Dragon Ball/Z/GT Fan Fiction ❯ Garrulous and Gritless ❯ I, 10: Gohan ( Chapter 10 )
[ Y - Young Adult: Not suitable for readers under 16 ]
By: ShiningMoon 
Anime/Manga: Dragon Ball/Z/GT Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Adventure / Action / Comedy / Drama / Psychological / Romance | Type: Divergence | Uploaded On: 01.15.2011 | Pages: 2 | Words: 2.5K | Visits: 279 | Status: Completed
Anime/Manga: Dragon Ball/Z/GT Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Adventure / Action / Comedy / Drama / Psychological / Romance | Type: Divergence | Uploaded On: 01.15.2011 | Pages: 2 | Words: 2.5K | Visits: 279 | Status: Completed
NOTE: Hmm, Gohan chapters are the toughest. I hope this one's okay!
...
Daddy.
I couldn't stop him.
He almost killed me.
Your friend Bulma saved me.
And then Piccolo saved me too.
...
Piccolo is sitting nearby right now, his legs and arms crossed like they always are when we're not training. He's mad at me and I haven't figured out why yet—just keeps telling me I was stupid, and keeps telling me I should have told him, and keeps yelling things that don't make sense, like these kids I saw one day when Mommy took me with her to go grocery shopping, when I told them I couldn't be friends because my house is too far away. He yells something and leaves for a bit, and I feel his energy rippling off him in the way mine does when something makes me so mad I want to cry—when I can't hide it away inside my stomach.
Piccolo says I was reckless and he says my daddy was even more reckless. But I already knew that.
When Mommy took me home all those days before, I decided something. I decided I wanted to see Daddy look all happy like he did when he hugged me. I decided I wanted to see why Piccolo was looking into my eyes like that when we left.
I decided that every single night after Mommy went to bed I would go outside to where Piccolo was, and ask him to spar with me. Soon Daddy found out about it, and he came, too. It was our secret. I only stayed out for a little bit every night, so I wasn't too tired when I woke up.
Two days ago Daddy came back at night to train after he visited Raditz (who is not my uncle at all). There was a big blackish-blue blotch on his eye and he kept putting his hand on his wrist. His leaned more against one foot and he kept moving his shirt to make sure we couldn't see his shoulder. He said he thought he was almost there, like Raditz almost maybe might have given the Earth a chance. He said he was gonna go visit Raditz the next morning.
But I didn't want him to get hurt so bad again. So I snuck after him, with my energy tucked up in my tummy. I waited by the door that goes into Bulma's lab with my ear against it, listening real carefully to everything they said. It was early—the lab was quiet. I think Bulma told people not go in there anytime my daddy was in there—I bet they didn't like seeing him get beat up.
But I didn't have to have my ear on the door to hear it, when everything went quiet and then my daddy suddenly screamed.
I couldn't even think. I broke down the door and I saw my daddy on the ground outside through the wall, and I saw Raditz laughing, and my energy exploded out of my stomach and into my hands, flowing out like lightning, kind of like the bright energy ball my daddy made when I saw him fighting Raditz the first time.
I don't remember what I said and I don't remember what he said, only that then Bulma was there and I couldn't move, and she threw a knife and my feet let me do one thing—jump over Raditz and knock him out with a move my daddy taught me.
Everything after that is dizzy.
I remember it, but I don't wanna. So I don't think on it too much.
I flip over onto my belly and hope I can sleep better that way. It's almost the morning, but I haven't slept all night. The stars were too bright and my legs hurt too much and my chest hurts too much and Piccolo makes grunting noises when I move around too much. Once I did almost fall asleep, but it turned real bad, with scary things under my eyelids, the things I don't wanna remember. It didn't last too long—Piccolo kicked me and I woke back up. I think he knew that I was having a bad dream and that's why he woke me up. I thanked him, but he didn't say anything. He saved me from having to look at all of those awful things again, inside my mind where they got burned in.
I haven't been home to tell Mommy yet. I wonder if somebody has. I wonder if Bulma did. I wonder if she killed Raditz like Piccolo said to. I'm afraid to stretch my mind out over there and try to feel for his energy. I'm afraid it'll still be there. I think if I feel it again my stomach will spill out.
"Gohan," Piccolo hisses out. "Rest your mind. Reign it in and your body will calm as well."
