Booms erupted through the land, Cell and Gohan trading blows as they flew impossibly fast, clashing in feats of strength never before seen on this planet's history. Each punch was an explosion, each blast an apocalypse, their might smashing against each other as a second rank Super Saiyan fought with all his heart against a pinnacle of biomechanical engineering. Good vs evil, in a fight to the death with no holding back.
Gohan was losing.
He hit the ground hard, the plate cracking and sending mountains of earth into the sky. He forced himself to a halt before he got dangerously close towards the planet core. Fighting there would risk destabilising the planet itself, regardless of whether he won or lost. He flew back out, throwing a blast of Ki towards Cell. He smacked the ball of energy away and delivered a roundhouse kick to Gohan's head.
Spinning through the air, Gohan could see the flashes as Cell drew closer. Quick stepping through the sky using bursts of Ki. He was hard to spot, and even harder to predict as Gohan tumbled end over end, however as he forced himself to a stop he threw out a blast of Ki that exploded directly into Cell's chest.
It wasn't a powerful blast, but catching the monster so off guard managed to do some minor damage, with Cell's eyes widening in surprise. Gohan tried to capitalise, delivering a flurry of punches directly into the open wound. He roared as he struck, arms working away even as he felt the burning in his muscles from how hard he was pushing himself. He was rewarded with a yell of pain from Cell, before he was backhanded away once more.
He flew down towards the ground, landing on his feet yet cratering the earth in the impact. Panting, he looked up at Cell to see his body regenerated. The small bursts as parts of his body replaced themselves as Piccolo did, were also accompanied by the telltale sparks of electricity that Gohan had seen many times before.
"No…"
It was a reluctant whisper, unintentionally released as Gohan's eyes widened in horror. Thanks to Piccolo's cells once more, Cell heard the word and grinned.
"That's right Gohan. I told you, I'm the perfect being. I've sifted through the DNA of some of these wretched creatures, taking anything of value from them. Like your friend, little Eren was it? My oh my, he was a new one, that regeneration of his was far too interesting to pass up. I've incorporated another way to heal into my being." His hands gripped in fists, his laughter echoing through the heavens. "I AM PERFECT! And I will only become stronger with every victory! But you Gohan… little Gohan. Look at you."
Cell's eyes narrowed on him, and as much as Gohan tried to stand tall, he couldn't.
"So pathetic. Where was the warrior of all those years ago? Now you can barely stand. So strong, yet so weak. This world has ruined you before we even met. You can't even close your fists properly." Reflexively, Gohan tried and failed to do so. One of his hands just didn't have the muscles and tendons connected anymore to grip as it should. "So pathetic. And to think, you once claimed yourself as stronger than me. I thought Goku was your father, but that arrogance seems to come from Vegeta."
The name hurt. Hearing his father's name spoken by such a monster cut him deeply. One of shame and loss, and Cell knew it. He floated down towards him, grinning happily as he looked down on the boy.
"Perhaps I'm wrong though. Not the arrogance of Vegeta, but of youth. After all, that's all you are. Such a small, scared child. A weakling, trying to live up to the legacy of your father. And where is he I wonder? His friends must surely have wished him back by now. But not you it seems. I wonder why. Could it be… that they don't want you back?"
Cell's taunts were obvious. Gohan knew he should fight back, argue and defend himself. But he just couldn't. His body hurt so much, his heart ached in grief. And the taunts… they were the same questions he'd wondered about for years. Had his family truly abandoned him? Was he really never going to be strong enough?
"After all, why would they want you? Too cowardly to unleash your full potential, it took the death of 16 and the suffering of your friends to make you act. And what did you do with that power? You strutted around like you were the best, the strongest, the unbeatable. And then you failed. Outsmarted, your father had to give his life to save you." Gohan couldn't even raise his head anymore, too beaten and weary to look Cell in the eyes. "And then when you had a second chance, you failed again. Even with every drop of power. From you, from your friends, from Vegeta. I still live… I am the perfect being Gohan. My victory is inevitable. I shall never die, never age, and never be stopped. I will consume this planet, every planet, until I have taken everything that ever was, and ever will be. And you will die, here, soon… but not yet."
