Chapter 63: New Beginnings

"...then, Gohan burst out of the pod and rammed into Raditz with enough force to crack his armor," said Piccolo, "The blow gut his power and paved the way for our victory."

Potara slowly shook his head. "Even as a little kid he still made a whole hell of a difference."

Piccolo nodded, a ghost of a smile on his face. "That he did."

"Afterwords, Goku locked Raditz down and told me to try my Special Beam Cannon again, and I did, it went right through both of...," continued Piccolo.

Potara stared at Piccolo in shock, mouth hanging wide open. "Piccolo..."

ZIP

"...you blew a hole through Goku?!" exclaimed Potara before she even had a chance to registered the sound.

"Yeah he did, and boy did it hurt!" came Goku's teasing voice.

Piccolo scoffed, but didn't attempt to hide his smug grin.

Potara glanced back, and was about to say something when she froze. Goku wasn't alone...

Her face went entirely blank to see an awkward and uncertain looking Gohan and Videl with Goku having a hand on their shoulders.

Gohan saw the look and sighed, mumbling, "Dad... I said we shouldn't force this..."

Goku clapped a hand on his back. "It'll be fine, c'mon, I see it's story time!"

Gohan sighed, defeated, and followed his father, he paused briefly near Potara to mutter, "Sorry, he kind of abducted us."

Potara said nothing, her eyes lingering on him for a moment before flickering to Videl's face. Gone was the initial explosive anger towards them after her birth. The awkwardness from yesterday was still there. Yet, to be so close to two that held so much of Pan's memories and lingering feelings was... intoxicating in a way. After Pan spent so much time away from them and repressing it, the desire and yearning was debilitating. She forced herself to look away and stare out into the clouds as Goku sat down next to Piccolo, and then Gohan and Videl sat a bit away on Potara's side. She did not trust herself to speak, and instead, she turned her head to stare at Piccolo.

Piccolo took the hint and resumed his story, "Afterwords I took Gohan with me to train for the arrival of Vegeta and Nappa for a year."

"Oh I don't know Piccolo, mom always said it was more of an abduction," said Gohan, a hint of a smile on his face.

Piccolo scoffed. "One you needed to break you of your whiny spoiled attitude."

"I was not whiny!" whined Gohan.

An amused twitch hit Potara's face. Gohan had been a whiny spoiled brat as a kid? Well, Grandma Chi-Chi did used to spoil her... spoil Pan... when she was younger, so she could see it.

"Besides, mom was raising me to be a scholar at the time, not a fighter," defended Gohan.

"Chi-Chi was a little crazy about your books," said Goku, scratching the back of his head, "She was reading you that math stuff before you could even crawl."

"Don't doubt that," mused Potara.

"Anyway...," began Gohan.

Potara listened quietly as Gohan, Piccolo, and Goku detailed the year of training, the first two on Earth, the latter on King Kai's planet. Aside from the stress of preparing for a potential world ending invasion (and didn't she know that feeling, or at least, Pan had), it hadn't seemed so bad. Then the Saiyan's arrived, and considering how Nappa blew up a city like it was nothing, she figured very little differentiated most of the Saiyans in this dimension compared to Terra's, save for whatever piece of history had allowed the Saiyans to thrive so much in the other. It was a wonder that Son Goku had ended up the way he did. If not for a bump on his head, would anyone here even be alive?

She briefly considers the notion to point that out to Goku... no. She snubs the ugly desire to inflict that kind of pain and lets it go. She wont deny she has an incredible amount of frustration and fury over her birth, her fusee's lives, Pan's family and friends, not least towards the gods, but taking it out on Goku like that is unacceptable. Giving him the thought that would nestle into his brain, fill him with doubts, weaken his confidence, make him think what if... or maybe not, in all honestly, very few things ever seemed to affect that man in a lingering way. He might just wave it off, still...

She blinks.

She's missing the story.

"Let me tell you, Vegeta was a nasty fight," said Goku, grinning fondly, "He was really skilled, and stronger than I was. The chips were down, but it was the fight of my life at that point."

He gave Potara a sly smile. "Don't tell him that though, it'll go to his head."

"Wouldn't dream of it," she answers back, amused.

