Contradicting Mission

Part 20

The good doctor hadn't always been a man of high status. His father, a Lower Class citizen, had been a secretary his whole life, catering to the Middle Class, always looking up through the glass cealing, never tasting its sweet sensations. He died young, fourty-three, leaving three children to fend for themselves. Koda's two siblings, Fiji and Karu, were younger than him.

Fiji was the youngest, and the cleverest of the three. Without the guidance of his father, he went in search of easy, quick money, and he found it in illegal narcotics. With his strong ambition, by the time three years had passed he supplied half the Lower Class Underground with any sort of illegal drugs: sedatives, stimulants, hallucinogetics, antidepressants, inhalents, psychodelics, depressants; anything the buyer wanted and was willing to pay for.

Fuji died at thirty-two during a dispute with his competition. Koda and his brother could not afford a funeral.

Karu, though the middle-child, was the largest of the three, and though he generally had a sweet personality, he was born with a mental defect, never letting him mature beyond age seven. Unable to function with his peers, he quit school and refused to leave the house for nearly ten years. At the death of his youngest brother his depression exploded into rage and he went on a strike for vengence and killed thirty Lower Class Aeesu-jin, swearing they had killed his brother. To escape the death sentence put on his head for his masacre, he ran away to space, to live the life of an Off-planet. Koda hadn't heard from him since.

The good doctor was the only man to make it. Despite the tainted name of his family, he survived through school with scholars, and was soon given his own class to teach. Though not as large as Karu, the doctor had always been plagued with a weight problem, but he carried it well, soon using his wide size to intimidate his class into co-operation, though he soon learned he simply didn't have what it took to teach the young.

After trying out a few other fields of work, he finally found his calling in medicine. Within twenty years, he was serving not only Lower Class, but also Middle Class. Within thirty years, he was raking his fingernails at the Upper Class's floor. Thirty-five years of medicine, and he was living comfortable in the Upper Class, searving the beurocrates and the stuffy-nosed pompous mongers that never knew what hard work ment.

Never fully able to rid himself of the Lower Class blood that his lineage proclaimed, he kept a second home in the Lower Clas areas--on the sly--which he visited whenever he couldn't take 'the good life' anymore.

It was here, in his secret little get-a-way, that he had been hiding from Heng's fury over the passing days from the time he woke up, unconscious, in some stranger's home. With no clue where he was or why he was still alive, or if Son Gohan or the others were alive, he stumbled down one hall after another, deeper into the Underground, until he found himself in familiar Lower Class areas. Finding his home, he went inside and locked the door behind him.

That had been four days ago. He hadn't left since.

When his door swished open suddenly, he had been prepared to strike death to the intruder with his raised tail. He was more than mildly surprised to find Son Gohan standing in his doorway, his tail twined around his waist, looking behind him pensively as he was nearly caught in the closing door.

"Son Gohan?! Son Gohan?!" There was surprisingly little he cound find to say. Are you okay? Where have you been? How did you escape Heng? Are the others okay?

Once the boy heard his voice, he seemed to wilt in relief, his eyes seemed to be begging for what he beheld to be true, his tail untwined from his hips and rose behind his back in a question mark, "Doctor Koda-san?"

The doctor nodded.

**

"...so we're all living on the surface for now. Sunow-san and his kids will probably have to become Off-planets and find some other planet to live on. They just have to get ahold of a spaceship."

The doctor stood up from his chair, hands folded behind his back. He nodded, "And you? When do you intend to leave?"

The boy lowered his head, "Just as soon as we...get rid of the Tahch-jin and finish this mission. We attack tomarrow."

"Why are you still doing this?" the doctor asked in bewilderment, "Why are you still trying to save this planet?"

A bitter-sweet smile crossed the boy's face, "I have to. I can't explain everything, it's just...too complex. I'm not sure I understand it all myself."

The doctor nodded, there seemed little more to say. Both hesitated, nearly said something, then sighed in unison. The doctor began pacing, his large, talon feet thumping softly on the ground. The boy twined his tail around his hip and rested it in his hands, rubbing his thumb against it gently, smoothing the hairs down.

"So this is the Lower Class area?" Gohan said.

The doctor nodded, "It is."

"How did you wind up here?"

The doctor smiled proudly, "I used to live here."

The boy looked around at the small, two room apartment. The worn floor. The dim lights. It was the least kempt, worn down section of the Underground he had ever seen. He then thought of the large, clean, well-lit office the doctor worked in. "You must have worked really hard to get as far as you have."

