Chapter Hundred-thirty
The Overflowing Power of Youth! Gotenks Goes All-out!
"What you mean?" Majin Boo asked Piccolo, his head cocked to one side. How could the green man defeat Majin Boo? He hadn't even hurt him! He was too weak! All he'd done was blow up a door!
"There's no way out of here now," Piccolo told him as he pointed back at the smoldering ruin of the door to the Hyperbolic Time Chamber. "The three of us are locked in here together forever." Majin Boo and Gotenks' mouths fell open in shock at the same time and nearly the same gape, which was surprising given that Gotenks actually had a hinged jaw. "You could kill us, sure," Piccolo said with a lackadaisical shrug, "But then you'd be here all alone until the end of time." He smirked and even started to chuckle, arms folded across his chest. It had cost the lives of everyone on Earth but Majin Boo had been defeated. The rest of the universe had been saved. Piccolo was so caught up in the cleverness of his victory that he didn't see one of Majin Boo's eyes start to twitch as Gotenks continued to gawk in horror.
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Well… that was one way to fix things, Goku guessed. "I have to try and get to Gotenks and Piccolo, though," she told Xī and Kibito. "We can't just leave them in there to die!" Xī looked at her suspiciously.
"Can you even do that?" she asked while flicking Goku's halo. "You are, well, dead, after all. Without a spell of protection to allow you to return to the living world."
"I don't know," she admitted, "But I have to try." She didn't even know if she could use Instant Transmission to get into the Hyperbolic Time Chamber. Just trying to sense ki from inside of it had messed with her head. She placed two fingertips to her forehead and strained as she looked at Gotenks and Piccolo in the crystal ball. She tried to focus on their ki signature but it was… strained and warped. Her head felt like it was going to burst open and she fell back onto the grass with a groan, massaging her temples in defeat. "Ugh… do you think you can get to them, Xī?" she asked.
"I can give it a sho–" Xī started to say before her eyes went back to the crystal ball. "Wait… what's Majin Boo doing?" That made Goku sit up quickly despite her splitting headache.
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Here? Trapped? Forever?! No, no, no! Majin Boo couldn't do this! He wouldn't! He remembered when Bibidi would put him inside his egg and make him go to sleep. At least then, he was asleep. He didn't even know how long he had slept between Bibidi and Babidi. This, though… to be awake, to be alive, forever and ever… no! No! He would never be trapped again! "No…" Majin Boo snarled as veins bulged and twitched in his scalp. "No!"
Gotenks wasn't really paying attention to Majin Boo at this point, they were too busy focusing on Piccolo. "Why did you… what's wrong with you?!" They demanded.
"You couldn't defeat Majin Boo," Piccolo told them. "I'm sorry but this is the sacrifice that had to be made for the good of the rest of the universe." Gotenks sputtered in anger and disbelief.
"But I wasn't– I was gonna–" Then Majin Boo opened his mouth impossibly wide… and screamed. His eyes went wide and his irises turned red as his aura flared around him. It nearly took Gotenks and Piccolo off of their feet from the power radiating off of him and the shockwaves from his screams. Steam curled out of the holes in his head and arms. It was the loudest sound that they had ever heard. The loudest sound that had ever existed. Purple blood began to seep from Piccolo's ears as Majin Boo's roar turned into a freakishly high shrieking whistle. In a blinding flash of pink light, a jagged circle about the size of a manhole cover appeared and seemed to float in the air, showing the Lookout outside of the Time Chamber. Majin Boo's scream had actually ripped open a hole in the very fabric of reality.
"What?!" Piccolo exclaimed in disbelief. He didn't even know something like this was possible! Was it because Majin Boo was some sort of demon, or was that just the raw power this monster was capable of? The hole began to shrink rapidly and a wicked grin crossed over Majin Boo's face. He turned his head all the way around to look back at Gotenks and Piccolo and waved a sarcastic goodbye to them before diving through the hole, stretching out his shape to slide through it.
"No, you don't!" Gotenks cried, leaping after him. It was too late, though. By the time they got to where he had been, the hole was closed. Now they were trapped and Majin Boo was free.