"Anyway, I'm not gonna give a play-by-play," said Goku, "We fought, it was pretty brutal, I went to a level of Kaioken I shouldn't have at the time, he became a great ape, the others cut his tail off, he got nailed by a Spirit Bomb, yet still got up to kick us around."

A dreamy look crossed Goku's face. "I'm pretty sure that moment right there was when I wanted him to become a rival like Piccolo."

"Replacing me as one is more like it," muttered Piccolo.

Goku grinned. "If you trained more, you never know."

Piccolo scoffed. "Sure, whatever you say."

Potara tuned out the light banter, considering what Goku said for a moment. "The Spirit Bomb huh."

Goku glanced over at her. "Yeah, what about it?"

"What is it like to actually use it?" she asked.

"I could teach you it and you could learn for yourself," he offered.

Potara shook her head. "I don't think I could learn how to use it. I'm aware enough of myself to know that I'm not pure of heart, neither of my fusees were after all."

Goku frowned, looking like he wanted to say something, before averting his gaze. She can feel the tension from Gohan and Videl, a tint of resentment to their Ki. Piccolo doesn't particularly react, so he agrees with her.

Potara sighed, but doesn't turn to Pan's parents, instead focusing on Goku. "Pan wasn't evil, Goku, not by a long shot, but she had become obsessed with chasing power, again, after the Dimensional Tournament. She wouldn't have been able to use the Spirit Bomb. There were... very few times she would have been capable of using it after she got pulled into the other dimensions."

She brought a leg back up off the edge, pulling the knee to her chest, wrapping her arms around it, to many memories not her own bouncing around in her head. "To much crap to deal with, to much left undone and unsaid..."

She shook her head. "Forget it, lets get back to the story..."

"Actually," said Piccolo, clearing his throat, "I'm aware you'd rather not, but... you have both an... outside perspective, and access to Pan's perspective. If you are willing, you can answer so many questions that we have, about what went wrong..."

"Oh, I don't know, not throwing that girl into therapy?" suggested Potara dryly before glancing at Gohan, "Honestly, from what I do know of your own trials, did you ever have anything like that? You were involved in life or death struggles from a age even younger than Pan, constantly losing and regaining people you knew. You appeared to come out mostly okay."

Gohan blinked at her.

She blinked back.

"I... well...," said Gohan, scratching the back of his head, "I didn't ever go see a therapist or anything like that, no. It just... never stuck? I mean, I had plenty of nightmares growing up, a few phantom pains here or there if I'm remembering a particularly bad fight. I don't think anything really detrimentally affected me, you know aside from being the most awkward person ever in high school."

Videl snorted in amusement, a fond look on her face.

"Though, even that might have been because of my lack of social experience outside of my dad's friends," admitted Gohan, "My world back then was pretty small."

He turned to Goku, "What about you dad?"

Goku had a mostly blank look on his face, glancing over at Piccolo.

Piccolo sighed. "We've talked about this kind of thing before Goku."

They did?

"...we did?"

Piccolo pinched the bridge of his nose. "Perhaps not in depth enough. We acknowledged the problem, thought to keep an eye out for her and be there if Pan needed it, but... I suppose Potara is right, we never really tried to fix it. Just trusted she'd be alright and come to us if she needed help. We somewhat forced it more after the Timeplane mess, and got some results, we definitly should have done more sooner..."

"I still don't get it," said Goku, frowning.

"I know you don't, or maybe we're not phrasing it right for you, I doubt you've ever honestly heard the word therapy before," said Piccolo, sighing, "I think its a Saiyan thing honestly. Nothing ever really seems to affect you or Vegeta and linger. Well... more you than Vegeta, I think we've all seen how growing up under Freeza's thumb shaped him. Gohan is half Saiyan, so perhaps he got a bit of it. Pan however was mostly human, and humans are emotional creatures, their experiences linger far more and with more impact than either Saiyan's or my own kind."

He thumbed at Videl. "Just ask her. She used to fight after all."

Videl stiffened and glared at him.

He gave her an unimpressed stare in return.