Cell leaned down, staring Gohan directly in the eyes as he spoke. "You're so full of self pity you haven't even noticed, have you? Our audience is almost here."
Cell's words triggered Gohan's mind, as he refocused on his surroundings and sent a shock of alarm throughout his body. The second team, his friends, they were flying towards him.
"You son of a bitch!" He roared and threw himself at Cell, managing to strike him in the face with his good fist. A kick to the chest had Gohan gagging and crashing back down into the dirt.
"Not yet Gohan. You don't die until everyone is ready to witness."
In the dark and empty void of space, a ship slowly began to fade into existence. Large and bulbous, the Hope 2 was an ugly craft. But as a time machine that had been stuffed inside of an existing spacecraft design, it was a marvel of engineering to anyone who had an eye to look at it. Aboard the ship itself, none of the crew would qualify as those who would be impressed by the magnitude of its design.
"Did it work?"
Goku's tone was insistent but was holding himself back rather well compared to his previous years of anxiety. He was even managing to remain in his seat, though the straps were gripped so tightly they had been ripped and were now purely decorative. Hunched over the controls of the machine, Future Trunks sat uncomfortably side by side with Android 17.
"The readouts are looking promising," the frequent time traveller announced, "but it's odd. We're not exactly sure where we were expecting to be."
"Gotta take into account drift hotshot." 17's hands flicked through the consoles readouts quickly, and though his mind was busy and focused, he found the energy to grin at Trunks' instinctual sneer towards him. "All those brains of your mom's you would think you'd have remembered that."
Trunks growled, but 18 spoke up before he could snap back. "17, stop antagonising him. Focus on why we're here."
"Right, sorry sis." 17 sobered quickly, remembering not only that as fun as it was, Trunks didn't actually deserve being poked and prodded as he was. Besides, he certainly hadn't forgotten the debt he owed the boy that had saved him and his sister. He had a niece now in part thanks to that spunky little kid. "Time and travel lines are matching with what we expected, looks like we're in the right place. We're off course by a few billion miles though, a bit of inaccuracy in the machine but don't forget to count planet drift too."
"A few billion!?" Goku fully stood up from his seat, still gripping the straps and not noticing as he ripped them completely free of the harness.
"Easy papa bear. We're in space, a few billion isn't that far. We're in the right solar system at least." Goku calmed a little, even though he couldn't wrap his head around the distances, he could accept it when smarter people told him not to worry about something. Trunks had helped build and fly the first version of the time machine, and 17 had downloaded schematics from Bulma before they left, meaning he literally knew the ship inside and out. "Tell you what, use those Ki senses of yours and tell me what you find. Give me a destination before you instant transmission away though."
Goku shut his eyes, as did many of the other warriors on board. There was silence as each one of them reached out, focusing and calming as they felt the ripples of energy throughout the system.
"So… King Kai was it?" As they waited, 17 turned to the blue god who was surprisingly tense as he gripped his chair. "How's it feel to be out of your universe?"
"Wrong!" He spat, though it was far more obviously fear than anger. "A Kai isn't supposed to be travelling like this, I could get in so much trouble! And this whole realm feels wrong, it's so sticky and fuzzy…"
His grumbles trailed off, but 17 was still left in complete wonder. "Hang on, what do you mean it feels wrong? Is that… bad?"
"Not for you mortals. But a Kai feels things differently. We can sense the fabric of the universe, every part of reality. Imagine going from walking on land to walking through water, this place is suffocating!"
"Oh, right." A question popped up in his mind, his mouth opening to speak before he closed it again. The Kai looked at him strangely, 17 clearly not normally one for hesitation. Finally, he did speak up. "Hey so, I never got the chance to find out before but… seven years ago, did you happen to know if another Android showed up? 16?"
King Kai nodded, knowing of the android well. "He passed onto heaven, refusing to be revived with the others. He's at peace."
"Good. That's… that's good." 17 breathed a sigh of relief. He hadn't been able to know 16 as well as his sister, but he knew the android well enough to call him human. One who was truly deserving of the peace he had found.
