Chapter Hundred-thirty-two
Gohan VS. Super Boo! Who is the Strongest in the Universe?!
Lapis woke up suddenly with a cough, realizing belatedly that he was buried under the rubble of his home. "Amy?" he called out as he rolled over onto his stomach and started to push himself up. "Rhodey? Emmy? Greg? ...Andy? J-Jamie?" With every lack of a response, his voice grew fainter and as he collected his senses, he was forced to confront the fact that he couldn't sense any of them. "No," he whispered under his breath, "No, no, no, no…" He created another energy field to push the rubble off of him and gasped out in horror at what he saw in the stark light of day.
His wife and all of their children were sprawled out on the ground, faces permanently frozen in horror with large holes ripped through their chests. Not only that but all the color had drained from them. Not just their skin, but their hair, their eyes, even their clothes. They looked almost like statues as they looked up at him with blank, dead eyes. Lapis forced himself to look away as he knew that if he looked at them for too long, he would just crumble apart into ash from the weight of his despair. But looking away was worse. All across the ground and through the grass, Lapis could see the littered bodies of all their pets. He'd taken them in, kept them comfortable and safe, given them a home when no one else would… and now they were gone. His nanite-enhanced vision looked out and saw that it wasn't just his pets, but every animal in the park. Hundreds of corpses littered the grassy fields, from mightiest dinosaur to the smallest shrew. It was so much death… he couldn't stomach it. He collapsed to his knees and pulled at his hair, still fighting back tears. It didn't make any sense. It wasn't fair! Why was he still alive if everything else had died? The only thing he could assume was that the blasts had been too strong for his shield but the backlash from the shield's destruction rendered him unconscious, dropping his ki so low that it seemed like he was already dead. So, even though it had failed, the shield had still saved his life.
'But not the people I actually wanted to protect,' he thought forlornly. What was he supposed to do now? What could he do? Had his shield only really bought him a few extra minutes of life? He didn't see any point to going on without his family.
A cough startled Lapis out of his misery and brought his attention to another pile of rubble that started to move. Adrian, he realized, it had to be Adrian! After all, if he could survive, Adrian would be fine! He didn't even have ki! He actually even started to smile when the rubble shifted and he saw Adrian's red hair and the top of his head. The smile faded quickly when Lapis saw the state of his friend.
Large holes were ripped through Adrian's torso and arms and half of his face was ripped off. By the pets the android was cradling in his arms, it was obvious what the gentle behemoth had been trying to do. He'd hoped to shield them with his body. Sadly, they were as gray and lifeless as everything else in the park. Probably everything else in the world.
"Lapis…" Adrian whispered weakly, looking at the other out of his one good eye. Lapis crawled over to him on his hands and knees, putting a hand on the back of the giant's head to bring him down and rest their foreheads together.
"It's okay, big guy," he tried to assure him even as his voice quavered. "I-it's gonna be okay. I-I've got you, we're gonna fix you."
"Is everyone… gone?" the redhead asked painfully. Lapis opened his mouth to speak but couldn't force out the words. It was like his grief was a ball in his throat and it was choking him to try and swallow it down. "Find… who did it…." Adrian wheezed as the light slowly faded from him. With his heightened hearing, Lapis could actually hear Adrian shutting down. He could hear him dying. "Make… them… pay…" That, somehow, stunned Lapis as much as anything else. He had never heard the other be vengeful before. Then Adrian closed his eye and slumped forward to the ground, dead and gone. Lapis bowed his head for a moment and sniffled helplessly as the tears dropped down into the barren earth before he fell forward as well, using his hands to catch himself as the tears ran down freely. But even so, it was only for a moment. His hands dug into the dirt and balled up into fists as he snapped his head back, his tears now of bitterness and rage rather than heartbroken sorrow, his sobs coming out as snarls between gritted teeth.
"I'll make them pay, big guy," Lapis promised as he seethed. "I'll make them pay!" His eyes cycled through different filters of vision until he could track the energy particles in the air that the pink lightning bolts had made back to their source. Then, in as blind a fury as he could ever imagine, he rocketed off into the sky so furiously that the earth split beneath his feet. There would be time for grief later. When it was done, Lapis would cry so much that his tears would fill an ocean. But now it was time for hate, not sorrow. Now it was time for vengeance.
OoOoOoO
There was a crack like thunder when Gohan deflected a kick from Super Boo off his forearm and retaliated with an elbow aimed at the jaw that Boo avoided by sucking his head down into his shoulders before he took advantage of Gohan's momentum to kick him hard in the back, then again, then on the third kick he drove down with both feet, sending Gohan hurtling down to the ground below, smashing him into New East City with such ferocious intensity that the entire city erupted in a golden fireball from the impact. Gohan rose immediately from the fireball with a blistering series of punches, hammering Super Boo up out of the mushroom cloud, flames trailing off their bodies as the demi-Saiyan lifted Boo back up into the air and grabbed him by his antenna, swinging him around and around before letting go to send him hurtling across the planet, waiting for him to come back so he could axe kick him through the Earth itself. Super Buu was on the defensive, though, and caught Gohan by the ankle. He hurled him down toward the ocean so furiously that the air around Gohan sizzled with friction and the ocean boiled when he hit the water.
"Come on out," Super Boo taunted as he hovered above the still-boiling ocean. "Come on, we've been at this for three minutes now. You know I can sense ki, so you won't be able to get the drop on me the way your mother did to Freeza." With all of the souls of those he had consumed on Earth, not to mention Piccolo's memories after absorbing him, Super Boo arguably knew more about Gohan's own life than he did himself. When Boo saw bubbles on the water's surface and felt a surge of ki rushing up toward him, he grinned. "That's right," he muttered, "Come on up, let's get this–" But then an enormous geyser of lava erupted from beneath the ocean right in front of his face. "What the?!" It was at that moment that Gohan emerged from the ocean right behind him and kicked him in the back, sending him through the lava.