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'Okay,' Goku thought, 'That's definitely bad.' She turned to Xī expectantly. "You have to get them out of there!" she told her. Xī nodded and focused, biting her lip. She was a Kaioushin. She had the power of Instantaneous Movement. She could go anywhere in the universe at any time she wanted… so why was she still sitting here?! Iridescent white blood trickled out of her nose before she, too, collapsed onto the grass with a groan, holding her head.
"This is insane!" she groaned as she sat up. "What dimension are they even in? It's like they exist outside of time and spa–" she stopped talking when she noticed that something was happening inside the crystal ball again.
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"Oh, great!" Gotenks cried as they threw up their hands. "Just great! Now Majin Boo's free and we're stuck in here! All because you," they jabbed a finger at Piccolo, "Had to overreact like a nutjob!" Piccolo balked and raised a hand to his chest.
"A nutjob?" he echoed. "I did what was necessary! You couldn't defeat Majin Boo! If you had been training harder, this wouldn't have happened!" Granted, Piccolo knew that Gotenks couldn't have foreseen having to deal with this new version of Majin Boo but that was beside the point.
"I was training hard!" Gotenks insisted. "I was strong enough to beat him!" Piccolo stared at them incredulously. "I… I was holding back," Gotenks admitted in an embarrassed tone as they shuffled one foot over the other. "I was… acting like I was in trouble… to make the fight more epic, I guess."
Piccolo didn't gawk and his eyes didn't bulge. Instead, they narrowed, and his lip formed a thin, hard line. "More… epic," he repeated, a vein pulsing in his temple. "More… epic?!" Now his eyes were wide and he bared his fangs at Gotenks, startling them. They started to protest in defense of themself before Piccolo screamed at them. "Everyone's dead!" he bellowed.
What? Gotenks struggled to figure out what that meant. Why would Piccolo scream something like that? What, because Boo was out and they were stuck? They knew that already. Unless. "Wait… you mean…"
"Yes," Piccolo growled. "Majin Boo killed everyone on Earth. Everyone. Now we're trapped in here and it doesn't matter how much power you have because no one can be revived now!"
"Why didn't you say that earlier?!" Gotenks demanded furiously, tears starting to well up in their eyes as the weight of what Piccolo said started bearing down on them.
"Because I thought you were taking things seriously," Piccolo spat. "Obviously I was wrong." Gotenks looked down at their hands as tears rolled slowly down their cheeks and pattered onto the floor. Their mothers… their friends… so many innocent people on Earth… For the first time in their life, Gotenks felt sadness. That sadness was soon overwhelmed by a new, far more powerful feeling: rage. They screamed with fury and pain and anger as power exploded out of their body. Piccolo gazed in amazement as Gotenks' golden hair glowed bright and blossomed out from their head, rolling down their back as lightning shot off of their body. They kept on screaming as the air in front of them started to shimmer until it finally tore.
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"Are you kidding me?!" Xī demanded with her face pressed against the glass of the crystal ball. "How did they… what did they… how could they have so much power?!" Kibito had fainted. Goku, meanwhile, was squealing delightedly with a proud smile on her face. She couldn't believe it! They'd really been able to turn Super Saiyan Three! Not to mention that their Super Saiyan Three was even stronger than hers! They'd definitely be able to beat Majin Boo now!
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Majin Boo stared up at the blue sky, breathing the free air again. That had been entirely too close. Only now, he realized, there was nothing left to do here. He'd killed everyone on this planet. There was no one left to scare. No one left to fight or kill. Maybe he'd just blow up the planet and fly off. He knew that he'd killed other worlds before. He knew that there was a universe out there that had gone far too long without witnessing the terror of Majin Boo. He would gladly return it to them.
Before Majin Boo had a chance to do anything, though, his attention was caught by a hole in space ripping right in front of him. He looked at it curiously for a moment before a golden cannonball came screaming out of it at him and caught him directly in the stomach, warping his entire body around it as he gasped in pain and was sent hurtling off the edge of the Lookout. He barely even had a chance to register what had just happened to him when something struck him in the back, sending him rocketing back toward the Lookout at an angle and directly through it, slicing it in half at a diagonal.