"Nothing… I don't sense him!" Goku's breathing picked up, panic quickly setting in.
"Kakarot's right." Vegeta growled, turning his steely gaze onto the pair of androids. "You robotic idiots took us to the wrong place!"
"Hey, I don't pick the place prince, I just fly us there. This is the right place I'm telling you!"
"And I'm telling you, that none of us can sense him!" The other nodded along, confirming that not one of them had been successful. "There are five planets in this system and not one of them has Kakabrat on them!"
"Five? There's six planets here your highness. Maybe if you weren't so busy throwing accusations around, then maybe you could still count."
"Six…?" Goku repeated the word, his voice low and lost. Desperation and despair were beginning to set in as he failed to understand. "What do you mean, we only sense five."
17's furrowed his brows in confusion, looking over the readouts from the console. Reluctantly, Trunks joined him and looked likewise confused.
"He's right, there's six planets here. There's one just…" He oriented himself based on the machines data. "That way."
He pointed to the side, yet as much as anyone could sense there was nothing in that direction.
"I don't sense anything." Vegeta grumbled, eyes shut and face scrunched as he tried to focus. "What is it, a dead rock?"
"No." Trunks brought up a camera view on the main screen for them all to see. It looked in some ways, similar to their own planet. The continents were different of course, but the basic structure was the same. Blue oceans, green and brown lands, polar regions and normal cloud formations. "A planet that looks like this should absolutely have some kind of life."
"What do you say we take a look then?" Tien's suggestion was met by a quick nod of the head from the others. "Trunks, can you bring us to the planet?"
"Not by using the time travel part, but that's why mom put engines on this one." A few flicks and buttons pushed later, and the ships quickly rumbled as engines flared into life and rocketed the ship away. The engines were tremendously powerful thanks to the technology reverse engineered from the Saiyan ships, and then subsequently improved by Bulma, but with warriors of such power on board none felt any strain from the momentum of the ship.
They watched as the planet grew closer and closer, the image becoming clearer and more detailed to the point that each one of them began to notice things on the planet. For one, there were signs of structures. Cities, dams, villages, train lines and roads. As they came closer, they could even pick out the sign of ships moving across the ocean.
"There's people on this planet…" Piccolo spoke for the first time since embarking on their trip, the rising of his voice showing the glimmer of hope that he had been trying to hold back. Like Goku, Piccolo had been devastated by Gohan's disappearance. However, unlike the Saiyan, Piccolo was reclusive by nature and had an outward force to direct his anger onto. Where Goku had been lost to depression and blaming himself, Piccolo had become cold, filled with the rage of betrayal and loss.
Piccolo too had lost a son, and he would do anything to get him back.
An alarm sounded as they approached, 17 and Trunks looking over the console in shock and confusion before the ship abruptly slammed to a halt. The ship slammed into something, the sounds of metal scraping and tearing across the hull as alarms beeped and wailed.
This time, even the warriors were taken off their feet by the sheer surprise of their stop. Though they recovered quickly, debris was sent flying across the inside of the ship from loose tools and other items.
"What the hell was that!?" Yamcha picked himself up from the floor, flicking off a tool box that had landed on his head. "Did you crash us into the planet?"
"No! No, we haven't reached the planet yet." Trunks turned off the alarm and began to mentally read through damage reports. "We hit something else, something we couldn't detect. We took damage but… we should be okay."
Goku began moving, remembering enough of the ship to know where he was heading.
"Goku, where are you going?"
"Outside Krillin." He opened a door and began hauling on a space suit. "I'll fly down there."
"What? But you can't go, there's something-"
Trunks was cut off by Vegeta, the prince holding a hand up in front of his face as he watched Goku finish dressing and moving to leave.
"You can't stop Kakarot boy, just let him try."
The airlock cycled quickly, and soon Goku was floating out into space. His eyes peered around for any sign of what they could have hit, but all he could see were the floating shrapnel of debris that had broken away from the ship.
And so he began his descent, floating down gently towards the planet. His hands reached out, steady and waiting. Seconds passed by, he drifted closer and closer, until… he stopped. His hands hit the barrier, the invisible wall that surrounded the planet. The spacesuit limited him somewhat, but he could still feel enough to understand something about the barrier.
