The Enemy of My Enemy is Still a Jerk! The Mighty Posin' Ginyu Force!
"Elder Guru," Nail said as he made his way for the door, "I can sense someone approaching. I'll go out and check. Dende, you stay with the Elder." Guru listened to the padding of Nail's feet as he made his way to the door and flew off. Guru wondered what his son looked like. He had never seen his face. In fact, Guru had lost his sight nearly half a century ago. Not long after his muscles failed him and he was permanently confined to the chair he now sat in, in truth. It seemed that the seventh century was when a Namekian's body began to break down. None of his sons seemed to notice, which was surprising. After all, he never opened his eyes. He supposed that it did not make a difference, since with his ki sensing and his naturally-heightened Namekian hearing, he could still paint a fair picture of the world. Of course, now his hearing was starting to go as well. Guru knew that he was not long for this world. And as this second cataclysm seemed to grip his people, Guru felt every single one of his eight hundred years.
"So you're the one that the other two Earthlings mentioned?" Guru heard Nail ask someone. "Very well. Come inside and be quick about it." There was a second set of footsteps with Nail's, a lighter set, perhaps the same size as Dende's.
"Gohan!" Dende cried excitedly and he heard his youngest rush across the room, the thud of a soft collision perhaps implying a rather energetic embrace. There was an exchange of bright, young laughter before the new voice gasped. Apparently, this Gohan had finally noticed him.
"H-hello, sir," the boy stammered out politely, "My name is Son Gohan. My mother and our friend Krillin told me to come to you. They said you could make me stronger." Guru focused his ki sensing on the new energy in the room as it approached him and just barely lifted his ancient eyebrows. This was as much expression as Guru had made in about two hundred years. This child...
Guru was not completely blind. His other senses and his ki sensing created the world around him in shades of light. Nail and Dende burned brightly like candle flames while the rest of the space around him only let off a faint glow, creating an outline. This Gohan, however… the boy was a fountain of light.
"Come beside me, child," Guru said slowly as he lifted his hand, "And I shall unlock the sleeping power within you." Guru heard the child's feet as he walked towards them and was surprised to hear how much the boy's footsteps sounded like their own. The other creatures' footsteps had a strange clunking sound, as if they wore shells on their feet. Guru settled his hand on the boy's head and, once again, had a moment of disturbed confusion at the strange growths he felt where smooth skin and antennae should be. Such strange creatures, these outsiders. He wondered what they looked like. When Guru opened the connection between the boy's ki and his own, he was shocked at the untapped power the boy had hidden inside. To unlock it all would take… quite a bit of time and would be far greater than a boy of his age would be able to handle. Perhaps only a sliver.
OoOoOoO
Suno and Krillin continued to wait for Vegeta to come to them. Their best shot, they decided as he came rushing towards them, was a quick and powerful blast before he had a chance to make his own attack and then press the advantage while he was off-guard. No sooner had this idea come to them than Vegeta was right in front of them. His purple aura of ki rolled off of his body like flames and the snarling, wide-eyed expression on his face gave them both a momentary pang of reflexive terror. The expression was, they realized, identical to the one he'd worn when he had nearly killed them all.
"Dragon Balls," Vegeta demanded, moving his jaw as little as possible as he held out his hands. "Now."
"D-Dragon Ball?" Krillin stammered nervously. Before the words even left his mouth, Krillin knew the next sentence was going to get him killed. "W-what're those? Never heard of 'em." Vegeta let out a howl of rage through his clenched teeth and drew back one of his hands while balling it into a fist with murderous intent before a sudden flash across their minds brought everyone to a screeching halt and seemed to pull Vegeta out of his rage.
"That power…" Suno whispered. That couldn't be Gohan. Could it? There was no way!
"Kakarot?" Vegeta muttered. Could she be here? The boy probably lied to him about that as well yet, if so, why hadn't he sensed her before? Vegeta shoved past the Earthlings and flew toward the hut on top of the Earthen spire with the pair of them trailing behind him. "Come on out, Kakarot," he demanded. "I can sense you in there!" Instead, to Vegeta's surprise, a Namekian came out to stand between him and the hut. It seemed that they weren't extinct, after all. On top of that, this one was the first he had met who hadn't been a cringing craven or a doddering old man. This one, who looked almost identical to the one he'd killed on Earth, had the look of a warrior about him. "Out of my way, green man," Vegeta demanded as he looked up at the Namekian with a scowl. "I have business in there."