"When you channel ki into something," Gohan explained as he teleported above the still-dazed Super Boo, "It registers as having a ki signature!" He raised both hands over his head and spiked Boo into the ground hard enough to make the land split and the ground quake. Then he was in front of Super Boo as the other reformed himself from a gooey puddle of limbs and pain. "You'd know that if you ever actually learned anything instead of being a soul-stealing, power-absorbing monster! Masenko!" He blasted Super Boo at point-blank range, sending him hurtling away. Gohan followed after him without sparing a second thought to the destruction and devastation they were causing. Why bother? There was no one left. There was nothing to save. There was only justice. There was only revenge.
OoOoOoO
Hercule witnessed the events unfolding with his mouth wide open in astonishment. He couldn't even really watch as the struggle was hopelessly beyond his power; he could only feel it in the sizzle of the air that made the hairs on the back of his neck stand up, in the trembling of the ground beneath his feet and the rumbling in the sky above like thunder. Despite all of this, he wasn't in any rush to run away.
"You really shouldn't be here," Dende insisted as he gripped Hercule by one shoulder with Bee tucked under his other arm. "It's not safe!"
"I'm not a coward," Hercule told him bluntly. Dende was dumbfounded. What in the world did that have to do with anything?
"I'm not calling– I don't–" Dende sputtered, still confused by that reaction. "What do you even think you're going to do?!" he demanded. Hercule shrugged.
"I dunno," he admitted. "But I'm not runnin' or hidin'. Even if Majin Boo isn't the same guy I tried to help, he's still in there somewhere. He's still my friend. I'm not abandoning him. I had to survive for a reason. Besides," he added dryly, "Where is safe?"
Dende paused and considered that. The entire planet was Gohan and Super Boo's battleground and, with the Lookout destroyed, he couldn't think of any real safe haven off of the top of his head. "...Alright," he finally conceded at last. "Just stay near me, okay? In case anything happens."
OoOoOoO
"Try this one on for size!" Super Boo taunted as he brought his hands down to his side. "Kaaameee… haaameee… haaa!" Boo thrust out his hands and Gohan brought his fists up with his index fingers raised. Shockingly, the wave completely dispersed against his hands, leaving Super Boo stupefied.
"After dealing with Cell," Gohan explained, "I had Tenshinhan teach me the Crane technique for Kamehameha deflection." He flew toward Super Boo and allowed himself a small smirk as he came in with a kick to the side of Boo's head "You're gonna have to do better than that!" Boo rolled with the kick, moving like flowing water before reconstituting himself a few hundred yards away.
"Let's try something a little closer to home, then!" Boo taunted as he jabbed two fingers at Gohan. "Makankosappo!" A pink bastardization of the signature yellow-and-purple spiral shot from his fingertips and went straight for Gohan who, in response, held up a hand with a glowing swirl of ki in his palm spinning in an opposite rotation to the drill of the Makankosappo. The beam spun out and dispersed, thin lines of ki arcing across the sky and slicing through the ground and sea but never touching Gohan.
Super Boo's startled expression allowed Gohan another grin. "For as long as I've known and sparred with Mr. Piccolo," he reminded the monster, "You think I wouldn't have figured out a counter to his best move?" Super Boo sneered at Gohan and fired another Makankosappo, then another from his other hand a fraction of a second later. Gohan diffused both beams with a spiral of ki in each hand, glaring at Boo as he did so. With a growl, Boo kept firing off beams, faster and faster. More arms grew out of the sides of his arms and and all along his chest, filling the air with beams like a hail of machine gun fire. But Gohan was the slightest fraction of an attosecond faster and blocked and diffused every shot, sometimes having to twist his body so that the trails of light didn't slice through him, and came through completely unharmed. Super Boo bared his fangs and prepared another attack when Gohan suddenly reversed the direction of the swirling ki, drawing all of the energy that Boo had sent against him back into his hand.
"What is–" Boo started to ask before Gohan grabbed his wrist with his other hand and drew all the ki into his hand as it flashed into a brilliant green spire, not unlike a drill.
"Giga Piercer!" Gohan roared as the beam fired directly at Super Boo. With a sneer, Boo stretched out his form like water and wound around and around the drill in a spiral, getting closer and closer before he lunged to strike. Just as he did, Gohan's hand moved from his wrist to lay flat against the back of his hand, which he turned to the side. "Giga Masenko!" He cried out as the beam changed shape, going out wide to blast Super Boo apart.
OoOoOoO
"Yeah, Gohan!" Goku cheered enthusiastically and pumped a fist into the air as she watched the battle with Pracya, Kibito, and Xī around the crystal ball. She'd been a little worried at first after Boo had absorbed Gotenks and Piccolo but Gohan was more than holding his own. He had this under control. She was so proud of the skill he was showing!
Xī, however, wasn't quite so ready to breathe easy. Although these new transformations were foreign to her, it was still the same Majin Boo that had slaughtered her kin and tormented her nightmares for eons beyond counting. She felt victory for a moment when she'd thought Gohan had destroyed Boo once and had felt the agony of it being ripped away. She wouldn't be able to breathe easily again until she knew, beyond all doubt, that he was absolutely destroyed and gone.
OoOoOoO
Despite himself, Vegeta couldn't help but huff and give an approving nod. So the boy used that brain for things other than reading books after all. Good.
OoOoOoO
Gohan's eyes narrowed as he surveyed the battlefield, trying to sense Super Boo. It was difficult, though, with how much he'd lowered his ki. "Come on," he muttered under his breath. "I know you're not dead. I know you're just hiding somewhere."
"That's why I've always been proud of you, Gohan," Piccolo's voice suddenly said in Gohan's ear. The sound made Gohan freeze despite himself and he felt a fist pounding into his back, driving the wind out of his lungs as he arched in pain. A foot came out of nowhere to crack him in the side of the head while he was still reeling from the first blow before dozens of blows from all directions battered Gohan, beating him senseless as Super Boo reformed. A heel kick crashing down on the top of Gohan's head sent him hurtling down to crash into the ground in an enormous cloud of dust. Boo came floating down through the dust cloud with a smirk as he watched Gohan struggle up to his hands and knees, trying to shake off the effects of the blow.