"I can't," I say. It's true. My blood is whipping around and it's strange, and it's hot like it might boil out of my skin, and I keep looking at the sky like I'm gonna find something there that will help. The stars all sparkle like they're making fun of me and I wonder if the guys Raditz says are coming are at one of those stars right now, and if they killed other boys' daddies, and if anybody killed their daddies so they know how bad it feels.
"Why not?" he sort of asks, but it's not that much like a question, more like he's making me answer.
"Because I'm really, really mad," I say.
"It will get you nowhere," he tells me. But that doesn't make much sense, because he gets mad all the time. He always yelled a lot. It's only just now that he's really, really quiet. Then he says again, like I didn't hear it the other times before, "What you did was stupid. You are lucky not to have died."
My everything hurts too much and I know I won't sleep, so I stand up to wander around, maybe go find a big rock to put all my anger into so I don't have to keep it in me like this, eating me and keeping me awake.
But Piccolo grabs the collar of my shirt before I go, and shoves me to the ground beside him. "Sit as I sit," he says, and with the way he says it I know he means for it to be part of my training. So I rearrange my legs to try to make them look like his. I can feel him looking at me even when my eyes are closed, and I can't help moving around just a little bit while I think of that.
But I don't really get a chance to calm down.
"Morning," a new voice says in kind of a serious way, and it sounds a bit familiar. I've met this guy before, on that island, with Bulma and everybody else before Raditz took me away. Compared to Daddy's other friends, he's not that much taller than me.
Behind him there's that Yamcha guy from before, and a much taller man with three eyes and a smaller one floating in the air beside him. A little cat is on Yamcha's back and it's shivering with its eyes on Piccolo.
"Bulma told me that Goku died," Yamcha says. "And that Kami told you guys to train." Piccolo nods his head a little, and narrows his eyes at the others like he sort of recognizes them. I think Yamcha notices because he adds on, "I found Kuririn and Tenshinhan and Chaotzu and told them what happened. We're all going to train with you." He sounds really serious about it.
Piccolo looks at all of them like I looked at broccoli on my dinner plate, back when I ate at home, back two days ago, back before Raditz killed Daddy.
"I can't believe his nerve," Yamcha almost spits, and I know he's talking about Raditz. "That bastard."
The ridges on top of Piccolo's eyes arch upward. "Did your female friend not dispose of him?" he asks.
Yamcha shakes his head and I feel sick. "She hasn't told me much," he says, and he sounds really angry about it. "But she did something..." he trails off and glances at me, like there's something he doesn't want me to hear. Piccolo narrows his eyes and Yamcha keeps talking. "She told me she cut off his tail and used this chemical that kind of seared the nerves off, or something, so that it can't grow back." He takes a few deep breaths like he's trying to hold in a lot of anger. "She thinks he won't do anything knowing that she's the only who can fix him up with a tail again," and his fists ball up, "she doesn't even know if she can actually do it, and I'll be damned if that bastard doesn't find that out eventually and kill her over it."
"Idiot," Piccolo mutters. "That woman knows not what she's doing."
"She was rambling about—about Saiyan physiology," Yamcha keeps going, "like she can find something out about them that'll let us beat the others. I hope so," his fists get even tighter, "but I'm not taking any chances. I don't want that brute to get his paws on Bulma and hurt her." Yamcha's nostrils get wider as he takes some more breaths. "I'll get strong enough to beat him myself the second she's done studying him." Then he kind of looks like he remembers that he's scared of Piccolo, or something, and shuts his mouth and his cheeks get kind of red. I guess maybe if Piccolo started looking real mean all these guys would run away. It seems most everybody is afraid of him (besides the three-eyed guy, who hasn't moved a single muscle since he got here).
My daddy's friend Kuririn has been leaning back and forth from one foot to the other the whole time, and finally after Yamcha finishes talking he asks really quietly, "What—what was it—I mean—did Goku—" he can't even finish talking, I think because he's afraid of Piccolo too.
"Raditz blasted a hole through Son Goku's chest," Piccolo said, and I grab at my stomach while it flips around. It's scarier to hear it out loud. "A fate I would have rather subjected him to my—" he stops and looks at me, and doesn't finish what he's saying. I'm too dizzy to make sense of it, of why he stopped, trying to push out all the things in my head that I tried not to look at and tried to remember but keep bubbling up under my eyes. I can't keep my guts inside me and everybody looks away when I spit up the tiny bit of food I had to eat last night while I couldn't sleep, and a bunch of other stuff I didn't know I had inside me. I run away so that they don't have to look, and when I'm pretty far off, I hear them go back to talking. I can't keep my mind from stretching out and finding where Raditz's energy ripples out from, and it makes me feel even sicker.