Videl huffed, crossing her arms. "Well, lets see you go through your entire worldview being shattered, finding out your father is a colossal liar who took credit for something he didn't do without even asking which made pretty much everything I had believed in up to that point a lie, get the shit brutally kicked out of you to the point of torture that I still sometimes have nightmares about, find out how weak you are in comparison to the actual people who saved the planet along with their enemies not to mention two children, witness acts of mass death and destruction for the first time in my life, along with getting eaten by a bubblegum monster, all in the span of like... two days?"

She shook her head. "And that was just the major things. I needed time to... get my bearings straight again, figure out what I wanted with my life. I was also dating Gohan, and well, I got married and pregnant. Taking care of my daughter mattered more to me than anything else. I mean... I do kind of miss practicing martial arts, but I just never have the time anymore. We got bills to pay, and I like Chi-Chi and all, but like hell was I staying a stay-at-home-wife once Pan left her toddler years like she did, its boring, and also unfair to make Gohan have provide for us alone, so I got a job."

A stubborn look crossed her face. "And I didn't like relying on my father's fake fame and money unless I absolutely have to."

Potara stared at her, a little wide-eyed. She couldn't remember the last time mom... Videl... went on that kind of rant. Wonder how long she'd been keeping that in for.

Gohan smiled a little. "Well, I kind of did like being the breadwinner."

"Yeah? Well I didn't like it when you had to pull all that overtime and consider changing jobs to make more money to support us, I like having my husband around after all," Videl countered, a single-eyebrow raised in challenge, before going sly, "Not to mention you were always so worn out by your job there wasn't that much 'us' time."

Gohan flushed a little, and Potara groaned, "I'm pretty sure age isn't added together for a fusion, I'm twelve physically at least, please don't."

"I'm far older and I don't want to hear it either," muttered Piccolo, "You mammalians are still strange to me to this day. I think spitting out an egg is far simpler than the whole mess you have to go through."

Videl snorted. "Coward. You just don't want to face childbirth, I tell you that requires being a real warrior."

Piccolo huffed. "I'm not going to pick that fight with you, I know better."

Videl grinned at him. "Smart man."

"I... think I kind of get it? You're talkin bout head stuff, healthy mind healthy body, that thing," said Goku at last, "But I thought I helped with that... Pan and I did talk when she got home from the other dimension, she told me about what happened and showed me it her memories. I mean, I'm not the brightest at all this emotional stuff, but even I got that a lot of things weren't right with what happened."

Potara's amusement at the situation faded into uncomfortable frustration. "Goku... you did help, a little, telling her you didn't resent her for what happened, but that was it. I mean..."

She frowned. "I'm not the best at this stuff either, my knowledge... Pan's knowledge of it all was either school, home school, browsing the internet, and TV shows, but I know working through what happens is more than just regurgitating it out and brushing it off after a few nice words. As an outsider looking at her memories, I know what affected her, and there was far more than that as time passed as well, not to mention the mental attack really destabilized her, and..."

She looked off of the lookout aimlessly. "...and there are memories of hers that I sorely wish I could rip out of my head and never have to see again."

"Like what?" asked Goku.

"Vegetto was a pretty big one," she answered bluntly.

Goku and Gohan both flinched at that.

"I honestly think we were the villains there," admitted Potara, her face souring, "That harpy Kaioshin of Time... she bumbled us into that mess without trying to figure something else out. We killed family and friends relying only on the words of a God out of her depth that it was the only way."

Goku glared down at the clouds, frustrated, but didn't say anything to disagree with her.

Gohan let out a soft breath. "We were the villains, Potara, we were. That, to our knowledge, was a lose lose situation no matter what. I wish we could have found another way, but did we have the time to wait? Allowing Towa to gain more and more power? It was an awful situation that I never want to go through again."

"Agreed," said Potara, sighing, minding turning over one memory after another, "For all her frustration with you, Gohan, she did love you dearly, and all the times she saw you brutally beaten into a pulp or nearly killed didn't help either. Most recently you getting chewed up and spit out by the Majin was pretty harsh for a kid to see."

Gohan looked away for a long moment. "Wasn't pleasant to experience either."

"I don't doubt it," said Potara, "Hell, I even think it bad."

Gohan gave her a dubious look.

She glared at him. Was he seriously thinking she wouldn't? She WASN'T the Doll! "What?"

"I'm not doubting you, but... why would you need to point that out? Wouldn't you have somewhat the same reaction Pan would have?" he said, "Potara, you just said it not long ago, you're a kid too."