"No," the Namekian said firmly as he crossed his arms over his chest. "You do not." Before Vegeta could make him eat his own antennae, he was shocked to see the abomination walk past the Namekian out of the hut and glare up at him. Either Vegeta was going mad or that power was actually coming from the boy!
"You… what… how…" Vegeta stammered furiously as he tried to look over the Namekian's shoulder. "Where is Kakarot?!"
Gohan's mouth quirked up in a little smirk as he crossed his arms over his chest. Had Vegeta actually mistaken Gohan's ki for his mom's? He hadn't realized how powerful the Elder Guru must have made him! "She's not here," Gohan told him firmly, "But if she was, you'd be in trouble."
"I mean," Krillin put in as he and Suno caught up to Vegeta, "I think you're in trouble already. You're kinda outnumbered." Nail gave a slight nod and cracked his neck like Piccolo would as Vegeta scowled and Suno put on a smirk of her own.
"So," she said as she held out a hand in a gesture that mocked Vegeta's own from earlier, "How about you give us your Dragon Balls?" Vegeta's face contorted into a sneer of rage and disgust. Before Vegeta could even contemplate the order he would kill them in, he heard a voice come from inside the hut.
"Nail!" a young voice called as a small Namekian ran out of the door.
"Dende," Nail told the boy while still eyeing Vegeta, "You should be inside with Elder Guru. This could get dangerous."
"B-but Nail," Dende stammered out in a panic, "Elder Guru has sensed a great ki coming towards the planet!" Vegeta's stomach twisted into a cold knot before he lifted his gaze skyward as he, too, sensed the power level. Not the brother, surely. Not on top of everything else! However, Vegeta soon realized that it was not a single power level but five. No sooner had Vegeta made this revelation before he saw five twinkling stars dropping towards the planet.
"Oh no," he muttered as the color drained from his face. "No no no no no."
"Jeez," Suno muttered with her own fear running through her veins like ice, "Those are… those are some serious ki."
"We can handle them, though, right?" Krillin asked, not believing the words even as he said them. "We just gotta work together." Vegeta groaned and had to choke down the revulsion that came with the sudden realization that the bald man's words were horrifyingly true.
"He is right," Vegeta admitted as he looked at them. Every word was a struggle comparable to pulling the planet out of its orbit with his bare hands. "If any of us fancies living to see tomorrow… we shall have to work together. First, and most importantly, I must become immortal."
"Go fuck yourself!" Suno snapped at him before bringing her hands over her mouth, realizing she'd swore in front of her son.
"We came all this way," Gohan added despite the redness in his cheeks from his mother's foul language, "After all we've lost, all because of you, and you honestly think that we'd waste our wish giving you what you want?!"
"Porunga gives three wishes," Nail pointed out helpfully, "So you would still have two more to use for yourselves." While he did not want to work with such an obviously evil creature, he too could sense the five power levels. They were… unnerving.
"Still," Krillin said while he jabbed a finger at Vegeta, "I can't think of anything I'd want to wish for less than for you to live forever." The Saiyan King rolled his eyes.
"Listen to me," Vegeta told them, his voice tight with restrained obscenities and threats, "Either I live foreve, or we all die and Freeza lives forever. I can assure you, whatever sort of monster you think I am, Freeza is a thousand times worse." That implication seemed to give the Earthlings some pause before Suno let out a huff.
"Fine," she relented angrily. "Let's go back to the camp and get our Dragon Ball." The four of them flew off, Vegeta looking smug while the Earthlings all looked agitated and wary.
"So Vegeta," Krillin asked, "Who the heck are these guys?"
"Only Freeza's deadliest and most powerful warriors. His secret weapon, his trump card. The most fearsome quintet in the Northern Galactic Quadrant: The Ginyu Force."
OoOoOoO
Freeza sat on the roof of the pile of useless scrap that was once the pride of his fleet and watched as the five Space Pods streaked down from the sky and crashed into the ground in front of him. He honestly had no idea how the Ginyu Force kept their pods so clean, although he supposed it was due in part to the Captain's discipline. The pods popped open, not even hissing like regular pods. Could Captain Ginyu whip inanimate objects into shape? Five blurs of movement flicked out of the pods and landed on the roof in front of him.