"As far as I had gotten, anyway. Something tells me I won't be working here any longer."

"I'm sorry," the boy said, his head lowering, his eyes centered downward, looking at his tail. The doctor may not be dead, but his life was over. Like Sunow and his children. Like Tousan. "I'm so sorry."

The doctor stopped pacing and looked across the room at the boy. Without a word, the Aeesu-jin approached him, his giant form hovering before the small Saiya-jin's body. The boy closed his eyes, irrationally expecting the Aeesu-jin to hit him. He would take it. He deserved it. He always did this to people, always ruined their lives. Always got them killed.

A large hand landed on his shoulder. He looked up, suddenly realizing how close the doctor was. How big. He subconsciously pushed his back against the wall behind him.

The doctor said, almost sternly, "It's alright."

After a sad, failed attempt to smile, the boy turned away.

"That cut on your cheek," the doctor continued saying, stooping his large, bulky body over to closer examine the boy's face, "It's healing up very well, even without stitches."

"Yeah, it's-," the boy paused, a frown forming in his forhead as the doctor continued to carefully inspect the now scarred-over slit on his cheek, his face hardly inches away,"-it's my Saiya-jin half. They tend to heal quickly."

"So I've heard. However, I would still like to take a closer look at your damanged rib cage. Going days with that kind of injury could lead to major resperitory problems."

"I'm all healed up now, no need," Gohan insisted, ducking out away from the wall and walking backwards from the Aeesu-jin.

"Then you have nothing to worry about."

The boy hesitated, as though considering vaulting out the door and escaping to the surface.

"You promised that after the meeting with Heng you would let me examine your side. Honest, I'll be as brief as possible. I'm only concerned. Son Gohan, you don't realize that you could die."

The boy continued to stand rooted in his spot, seeming to shrink where he stood; his tail moved slowly and mindlessly, as though its will was independent of his body. So small. Really nothing more than a child. Why was he the one on this mission? Why not a soldier? Or at least an adult. He really looked like he was shrinking.....

"Son Gohan? Gohan."

The boy responded to his name, his eyes slowly meeting the doctor's.

"I want to help. Please."

It seemed to take absolute will power, but finally the boy sagged in consent, "What do I have to do?"

"I had a friend stop by my office yesterday to get my medical bag. I'm afraid I don't have much in it, but if you'll wait just a moment, I'll get it."

**

His original fractured ribs had indeed healed, just as the cut on his face and the long scratch on his leg had, leaving nothing behind save little tender, miscolored areas. However, the doctor discovered, there were many other wounds to look at. His fight with the twenty attackers--Gohan was sure, now, that they had been Henning's men--had left extensive damage. His left arm had been fractured, his left knee had been dislocated, three ribs had been re-fractured and nearly all his knuckles had been half-smashed.

Gohan was surprised to find there had been so much damage. He had only been sore for the first day. The next two days slightly stiff. But this last day he felt just fine. The doctor was equally amazed that such heavy damage could be healed in such a short time. He was sure, though giving such a diagnosis felt unreal, that if the boy's body continued to heal as fast as it was, he would be nearly back to new within two weeks. They both agreed that Saiya-jins must be one of the heartiest creatures alive.

An hour after arriving at the doctor's home, Gohan pulled his shirt on, grateful that the whole poking, proding, lack-of-personal-space part of the reunion with the good doctor was over. He pulled a small container from one of his pockets. Gratefully, he had remembered to pack a lunch before leaving his capsule house.

All akwardness between them deminished, and as Gohan ate the doctor sipped a cup of strong green tea and the two talked like old friends, discussing Aeesu-jin history and Aeesu-jin and Earth discoveries each planets scientists had made.

The doctor was particularly shocked when the boy showed him his capsules, demonstrating their use by opening his motor-bike capsule right in the living room. Gohan was equally amazed to hear about the Aeesu-jin's first expiriments in developing a chamber that could instantly heal an injured person. The first steps toward the healing tanks that had repaired his father on Namek intime to make his crucial enterance into the Freeza fight.

"What's the rest of the Underground like?" Gohan finally asked, "How far does it go?"

"Sometimes I wonder if it ever stops," the doctor said, "There are millions of miles of tunnels, running all over--or under, I suppose I should say--the planet. I don't know how far down it goes. Some say all the way to the planet's core, but that's nonsense, for the heat that far down would burn an Aeesu-jin alive."

"Are there any areas below the Low Class?"