With a scream, Gotenks was already there as Majin Boo came out of the bottom half of the Lookout with both of their fists clasped together. They swung their fists up with a cry and smashed into Majin Boo, sending him launching straight up into the air and through the Lookout again, spinning and screaming in confusion and pain. Gotenks followed Majin Boo everywhere, striking like chained lightning, each blow flowing into the next before he even had a chance to realize what was happening to him. It was only on about the fifteenth hit that Majin Boo even realized he was being attacked by a person.
Well before that fifteenth hit, however, Piccolo had recovered enough from barely squeezing through the hole that Gotenks had made and could only watch as they used Majin Boo as a piece of demolition equipment to destroy the Lookout. The part of him that was Kami was screaming and, if he had a heart that functioned like a human's, it would surely be going into palpitations. "Stop it!" he demanded from atop a floating chunk of Lookout as Majin Boo and Gotenks whizzed past his head. "Stop destroying the Lookout!" Gotenks kicked Majin Boo straight up into the air and flew up past him, tucking into a tight ball and spinning as they hovered, faster and faster, until their body hummed and whirred with energy and was surrounded in a bright yellow aura. They shot down like a rocket, barreling into Majin Boo and sending him hurtling to the ground down below, crashing through Korin Tower as they shot down to Earth. "Oh, come on!" Piccolo cried out in dismay as the chunks of Lookout began descending after them.
Gotenks was holding Majin Boo by a fleshy chunk of collarbone with one hand while they used the other hand to wail him across the face with backhands and forehands at lightning speed, their arm a blur. "Who's the strongest now, huh?!" They demanded as they continued their assault with angry tears in their eyes and their jaw clenched in rage. "Who's the strongest now?!" Majin Boo caught their arm with one huge fist and grinned up at them despite his distorted and bruised face.
"ME," he snarled, swinging with his other fist. The impact was like a thunderclap and the blow sent Gotenks flying away to crash so violently into the trees behind them that the shockwave blasted the trees in that half of the forest to splinters. Without even missing a beat, Gotenks got up and charged at him with both arms thrust back. The sight made Majin Boo's pulse, such as it was, race and he grinned as his injuries healed themselves and he charged back at them, arms swinging as he leaned forward. Finally! Someone he could go all out against with this new body's power! He flew at them with a roar that they matched, in intensity if not in bass, and they smashed into each other with a violent headbutt. The shockwave from that impact sent the falling chunks of Lookout back up into the air, leaving Piccolo scrabbling and holding onto the tiled floor for dear life.
"Oh, come on!" he bemoaned as he was sent hurtling up into the sky.
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"When I tell you to take someone's soul out of the purification machine, you take them out of the machine!" Uranai Baba was screaming at a hapless ogre as she held a soul by its puffy white tail. "Do you know who I am? Do you see this hat?!" The ogre cowered at her tiny fist when she shook it at him and she sighed before dismissing him with a wave then turned her attention to the soul cloud, rolling up her sleeves and wiggling her fingers. "Bones bleached white and blood runs red, howsabout you come back from the dead!" With the incantation, lightning shot from her fingertips and the cloud was absorbed in… a slightly bigger cloud, or a puff of smoke. When the puff disappeared, Vegeta was standing there in its place, still dressed in rags and still in the middle of screaming with a halo floating over his head.
"AAhhhhh… what's going on?" he asked as he looked around on confusion. "Where am I?" Baba snapped her fingers and his clothes returned to their original, undamaged state while Vegeta looked up at his halo, still perplexed. "I thought I didn't get to keep my body."
"You don't," Baba told him bluntly, "But Enma's making a special consideration on account of things looking bad at the moment."
Vegeta frowned. "Which means that my sacrifice didn't kill Majin Boo," he surmised.
"Nope," Baba said with the same bluntness and a pop of the 'P.' "I got down here as quick as I could but these bozos had already started purifying your soul when I got down here. So if you feel any different, it's because they cleansed the first five years of sins from your life."