"Company," The Captain barked as his Force snapped to attention, "Present!" It always gave Freeza a moment's pause when he saw Ginyu in this new body, even if he had been using it for years. With his purple skin; bald, veiny head; and polished black horns, the man was a far sight different from the woman he had initially employed all those years ago. Freeza watched in bizarre fascination as the Ginyu Force pumped their arms and stamped their feet in perfect synchronicity.
"Guldo!" called out the bulbous little four-eyed green man as he brought one hand up under his chin and tucked the other arm under his elbow.
"Jeice!" sounded the red-skinned, white-haired tall youth as he leaned his body to the left and threw up his right arm with a tight fist.
"Burter!" cried the blue-scaled, red-eyed giant lizardman as he stood on one foot behind Jeice and spread his arms wide.
"Recoome!" bellowed the redheaded giantess, adding her voice to theirs as she turned her back to Freeza and turned her head to look over her shoulder, pointing one arm out and curling the other to accentuate her bicep.
"Captain Ginyu!" Ginyu put himself front and center even as he crouched to make sure he did not obscure Jeice or Guldo from view.
"Together," they crowed in united triumph, "We are the symbol of excellence! The force for order! The Fist of the PTO! We! Are! The Ginyu Force!" Freeza stared at them for a long moment as they continued to hold that pose. Somehow, he always managed to forget that this was a thing that they did. How did he always forget? And, more importantly, why did they do it? Still, he supposed it barely mattered. They were effective and that was what was most important. He gave a quick and polite clap which was enough to make the Ginyu Force drop out of their poses and stood with their feet apart and their hands behind their backs.
"Yes, yes," Freeza said dryly, "Very good. Tell me, did you remember the scouters as well?" Burter dashed back to his pod and returned moments later with a briefcase before opening it and presenting it to Freeza. Well, "dashed" was a generous term. It was ponderously slow for Freeza. Still, the blue man fancied himself "The fastest in the universe" for whatever daft reason, so Freeza smiled and acted surprised and let him carry on his little charade. "Ah! Thank you, Burter." He smiled graciously and slipped one of the scouters onto his ear with his psychokinesis as Burter bowed his head appreciatively. "That takes care of that bit of business," he told them while using his hands to adjust the scouter comfortably. "Now, there is still the matter of the Dragon Balls and Vegeta and these other strangers he's associated himself with. I need you to find the Dragon Balls and bring them back here and then kill those fools. Their crime was being stupid enough to oppose me."
"You can count on us, Lord Freeza," Ginyu assured him with a smart salute before he clicked his heels together and spun around to face his men. "Ginyu Force! Move out!" The quintet flew off and as Freeza watched them fly away, he wondered how they changed the color of their battle auras. It was a nice little trick and made them so color-coordinated. They vanished soon enough and Freeza was left alone again with his thoughts.
"...How many planets' worth of elderly people have I killed?"
OoOoOoO
Bulma heard footsteps from outside the Capsule House and rushed out to meet the others, mostly because she needed someone to talk to. She really should have built a radio that could work on other planets to go with her phone.
"Hey guys," she greeted eagerly as she ran up to them. "What's going…" Bulma stopped and stared at the company that Gohan, Suno, and Krillin had brought with them. "Why the hell is Vegeta here?!" Bulma asked in a mixture of confusion, anger, and fear.
"It's a long story," Suno mumbled wearily. "We need the Dragon Ball." Bulma went quickly into the Capsule House and returned with the Dragon Ball a little more slowly, hefting it into Gohan's hands with a heaving breath of effort. She was more than a little miffed that Gohan barely registered the weight of the stupid thing. She needed to start going to a gym.
"Wait," Bulma said warily as she pointed a finger at Vegeta, "You're not helping him, are you?!"
"Point that finger at me again, wench," Vegeta snapped, "And I'll make you eat it." Bulma shrugged and even smirked a little.
"No big deal," she shot back. "When I get home I'll just build a new finger. Y'know why? 'Cause I'm a fuckin' genius."
Vegeta furrowed his brow at her and she could see the veins twitch in his neck, visible for just a moment. "Speak to me that way again," he warned her coldly, "And I shall see what a genius' brains look like." Bulma stuck her tongue out at Vegeta and he gave her the smallest chuckle. She certainly had spirit.
"Come on," Krillin told them, already lifting into the air, "We're wasting time! Just take us to the rest of the Dragon Balls!" The five flew off and left Bulma alone again. She sighed and went back inside. Maybe there were some parts in the toaster she could use to start on that radio.
OoOoOoO
Vegeta finally led them to the area where the six Dragon Balls were, one of which still had a horrifying blue handprint of Zarbon's blood on it.