"Gohan," I hear Piccolo shout. I walk back to him slowly, because all this being sick made me so shaky.
"Maybe he should tell Chi-Chi what happened," Kuririn suggests, and I feel almost like being sick again just thinking about saying any of what happened, or any of what I saw, out loud.
"No," Piccolo says real sharply. "One of you will do it."
They all start shivering a little bit, even the three-eyed one. "Maybe you should," Kuririn says, the whole time laughing in a nervous way.
"I could kill you," Piccolo says very very quietly, and Kuririn stops laughing. "If you are too weak of will to perform such a simple task, there is no point in tolerating your presence. If any of you plan to act as children," this time he even looks at me, "then you will be removed from this area by whatever force necessary." He keeps going, "I will allow you to stay otherwise, for what limited experience you will provide in training. But remember you this: When my safety has been secured by defeating the Saiyans, and when you wish Son Goku back, I will kill him."
I don't think it's true. I don't think he will. I don't think Piccolo is as bad as Raditz.
I really, really hope not.
I don't wanna think about it.
The others move around nervously and whisper; I dunno if they don't know that Piccolo can hear mostly everything. I can hear the three-eyed guy say something about needing to get stronger anyway to defeat Piccolo later. I don't understand all this, all these friends my daddy has, why they don't like Piccolo at all...
"Fine," Kuririn finally says. "I'll tell her, but don't be surprised if she shows up here." He narrows his eyes and his normal kind of twitchy movements are gone for a second. "I don't like you, Piccolo, but right now what's important is making sure we can help Goku when he comes back. And Yamcha is right—we have to get strong enough to keep Raditz from doing anything else."
It makes me feel better to think of all these guys helping out, like if they would have been there instead of me when Daddy died, they could have done something about it—like if Raditz tries to do anything again, they will. And it's nice to be around more people who love my daddy like I do. Yamcha comes up to me and puts his hand in my hair and it makes me feel a little better. "We'll make sure to give these Saiyans what they deserve," he says, "and that you never have to see such an awful sight again."
I smile a little bit, and get a nice warm feeling from his hand being on my head. I feel like I could just... I yawn and I can't keep my eyes open. Nobody stops me when I lay down right there, in the nice, soft grass, and close my eyes for just a bit...
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...
Daddy.
I couldn't stop him.
He almost killed me.
Your friend Bulma saved me.
And then Piccolo saved me too.
...
Piccolo is sitting nearby right now, his legs and arms crossed like they always are when we're not training. He's mad at me and I haven't figured out why yet—just keeps telling me I was stupid, and keeps telling me I should have told him, and keeps yelling things that don't make sense, like these kids I saw one day when Mommy took me with her to go grocery shopping, when I told them I couldn't be friends because my house is too far away. He yells something and leaves for a bit, and I feel his energy rippling off him in the way mine does when something makes me so mad I want to cry—when I can't hide it away inside my stomach.
Piccolo says I was reckless and he says my daddy was even more reckless. But I already knew that.
When Mommy took me home all those days before, I decided something. I decided I wanted to see Daddy look all happy like he did when he hugged me. I decided I wanted to see why Piccolo was looking into my eyes like that when we left.
I decided that every single night after Mommy went to bed I would go outside to where Piccolo was, and ask him to spar with me. Soon Daddy found out about it, and he came, too. It was our secret. I only stayed out for a little bit every night, so I wasn't too tired when I woke up.
Two days ago Daddy came back at night to train after he visited Raditz (who is not my uncle at all). There was a big blackish-blue blotch on his eye and he kept putting his hand on his wrist. His leaned more against one foot and he kept moving his shirt to make sure we couldn't see his shoulder. He said he thought he was almost there, like Raditz almost maybe might have given the Earth a chance. He said he was gonna go visit Raditz the next morning.
But I didn't want him to get hurt so bad again. So I snuck after him, with my energy tucked up in my tummy. I waited by the door that goes into Bulma's lab with my ear against it, listening real carefully to everything they said. It was early—the lab was quiet. I think Bulma told people not go in there anytime my daddy was in there—I bet they didn't like seeing him get beat up.