"Huh," Vegeta muttered as he inspected himself curiously, "So that's what that odd feeling was." Then he shrugged. "What are we waiting for, then? Take me to Earth!" He wasn't sure how much good he could do if blowing himself up didn't defeat that monster, but if he was alive, even by a circuitous definition, that meant he could fight.
"Not yet," Baba told him with a hand held up in his face as she hovered on her crystal ball. "Enma's keeping you as a pinch hitter for now."
"A what?" he asked incredulously.
"What, you never watched baseball?"
"Gods, no. It's painfully dull."
Baba shrugged. "Eh, you're not wrong," she muttered in agreement. "The point is, Enma's keeping you as a last resort until there are absolutely no other options left."
Vegeta huffed and crossed his arms. "Fine," he huffed. "Can I at least see what's going on?" Baba tapped the Crystal Ball. "I can't watch anything if you're sitting on it!" The next thing he knew, Baba was sitting on his shoulders. "This is not better!" he groaned indignantly.
"Hey, it's not great for me, either!" Baba sputtered as she craned her neck to the side to look around Vegeta's hair. "Get a haircut already!" Vegeta ignored her and turned his attention to the Crystal Ball floating in front of him.
"...What am I even looking at?" he asked, bewildered. Who was this small child? Why did they have so much hair? What had happened to Majin Boo?
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"Die! Die! Diediediediediediedie!" Gotenks screamed as they lobbed down ki blast after ki blast down at Majin Boo, lances of golden, spearheaded light that devastated the landscape beneath them as he zigged and zagged between the beams. There was no one left to save. There was nothing left to protect. There was only anger, pain, and revenge. Majin Boo flew up at Gotenks and collided into them with a kick but, with a primal scream, they ripped Majin Boo's leg off and actually started to bludgeon him with it before he took it away and reattached it to his body Majin Boo howled and slammed his fists down on top of Gotenks' head, sending them crashing into the ground, but they had barely even made an impact before they were attacking again, flying up after him with a wild series of brutal haymakers, pocketing his torso with craters before spinning him around by the antenna and throwing him so hard that he sailed around the world and crashed into Satan City. When Gotenks got there, Majin Boo was waiting, ripping up a skyscraper out of the ground and slamming it down on top of them. Then he dropped a second skyscraper onto them, and a third, before they let out a cry and sent a blast out with their ki in all directions, devastating the city. "Let's see how you like this!" Gotenks hollered furiously up at Majin Boo. Then, the ancient god-killing abomination saw something that he'd never seen before.
Gotenks opened their mouth and blew what looked like a giant white bubble before the bubble tapered off out of their mouth and flew into the air. The bubble grew a pair of arms and shaped itself into what looked like a torso, with a ghostly tail trailing after it before it reached into its shoulders and pulled out its own head, which was a mirror image of Gotenks' own enormous Super Saiyan Three locks. Piccolo, who had finally managed to catch up, was as perplexed and confused as Majin Boo (as well as all of the Crystal Ball spectators) as Gotenks produced six more of these spectral simulacra.
"I… I have so many questions," he muttered.
"Super Ghost Kamikaze Attack!" Gotenks cried as they jabbed a finger up at Majin Boo. "Get him!"
"Right!" The Ghostenkses all cried in unison before flying up at Majin Boo. So they could talk as well. He sneered at one of them and swatted it away as it came closer.
"Pathetic!" he snarled. Though his smug contempt turned to confusion as the ghost glowed the second it touched him before it violently erupted, sending him hurtling into the other six, all of whom exploded upon contact, leaving Majin Boo dazed as he tumbled through the air, straight into the path of Gotenks' next attack.
With their hands clasped together to form a ring, Gotenks charged ki energy into that ring and fired multiple ki bands at Majin Boo, trapping him in a ball form until, with a flash of yellow light, he was trapped inside something that looked like a beehive. Gotenks caught it in their hands with a malevolent smirk, looking at the ball and feeling Majin Boo writhe inside of it like a horde of buzzing bees.
"Is he trapped in there?" Piccolo asked as he floated toward them cautiously.