"Not dwellings, no. The Aeesu-jin refuse to live that far down, it gets too warm for our comfort. However, that's where most of the aliens live. There's been quite a few Saiya-jin coming in, lately. Apparently their planet is under alot of hard times, Tsufuru-jin civil wars and such, and they look for Aeesu-jin employment to not only get food to their families, but also to escape their planet."

"They willingly become slaves?" Gohan's voice was harsher than he ment it to be.

"Some, the homeless or the weak or the poor. The ones who would do anything to get away from where they live. But many of them are well-paid for their work. All Saiya-jin have to come here for training before they can work for the Aeesu-jin--mosly off planet work and such."

"What kind of off planet work do they do?"

Here, the doctor paused.

"They clear planets." The boy answered his own question.

"It's a profitable trade, unfortunately, and the Aeesu-jin involved don't care that it's wrong. There are millions of Aeesu-jin that are opposed to the growing Planet Trade, I being one of them, but you must know by now that the more power they have, the more corrupt people can become. There's no stopping those in power, and trying only gets you an instant death."

"Can I see?"

The doctor raised his eyebrows, "See what?"

"The Saiya-jin. Where they live. What they look like...I haven't seen very many Saiya-jin in my life."

"You want a tour?"

"If it's not too much trouble." The boy said, his tail slithering up his arm like a python, around his wrist, twisting up his forearm. His face reddened when he realized he might have sounded like Forester.

"Alright, then. I used to explore that level in my youth, so I know the layout. It's dangerious, though. Backlash runs almost half the Aeesu-jin/alien interactions, and Heng keeps at least two men there for security."

Gohan's eyebrows knitted, "Let's not then-"

"However," the doctor said, an almost youthful smile crossing his face for the first time in over fifty years, "I know of a place or two that are less guarded than others. It's not the best example of alien habitats on the planet, but if you want to see..."

"Have you found him yet?" Henning asked his sentry, leaning over the Aeesu-jin's shoulder as he typed at his console.

Behind him, Joru said, "It doesn't help to rush."

Henning gave him a withering look before disreguarding his words.

The sentry looked at both Tahch-jin brothers, hesitated, then sighed, saying, "Sir, there just isn't enough information to pin-point him. Or even get a general area."

"What do you mean? The whole reason I gave you those chi detectors was so you would be able to find him easier."

The Aeesu-jin shook his head, "I don't know what to say. The signal General Kokoschka reported to us was far below the minimum power we've estimated for Son Gohan. Too low to even consider pursuing."

"Nevertheless, I want whoever it was climbing through the vents found."

"That's the other problem, sir," the Aeesu-jin said, "It was only brief before it just...vanished. A flash of minute power that died on its own."

"Um...," Joru said, getting both his brother and the sentry's attention.

Henning grinned, "You have a threory, brother?"

"Just a hypothosis. Do you remember, brother, how Son Gohan broke into our complex the other day?"

"Yes."

"Right before he left, he jerked his attention to the door, for no apparent reason. It seemed like he heard something we couldn't. Less than a minute afterward, the guards entered through that same door. Before that, when he and that blue monster were rescuing the Aeesu-jin and that other alien, he seemed to know exactly where to go, as though they were wearing some secret homing beacon that could not be detected."

Henning tilted his head back, "What do you think?"

"I think that perhaps this boy has some sort of control of chi. Like he can see it, or hear it, or-"

"A sixth sense?"

"Yes; sight, sound, taste, smell, touch and-"

"Chi."

"It's a thought, anyway," Joru said.

"Interesting," Henning agreed, "Perhaps....perhaps this theory has more to it than you think, brother. Perhaps not only can he see chi...perhaps he can also control it. Or his own, anyway."

The Joru and the sentry watched him, waiting for him to speak the thoughts suddenly coming to his mind.

"Just as we can close our eyes when we don't want to see, and cover our ears when we don't want to hear, perhaps he can-"

"-dissolve his chi if he doesn't want it felt? Control his own chi?" Joru wondered, then said, "That would make sense. If he did that-"

Henning nodded, "If he did that, it would explain why our scouters only picked up a tiny wink of his power before he buried it away for later."

The sentry's forehead creased, "Then how do we find him?"

"The hard way, unfortunately. As astounding as this discovery is, it only makes things harder. Get as many men in here and have them start searching over all the monitoring units. Room by room. Keep an extra ear out on the transmission waves for any disturbances by aliens. That boy seems to have a difficult time staying discreet."

"Yes sir."