"Okay," Krillin said as they touched down in front of the Dragon Balls, "Now we just need to–"
"Hand those over," quipped a voice in a precise and sonorous baritone. "Then you will be able to die a humane and painless death." The four gawked at the multi-colored humanoids standing in front of them. They had just… appeared! "Captain Ginyu of the Ginyu Force, pleasure to make your acquaintance. This is Recoome, Burter, Jeice, and Guldo." The horned one gave a polite bow of his head and pointed at each of his allies in turn.
"Why am I always last?" Guldo, apparently, grumbled. Not sure what else to do, Gohan, Suno and Krillin gave awkward waves in response. Vegeta groaned and rolled his eyes.
"Eh, Cap'n," Jeice muttered out of the side of his mouth, "Weren't we s'posed ta do a pose r'somethin'?" Captain Ginyu scoffed.
"Don't be preposterous, Jeice," he told his red-skinned compatriot as he tucked two Dragon Balls under each arm and kicked one up with his foot to rest on his head between his horns. "This rabble isn't worth the effort of a pose. Just look at them!"
"I have to ask, Ginyu," Vegeta asked, "Can those scouters find the Dragon Balls?"
"No," Ginyu told him, "We followed your Power Levels. Why do you a–" Vegeta ripped the last Dragon Ball out of Gohan's hands and hurled it to the horizon with all his might. Vegeta looked back down at them smugly… where the Dragon Ball was in Burter's hand.
"W-what?!" Vegeta stammered out in shock, "But you… how?!" He'd heard stories of Burter's speed, but this was preposterous! Burter smirked and jabbed a thumb proudly against his chest.
"You can't beat my speed," he boasted, "I'm the fastest in the universe!" Jeice muttered something under his breath and Burter shot him a look. Before they could argue about anything, however, Suno whispered out a "Shinsoku Odori!" and then the Dragon Ball was in her hand.
"You may be the fastest in the universe," she quipped, "But, unless your speed defies the reasoning of God, I'll always be faster!" She knew she was pretty lucky, though. Judging by his power level, if Burter's attention had been on her, they could have had trouble. No sooner had she thought that then the Dragon Ball was suddenly in Ginyu's hand! He had three Balls under each arm as well as the one carefully balanced between his horns.
"You all have fun," he told his Force. "I'm taking these back to Lord Freeza. I'll be back in an hour and I swear, if these lot are still alive when I get back, there shall be no space sodas for any of you!" Then he was just… gone. Completely vanished!
"How soon did you say Kakarot would get here, boy?" Vegeta muttered out of the side of his mouth.
"I-I don't know," Gohan admitted. "I just hope it's soon." Vegeta was forced to agree as the Ginyu Force huddled amongst themselves. Krillin listened to what they were chanting and strained to listen more carefully. It sounded like they were playing… no, no, that would be insane. How would that game even reach outer space?!
"Ro! Sham! Bo! Ro! Sham! Bo! Ro! Sham! Bo!" The huddle burst apart and Guldo pumped his fists triumphantly into the air.
"I win!" Guldo cried out with a whooping laugh and the excitement of a man who was not used to winning anything. Ever.
"Guldo," Recoome warned him with a tone of mock severity, "You better not have been holding your breath!" What, Krillin wondered, did that mean? Guldo chuckled to himself as he advanced toward them. Recoome watched her comrade eagerly while Burter and Jeice stood off by themselves and argued in a language that Krillin couldn't even begin to understand.
"I hope you're ready, weirdos," said the short, squat, green-skinned alien with two extra eyes that came out of his temples, "Because now you're gonna tangle with Guldo of the Ginyu Force!"
OoOoOoO
Goku was startled awake from her nap by the tinkling of a sing-song alarm that echoed through the ship's speakers. She yawned and stretched as the ship spoke to her.
"Attention," it said, "We will be arriving on planet Namek within the next twenty minutes." As Goku got dressed in a fresh gi, she thought it was kinda funny that the ship sounded just like the robot woman in the game Krillin liked with the blue and orange gun. Goku did a few more stretches and tied the senzu pouch to her belt before she walked to one of the windows and looked down at the planet below. Vegeta, Freeza, and who knew what else was down there on that planet. But Goku wasn't scared one little bit. This was the hardest she'd ever trained and she couldn't wait to see how it paid off.
"Look out, Piccolo town," she called down eagerly, "Here I come!"