"Not for long," Gotenks admitted as they tapped the ball. "I'm gonna need to hit this guy pretty hard to make it count while he's trapped in here." Then they gave Piccolo a grin. "You ever played volleyball?"
"Once," Piccolo muttered, "Before half of you was born." It was during one of Goku's insipid "break days" during the three years during their training to prepare for Cell's attack when she'd dragged him to the beach along with herself, Suno, Gohan, and the other Trunks. But he didn't really see what that had to do with–
"Serve it!" Gotenks demanded, already in the process of throwing the Boo Ball at him. It was only his own decades of training that gave Piccolo the reflexes to bring his hands up and slam the ball into the air, watching it sail up into the sky. Gotenks flew up past him and he dove quickly out of the way, sensing what was coming. "Spiking Boo Ball Slam!" Gotenks cried, charging a frightening amount of ki into their fist before punching it back down toward the ground. The ball's impact annihilated what remained of Satan City, leaving a sheet of glass and an enormous crater in its wake. "Come on out!" Gotenks screamed after a few seconds of stillness. "I know you're not dead yet! I can sense you, you big dummy!"
With a roar of primordial hatred from the dawn of creation and a massive wave of pink ki energy, Majin Boo rose out of the pit Gotenks had created with his body. He had recovered from his wounds but his irises had turned red again and his veins were bulging out from under his skin. This child, this insect, this nothing… was as strong as he was. Maybe even stronger. No! Nothing was stronger than him! He was the strongest one there was! "Kill… you…" Majin Boo snarled as his head twisted to one side and a truly frightening smile emerged on his face. "I'll kill you!"
"I'd like to see you try, you jerk!" Gotenks taunted with a grin of their own. But even as they said that, they felt… weird and tingly. They did their best to ignore it, keeping their focus on Majin Boo as he slammed his hands forward, pink energy charging up in his hands.
"FINAL FLASH!" He screamed, firing a titanic beam of pink ki at Gotenks, who sneered in contempt.
"Stop stealing my parents' moves, you jerk!" they spat as they brought their own hands to one side, one glowing blue and the other glowing purple. "Galickhameha!" They cried as they thrust their hands forward, firing an enormous double-helix blue-and-purple beam at Majin Boo, matching the size of his own blast. The mighty energies clashed and strained against one another before, with one final scream, the Galickhameha overwhelmed the Fauxnal Flash and enveloped Majin Boo.
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Vegeta groaned, placing his face in his hands so he wouldn't have to look at what he'd just seen. He just knew, wherever Kakarot was, she would never let this go…
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"I knew it!" Goku declared enthusiastically. "I knew they could do it! I knew that move was awesome!" She pumped her fists into the air with a grin, bouncing up and down excitedly. Xī was similarly ecstatic and she actually leaped up from her seat, grabbing Goku's hands and pulling her up to dance around the crystal ball, laughing her head off. There was no way Majin Boo could have survived that!
Kibito had fainted again.
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Gotenks panted and gasped as they let their arms drop, sweat beading on their forehead. That wasn't it. They knew it. It couldn't be that easy to blow up Majin Boo. Not if this was even stronger than the one that had fought their parents. They glared at the horizon, looking for any sign of Majin Boo. They wouldn't let him get the drop on them. They were going to win! The tingling was getting worse but they just had to ignore it. Besides, it didn't make any sense. They still had so much time!
Piccolo had been blown away again like a stray leaf in a hurricane by the power of the combatants and was trying not to think too hard about his own irrelevance in this contest as he flew back toward Gotenks, his own eyes watching for Majin Boo and his ears listening intently. He heard a distant, far-off buzzing noise like a drill and tried to pick up on the noise, wondering what it could possibly be… when he sensed that same malevolent ki rushing toward Gotenks again. How?! How could Majin Boo still be alive after that?! "Gotenks!" he cried, "Watch out! Majin Boo's coming in for another attack!"
No sooner had Piccolo given his warning than Majin Boo burst out of the ground underneath Gotenks, flying up toward them, his body having twisted and contorted its shape into a drill. Gotenks turned down to look at him as he charged forward and was able to see his antenna arching back for an attack of some kind. All Piccolo saw and heard was the flash of pink and the crackle of electricity, but that was all he needed to see.