Though he had tried to open his mind to all the possibilities he would face, Gohan was still surprised by what he saw apon entering the Saiya-jin's sector of the Underground. The doctor said it was the training grounds, where the Saiya-jin trained to maintain a working power before taking on the tasks the Aeesu-jin required of them. From what the boy had known before, Saiya-jins were capable of training themselves. They were strick on themselves, sturdy, pushing their powers to their limits and consistantly raising their chi by the day.

He expected to see, as he entered the training rooms, Saiya-jins sparring with eachother, children watching to pick up techniques, others pausing to catch their breath before battling again. He imagined them laughing, perhaps. Having fun. Expirimenting with what their bodies would allow, then stretching beyond it to find new, vast, hidden wells of untapped potential.

Though it was well-lit, the harsh halogen lights burning down on white walls and floor, there was a dark feeling to it. Bleak, oppressive. The instant the boy walked through the door, directly behind the doctor, he flinched. There was bad chi here. It stank like raw sewage to his mind. It was festering. There was rage, anger, seething, smoldering like magma, straining against whatever force was daring to hold it back. It was an instant feeling, like plunging into burning tar, clutching at the boy's arms and legs and tail, so heavy with darkness it seemed to flatten his hair against his head, pull down at his shoulders. It was like drowning.

When he looked around, he expected to see the room filled with faces contorted in rage, their lips drawn back from their teeth like starving feral dogs fighting over a scrap of meat, their eyes burning red as coals. Frothing. Insane.

But everyone in the room seemed calm.

As Gohan continued walking silently behind the doctor, looked right and left in awe and horror, he saw Saiya-jin of all sizes and shapes, their faces blank as new sheets of canvas, though their souls were pregnant with rage. They weren't sparring against eachother. They were waiting in lines. At the end of each line was a mat, thirty by thirty feet wide, and hardly soft enough to stifle even the softest of falls. Worthless, and the boy wondered why they were even used at all.

But his attention was not on the mats, it was what was standing on each mat. Creatures. Gohan had a hard time recogizing them as sentient, they seemed more beast than man. They were aliens, not all of the same race, but seeming to be of one spirit. They were evil. Strong. Some hairy, some scaley. Some blue, some brown, some orange, some green. They were all huge, rippled with muscles, and seemed to have abolutly no good in their eyes, their soul, their heart or their mind. And the Saiya-jin were waiting in line, their hearts full of pure fury, to fight them. Gohan paused to see them better, and his eyes widened. The mats, he saw now, were covered in blood. Over the scalding chi crushing in around him, he hadn't even smelled it.

The horror of his own mind screeched to a standstill as a mortal scream of anger, frustration and pain filled the large room.

Gohan's head jerked around, finding the source of the tortured sound to be a Saiya-jin. He was laying on a mat, a brutish, giant, green-skinned ogre standing over him. The Saiya-jin's arm was twisted so horribly it was no longer in its socket, flopping around limply as the Saiya-jin squirmed and writhed in agony on the ground, clutching and scraping with his fingernails. Screaming. He had lost his reason, the pain must have been maddening. What was far more horrifying was that Gohan knew the Saiya-jin couldn't have been much older than he was. Thirteen, fourteen. Too young to have to endure such agony.

Gohan opened his mouth but no sound came to him. He looked frantically left, then right, looking for a medic to come rushing forward or for the Saiya-jin around him to save him, pull him off the mat, do something.

None of the other Saiya-jin moved, though their eyes all focused on the screaming, writhing, painriddled youth. No one moved, though the burning power of their anger rose to even further unspeakable heights, so strong and heavy Gohan found himself almost staggering under its weight, his head spinning from the sudden smell of fear and blood and pain and rage. The chi around him felt like it was eating his soul alive.

The doctor's hand suddenly came down on the Gohan's shoulder, "We should leave."

But the sight was atrociously clutching onto the boy's attention, and in a daze he shook the large Aeesu-jin's hand off him.

The Saiya-jin's screaming was so hard it sounded as though his throat had been shredded to ribbons. Insane. Such pain.

"Stop screaming already!" the monstrious green ogre yelled at the agonizing youth, "Suck it up like a warrior!"

The Saiya-jin went on screaming, his voice beyond human. He was beyond thought process, consumed by pain.

"I said shut up!" the ogre yelled, and drove his foot deep into the boy's side. The screaming stopped. The Saiya-jin stopped writhing, stopped moving. The ogre stepped forward, looking down at the inactive form, "You don't follow orders very well. I have no other choice but to...fire you."