Potara let her leg go in order to cross her arms and scowl at him.

He smiled a little at the look, but shook his head. "Actually dying to Black probably didn't help either."

"Well, she did completely freak when you did," pointed out Potara, before frowning, "Not to mention, didn't Zamasu put a universe wide genocide on display right in front of her?"

Gohan closed his eyes and sighed. "Alright, I think your point is made. I just... I didn't see the impact..."

"Didn't see it?" Potara said, incredulous, "What, you think just because she wasn't frothing at the mouth with madness she wasn't affected? Gohan... why do you think she was so obsessed with attaining power to begin with?"

A pinched look crossed his face.

"Gohan, she didn't seek power because she was some tyrant looking to take over the universe or some garbage like that," said Potara; though it would have been much easier to hate Pan if she had, "She sought power because she was afraid. Because no matter what she did, she and everyone she cared for kept getting hurt, she wanted to protect herself and others, and saw no other path to do so, to blinded or afraid to see another way."

Potara sighed, thinking it over, and grudgingly offered Pan something. "Unlike you Gohan, when Pan started going through her struggles, her pillar of support, the person she looked up to, wasn't family or friends, it was a jaded sociopath that held things together on an apocalyptic Terra. Odianna was a terrible influence and a terrible example to follow, not to mention the woman's hatred of Saiyans left a lot of self-doubt in Pan. Going from a happy life to living in a desolate world like that was... jarring to say the least for a child."

Potara stared down at the clouds for a long moment. "I could go for hours honestly, picking apart everything that happened, everything that went wrong. Its... easier I guess, for me to do so, go through and look at everything. I remember it, but I didn't live through it. Outside of the mess I was dumped into... I'm not linked to any of it."

She made a face. "Aside from longering memories along with picking up the mess Pan and the Doll made of things by making me to begin with."

Piccolo shifted, adjusting his turban. "I have a question on that, on the Doll. Just... why? Why did the Doll do that?"

Potara shrugged. "The notion of right and wrong was never something introduced to her, all it had for memories were Pan's battles and training. It saw fusion as a way to reclaim the Power of Creation, she didn't understand she would cease to exist as well, she had intended to overpower and erase Pan completely."

Piccolo's nostrils flared. "Tss."

Potara grunted in agreement with that, and the noises of disgust the others made.

"So it what, just defaulted to being a monster?" asked Videl sourly.

"I don't know," said Potara, frowning as a trickle of unease rolled down her spine as she looked back on the Doll's early memories, "Something about the whole thing is... off."

She narrows her eyes intently, the hair on the back of her neck standing up as an impossible thought strikes her that really should have occurred to her before now. "Wait... wait... how?"

Gohan frowned. "How what?"

"A fusion is a merging of two bodies, minds, AND souls," stressed Potara, "But God constructs DON'T have souls, an Angel at the Dimensional Tournament told m-Pan that. So how could it fuse at all?"

"Maybe they were lying...?" suggested Goku.

"For what reason would a god not of our dimension randomly lie to a person they were unlikely to meet again?" said Potara, frowning, going back through Pan and the Doll's memories, "Whats more..."

Ice prickled along her skin. "The Doll wasn't aware at the beginning, I can recall its initial memories, its first training match against Pan, but there was no consciousness to it, no will or thought or function beyond fighting. No soul, just emptiness. Its like... all of the sudden it suddenly became aware of itself, gained a mind, a will, a soul."

"Could it be because of the Power of Creation?" asked Piccolo, "You said it was stolen and put into the Doll."

Potara hummed. "Maybe... but why wouldn't it have been instantaneous? This all the sudden happened in the middle of her first stay in Whis's pocket dimension, like, months into it."

"Months?" asked Gohan.

"Whenever she wasn't being used to train Pan, the Doll was 'stored' in Whis's pocket dimension, ten years in total," answered Potara, grudgingly offering, "I'm not going to make excuses for her, but most of her life revolved around being stuck in a hazy stressful endless environment of nothing but her, fearing that the next time she came out that Whis would kill her, the only time she was out was to be thrown into a fight against Pan."

Gohan frowned intently. "That's..."