"Don't you see, Gohan?" he asked mockingly as he advanced on him. "You can't beat me. You don't have a chance. I'm everyone you've ever met, everyone who's ever even seen you. I know your every move, your every thought." Then he reached one hand back, morphing his fist into a spearhead. "For example… I know you're afraid." Then he shot his hand forward and his fist shot through Gohan's back and came out on the other end. He raised Gohan up over his head with a laugh as his form went slack on his wrist, a triumphant laugh that died down as he suddenly realized there was no blood running down his hand. Then, it was Gohan's turn to laugh. A wheezing, gasping, pained sound but a laugh.
"Multiform technique," he taunted right back. "Guess you don't know me after all." Then "Gohan" burst into a puff of smoke as Boo got into a defensive stance, looking around in every direction, trying to sense Gohan. But that was the problem: he couldn't sense him. He seemed to be everywhere. There were ki signatures in every direction.
"What game are you trying to play?" Boo demanded with a snarl. Gohan's mocking laughter greeted him but even that was untraceable. Was he throwing his voice?
"Like I said, you don't know me that well, Boo," Gohan teased him. "For instance, you don't know that for the last seven years, I've been trying to figure out how to manipulate the color of my ki. Is it empathic? Is it psychosomatic?" Something punctured Super Boo's arm and caused him to cry out in pain. "A little of both, actually."
"So, what?" Boo asked through gritted teeth. "You made yourself invisible?" He reached for his arm with his other hand but something shot through it as well, driving his hand into his chest like a nail with a gasp of pain.
"No," Gohan told him matter-of-factly, "Turning my ki invisible wouldn't turn me invisible, since aura is translucent, anyway. Now, ki attacks on the other hand…" A howl of pain was ripped from Boo as something else shot through his knee, and another something pinned his antenna down to the ground. "See, you don't know anything about the kind of fighter I am," he told the other as more invisible bolts shot through Super Boo's legs, arms, and torso, even one through his open mouth when he cried out in pain. "You don't even know anything about the people you absorbed. For example, Mr. Piccolo would be smart enough…" Gohan suddenly appeared in front of Super Boo with Instant Transmission, one hand raised next to his head with a smirk. "To know this had been a trap." Then the ki bolts became visible, orange daggers of light stabbing through Boo's body with crackling orange spheres at the ends of them. With a snap of his fingers, the spheres came hurtling toward Boo, who was squirming and screaming with wide-eyed terror and helplessness.
OoOoOoO
Hercule, Dende, and Bee watched the orange mushroom cloud in the distance with awe, though they were forced to avert their eyes from the burningly-bright light. For a moment, Dende thought that was going to be the end of it. Yet even though he was severed from his worlds' eye with the Lookout destroyed, he still had enough of his Godly senses to be able to sense Boo's ki. What was it going to take?!
OoOoOoO
Gohan could sense Super Boo, too. He started flying off in the direction he had sensed him from and found himself wondering how in the hell Boo could have been blown so far away. Unless he'd broken off a piece of himself and hidden it away at one point during the battle. "I really hate regenerators…" he muttered under his breath. He was starting to get worn down and his body was covered in scrapes and bruises. He'd have to find a way to end this soon or Boo would wind up outlasting him. Then Gohan sensed something coming toward him. But it wasn't quite Super Boo's ki. It wasn't anyone he knew, either. Was there someone else that survived?
Soon enough, Gohan got the answer to that question: no. If anything, what Gohan saw was proof that no one had survived, because at first he thought he was seeing hundreds, no, thousands of ghosts. Then, however, he realized that all of these "ghosts" had Super Boo's face. He'd never seen Piccolo do anything like this. Since Boo wasn't exactly the creative type, that meant this attack could only have come from–
"The kids," Gohan growled between clenched teeth as his blood began to boil. He fired hundreds of bolts of ki from his hands to destroy the ghosts and they rocketed toward him to close the distance. Acting on instinct, he swatted one of the ghosts away to try and deflect it and then cried out in pain as it exploded against his wrist, covering his forearm in burns. He reeled away from the explosion and stared in horror as the ghosts kept hurtling toward him. He dove down and rocketed up and flew back and forth between them, twisting through the sky with all his speed and skill, pulling hairpin turns to make the ghosts explode against one another, weaving desperately to avoid them. "Come on," Gohan muttered as he turned his head back to look at the ghosts, feeling a sense of relief at how drastically their numbers had whittled down. "Is this all you've got? You're stealing moves from little kids now?"
Then he felt a palm against the back of his head and an iron grip squeeze tight. "Actually," Super Boo taunted as his black nails dug into Gohan's skin and the ghosts dissipated, "This was a trap." He chuckled as his other fist slammed into Gohan's kidney before moving up to grip one side of Gohan's head. His other hand moved to grab Gohan's other temple and squeeze, both hands pressing down on the sides of his head as Gohan cried out silently in pain. "I know you better than you think, Gohan," he told him mockingly. "I know you're a bit of a scholar. In that case, let me give you a bit of a lesson." Then lightning shot through Super Boo's palms and into Gohan's mind as he screamed out in agony and pink light shot out of his eyes.
OoOoOoO
Gohan watched as everything wound backwards as his entire world changed and flickered at lightning speed. He saw cities shrink back into the ground, saw Piccolo Daimaou's armies ravage the world, saw a half-second flick of something purple and a bright flash and dinosaurs roam the Earth in far greater numbers than they did now before the sea swallowed them up and then the clouds sucked the sea back up and the world boiled away in a burning ball of gas. Then there was nothing, and slowly he watched all the stars wink out as they were drawn back to the beginning.
