so long that for a second he didn't have an answer.
"K-Ken," he finally said. "My name's Ken." Goku smiled and he smiled back.
"It's nice to meet you!" she said as Krillin facepalmed.
"It's nice to meet you, too, Goku. But you better focus, your match is first!" he ran off the stage along with everyone but Goku and Ranfan. Goku grinned as she dropped into a fighting stance. Ranfan frowned as she took the traditional Taijutsu stance. One leg forward and bent, leaning back slightly, arms raised towards her face. It was a good thing she would probably just need to use her martial arts skills for this one. Unless this preteen was extremely aware of her own sexuality at a young age which Ranfan highly doubted.
They circled each other slowly and tried to gauge one another's abilities. Ranfan frowned as she weighed her options. The problem with fighting someone so short was that none of her training was really designed for it. She threw out a knee at Goku's head and Goku put out hand to block it. Ranfan had expected the kid to go flying even if she blocked it but Goku seemed to have her own plans since she didn't budge. Ranfan blinked but quickly retracted her leg and thrust it straight out as she twisted her hip to drive her foot into the girl's head. The kick landed precisely and sent Goku flying across the ring. She hit the ground and tumbled a few more feet before she came to a stop. Ranfan grinned to herself as she brought her leg back down. That wasn't so hard! But then Goku got right back up and dusted herself off as she shook her head. … What?
"That's an interesting stance you have!" Goku called from across the ring as she hopped from one foot to the other. "What martial art is that?" Ranfan blinked dumbly even as she automatically returned to her guard.
"Ta-taijutsu," she muttered in response. Was this kid for real? Goku grinned and got into a crouch.
"Cool! You'll have to show me some stuff later! My turn!" Goku was gone in a flash again and reappeared right in front of Ranfan with her feet raised to plant a dropkick in her stomach. Ranfan barely raised up her leg in time to block the blow and she almost wished she hadn't. It hurt like hell! She hopped back on one foot and got back into her guard with a wince. Goku charged forward again and Ranfan just managed to roll out of the way of the attack. Goku came to a halt at the edge of the ring and pinwheeled her arms to stop herself from falling. 'Now's my chance!' Ranfan thought before she threw out a knee to Goku's back. If it hit her it would knock her out of the ring for sure! But that 'if' was the problem since it never did. In the middle of pinwheeling like an idiot Goku leaped backwards and bounced off of Ranfan's knee to land behind her. Ranfan spun around and stared as Goku waved at her with a grin. Ranfan furrowed her brow in frustration. This kid was making her look like an amateur! Ranfan let out a wordless scream and exploded with a barrage of kicks, knees, elbows and forearms. Her limbs were a blur as she made a desperate assault. Goku ducked and dodged and rolled over every. Single. Strike.
"What the heck are you?!" Ranfan screamed in futile fury. Beads of sweat dripped down her forehead as she let out ragged breaths. Goku grinned up at her.
"I'm a Goku!" she exclaimed before giving a little frown. "I'm sorry but I'm kinda bored. Your Taijutsu is really cool and all but I think I'm ending this." Before Ranfan could even comment on this insult, Goku jumped up and punched her across the jaw. Ranfan flew out of the ring in a tight spiral and went into the grass. She actually had so much momentum that she burrowed into the ground.
"C-contestant Son Goku is the winner!" Ken shouted in a bit of delayed shock. Goku held up an arm victoriously and smiled as the crowd cheered. Some helpers plucked an exceptionally dizzy Ranfan out of the ground and carried her away. Goku hopped out of the ring and walked to the back. So much fighting! She wondered when they'd get to eat.
OoOoOoO
Jackie Chun watched as Bacterian got into the ring and shuddered. He could see the dirt and grime covering every inch of the man's skin. It was caked on for God's sake and made Bacterian's skin a good three shades darker. Even worse, Jackie could smell it. Imagine the worst smell in human history. Bury that smell in a hole in the ground and let it stew for about fifty years. Then dig it up and set it on fire. Then put out the fire with garbage water. That would be nearly as bad as the smell coming off of Bacterian and, as Bacterian stomped towards Jackie, he came to the realization that it was even worse than he'd imagined. The stink, the stench, wasn't limited to Bacterian's body. It hung off of him like a cloud and rolled off of him in waves. It poisoned the very air around him.
"Bahahaha!" Bacterian laughed a great belly laugh that made his whole body jiggle as he stalked towards Jackie. The old man grit his teeth as he pondered his strategy. Thankfully, he could sense the giant man's battle power. Nothing to write home about. Clearly he'd gotten through most of this tournament on the strength of his stench than of his body but Jackie had a secret weapon of his own.
As the cloud of filth crept closer and closer to Jackie, he resigned himself to the fact that he couldn't test the boys' skills if he got eliminated in the first round. Jackie held in a breath as he decided how to win this fight. Any hit he gave Bacterian would get grime all over his nice shoes and suit. Jackie raised one arm and gave a hard downward swipe in Bacterian's direction to release a kiai wave that knocked Bacterian out cold. No sense knocking him too close to the poor audience.