"That can't be it," said Videl, quiet but tone rising, "Its awful, yes, I agree, and it probably made it worse. But the Doll was evil. No, don't give me that look, it deliberately treated my daughter awefully and forcibly merged with her to make you, it had no regard for anyone but itself. Even if it didn't know right from wrong, that's what it did. You're the only one we can ask. How did it get like that?"

"She," said Potara in a warning tone, "Objectifying someone you hate is beneath you. I hate her, and even I don't call her an it."

Videl pursed her lips. "How did she get like that?"

"She woke up like that," admitted Potara, going over the memories and thoughts again and again... but finding no rhyme or reason, "I don't get it myself. Where did that personality and soul come from?"

"Outside interference maybe," suggested Piccolo, rubbing his chin, "And if so, who?"

"Hell if I know," said Potara, considering the notion, "But who would even do that? Would have the reason, the will, and more importantly the ability to do so? Not to mention doing it under Beerus and Whis's noses?"

"Messing with souls isn't a normal ability in any shape or form," pointed out Gohan, "I think the only time any of us really encountered it before we met the highest gods was Ginyu of all people with his body swap."

Goku made a face at that. "Bleh. That wasn't fun."

"For who... the person who mentally attacked Pan is still an unknown, perhaps them?" suggested Piccolo.

Potara shrugged. "I haven't a clue. Even if it is, the question still remains: Why?"

There was an uncomfortable silence for a time as they stewed on it. Potara considered the desire to fly off, to leave the issue and these people for another day. She brushed it off though. There was a possibility that whoever went after Pan and messed with the Doll, if that's what happened, might come after her. For all of her power as a Potara fusion, magic was still something she had no defense against. She wasn't certain where she'd even begin to learn about defending against it. On the other end of the spectrum, on Gohan and Videl with Goku dragging the two of them here...

Her eyes flickered to them, catching Gohan giving her a contemplative look out of the corner of his eye. They both shifted their gaze away after their eyes met.

Potara cleared her throat; she wanted off the subject of Pan and the Doll anyway. "Aside from ki and other dimensions apparently being known about, was there anything else major that happened this last month?"

"Vegeta had the Kais bring him cross universes for a few days to give Cabba and his people a heads up about the other dimensions," said Goku, crossing his arms, "Not that I think they'll really be affected. The portal is in our universe, and I doubt the Kais are going to often give people lifts like that."

"Nor do I believe most gods are going to readily leave their dimensions to come traveling," pointed out Gohan, "They have responsibilities."

Potara briefly frowned; it wasn't often she considered the other Universes in their own dimension. They really hadn't impacted her life-Pan's life-outside of the very rare universe tournament. "I really don't think it would be a good idea to allow Kale's Empire to learn about them. The last thing they need is to have that kind of influence on their way of life."

Goku huffed. "I doubt it'd happen, they wouldn't get along at all."

"That's a point to make, I wouldn't want to get caught in the middle of a Saiyan culture war," agreed Gohan, "Though, Vegeta has probably already considered it. He's way ahead of us on that part."

Potara tilted her head, remembering something from Pan's memory of the Dimensional Tournament. "Did they send their 'envoy' yet?"

Gohan shook his head. "No, but Vegeta said he's expecting them within the month about a week ago."

Potara hummed. "So long as he keeps an eye on them. Though I really can't see a Saiyan dressing up and playing nice."

"Hey," said Goku with a pout, "I can dress up n stuff for special events."

"Dad, diplomacy is a bit more than fancy clothes," said Gohan in a teasing voice before a considering look crossed his face, "It'll be interesting I suppose so see how it plays out. I doubt diplomacy means the same to us as it does that kind of Saiyan, Vegeta is smart enough to lay down ground rules though. If their envoy pulls anything, there are many people here to put them in their place."

Potara frowned a little, her only real knowledge of what diplomacy was came from Pan watching some function on TV a few years back between nations on the Earth. Maybe Gohan had mentioned it during Pan's homeschooling. It had seemed dreadfully boring. But, along those lines, it made her think back to Terra and Kale, on something she hadn't thought to mention when she was detailing their 'Hybrid Program'. "I dunno, as much as he and his empire worries me, Kale said that he hadn't let Coli go purge that human world she said she would."

