Son Gohan woke up with the first lights of the day. He left Goku sleeping with arms and legs outstretched in the middle of the old mattress, and left without making a sound. He stretched a little to warm and grease his old bones, and they clicked and cracked in protest. Ever more he felt the weight of the years, not only in his body. Now warm, with blood flowing through his veins and filling him with vigor, he began to throw punches into the air, fighting against an invisible enemy.

Goku's arrival had changed the course of his last few years on this earth, that he would not take long to abandon. If it weren't for the boy, old age would have taken a much harder toll on him, and he probably would have let it happen. But raising and training a child with such magnificent vitality had forced him to stay active. In fact, even though his body no longer burned with the fires of youth, Gohan felt more strength inside of him than he had ever possessed; something unthinkable for any mortal, only within the reach of legendary figures like his master, the Turtle Hermit.

More than that, Goku represented the opportunity of leaving a legacy that would survive him, something that he had given up a long time ago, and had come to accept. With the sun already high in the eastern sky, Gohan stopped to catch his breath.

Goku walked out the door of the small house, tying a cloth belt to the pants of his gi. He jumped on the spot and stretched his legs, leaning sideways several times.

"Ready to begin morning training, Goku?" Son Gohan asked.

Goku smiled and got on guard as his only answer.

Son Gohan took a deep breath as he assumed his fighting stance, and thanked whatever deity or destiny had sent him this strange and wonderful monkey child.

Kakarot dreamed about his family again. This time, he trained with Raditz and Father by the river while Mother roasted two bears and a tiger.

When the training ended, his father, who sometimes looked like an older version of him, and others like old Son Gohan, used his scouter to measure their progress. "You have both improved a lot, especially you, Kakarot. Soon we'll be able to depopulate this planet. Now let's eat."

They wolfed down every last bit of meat, and even gnawed on the bones for a while, while they told stories besides the fire. They took a nap under the shade of a tree, the four of them together. Somehow, Kakarot realized he was dreaming, and his joy dimmed and soured.

As he woke up and remembered the dream he had just abandoned, a wave of shame washed over him. Almost every time he dreamed about his Saiyan family, they did the same things as he would do with the Earthling on any given day. Was that what he wanted, to continue living as he did, only with his Saiyan family? Where did that leave Son Gohan, the man he called grandfather, and that one day he would kill?

Kakarot jumped out of bed and put on his gi, hoping that the morning training would clear his mind of those stupid thoughts. After warming up, something the old man insisted on, he practiced every punch and kick he knew, performing them a hundred times with perfect form, applying a little more force and speed with each blow.

Once he was done, he assumed a fighting stance in front of Son Gohan, who had been watching him, leaning against the trunk of a tree. The old man handed him a wooden staff and unsheathed his own, which grew to the same length as Kakarot's.

They both advanced and their weapons swirled, stabbed, clashed, and bashed, tracing

swishing arcs through the air. The staves collided again and again, causing loud bangs that made the nearby birds flutter away. Kakarot attacked Son Gohan from above, who intercepted the blow with ease, and they locked staves for a moment. Kakarot leaned on the old man's staff and jumped again. He spun in the air, delivering a whirlwind of blows.

Son Gohan, of course, blocked them, and soon they got into another stalemate. Kakarot jumped back, knowing he couldn't overpower his opponent, and launched several probing attacks while conserving his strength, seeking to cause the old man to lower his guard for an instant. The fighting continued until noon.

As always, Son Gohan prevailed, but every day he had to push himself a little harder to keep his advantage.

"I think that's enough for today," the old man said panting.

They ran and leaped through forests, rocks, and cliffs, bound for the river. After putting the day's lunch in a big pot over the fire, they plunged into the water to wash the sweat from their bodies.

"You have improved a lot, Goku, especially with the staff," Son Gohan said. "Soon I won't have much left to teach you. Now let's eat."

The words echoed in Kakarot's mind, and for a sliver of a moment, he could have sworn he had heard them before. Kakarot buried his head in the river so that the cold water would wash those strange ideas away from his mind.

Once on land and dry, they got ready to eat. Kakarot devoured bowl after bowl of rice with bear's meat, and the delicious fat dripped down his lips. They had caught the bear a few weeks back raiding their food reserves. Instead, the animal ended up doubling them.