It was solid. There was no bending, or rippling, or compression of any kind. He pushed it against it carefully at first, then harder, and harder. He was using the full power of his base form against the barrier, pressing to the point that his suit began to tear.
"KZZHHH- Goku!" The static filled voice of Trunks was blaring from inside a speaker in his suit. "You're going to destroy your suit. You need to be careful!"
He paused, assessing his lack of progress against the invisible barrier. He then promptly took a deep breath and transformed into his super Saiyan form. The yellow aura burned away his spacesuit, incinerating it before decompression could rip it apart. With his power, Goku could survive the vacuum of space as long as he had air.
He threw a punch into the barrier. Then another, and another, battering away with all his considerable might. Punches turned to kicks, and then into Ki blasts. He was smashing against it like a wild animal, so much so that he didn't notice for quite some time that King Kai had been trying to reach him telepathically.
'Goku! You can't destroy that barrier, it's just too strong!'
'King Kai, do you know what this is?' Goku paused his assault, though his body remained tense and primed to strike.
'It's magic Goku, very powerful magic too. Give me a moment, I'll take a closer look.'
True to his word, after a short wait King Kai emerged from the ship in a space suit of his own. Goku still struggled to hold off in the time it took, his body shaking with adrenaline and power. With tremendous self-control, he pulled himself aside and let King Kai inspect the barrier.
'Yep, as I thought. This is powerful magic.' King Kai took the liberty of linking the minds of all present telepathically for any who didn't have the ability. 'This is far beyond most mortals.'
'How old do you think it is?' Krillin asked, his face peering visibly through one of the ships windows. 'Could it be something to do with Gohan?'
'I'm not sure, you'd have to ask the one who created it.' He pressed his hands against the barrier and a soft glow began to emanate around them. 'Let me see what I can find out.'
Silence followed briefly as the Kai worked, his eyes shut beneath the suit and glows of energy pulsating away and fading. The waiting was killing Goku, tension building inside of him. He was almost relieved when Krillin spoke up again.
'Hey King Kai… do you even need a space suit? Does a god need air to breathe?'
'I'm not exactly willing to find out Krillin. I don't want to find out what happens if a Kai dies in a different universe to where he's-… oh.'
'Oh? What's oh?'
Goku floated over, his question insistent as he almost physically wished he could press an answer from the Kai.
'Not something good Goku. This barrier was put in place by a Kai. Not just any Kai, but a supreme Kai. This is very powerful magic, and uniquely godly in origin.'
Goku blinked in confusion before he shouldered onwards regardless. 'Alright, so where's the Supreme Kai? We need to get him to let us through.'
'Whoa whoa whoa.' King Kai turned to face the Saiyan, waving his hands frantically as he tried to ward Goku away from his reckless idea. 'Goku, no. This isn't just some guy you can speak to, this is the supreme Kai of this universe! You don't just go and make demands of someone like that.'
Goku's eyes narrowed and he floated closer to King Kai, staring him directly face to face.
'King Kai… it doesn't matter who it is, I will get Gohan back.'
He moved to protest, he really did, but King Kai slumped in defeat quickly. He knew Goku would persist no matter what. He supposed deep down he just wanted to have still made the effort to try and stop him.
'Alright. Back on the ship, I'll show you where to go.'
The team of five soldiers raced quickly. Petra, Jean, Mina, Sasha, and Mikasa, each of them flying as fast as they could towards Gohan's beacon of power. In spite of his incredible aura, they could each see how it was dwarfed by another. The monster he called Cell was there, fighting, winning.
Mikasa remembered the feeling when she had felt Eren's aura disappear. His murder at the hands of Cell, one she had known was coming, yet tore her up inside all the same. And next, next was going to be Gohan.
The others didn't believe her of course, they couldn't. It was why they were all racing as fast as they could towards him, to try and do something to help in spite of her warnings. Maybe she shouldn't have told them, maybe she should have. She didn't know what would happen next, that was Eren's knowledge. A knowledge which had now taken to the grave.