"Gotenks," he warned, "Get him now!" Gotenks grinned and brought their hands up in a circle again.
"Galactic Donuts!" They cried, shooting out several rings from their hands again. The rings wrapped tightly around Majin Boo's body and trapped him in place, pinning his arms to his sides, his legs together, and his antenna against his back. He opened his mouth to scream at them and they smirked. "Hold that pose!" They told him before firing one more ring, this time directly into his mouth, freezing it open. Then Gotenks took in a big breath that made them puff out their cheeks and stuck in their stomach before they seemingly spit out dozens and dozens of small white pellets directly into Majin Boo's frozen mouth. So many so that Majin Boo's body strained and squished out around his bonds until he was more rotund than his previous form. Gotenks finally stopped and wiped their mouth with a smirk and snapped their finger. "Super Ghost Kamikaze Delayed Detonation Attack!" Majin Boo's eyes widened in horror as he ballooned to an even greater size and seemed to be trying to wretch up the Ghostenkses that were suddenly inside of him before light was suddenly pouring out of his eyes, mouth, ears, and various other holes before he violently erupted in a mushroom cloud with Gotenks' face on it. Gotenks cheered and threw up a victory sign before they suddenly, without warning, defused.
For a moment, Goten and Trunks hung in the air, looking at each other in confusion.
"What the…?" Trunks asked.
"But how did we…?" Goten wondered. They still had so much time! Then, as if reality was catching up with them, the pair dropped out of the sky, plummeting toward the ground below. Having burned up all of their energy in their fusion, they had no energy left to keep themselves in the air. Piccolo's arms reached down from out of the sky and grabbed them by the backs of their shirts and pulled them back up toward him with a perplexed expression on his face.
"What the heck happened?" Trunks asked. "We were only Gotenks for, like, five minutes!" Outside of the Hyperbolic Time Chamber, at least. To be fair, he and Goten had noticed that the fusion seemed to last a lot longer in that weird place.
"If I had to guess," Piccolo surmised, "Just as how Goku's Super Saiyan Three transformation burned through her time on Earth, Gotenks' transformation burned through the time of their fusion. Or… your fusion. Whatever." He shrugged. He still hadn't entirely figured out how to refer to or address Gotenks.
"So did we win?" Goten asked as they flew. "Can we bring anyone back?"
"I don't know," Piccolo admitted, "And I don't know. We need to track down any scraps of Majin Boo that might have escaped that blast and destroy them all. If there's even a scrap left, he'll be able to return. After that…" he paused for a moment in thought. "After that, we'll go to West City. Vegeta's spaceship should hopefully still be undamaged. We'll be able to take it to New Namek."
"What's New Namek?" Goten asked curiously. "Why do we need to go there?"
"Because we can't use Earth's Dragon Balls," he reminded her. In all of the chaos, he hadn't seen Mr. Popo save Dende and he hadn't been looking for his ki to find out that he was still alive.
"So everyone's gone?" Trunks asked sadly. What was the point of winning, then? Were they the only people left on Earth?
"For now," Piccolo told him. "But we can use the Namekian Dragon Balls to resurrect Dende and then we'll be able to use Earth's Dragon Balls to bring back everyone else."
"Including my dad, right?" Trunks asked eagerly.
"And Gohan?" Goten added with an excited smile. Piccolo couldn't help but smile with them.
"Yes," he assured the pair, "They'll be brought back with everyone else."
"Alright!" The two half-Saiyan children cheered in unison.
"But first," he reminded them, "We have to make sure Majin Boo is destroyed."
"Ahhh, don't worry about it," Trunks assured him with a grin. "We blew the crap out of that guy!"
Goten gasped. "Trunks! You're not supposed to swear!"
"I didn't!" Trunks insisted. "I said 'crap'!" Goten gasped again. "That's not a swear!"
"Yes, it is!"
"Nuh uh!"
"Uh huh!"
Piccolo groaned.