"Do you know today it is, Goku?" the old man asked him.

"Laundry day?"

Son Gohan laughed. "No. It's a very special day. Today makes it eight years since I found you, and as far as I'm concerned, that means it is your birthday. And a birthday boy deserves a present."

Kakarot had already had several of those things called birthdays. Son Gohan usually gave him new clothes, and last time he also gave him the staff he used to train. Knowing the old man, the bundle he was hiding at his back was likely a new gi, since his was becoming too short and tight.

"Happy birthday, son." The old man offered him the bundle wrapped in cloth, which contained a blue gi, a white belt, and a pair of red wristbands. "The gi is a little big, so it will last longer."

"Thank you, Grandpa," Kakarot said, almost as a reflex.

"And that's not all." Son Gohan extended the Power Pole inside its sheath to him, with a smile on his wrinkled face. "It's been with me through countless battles and adventures since the Turtle Hermit gave it to me more than sixty years ago, and from this day, it is yours." Kakarot's eyes filled with tears in an instant without him being able to do anything to stop it. Kakarot looked down, embarrassed and hoping that the old man hadn't seen his pathetic gesture of weakness.

"Oh, don't worry. There's nothing wrong with crying out of happiness," the old man said in a low, comforting voice, and hugged him.

How could he give him the Power Pole? That relic was, along with the bright orange sphere with four stars inside, Son Gohan's most precious treasure. Kakarot had always assumed that after killing the old man, he would take the weapon since it would be of great use in traversing the planet, but he would never have expected him to just hand it over to him, without expecting anything in return. Why had that made him shed tears?

Kakarot knew that he couldn't indulge in useless sentimentality with the Earthlings, not even with the one that had raised him. But he held on to the man and burst into a loud cry, and a part of him hated himself for it. Kakarot would wonder for the rest of his days if he hated himself for hugging Son Gohan or because of the shame of knowing what he would do to the man to whom he was worth more than any treasure.

The next morning, Kakarot got up early and, after cutting a hole in the pants of his new gi for his tail, ventured into the forest with the Power Pole on his back. Son Gohan had told him that they wouldn't train today and encouraged him to familiarize himself with his birthday present. Kakarot unsheathed the staff and grasped his fingers around its smooth shiny surface. He set one end of the Power Pole on the ground and held on tightly. "Stretch out," he said, and in an instant, ascended over the tops of the trees and left them behind. From his vantage point, he beheld the splendor of Mount Paozu in its entirety.

Kakarot returned to land and explored each peak of the countless rock formations. He had climbed each of them after hours of effort in the past, but thanks to the Power Pole, he could now ascend to the top of any in seconds. On the highest peak of all, Kakarot tried to ignore the danger warnings in his mind and walked up to the edge. He looked down to the great distance to the ground, which would mean certain death.

Kakarot walked back to the other end and took a deep breath. He ran to the edge and jumped with the staff in his hand. He aimed one end towards the large rock. The Power Pole obeyed his command and stretched, hitting the stone wall and propelling him into the air like a cannonball.

He landed on another peak and rolled to cushion the fall. He ended up on his back, roaring with laughter as he looked up at the endless blue sky.

Before returning home, there was something he had to do. He had put it off for months already and doing so had only caused him distress. Without the help of the Power Pole, he trekked the known path to the cave behind the waterfall, where his space pod remained hidden. He accessed the interior of the ship and removed the scouter from its compartment. After a short scan, Kakarot wrote Son Gohan's power level with a sharp stone on the cave wall.

118. The old man had improved since last time.

Kakarot hadn't wasted his time either. Not only had he gotten stronger, but he had learned skills that would be very useful to him in the future. For example, how to multiply by ten.

"I'll tell you a trick that will make it so much easier, Goku," the old man had told him last winter, when a heavy snowfall forced them to remain inside the house for several days. "Whenever you want to multiply a number by ten, all you have to do is write a zero at the end of it."

And that's how he would do it for the rest of his life, Kakarot thought as he pressed the scouter's button twice. A thousand thoughts raced through his mind in the seconds that the device took to calculate his power level, and were silenced at once with the last beep, which showed him his new strength.

12.

Kakarot wrote the number on the wet rock, beside Son Gohan's, and despite knowing the result, forced his trembling hand to add the zero. A zero as round as the full moon.