"Before there was time," Super Boo's voice boomed as it filled all existence, "Before there was anything–" and Gohan watched a diminutive figure with light blue skin and white hair, with a blue halo behind his head and dressed in blue with an orange triangle in the center of his chest drop a tiny, purple-and-blue swaddled bundle and left it floating in the infinite abyss as radiating light was drawn back into it until the light was blinding. And then, complete darkness. "There was nothing." The absolute blackness lasted a few more seconds before a dark, blood-red light began to fill all of existence. "And before there was nothing…" Gohan could only watch in horror as, bathed in the all-present hellish light, an infinite writhing field of pink tendrils reached and black eyes looked in all directions, screaming in rage, pain, and hunger with infinite mouths, "There was me." The magnitude of Gohan's horror was magnified by his pain as he felt Super Boo's thumbs jam themselves into his eyes as the illusion ended.
OoOoOoO
"Gohan!" Goku screamed out in panic when she saw her son take such a grievous blow. "I've got to help him!" she insisted as she started to stand before Xī grabbed him.
"There's nothing you can do, Goku!" she reminded him. "Even if you were powerful enough to fight Boo, you're dead! You can't go back to the living world anymore without potentially causing serious damage to the very fabric of reality, especially considering that Gotenks and Boo already ripped holes in it! There's no telling what could happen!" Goku still looked like she was about to jump. "If there's absolutely no other chances left, I'll let you go back, but we can't afford to take that risk."
Slowly, Goku forced herself to sit back down. She had to have faith in Gohan, like she always did. Besides, Dende was there. He'd heal Gohan, right?
OoOoOoO
Hearing Gohan's pained cry echo on the wind had been enough to drive Dende into action and he flew off toward the sound and the sense of Gohan and Boo's ki, and the sight that greeted him was absolutely horrible. Gohan's eyes had been gouged out and Majin Boo, who was wearing a vest for some reason, was walking through his desperate, wide swings and mocking him. He had to get in there, he had to heal Gohan and help him! But what could he do?! He couldn't get close enough to touch Gohan without Boo seeing him and if he saw him, he'd kill him!
'But if I don't do something,' Dende thought helplessly, 'He'll kill Gohan! Ohh, what do I do, what do I do?!' He'd need something. He'd need a miracle.
OoOoOoO
"You're all alone, boy," Super Boo mocked as he leaned away from one of Gohan's swings and slammed his fist into Gohan's ribs as he staggered toward him. "There is only death left for you and darkness for the entire universe." Gohan sagged off of Boo's fist and stumbled away, trying to focus, trying to sense his ki. But the pain made it impossible to think and his mind was still reeling from the vision. But he had to do something. Anything! "Your death is only the beginning," Super Boo assured him. "I will reach out my hand across the whole of existence, wrap my fist around it, and squeeze. I'll squeeze until every last light has been extinguished. You're strong, child," he conceded as Gohan struggled to stay on his feet. "But I am beyond strength. I was the beginning and I will be the end." He reached his hand out toward Gohan, ready for the killing blow. "And I have come for you, Son Gohan." Then a green-white blur barreled into Super Boo and carried him up into the sky, followed a second later by a thunderous crack and a scream of rage, leaving Gohan very confused.
OoOoOoO
'Well,' Dende thought, 'That's definitely a miracle.' Then he flew toward Gohan as quickly as he could as the other collapsed to the ground, struggling to stay conscious. "It's alright," he assured Gohan as he lay his hands on him and let the healing magic flow, "It's alright, Gohan, I've got you." Gohan's ragged breaths became deeper as his eyesight returned and he blinked up at Dende in surprise. "Just like old times, huh?" Dende joked, making Gohan chuckle weakly.
"I know this is a weird time to bring this up," he told Dende as he lay there in the dirt, "But I'd kinda like Freeza to come back." Dende shot him a look and he shrugged. "At least Freeza didn't regenerate," he pointed out. "If I put a hole in Freeza's torso or somewhere like that, it'd probably stay there. Heck, I'd even be okay with Freeza coming back magically stronger than me as long as I didn't have to put up with him regenerating. In fact," he went on as Dende continued to heal him, "When the Earth is inevitably in danger again and I have to fight whoever it is–" Because of course it would and of course he'd be the one to fight them– "I just really, really hope they can't regenerate."
"You could always use the Dragon Balls to wish for a healing factor," Dende observed. Gohan blinked up at him in surprise as it was clear that the thought had never even crossed his mind. "Well, save that for after we've wished everyone else back," Dende decided.
"Yeah," Gohan agreed with a nod as he flexed his unburned fingers. "What the hell was that, anyway?"
OoOoOoO
Lapis continued to scream with rage as he battered Super Boo relentlessly with pummeling fists, his entire body glowing with green energy as he kicked his infinite energy reactor into overdrive. "Hey, asshole!" he roared as he grabbed Boo by the antenna and swung him around and around. "You wanna know what infinite energy looks like?!" He released to send Super Boo flying straight up into the air and thrust his hands forward. "It looks! Like! This!" A blindingly bright green burst of ki shot forth from each hand and Lapis twisted his hands so that they formed a cyclone, trapping Boo inside it. "Infinity Cyclone!" Super Boo cried out in pain as he was shredded apart and Lapis kept pouring on more and more power, with everything he had, as his eyes exploded and ki flew out of them as well and out of his mouth. His hands burst and his arms erupted up to the elbows as ki poured out of him continuously, his body glowing like a star.
At last, when Lapis finally couldn't sense a single drop of Majin Boo's energy left, with nothing else left to go on now that his eyesight was gone, he let his stumps drop to the sides as smoke curled off them and out of his eyes and ears. He gasped and panted and tried to take in a breath… but couldn't. Something was blocking his airway, was caught in his throat, was… moving. Lapis felt something wriggling around in his throat and felt fingers crawl up out of his mouth in horror. One of Super Boo's hands had escaped the cyclone and had shrunk itself down impossibly small and slipped into his throat through his nasal passageway. Lapis tried to scream and tear at the fingers, but he lacked hands to defend himself anymore and the hand, which was growing into an arm down his throat, completely muffled the sound. With one last terrified scream, Lapis was completely swallowed up in pink in the blink of an eye and Super Boo quickly reformed around him.
"Huh," he muttered curiously as he watched green lightning dance up and down his arms and between his fingers. "Interesting." Now he knew what infinite energy looked like… and what it felt like. Very interesting indeed.