He lifted his mammoth foot above the Saiya-jin's head, obviously intending to kill him.

"No, stop!" a Saiya-jin finally yelled, running forward, then suddenly stopping at the edge of the bloodied mat, "Please don't! That's my son, my last son! His brother was just killed yesterday, please don't!"

"Get back in line!" the ogre yelled, "You have a problem with the way I train, you can take it up with me when it's your turn!"

"No!" a second, female voice interupted and a woman ran to the side of the boy's father, her furry tail and long black hair sweeping in behind her, "Please, I'm the boy's mother! Give him one more chance! He's a strong boy, he'll meet your standards within a week, I swear!"

"Your whole family is seeded with mutiny!" the ogre accused, "You'll all die!"

The man wailed, sinking to his knees. The woman tried to say more, but her face distorted with grief and she covered her mouth with his hands, saying, "No, no, not my son, please, no..."

The ogre raised his foot into the air to deliver the final blow to the downed boy, when suddenly, with a savage yell, the father rushed forward, his eyes livid. The mother rushed in directly behind him, a wild shriek for blood flying from her lips.

And an amazing thing happened.

Suddenly, in a single wave, more Saiya-jin rushed forward, like a giant tidal wave, burying the green ogre under their number, their feet flying, their fists pounding repeately, their yells of savagery and anger and pent up years, lives, of frustration and restraint suddenly burning to ash in the heat of their erupting rage.

The ogre vanished under them, his scream drowned out by the screams of his attackers. Gohan could only watch as dark purple blood began to leak out from under the attacking Saiya-jin's feet. They were beating the ogre to death. He was probably already dead.

The rebelling Saiya-jin were abruptly scattered as a blast of searing blue chi exploded against them. Some of the Saiya-jin died the instant it hit them, others wounded beyond fighting. Gohan followed everyone else's gaze as they saw the other brutish alien 'trainers' were not directing their attention to the rebellions happening. One of them, a huge pink alien with horns lining his head, had been the attacker.

The other Saiya-jin, waiting in other lines, were now looking, too. The passive, blank looks on their faces seemed to suddenly melt into determination, rage, and what could almost be joy. They turned on the other aliens, pounding them into the mat, their chi's blasting up for battle and their spirits suddenly clutching at the curtains of the window to freedom.

But, though the trainers were dying, so were the Saiya-jin. Now that surprise was gone, the trainers were blasting into the attacking crowds killing them in midstep, burning their bodies, dissolving their chi's.

Gohan heard one of the trainers yelling into a communicator. He was calling for help. Reinforcments.

"Gohan," the doctor said, tapping the mezmerized boy on the arm, "We have to get out of here! If the Aeesu-jin guards come here they'll surely recognize you-"

But the doors of the training room had already opened, and two large fleets filled the room, their tails dealing death to any Saiya-jin they came across.

"Kill them all!" one Aeesu-jin commanded, and the order was starting to be filled out.

But then, the door on the opposite side of the room opened, and what must have been all the Saiya-jin in the Underground rushed to meet the fleet of Aeesu-jin. One of the Saiya-jin must have called for reinforcements as well. The room was getting packed, too packed, and there were more Saiya-jin and Aeesu-jin just waiting outside the doors, unable to squeeze in and fight. The room just couldn't hold that many.

A sudden wave of fighting, bleeding, stinking, rageful Aeesu-jins, Saiya-jins and unknown trainers swept over Gohan and the doctor. Gohan heard his only ally yell, "Son Gohan!" before he vanished under the mob of bodies. Gohan was alone in a sea of fighting. His mind refused to co-operate.

It was insane. A massacre. A blood bath. He couldn't focus his eyes as he looked around. It was all red, a bleary haze. Something was on fire, burning. Gohan could smell the smoke, just as he smelled death and blood and fear and hatred, searing heat mixing with equally burning emotions as everyone--men, women, children--present wailed away at eachother. People were dying, and killing, and burning. Gohan could feel their chi's raging, then suddenly being cut short like a snuffed candle.

It was strange, but though he was almost painfully aware of each acute sensation, he couldn't focus on his surroundings. It was all a smear of moving, screaming, blasting, dying, killing. He didn't want to concentrate on it, his mind was hazing in compliance.

A sudden explotion of chi behind him brought him half-way back to his senses, and with a face almost void of expression he watched an unrecognizable alien run past him, his whole body being consumed alive by fire. He was screaming. Slowly, Gohan's head turned to watch him run by, the flames leaping off his body and the smell of his burning skin flooding his senses. It was insane.