"Ten! And Jackie Chun is the winner!" The crowd's cheer was slightly-muted as most of them were stunned silent that Jackie seemed to have won without even touching his opponent. The ringside attendants had the unenviable task of removing Bacterian's unconscious body from the ring. They settled on using push brooms to literally roll the large man away. 'Might want to roll him into the ocean,' Jackie thought, 'But then he might kill all the fish. In the world.'
OoOoOoO
Krillin stared up at his opponent open-mouthed. As the yellow-and-blue heavyset dragon bared his fangs and flexed his fingers to show his bright claws, Krillin tried to calm himself. He'd trained for this. He'd spent the last year and a half with Son Goku and Master Roshi in preparation for this sort of thing. Then Giran roared and stomped towards him. Well, the old man certainly hadn't trained him for dragon-slaying!
Krillin nervously dodged out of the way of a few of Giran's claw swipes as he fought his biological imperative to run and scream. He was so nervous that he didn't even register that Giran's claws were coming nowhere close to hitting him but Giran noticed and the fact that he hadn't already punched this kid hard enough to knock him off the island was infuriating the lizard. He swung faster and harder with blows powerful enough to tear a normal man to shreds. Blue-haired Launch flinched as Krillin dodged every swipe. She couldn't help but be scared for the little fella. He was so small and the dragon-man was so big! Giran roared loud enough to shake Krillin's bones and the former monk couldn't stop himself from ducking down into a ball in self defense. Giran grinned and opened his maw to go in for an attack but was blinded by the sun reflecting off of Krillin's shiny dome. He stumbled away and held at his eyes.
"Krillin!" Goku shouted from the sidelines while her friend was still cowering with his eyes screwed shut, "Punch him already!" Krillin looked up to see Giran still recovering from the blinding light and lunged into action. He threw an uppercut that caught the dragon under the jaw and made him stagger then followed up with a series of rapid-fire punches to the rather pronounced yellow belly that made it jiggle and caused Giran to stumble back. He teetered on the edge of the ring. He spun around on instinct and smacked Krillin with his tail with the impact sending Krillin flying to tumble towards the edge of the ring. Giran blinked as his vision finally cleared. He growled as Krillin picked himself up off the ground.
"No more runnin' around for you, boy!" he declared before he opened his mouth as wide as he could. A strange pink light began to glow brighter and brighter from deep inside him. Krillin dove at the last second, expecting a fireball of some kind. He was shocked as an enormous wad of gum flew out of the dragon's mouth and hit some poor sap in the crowd.
"Gah! My hair!" cried the aforementioned poor sap. Giran growled at the ineffectuality of his last attack. That would have captured the boy for sure! Giran charged towards Krillin with his mouth open wide. Saliva dripped from his angry jaws as Krillin held out his hands.
"H-hold on!" Krillin shouted and Giran came to a confused screeching halt. What was the boy's plan? "Look, the whole… growling and snapping and the stuff with the teeth. You're not gonna eat me or anything, right?" Giran blinked and pulled back as he shook his head.
"Nah," he grumbled. "'Course not. Why would I do somethin' like that?" Krillin fell out of his fighting stance as the two of them apparently stopped fighting to have a civil discussion.
"Then why do you do all that stuff?" Krillin asked as Giran gave another shrug.
"Scares people and all that," the dragon muttered defensively.
"But aren't you better than that?" Krillin prodded with his hands on his hips. "You're strong, you're fast. You shouldn't need to perpetuate stereotypes to get ahead!" Giran nodded with a smile on his face.
"Yer right!" he told Krillin and threw up his fists triumphantly. "I don't need to be the monster these people think I am! I can be my own dragon!" Krillin grinned and held out a hand.
"Then let's do this right!" he declared before Giran nodded again and shook Krillin's tiny hand in his own. He could do this! He could make a good example for people like him everywhere! People that society called monsters. They could be just like regular people without relying on-
Giran was distracted from this introspection as Krillin jumped up into the air and kicked Giran in the face before somersaulting forward off the dragon's snout to jump behind him. He finished with a spin-kick to the back of Giran's head that made him tumble out of the ring. He hit the dirt before he even had the chance to flap the small wings that improbably allowed him to fly.
"And with a cunning ring-out, Krillin is the winner!" Ken declared as Goku ran into the ring to pick Krillin off the ground in another powerful hug as Krillin turned red with public embarrassment. "He will move on to face Son Goku in the semifinals!" Krillin squirmed out of Goku's grip as she grinned. Giran got up slowly while holding the back of his head.
"Hey," Krillin told the dragon man, "I meant what I said about you being better than this and all that. I just really had to win," The dragon smiled as if he'd been pranked and gave the bald monk a thumbs-up.
OoOoOoO
Yamcha paced around the ring for about a minute while he grinned and flexed and shouted nonsense. All the while, Namu watched him and never moved his neck. He barely moved his eyes. The contrast between the two fighters was like night and day. Everything about Namu struck Jackie Chun as… eerie.