OoOoOoO
"Alright," Dende declared as he took his hands off of Gohan, "I think that's everything I can do." Gohan hopped up to his feet and looked himself over before nodding.
"Yeah," he agreed as he ripped off the tattered remains of his shirt. "Which means I need you to get out of here, Dende. Now."
Dende blinked at Gohan in confusion. Leave? But he could keep healing Gohan if he got hurt? Why would he need him to– "Oh, right," he reminded himself with sudden realization. "The Dragon Balls. Duh." If he died then that would mean no one could be wished back.
"The heck with the Dragon Balls!" Gohan exclaimed, startling the green Guardian of Earth. "Dende, you're my friend!" A frown set on his face as he remembered all that had been lost today. "I just don't want anyone else to die…" Dende nodded slowly and turned before stopping himself.
"Gohan," he said, "Wait. In case… I mean, if anything happens, and we all die…" Dende grabbed the back of Gohan's neck and pulled the slightly taller man down, leaning forward to press their foreheads together. His antenna went through Gohan's hair to brush along his scalp before he pulled away, leaving Gohan very confused. "It's… a-a Namekian thing," he explained, looking away as his face flushed. Gohan nodded and couldn't help but smile.
"Thank you, Dende," he said warmly. Then he rocketed into the sky toward Super Boo again, one fist drawn back and ready to strike. Boo's ki felt… different now. He couldn't place it. Not that it really mattered, though. He could tell that he'd gotten a zenkai boost from Dende healing him and now he was sure that he had the advantage.
Super Boo came rocketing toward him with a malevolent grin on his face and green lightning crackling all over his body. "So what does this make it?" he asked. "Round three?"
"No," Gohan retorted, "The final round!" Their fists met in a titanic shockwave that shook the heavens and they entered another furious exchange of blows, fighting with everything they had, each blow delivered with killing intent. Gohan's eyes burned with hatred and his soul roared like the blazing inferno of a star. Boo's black eyes were filled with malevolent glee and the black abyss where a soul should have been was only the empty, all-consuming, all-hungering void of a black hole. A deafening collision of fists sent them hurtling away from one another with the shockwave and Gohan drew his fists down to his side. A blazing red star formed in his hands as Super Boo stretched his hands out to either side and gathered green ki in his palms. "Shin… Ryuuuu…"
"Final…" Super Boo roared as veins pulsed under his flesh and steam poured out of his holes, lightning racing along his arms.
"Haaa… meee…"
"INFINITY!" Super Boo thrust his hands forward and a beam of emerald light ripped forth from his palms that consumed half the sky.
"HAAAAA!" Gohan threw his hands out and a blood red dragon came roaring out of him, its mouth open wide as it bellowed in rage, twisting and spiraling before it charged straight and met Boo's attack head on. The collision of beams met in a blinding eruption of light that seemed to warp space and time around the point of collision, sending ripples across all of creation.
OoOoOOO
"WHAT THE HECK IS GOING ON?!" Enma demanded as he clutched onto his mahogany desk for dear life. "SOMEBODY MAKE IT STOP!"
OoOoOoO
As all of Hell trembled and quaked around him, Vegeta powered up to Super Saiyan 2 to keep himself planted, his arms still crossed as he huffed and outwardly looked unimpressed. But on the inside, he couldn't help but be… almost proud. 'So this is what you'd always been capable of, eh, boy? You really are Kakarot's son.'
OoOoOoOoO
Billions of lightyears out in star-studded infinity, far beyond the raging battles of the Arcosian Empire and the Galactic Federation and far, far away from Earth; the cosmic tremblings even reached the palace of Beerus the Destroyer. His right ear flicked and he turned over in his sleep, muttering under his breath. "Smmr Syy Ghh…" before he returned to his silent, occasionally-snoring slumber.
OoOoOoO
Pracya gave a startled cry and dove for the crystal ball as it started rolling and bouncing away from all of the shaking and grabbed it, holding it over his head so it wouldn't fall again. While Xī and Kibito struggled to maintain their balance, Goku sat on the ground in deep thought like nothing was happening around her.
"This isn't good," she muttered. "Boo and Gohan are way too evenly matched for Gohan to get enough power to completely destroy him. Plus, Boo will be able to keep regenerating no matter how much damage Gohan does to him but Gohan'll just keep getting worn down." Dende had been able to heal Gohan once but that was probably the only shot they were ever going to get. The only people left on Earth were Dende, Hercule, Gohan, and a dog. She furrowed her brow and balled her fists in frustration. "There has to be something we can do! I can't just sit here!"
"Well," Pracya said slowly as he set the crystal ball back down. "We might have one last trick up our sleeve: fusion."
Goku blinked at that. "What, like the Metamorans?" she asked. "Our fusion would be strong, sure, but I don't think Boo's just gonna stand there and let Gohan and me do the dance."
"No, no, no, not that nonsense!" Pracya told her as he shook his head. "I mean the good stuff! The Fusion of the Gods!" Goku blinked again and Xī looked at her elder as well. "The Potara," he explained in exasperation, plucking off one of his earrings and showing it to Goku.
This did nothing to alleviate Goku's confusion. "I'm not really a jewelry gal," she told him. "You'd be better off giving these to Suno. She likes this kinda stuff." Pracya groaned and slapped his palm into his face as he started to put his earring back on.
"Oh, no, wait!" Xī exclaimed just as Pracya had begun to speak. "I remember now! The Potara fusion! It's even stronger than the Metamoran fusion and…" Goku gave her a withering look as Xī realized that she very likely could have suggested using these all the way back on Earth and she gave a sheepish chuckle. "Here," Xī said as she took off her left earring, "Take mine and-"
"No," Kibito said at the exact same moment, taking off his right, "Allow me–" There was a split second as they both realized what they'd just done and then their bodies crashed together. There was a momentary flash and then… Xī seemed to be standing in front of Goku and Pracya, slightly bulkier, with noticeably higher ki, wearing Kibito's clothes and having his hair.