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"Freakin' isn't a swear, either!" Trunks told Goten as he blasted a tiny scrap of pink goo into dust.
"It is so!" Goten retorted as she blew up another one with a finger beam of blue-white ki. "Trunks, you gotta stop talking like that! My mom won't let us hang out if she finds out you're a potty mouth! Piccolo, you're a grown up! Is freakin' a swear?"
Piccolo declined to comment. They'd been carrying on like this for almost twenty minutes now. He'd been half-tempted to rip off his own ears about fifteen times already but he didn't want to traumatize them with the sight. Although if they kept this up, he couldn't really care less about their trauma. "Alright," he said instead after a few more minutes, "That's everything. I can't detect any trace of Majin Boo. I think we can safely head to West Ci–"
A writhing, screaming, human-shaped tower of pink goo burst up from the ground less than fifty feet from them, scaring the trio half to death. Goten and Trunk staggered back away from it, mouths open in shock. Piccolo just stared in horror, breaking out in a cold sweat. He hadn't even been able to sense Majin Boo's ki! Had… had one small scrap of Boo's body retained enough consciousness to mask his ki while his body regenerated.
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"Oh no!" Goku cried in alarm. "They still have a long time before they can fuse again and Majin Boo's healing fast!" She spun around to look at Pracya, who was still doing his weird ritual on Gohan. "Hey! Stop! Wrap it up! Gohan needs to be on Earth right now!" Pracya looked at her and blinked, letting Gohan shift slowly to the ground as he suddenly realized something.
"Silly me," he muttered, "I was probably done… oh, two hours ago. Musta lost track of t-erk!" His words caught in his throat because Gohan's hand was around his withered ancient throat, his dark eyes hard like chips of obsidian as he hauled the impossibly old man off his feet and started to throttle him.
"My little sister is in danger, you creep!" he roared. "Everyone's in danger! Are you telling me I already could have saved them by now if it wasn't for your stupid…" he trailed off and his face shifted from one of rage to awed realization as he let Pracya drop to the ground in an undignified heap, looking at his hands in amazement. "I… I feel so... different…" The rage that Gohan needed to call upon to pull out his deeper power, the rage inherent to the Super Saiyan transformation… it wasn't there anymore. "What happened?"
"You're welcome," Pracya coughed and hacked as he rubbed at his throat. "Try powerin' up, ya jackass!" Gohan nodded and did just that, bringing his hands down to his sides and adopting a stance like the one he used when turning Super Saiyan. He roared out as a powerful wind swept around him like he was standing in the eye of a hurricane. The wind picked Pracya up and sent him hurtling away before it died down and Gohan looked at himself again.
"I… I feel so powerful!" he exclaimed.
"That's great, Gohan!" Goku told him. "I'm really proud of you! But you gotta get to Earth, right now!" Xī nodded and stood up quickly.
"I'll take him," she told the others. "He's my champion, after all." Then she was in front of Gohan in a moment of Instantaneous Movement and laid a hand on his shoulder, preparing to leave before Goku suddenly Instant Transmissioned herself to stand beside them.
"Hold it!" she shouted, startling Xi. Then she turned her attention to Gohan, putting her hands on both of his shoulders as she looked up into his eyes. "I'm… I'm never gonna see you again," she said softly. "Not for a really long time, anyway. Not until you die. So, until then, I… I just wanna tell you how proud I am of you, Gohan. How happy I am that I got to see you all grown up. I love you, son." Gohan nodded and rubbed his eyes, sniffing a little.
"I love you, too, mom," he muttered. "I-I'm really glad I got to see you again." Goku grinned and pulled her son into a hug, which he returned gladly.
"Now get going," she told him when they pulled away from each other. "Go be the hero! You were always better at it than me, anyway." Gohan actually blushed bashfully at that and waved his mom goodbye and she returned the gesture before he and Xī disappeared.