'Just what,' the old master wondered, 'makes this man so focused? When I do it, it's an act but this guy's made of ice!' With the slightest mental manipulation, he was able to gaze into the younger man's mind. Telepathy was one of the minor perks that came with exceptionally advanced ki sensing. It required you to be entirely stationary and focusing your mental energies towards the act so it was less than useless in combat. As Jackie peered into Namu's thoughts and sifted through his memories he saw… A homeland crippled by drought. A people in desperate need of help. A solemn vow. 'I will win the prize money and buy water from the city! I swear it!' Jackie swallowed with his eyes wide in surprise. 'If I didn't have a job to do here, I might forfeit rather than beat him...' Jackie thought before shrugging. 'Maybe I can still do something for him.' Meanwhile Yamcha was just about done with his pre-match antics. He wandered over to Bulma and she leaned over the barricade to give him a peck on the cheek.
"For luck," she whispered before leaning over further and giving him a smack on the behind. "Now get in there!" Yamcha got into the ring, grinning like an idiot but his smile quickly faded in the face of Namu's unearthly seriousness. Both fighters slid into their stances. Namu held one forearm diagonally across his chest, slightly outstretched and ready to either strike or block. Yamcha crouched forward and tensed his fingers, ready to unleash the Wolf Fang Fist at any moment.
Yamcha made the first move and charged forward to throw a pair of quick jabs that Namu ducked and weaved under. Yamcha followed up with a knee aimed for the chin that Namu leaned away from and glared. He hopped back to get a run-up to hit Namu with a palm strike but Namu put one hand under Yamcha's elbow and thrust Yamcha's arm up into the air before delivering three quick chops to Yamcha's sternum in quick succession. Yamcha staggered back while gasping for air with his hands pressed to his sternum. He teetered towards the edge of the ring while Namu closed his eyes and waited. All he could do was pray that he would cause the other man no lasting damage. He was so wrapped up in his own thoughts that he barely had time to register that he hadn't heard a body hit the ground before he opened his eyes to see Yamcha's boot taking up his entire worldview and smashing into his face. Namu flew backwards and landed hard on his back three-fourths of the way across the ring.
"It'll take a lot more than that to keep me down!" Yamcha said with a cocky grin as he flicked a thumb across his nose. Still, that attack Namu had used had hurt like hell. Whatever he'd done had made it feel like Yamcha's entire nervous system wanted to jump out of his body. He'd have to keep on his toes.
"Your physical strength is most impressive," Namu conceded as he got to his feet while he wiped a droplet of blood from under his nose. "But it will not be enough." They both charged this time and crashed in the center of the ring. Their knuckles locked together as they tried to force the other towards the ground, straining against each other. Yamcha would push and Namu would give ground until he tripped Yamcha's leg out from under him which forced him to give ground in turn. Their auras flared against and entangled with one another, invisible to all but Jackie Chun who watched with rapt attention. Namu raised his knee to strike Yamcha in the chest but Yamcha blocked it with a knee of his own. They dropped their legs before Yamcha attacked with the opposite knee and now it was Namu who blocked.
Realizing they'd come to a stalemate, both men broke away from the knuckle lock. Namu simply leaped back while Yamcha leaped high into the air and did a few backwards somersaults before he landed. Using the momentum of his landing, Yamcha charged forward and slammed into Namu's cross-armed guard. Namu gritted his teeth as Yamcha stomped forward, causing him to skid back.
"As I said," Namu said with a grunt, "you do not lack for physical power." He drew in a deep breath and thrust his arms out to send Yamcha staggering away. He threw himself at the former bandit with a flying kick that cracked him across the chin and staggered him. "But you lack true conviction!" He threw out a double palm thrust to the stomach that Yamcha barely rolled away from, hopping back to give himself some more distance.
"I'll show you conviction!" Yamcha growled as he got back into his Wolf Fang Fist stance. "Wolf Fang Fist!" he cried and ran forward to throw out a flurry of wild strikes. Namu threw up his guard and absorbed them all.
"You fight for a selfish goal," Namu said even as Yamcha wore down his guard. "You fight only to prove your own strength! You fight for arrogance and pride!" Yamcha snarled and drew back his fist for a powerful blow.
"Shut up!" he screamed as he struck. However, before he had even fully extended his elbow, Namu was already gone with an overhead leap, twisting to land behind Yamcha. Yamcha leaped to throw out a spinning back kick but Namu evaded it with a backwards handspring. "Who the hell do you think you are to lecture me?!" he snapped as he charged at Namu again. Hadn't he risked his neck fighting Goku when she was a giant monster to protect Bulma? Wasn't that fighting for something greater than himself? Yamcha howled wordlessly as Namu spun effortlessly around every wild strike.
"Until you fight when others depend on you," Namu said as he raised his arms overhead in a cross, "to understand that on your victory or failure hang the hopes of all you care about, you will never be more than what you are!" He drove his forearms down powerfully into the back of Yamcha's head and neck. Yamcha took a single staggering step forward before everything went black and he collapsed to the ground.
"Ten! Namu is the winner!" Namu gave a slight bow before exiting the ring. From the sidelines, Bulma's expression was a war between fuming at Yamcha for embarrassing her by losing and concern for his well-being after a blow to the head like that.
"Maybe you should have given him more luck," Blue-Haired Launch offered innocently.