Xībito looked down at herself for a moment and stared at her hands as a sudden and horrified panic settled over her and she shrieked, running her hands through her hair as she came to grips with her own existence. However, after a few seconds, she managed to compose herself with a few deep breaths and calmly patted herself down. "Okay," she assured herself in a slightly-huskier version of Xī's voice. "Okay. Alright. I'm good. This presents…" she paused for a moment, her hand in a significant place. "...Possibilities." Her mind wandered before she shook her head to bring herself back to the present.
"Right," Pracya carried on as if nothing happened. "You just have to put one on your right ear and have Gohan put the other on his left ear. Then," he pointed at Xībito, "You're fused."
"Should I power up to Super Saiyan 3?" Goku asked. "So that Gohan and I'll be a little closer in power."
"Absolutely not!" Pracya told her sharply. "If you transform before you fuse, you'll be stuck as a Super Saiyan forever until you burn out and die!" Oh. Well, yeah, Goku definitely didn't want to do that. "Don't worry about powering up to try and match him. Once you fuse, the fusion will have access to all of your combined power and they'll have more than enough power to completely obliterate Boo. There's only one catch," he added, "The process is permanent." That gave Goku a moment's pause as she was in the middle of fixing the earring to her right ear.
"Uhhh…" That could be a problem.
"What's the matter?" Xibito asked. They were so close to winning now. What the heck could Goku's problem be?!
"It's just that…" Goku explained awkwardly as she rubbed the back of her head. "I'm married to Suno. Who's Gohan's mother. But Gohan was dating this girl Videl, I'm pretty sure, so…" she tapped her fingertips together awkwardly. "How's that gonna work?" she asked. Xībito and Pracya face-faulted straight onto the ground.
"Oh, you cannot be serious!" Xībitobito exclaimed with frustration as she got back up. "Just… just put the earrings on and then we'll have the dragon unfuse you or something."
"You really think Shenron can do that?" Goku asked.
"Who's Shenron?" Xībitobito replied.
"Wait, what Dragon did you mean, then?" Goku wondered.
"There's still one problem," Xibito realized, rather than answering her question. "You're still dead and we don't have nearly enough time to go to New Namek and use their Dragon Balls to revive her." She hummed thoughtfully and looked down at the grass as she worked her brain to try and come up with a solution. They couldn't just let Goku go back, especially with the energy Gohan and Boo were putting out now.
"Oh for crying out loud," Pracya sighed irritably. "I'll fix this nonsense." He rolled up one sleeve of his shirt and the tip of his index finger glowed with a dazzling light. Slowly, he began to reach for Goku's forehead.
"No, wait, Pracya!" Xībitobito exclaimed. "You can't!" But Pracya was already pressing his fingertip to Goku's forehead and she took in a startled gulp of air as she felt something pound in her chest. She looked up and watched her halo dissolve into stardust and get blown away on the breeze.
"I'm alive…" Goku realized as she put two fingers to her neck, feeling her pulse. She'd honestly sort of forgotten what her heartbeat felt like.
Xībito looked back at Pracya and was surprised to see that the Elder Kaioushin was still alive. "I don't understand," she muttered. "I thought you gave her your life force." Pracya shrugged with a bit of a chuckle.
"I'm over 75 million years old," he reminded them. "A hundred years is like a drop in the bucket for me. Not that I wanna make a habit out of it or anything but I don't really mind this one time." Goku's face was screwed up in concentration as she tried to count how long she was supposedly going to live now on her fingers. "Hey," Pracya said sharply as he snapped his fingers repeatedly in front of her face. "Focus! Go to Earth, give Gohan the earring, kick Boo's pink butt, wish everyone back." He took his earrings off and handed them to her, practically shoving them into her palm.
"Right," Goku agreed with an emphatic nod as she focused and found Gohan's ki. "Thank you, Kaioushin. I won't forget this."
"And you better not forget my date!" Pracya reminded her as she teleported away with Instant Transmission.
OoOoOoO
The explosion from both beams meeting in a stalemate sent both warriors tumbling away and Super Boo was the first to recover, charging at Gohan and stretching his arm out to try and catch Gohan by surprise with an elongated jab. But Gohan grabbed his forearm instead and yanked him closer, smashing Super Boo's face into his outstretched fist so viciously that it came out the back of Boo's head before his foe kicked him in the chest with both feet to knock him back.
"This is hopeless, you know," Super Boo taunted as his face reformed to show Gohan a sadistic grin. "I won't get tired. I won't slow down. I can keep going forever. I can wait this out until you burn out, wither, and die."
Gohan chuckled even as he wiped away the bead of sweat that trickled down into the cut on his forehead. "You must be talking about somebody else," he retorted. "I can do this all day. Shinsoku Odori!" Gohan rocketed toward Boo in a blur of blue and white, overwhelming him with relentless strikes from every direction.
"That's right, Gohan!" his mother's voice cheered from behind him. "I knew you could do it! You've always been such a smart boy!" He snarled in anger and drove a knee up under Super Boo's chin to launch him into the sky before whirling around.
"I've had enough of your–" then he froze, staring. It… it was his mother. "Tricks?" Son Suno floated there in front of him, alabaster white and with a ghostly tail coming down from her waist but it looked identical to her. Super Boo twisted his head the right way around and watched Gohan's moment of anguish with a wicked chuckle. He'd spat the ghost out during their energy struggle and it was working perfectly. He sucked in a big gulp of air and leaned his head back. If one ghost could make him freeze…
"Oh, Gohan," Suno sighed mournfully. "Why couldn't you have been this strong sooner? Why couldn't you have saved me?" Gohan snarled in anger at this phantom abomination wearing his mother's face and fired a ball of ki at it. She exploded on contact, as he'd expected, but then she screamed… and it sounded so real! It was like… like he'd…
"Why did you do that, big bro?" Goten asked from behind him. "Why did you kill mama?" Gohan turned back around and stared in horror as he saw everyone he'd ever met staring at him as ghostly apparitions, each of them looking at him with an accusatory glint in their white eyes.