Gohan gave her a blank look for a moment before a grim recognition appeared. "Oh, that girl she tortured and threatened."

"Mhm," said Potara, "He also 'apologized' for her threatening mo-Videl."

Gohan said nothing for a few seconds staring at her with eyebrows furrowed, and she hoped he wouldn't say anything about the slip-up, she couldn't help it sometimes, they just slipped through; he finally nodded. "Well, he's more diplomatically inclined than I thought."

"Is that a good thing or a bad thing?" asked Goku.

Gohan made a face. "It means politics. Which none of us save Vegeta have any kind of real experience in."

Potara gave him a blank look, she had no idea what the hell he was talking about with 'Politics'. The word was vaguely familiar, maybe Pan had heard it on TV at some point. The way he said the word thought made it sound tedious. She hoped she wouldn't be involved in any way. She didn't consider herself nice, nor was she 'dressing fancy', her current clothes were what she saw herself wearing for the majority of her life if she had her way. She was more inclined to punch one of Kale's Saiyans than speak with them, but she wasn't ignorant. Kale had expressed interest in recruiting Pan, and recruiting her. She had the irritating hunch he wouldn't let it slide easily...

Her thoughts paused when her stomach growled at her. It occurred to her she hadn't eaten since before she had come back to Earth yesterday, and it was easily passed lunch now.

"Well," said Gohan, "I think that's our cue to call it for now."

Goku laughed. "Yeah, go get some food Potara, can't spar on an empty stomach. You did say we would earlier."

Potara rolled her eyes. It was always about sparring with him...

Gohan looked to her, clear hesitation on his voice. "Would... you like to come to the house? We can make you something to eat."

Oh dammit...

She closed her eyes and let out a soft breath before opening them and saying, "I'll tell you the same thing I told Piccolo, don't mince words."

"I wasn't," said Gohan calmly, "I believe in starting slowly. A nice meal, relax for a bit... then I guess we can talk about your situation and go from there."

"My situation," she echoed flatly.

He raised an eyebrow at her. "Fusion of incredible power or not, you're still physically twelve, mentally a child, and Pan was way behind where she should be with home schooling considering how much time she put into training."

She scowled. "I can take care of myself. I did this last month just fine!"

"Doing what and living where?" he asked dubiously.

"Working the Dimensional Market as a bouncer," she said, before averting her eyes and mumbling, "N' sleeping under the market stands when they were closed."

Gohan exhaled, exasperated, "Potara..."

"Oh for gods sake," said Videl, frustrated, "What happened when and before you were born was awful, and yes we said horrible things to eachother, but we're not going to turn you away to live under a table!"

Potara flushed, sputtering for a response.

Gohan sighed, stood up, and took a few steps to offer her a hand. "Come on Potara."

She swallowed thickly, staring at that hand with naked fear in her eyes. So many negative thoughts swarmed her, afraid that it would end awfully, or that they were only doing this to cling to what was left of Pan, that they wouldn't see her for who she was not who she was born from...

"Give them a chance Potara," said Bata.

"Why should I?" asked Potara bitterly.

"Because otherwise you're going to be alone," warned Bata, "And do you really want that?"

Bata's words cut through her thoughts. Potara hadn't answered the young Guardian, but it was really an obvious thing. She hesitatingly reached up and took Gohan's hand, because as much as she feared the potential for rejection, for this all going bad, she craved the family that Pan had taken for granted and the Doll had never known. She wanted it so badly...

She wanted a place to belong too, a family to belong to.

She didn't want to be alone.

Author's Notes:

Been a good long while since I last really touched this. I decided to go ahead with a continuation rather than a re-write. To much effort put into this to not see it through to the end. As such I deleted the questionnaire chapter. On that note, here's some 'patch notes':

-Re-read the entire story and tried to clean up some spelling/grammar issues, I think I got most of the your VS you're issues fixed. Feel free to point out any further mistakes you guys find.
-Did various minor story edits here and there, not worth re-reading unless you really want to.
-Removed the reference of Creation SSJ Pan (green energy) being stronger than Beerus in Chapter 35. I'm redoing power scaling a bit for consistency and future use's sake. I'll eventually be re-writing the Potara VS Beerus then Whis fights, I'm not really satisfied with drastic overpowering/one shotting.