OoOoOoO
A shiver ran through Gohan's body as he and Xī materialized on Earth and he realized that he… couldn't sense anyone. It was like Namek. Was he too late? Was everyone gone? He closed his eyes and managed to sense Goten, Trunks, Piccolo… and Majin Boo. He breathed a sigh of relief at that because at least they were alive. "Xi," he said as he looked at her again, some part of him still unable to believe that she was the highest celestial being in the universe. Although apparently there was more than one of those… he tried not to think about that too much. "Before you go, I was hoping you could do me a favor. This Kaioushin stuff… isn't really my style," he explained as he gestured to his clothes. "Do you think you could give me some new clothes again?"
Xī nodded. "Not a problem," she assured him with a bit of a smirk, "And no offense taken. What do you want? The same gi as your mom?" Gohan shook his head.
"I've been dressing like other people all my life," he replied. "Her, Mr. Piccolo, Vegeta for a little bit there. I want to look different. Can you just… look in my head?" he asked. Xī nodded and saw the picture in Gohan's mind, raising up her hands and flicking her wrists. In a blink, Gohan's Kaioushin garb had been replaced by a white sleeveless gi with the character for "Justice" emblazoned in blue on the back inside of a circle, baggy white pants, a blue belt, blue socks, and black shoes. "Perfect," he told Xī with a grin, "Thanks!" She nodded and was about to go when she was struck by an idea.
"I know you're off the market," she told him teasingly, "But… for luck," she gave Gohan a quick peck on the cheek before teleported away again.
Alone at last, Gohan touched his cheek and blushed for a moment before he turned his body toward the kis he could sense. "Okay," he muttered, balling his fists as he got serious, "It's all on me now." There was a spark in his eye and he rocketed off into the sky. "Here I go!"
SSV/N: Today's omake is an alternate cut of Goku's appearance in the Afterlife after she dies with Raditz but before she goes on Snake Way. This was the original take, before Zelenal reminded me that this isn't how the Afterlife in Dragon Ball works.
Goku was surprised to find out that she'd woken up. She didn't think that you woke up from death. She was standing at the end of two huge lines of puffy little clouds. Super huge! They just seemed to go on forever and ever, with more hundreds of thousands of puffballs. Maybe millions!
"Don't look at it for too long," said a very familiar voice beside her. "You're staring at every dead soul in the entire universe. Your mind simply isn't meant to comprehend numbers this large. The one on the left is Limbo while the other leads to King Enma." Goku turned and couldn't stop herself from smiling when she saw Kami!
"Master Kami!" she cried excitedly as she threw her arms around him in a hug. "It's good to see you! But what are you doing here? Where is here?" Kami returned the hug somewhat awkwardly and gave Goku a pat on the shoulder so she'd release him.
"That's my question," said another familiar voice. "Where the hells are we? This doesn't look like my afterlife at all!" Goku turned to her left and saw… Raditz?!
"Well, I'm afraid it's not your afterlife at all," Kami explained with no small bit of contempt. "As for why you're here, Goku, I brought you here because you are to receive special training with the great North Kaiou before your friends revive you. It will give you the strength you need to defeat these Saiyans. I just need to convince Enma to let you pass. We've not a moment to lose!"
"Wait!" Raditz objected as Goku and Kami started to walk off, even as a pair of musclebound blue ogres appeared on both sides of him and grabbed his arms. "Kakarot, listen to me! Don't go back! You'll only die again! You can't defeat Vegeta! Even if you do, you'll never stand a chance against Freeza! He's the one who destroyed our planet! He's the most powerful being in the universe! Kakarot, please!" Goku stopped and looked over her shoulder at Raditz, sparing him only the briefest glance.
"That's why we're different, Raditz," Goku said as the ogres clapped chains around his wrists. "I never listened when people told me what I couldn't do." Then she followed Kami as the ogres led Raditz away. Raditz tugged at his chains suspiciously.
"Don't even try," one of the ogres told him. "The Enma locks are the most powerful bonds in the world of the living or dead."
"Really?" Raditz asked curiously, "What're they made of?"
"Your sins," the other ogre explained.
"Oh that's bullshit," Raditz protested as they shoved him into a cramped elevator. "And where is this taking me?"
"Hell."
"Oh fuck off!" The doors shut with a resounding CLANG and the elevator began its long, long trek down.