"Why didn't you save me?" Videl's ghost demanded. "I thought you cared about me, Gohan!"
"How could you let this happen?" Krillin asked. "I've known you since you were four years old! But you let me die! You let my family die!"
"No…" Gohan muttered as he started floating away from them. "Stop it… stop it!"
"If it weren't for me, you wouldn't even exist!" Bulma told him sharply. "And you couldn't even save me! How could you?"
"I didn't… I didn't mean to!" Gohan insisted as he covered his ears. He had to block it out, he had to block them out!
Super Boo chuckled again and jabbed an accusing finger at Gohan. With a vengeful roar, the ghosts descended on Gohan and he flew away, turning around so he wouldn't have to look at them. They weren't real, he forced himself to remember. They weren't real! But every time he weaved and dipped and spun through the air, making the ghosts collide into one another and explode, they all screamed and it sounded so real. It became too much and he was overwhelmed. Gohan stopped in midair and he came to a screeching halt, all of the ghosts crashing into him at once in a blossom of red flame. With a victorious smirk, Super Boo watched Gohan spiral toward the ground in an unconscious heap with smoke trailing behind him.
OoOoOoO
"Okay," Baba decided, "That's it. We're goin' to Earth." Vegeta blinked and raised one eyebrow.
"So what's our plan, then?" he asked.
Baba shrugged. "Get in there, by a few seconds for Dende to heal him and then fuse."
"That's our game plan?" Vegeta asked indignantly. "A dance?"
"Hey, it's the eleventh hour and the fifty-ninth minute. You got a better idea?" When Vegeta offered no reply, Baba nodded with a huff. "That's what I thought," she muttered as she pushed up the sleeves of her robe and prepared the teleportation spell.
OoOoOoO
Gohan got up groggily onto his hands and knees, the impact with the ground having brought him roughly back to consciousness. He shook his head as he tried to struggle to his feet but lurched to one side and fell down again. Every time he tried to move, it hurt. He could feel Super Boo coming toward him and the ringing in his ears stopped right in the middle of Super Boo's monologue.
"-inally going to kill you," Boo admitted as he looked down at Gohan, "But I believe I've come up with a much better idea. After all," he explained as he raised a hand like a cobra ready to strike, his hand growing huge and blossoming open like a flower, "What could be a worse fate for you than to become part of me?" Gohan pushed himself up onto his feet again, trying to think above and between the painful pounding in his skull. He had to do something, he had to think, had to come up with a plan, had to–
"Taiyobakudan!" Goku's voice cried out as a bright light came hurtling down out of the sky above. Super Boo looked up in confusion as the light hit him directly in the face and exploded, overwhelming his eyes with searing white light and causing him to reel back in pain, clutching at his face and shrieking with rage.
"Mom?" Gohan muttered in confusion as he looked up at the sky and blinked til his vision cleared. That was her! But he didn't understand… and what was she holding in her hand.
"No time to explain!" she told him as she reared her arm back. "Catch!" Goku threw something at him with all her might and he reached his hand out and jumped up to catch it and whatever it was… sailed right between his fingers.
"...What was it?" Gohan asked.
"Oh for crying out loud!" Goku cried out. "You missed! How could you miss?! I was ten feet in front of you!"
"Well you didn't exactly tell me what I was supposed to catch!" Gohan pointed out defensively as he dropped to the ground and started rooting around for whatever the hell his mom had thrown at him. "What am I even looking for, anyway?"
"Earring!" Goku exclaimed, keeping one eye on Super Boo who was still flailing around and holding his face.
"An earring?!" Gohan echoed incredulously as he shoved away the rubble he'd made when he landed. "How's an earring supposed to help me?!"
"That's why I said no time to explain," Goku shouted down at him, "Just find it and put it on your left ear!" That was when she noticed Super Boo had recovered and put his focus squarely on her. "Ahhh, nuts," she muttered as she powered up to Super Saiyan 3. Nothing about this was going to be good. She got into a fighting stance and braced for impact as Super Boo came barreling toward her.
"Found it!" Gohan cried as he held the earring up. Right as he did that, however, something else happened that made Majin Boo come to a screeching halt: he was suddenly wearing Piccolo's cape instead of Gotenks' vest. He looked down in confusion and horror at his new, reduced form. Most importantly of all, his ki had dropped significantly. Goku breathed a sigh of relief as she dropped out of Super Saiyan 3.
"Don't worry about putting on the earring, Gohan," she called down to him. "You can definitely take him now. Good thing we don't have to be one person forever anymore."
"Wait, we almost did what?!" Gohan asked in horror. He decided to worry about that later and, with the earring still clenched in one fist, he teleported up between Majin Boo and his mom and throw a flying kick into Boo's face, following with a crescent kick that smashed Boo down into the ground. He was there as soon as Boo hit the ground with one hand outstretched, charging all of his power into it. "It's over, Boo," he growled. "You lose."
Majin Boo nodded and slowly closed his eyes. "You're right," he agreed. "You've beaten me, Gohan." That actually gave Gohan a moment's pause. Was Boo actually showing humility at the end? "I suppose the old saying really is true. If you can't beat 'em…" Boo tilted his head down far enough for Gohan to see his antenna was gone before he flashed him a toothy, wide-eyed manic grin. "Join 'em!"
"Gohan, look out!" Goku cried. He looked down and saw Boo's detached antenna wrapped around his leg and had a fraction of an instint to react.
Luckily for Gohan, a fraction of an instant might as well be an eternity. Before Boo's antenna could even start to move up Gohan's leg, it, along with the rest of Majin Boo, was reduced to atoms with just the slightest display of Gohan's power.
"Woo! You did it!" Goku cheered, pumping a fist into the air as she joined her son on the ground. "I always knew you could do it!" Gohan gave his mom a small smile before looking down at his hand, clenching and unclenching it with a complicated expression on his face. "What's wrong?"