When they came in view of the battlefield, a wreck of the land was all that greeted them. The once proud and bustling city was scarcely remaining. Crumbled and burned remains were strewn across a land which had been torn asunder by the clash of two mighty powers. The clash was ongoing, faster than they could see but the impacts were impossible to miss. Booms through the sky as fists collided, great chasms of the earth being blown wide open as they tossed one another through the earth.
The reappearance of Gohan heralded his defeat. His battered and bloody body hit the ground in an explosion, his last attempt to fight back a failure. Victory for him had been impossible. Cell had grown too powerful, feasted on too many, and Gohan had long since been too wounded.
A foregone conclusion in the worst way imaginable.
Petra choked back a scream as she flew towards Gohan, landing and cradling him in her arms. He was still conscious but was beaten so badly and so dazed that he could only barely comprehend her presence.
"Gohan! Gohan please, speak to me."
"R-… run." His hand came up, pushing her away with what should have been immense power. Instead, only a soft and pitiful nudge remained. "Please, run."
"I won't leave you. I won't."
"My, aren't you two just the sweetest little lovebirds I've ever seen." The voice was chilling. Powerful, smug, and yet so cold. Petra turned as she heard the footsteps of Cell, mechanical yet organic, and stomping heavily towards them. It was the first time she'd ever seen him, and yet he was just as horrifying as she had imagined.
Worse, because in her imagination Gohan was there to protect her. He was strong, unbeatable. Not here, laying weakly with a broken and fractured body.
"Please," he strained, "run…"
She didn't. Instead, she rose and splayed her fingers, concentrating power as she prepared to solar flare the creature. As her fingers split, the monster grabbed her hands. His grip was hard, almost bone breaking, but there was a sick glee in his eyes that told her he was being deliberately gentle with her. She hated the yelp of pain she let out, knowing how it must have hurt Gohan to hear.
Around them, her comrades struck. Beams of energy blasting out towards Cell, a desperate attempt to hurt him in any way that they could. His sickly aura buffeted the strikes, and sent a pulse of energy blasting out towards them that dropped each of them to the ground.
"Perhaps you should have listened to your boyfriend. A little late now though." His tail extended out, stretching from his back and with the needle raised over his shoulder ready to strike. "I must thank you however, you saved me precious moments of hunting you down."
"Leave her alone Cell!" Gohan's growl was strong, but his body was not, and even as he tried, he failed to stand, stumbling back to one knee and glaring up at him.
"I'm here to make a statement Gohan. One that will never be forgotten, a pain that will be etched into the minds of all here." His tail wiggled in anticipation, and Petra flinched, shutting her eyes in fear. "But I remember what you did to me Gohan. If there's one lesson I learned from that day, it was the price of arrogance."
His tail struck, Petra froze as her life flashed before her eyes.
But Cell didn't strike her. His tail speared out, blooming to swallow a being. But not her. Instead, he struck down onto Gohan. Gohan's hand reached out, catching the end of the open tail as it pressed down upon him, his groans of pain muted by Petra's screams of terror.
"You are a being of incredible power Gohan. Though you will never be a match for a perfect being as myself, I see no reason to let such strength go to waste. Goodbye Gohan, I thank you for the power you are about to give me."
The tail descended further, Gohan's arms dropping as he struggled against Cell's might. The tail wrapped around him, his top half ensnared as his waist and legs dangle free. Wriggling as he continued to struggle.
"Please, NO! Please don't do this!" Petra begged, openly in terror as she watched Gohan beginning to be consumed. His struggle was unrelenting, but futile to all who could see it. "Let him go, please! I'm begging you!"
Cell held her all the time, forcing her to watch the tail foisting him into the air. His lower half kicked and thrashed desperately.
"Hm… perhaps you are right. I don't need to absorb him." A faint flutter of hope bloomed in Petra's heart. "Not all of him."
The tail snapped, crunching down at Gohan's waist as blood spurted free. Down along the length of the tail, Gohan's top half was pulled into Cell's being, his power absorbed. From the end of the tail, Gohan's bisected waist and legs were dropped free. Hitting the ground in a bloody splat.
And Petra's heart broke.