But I didn't have to have my ear on the door to hear it, when everything went quiet and then my daddy suddenly screamed.
I couldn't even think. I broke down the door and I saw my daddy on the ground outside through the wall, and I saw Raditz laughing, and my energy exploded out of my stomach and into my hands, flowing out like lightning, kind of like the bright energy ball my daddy made when I saw him fighting Raditz the first time.
I don't remember what I said and I don't remember what he said, only that then Bulma was there and I couldn't move, and she threw a knife and my feet let me do one thing—jump over Raditz and knock him out with a move my daddy taught me.
Everything after that is dizzy.
I remember it, but I don't wanna. So I don't think on it too much.
I flip over onto my belly and hope I can sleep better that way. It's almost the morning, but I haven't slept all night. The stars were too bright and my legs hurt too much and my chest hurts too much and Piccolo makes grunting noises when I move around too much. Once I did almost fall asleep, but it turned real bad, with scary things under my eyelids, the things I don't wanna remember. It didn't last too long—Piccolo kicked me and I woke back up. I think he knew that I was having a bad dream and that's why he woke me up. I thanked him, but he didn't say anything. He saved me from having to look at all of those awful things again, inside my mind where they got burned in.
I haven't been home to tell Mommy yet. I wonder if somebody has. I wonder if Bulma did. I wonder if she killed Raditz like Piccolo said to. I'm afraid to stretch my mind out over there and try to feel for his energy. I'm afraid it'll still be there. I think if I feel it again my stomach will spill out.
"Gohan," Piccolo hisses out. "Rest your mind. Reign it in and your body will calm as well."
"I can't," I say. It's true. My blood is whipping around and it's strange, and it's hot like it might boil out of my skin, and I keep looking at the sky like I'm gonna find something there that will help. The stars all sparkle like they're making fun of me and I wonder if the guys Raditz says are coming are at one of those stars right now, and if they killed other boys' daddies, and if anybody killed their daddies so they know how bad it feels.
"Why not?" he sort of asks, but it's not that much like a question, more like he's making me answer.
"Because I'm really, really mad," I say.
"It will get you nowhere," he tells me. But that doesn't make much sense, because he gets mad all the time. He always yelled a lot. It's only just now that he's really, really quiet. Then he says again, like I didn't hear it the other times before, "What you did was stupid. You are lucky not to have died."
My everything hurts too much and I know I won't sleep, so I stand up to wander around, maybe go find a big rock to put all my anger into so I don't have to keep it in me like this, eating me and keeping me awake.
But Piccolo grabs the collar of my shirt before I go, and shoves me to the ground beside him. "Sit as I sit," he says, and with the way he says it I know he means for it to be part of my training. So I rearrange my legs to try to make them look like his. I can feel him looking at me even when my eyes are closed, and I can't help moving around just a little bit while I think of that.
But I don't really get a chance to calm down.
"Morning," a new voice says in kind of a serious way, and it sounds a bit familiar. I've met this guy before, on that island, with Bulma and everybody else before Raditz took me away. Compared to Daddy's other friends, he's not that much taller than me.
Behind him there's that Yamcha guy from before, and a much taller man with three eyes and a smaller one floating in the air beside him. A little cat is on Yamcha's back and it's shivering with its eyes on Piccolo.
"Bulma told me that Goku died," Yamcha says. "And that Kami told you guys to train." Piccolo nods his head a little, and narrows his eyes at the others like he sort of recognizes them. I think Yamcha notices because he adds on, "I found Kuririn and Tenshinhan and Chaotzu and told them what happened. We're all going to train with you." He sounds really serious about it.
Piccolo looks at all of them like I looked at broccoli on my dinner plate, back when I ate at home, back two days ago, back before Raditz killed Daddy.
"I can't believe his nerve," Yamcha almost spits, and I know he's talking about Raditz. "That bastard."
The ridges on top of Piccolo's eyes arch upward. "Did your female friend not dispose of him?" he asks.