"I dunno… It just feels… Disappointing? It was the hardest fight I've ever been in but it just kinda… ended," he said with a shrug. "There wasn't some massive beam struggle like with Cell or all of us coming together to only barely eke out a win like with Vegeta. I wasn't fulfilling some ancient prophecy to get revenge on the man who took out our entire race like with you and Freeza. It wasn't even an overwhelming victory. Boo just sorta timed out because you saved me and then I just won."
Goku gave her son an understanding smile as she patted him on the shoulder, "No, I get it. Even if you've always been more of a hero then a warrior, you're still half-Saiyan. If I was in your shoes, I'd be just as disappointed. Hey, I was disappointed that I needed all of you guys to help with Vegeta!"
Gohan chuckled slightly at that as he handed his mom the earring. Leave it to his mom to comfort him in the weirdest of ways. "So, uh… What now?" he asked as he looked around. This place wasn't even recognizable as Earth anymore and Gohan knew that that'd be true no matter where they looked.
"Well, Dende's still alive so… maybe the Dragon Balls are fine but it'll take, like, half a year for them to recharge so I guess we just pop on over to New Namek and use theirs!"
Gohan nodded with a smile, "That sounds like a—" Before he could finish, the strangest and most horrifying thing happened. Pink ooze began to pour out of every pore on his body. He only had time to give his mom a horrified look before he was completely surrounded by the pink goo of Majin Boo.
There was a dark flash of red light that obscured Boo from view for a few seconds and, striding out of the red inferno, came Super Boo. He was wearing Gohan's white gi but far more noticeable than that was his power. It was just… it was just… "Too much…" Goku muttered weakly. She hadn't felt this completely overwhelmed by a foe's power since the first time she'd fought Freeza. She didn't even have a chance.
"As I'm now the most powerful being to have ever existed," Super Boo began in a measured and sonorous tone, his deep voice deceptively soothing, "I suppose I'll exercise a moment of magnanimity and give you a sixty second head start." He flashed Goku a wicked grin. "You'd better make it count. After all," he reminded her, "I have Instant Transmission now."
Rather than fight, or run, or have any kind of response, Goku was… frozen. Where could she run? What could she do? How could she possibly win? The only people left in the world were Dende and Hercule. Dende was probably stronger than Hercule but had no fighting experience whatsoever. And Hercule was a decent martial artist but… ugh, they'd just both make here weaker, anyway!
"Forty-six," Super Boo counted down, "Forty-five, forty-four…" Then, Goku sensed it. For a moment she thought she was imagining things. Why would she be sensing him? But it wasn't exactly like she had a lot of options, either. In a blink, she was gone.
OoOoOoO
"Alright," Uranai Baba told Vegeta as they materialized in the desert, although Vegeta was reasonably certain there was supposed to be a city here. "We're here. Good luck!"
"You couldn't have brought me any closer to the battle?" Vegeta asked irritably.
Baba huffed at that. "Hell no!" she told him flippantly before shooting back up into her hat, which then winked out of existence. Vegeta stared at the dark red light on the horizon and glared. So Majin Boo was even more powerful and there was no sign of Gohan's ki. Not exactly a good sign. Then his brow furrowed in confusion. Was that–?
"Vegeta!" Goku cried as she suddenly popped in front of him, startling him enough to knock him on his ass. "Boy, am I glad to see you!"
"Kakarot?!" Vegeta exclaimed in confusion. "What the hells are you doing here?!" Then he noticed the lack of her halo. "And why aren't you dead?!" He demanded. She shook her head and held out her fist, which had an earring on the end of it, to his growing confusion.
"No time to explain, just put this on your left ear!" Vegeta looked at the earring before noticing that Goku had the same strange little bauble on her right ear and he raised one eyebrow at her in confusion. "If you put it on, we'll fuse," Goku told him, "And we'll be strong enough to defeat Majin Boo. Now I know you don't like me and you probably don't wanna fuse with me and I'm not crazy about it, either, but it's–"
"Oh, give it here," Vegeta muttered as he yanked the earring out of her hand. Goku blinked in surprise.
"Wait, really?" she asked as Vegeta struggled to affix it to his ear.
"I'm not an idiot, Kakarot," he grumbled. "This monster murdered my wife and son. He killed my family. Your family. Ou– your friends. My pride isn't worth more than that."
"Huh. I was gonna make a speech and everything."
"Yes, and I'm sure it would have really put those three brain cells of yours to work."
Goku chuckled at that. "Heh, you better not make too many cracks about me being stupid. Once we're the same person, my stupid might rub off on you." Vegeta rolled his eyes and finished clipping the earring on as he felt a powerful energy radiating through his entire body, as if all of the atoms and molecules of his existence were being irresistibly pulled toward Goku. "Oh, by the way," she told him, "We're gonna be stuck like this forever."
"Wait, what?!" was all Vegeta had time to say before they were suddenly launched toward one another.
"-hree, two, one," Super Boo counted out, having already teleported toward Goku's ki. He started flying toward a bright light with a smug grin, wondering what last little trick she had up her sleeve. "Ready or not, here I–" A fingerless-glove-wearing fist smashed up under Super Boo's jaw to send him reeling and nearly ripped his head clean off his shoulders. Once he recovered enough to actually put his head on straight, he gawked at the sight that greeted him.
A figure that was neither entirely feminine nor entirely masculine was standing before him with a blue gi, blue pants, an orange undershirt, white boots, and white fingerless gloves. Their expression was a mixture of excitement and smugness as they flashed Super Boo a toothy grin, their black hair standing up on spiked ends and their dark eyes flashing with energy.
"Who… who are you?" Super Boo demanded as the enormity of his foe's power slowly dawned on him. That wasn't supposed to be possible. He was supposed to be the most powerful being in the universe! No one could be stronger than him. Who the hell was this… was this…
"Vegeta plus Kakarot," the other declared in a voice that was equal parts Vegeta's pride and Goku's exuberance as he jabbed a thumb into his chest. "I guess you can call me Vegetto!" He wasn't sure why that was his name but it felt right. "And I'm the one who's going to destroy you!" Born from the fusion of the two greatest Saiyan warriors to ever live, the Strongest in the Universe had finally arrived!