Yamcha shakes his head and I feel sick. "She hasn't told me much," he says, and he sounds really angry about it. "But she did something..." he trails off and glances at me, like there's something he doesn't want me to hear. Piccolo narrows his eyes and Yamcha keeps talking. "She told me she cut off his tail and used this chemical that kind of seared the nerves off, or something, so that it can't grow back." He takes a few deep breaths like he's trying to hold in a lot of anger. "She thinks he won't do anything knowing that she's the only who can fix him up with a tail again," and his fists ball up, "she doesn't even know if she can actually do it, and I'll be damned if that bastard doesn't find that out eventually and kill her over it."
"Idiot," Piccolo mutters. "That woman knows not what she's doing."
"She was rambling about—about Saiyan physiology," Yamcha keeps going, "like she can find something out about them that'll let us beat the others. I hope so," his fists get even tighter, "but I'm not taking any chances. I don't want that brute to get his paws on Bulma and hurt her." Yamcha's nostrils get wider as he takes some more breaths. "I'll get strong enough to beat him myself the second she's done studying him." Then he kind of looks like he remembers that he's scared of Piccolo, or something, and shuts his mouth and his cheeks get kind of red. I guess maybe if Piccolo started looking real mean all these guys would run away. It seems most everybody is afraid of him (besides the three-eyed guy, who hasn't moved a single muscle since he got here).
My daddy's friend Kuririn has been leaning back and forth from one foot to the other the whole time, and finally after Yamcha finishes talking he asks really quietly, "What—what was it—I mean—did Goku—" he can't even finish talking, I think because he's afraid of Piccolo too.
"Raditz blasted a hole through Son Goku's chest," Piccolo said, and I grab at my stomach while it flips around. It's scarier to hear it out loud. "A fate I would have rather subjected him to my—" he stops and looks at me, and doesn't finish what he's saying. I'm too dizzy to make sense of it, of why he stopped, trying to push out all the things in my head that I tried not to look at and tried to remember but keep bubbling up under my eyes. I can't keep my guts inside me and everybody looks away when I spit up the tiny bit of food I had to eat last night while I couldn't sleep, and a bunch of other stuff I didn't know I had inside me. I run away so that they don't have to look, and when I'm pretty far off, I hear them go back to talking. I can't keep my mind from stretching out and finding where Raditz's energy ripples out from, and it makes me feel even sicker.
"Gohan," I hear Piccolo shout. I walk back to him slowly, because all this being sick made me so shaky.
"Maybe he should tell Chi-Chi what happened," Kuririn suggests, and I feel almost like being sick again just thinking about saying any of what happened, or any of what I saw, out loud.
"No," Piccolo says real sharply. "One of you will do it."
They all start shivering a little bit, even the three-eyed one. "Maybe you should," Kuririn says, the whole time laughing in a nervous way.
"I could kill you," Piccolo says very very quietly, and Kuririn stops laughing. "If you are too weak of will to perform such a simple task, there is no point in tolerating your presence. If any of you plan to act as children," this time he even looks at me, "then you will be removed from this area by whatever force necessary." He keeps going, "I will allow you to stay otherwise, for what limited experience you will provide in training. But remember you this: When my safety has been secured by defeating the Saiyans, and when you wish Son Goku back, I will kill him."
I don't think it's true. I don't think he will. I don't think Piccolo is as bad as Raditz.
I really, really hope not.
I don't wanna think about it.
The others move around nervously and whisper; I dunno if they don't know that Piccolo can hear mostly everything. I can hear the three-eyed guy say something about needing to get stronger anyway to defeat Piccolo later. I don't understand all this, all these friends my daddy has, why they don't like Piccolo at all...
"Fine," Kuririn finally says. "I'll tell her, but don't be surprised if she shows up here." He narrows his eyes and his normal kind of twitchy movements are gone for a second. "I don't like you, Piccolo, but right now what's important is making sure we can help Goku when he comes back. And Yamcha is right—we have to get strong enough to keep Raditz from doing anything else."
It makes me feel better to think of all these guys helping out, like if they would have been there instead of me when Daddy died, they could have done something about it—like if Raditz tries to do anything again, they will. And it's nice to be around more people who love my daddy like I do. Yamcha comes up to me and puts his hand in my hair and it makes me feel a little better. "We'll make sure to give these Saiyans what they deserve," he says, "and that you never have to see such an awful sight again."
I smile a little bit, and get a nice warm feeling from his hand being on my head. I feel like I could just... I yawn and I can't keep my eyes open. Nobody stops me when I lay down right there, in the nice, soft grass, and close my eyes for just a bit...
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