His head stopped turning when he came across a second, even more prepostrious sight. A Saiya-jin boy--he couldn't have been more than ten years old--was fighting against a giant blue fishy-like alien with a peculiar fin on the top of his head. The alien was huge. The Saiya-jin boy was miniature. But the battle was waging in favor of the tiny Saiya-jin. Probably the alien had been hurt by some other group of rebelling Saiya-jin that had already died, and the boy was just finishing him off.

It didn't matter. What struck Gohan as insane was that the Saiya-jin boy was winning, each time his small fists struck his opponent there was an audible shattering of bones. The youth was smiling, then laughing, as his 'trainer' turned victim retched and from his mouth a stream of blood splattered to the ground. Gohan found himself cheering the child on, mentally willing him to continue the horrible one-sidded battle to its macabre end.

When the child raised his hand above the alien's head, Gohan's mind said 'Do it!' And when the child drove his elbow through his opponents skull, sloshing the ground with gray matter and blood, Gohan's mind said, 'Yes!'

An Aeesu-jin, his face contorted with rage, suddenly plowed his way into Gohan's perception, his wild red eyes were centered on the Saiya-jin boy, who was too busy proudly surveying his kill to realize his danger. The Aeesu-jin raised his fist to kill the child, but was never able to follow through with his attack.

For Gohan had already blasted a gaping hole through his chest.

The Aeesu-jin fell, dead, and the Saiya-jin boy's eyes met Gohan's for a brief second, looking almost confused as to why he had saved him. Gohan smiled. The boy smiled back and gave a Saiya-jin salute. Then he was gone, rushing back into battle to kill and probably be killed. Gohan bit his lip until he felt blood run down his chin. He was staring at the dead Aeesu-jin--his own victim--in silence. The blood that dripped from his chin to struck his collar bone. His tail whip-snapped against his calves.

He wasn't really seeing the Aeesu-jin body. He was looking through it while his senses picked up the chi around him. Saiya-jin were dying. Too many at once. It wasn't a fight, it was just Saiya-jin's struggling to survive a few seconds before being killed. Gohan blinked, then raised his head to look around him, taking in everything he saw. He was standing in a sea of bodies, all moving in different directions. The floor was crimson, burried under the wash of blood that poured from the less fortunate fighters. It was so crowded that ever after death took them some of the bodies didn't even have the merciful space to fall to the ground. Like being in a can of fighting sardins.

When the boy's tail hung down behind him, he had to curl the end upward or else it would actually dip into the blood under his feet. His boots were already slick with sticky red.

As he felt one Saiya-jin chi after another cease to shine, Gohan became aware of something deep within him, fighting its way to the surface. It was wild and angry, berserk. It wasn't fair. He wished everyone would stop fighting, killing, hurting, dying. If only for a minute, just so he could think. It was too loud. People were dying too loud. He had to get ahold of and stop that thing inside him, worming and burrowing its way through him; spiraling up his body and mind then plunging him through its center.

He squeezed his eyes shut and clamped his hands over his ears, trying to block out the sounds, the sights. It didn't matter what he did. He still smelled them. Worse, he felt them. Like standing in the middle of a room, filled with millions of strobe lights, all flashing so brightly they hurt. Occationally, a light winked out, but it didn't matter because each time one did, another three started flashing. War. Riots. It was a new concept to the boy who was used to one-on-one conflicts. It was horrible. Worse, perhaps, than the kind he was used to.

But now that he was in one, part of one, it was almost aluring. He was part of the entire mass of Saiya-jins, a massive, multi-part body of freedom fighters. On the losing side, as usual, but for now it didn't matter. A Saiya-jin ran past him, shouting back to him, "Move your ass, kid! There's Aeesu-jin to be killed!"

It was a final push. With a yell, he raised his knee and spun, ramming a powerful, deadly blow to an Aeesu-jin as he ran by, trying to chase a speedy Saiya-jin. The race ended, and the Aeesu-jin died. Gohan gathered chi and blasted two more Aeesu-jin to oblivion, the smell of the burning skin arousing that thing that was now quivering dangeriously from the surface. His battle lust.

He demolished some unrecognizable alien's face with his elbow, then smashed his rib cage in with his shoulder. The opponents were all so large!

Suddenly, a strangely familiar hand grabbed hold of his arm, and the good doctor appeared next to him, surveying the smatterings of blood on his gi. Gohan didn't want to talk to him right now. He had to get away.

"Stop it!" the doctor yelled over the roar of battle, "Look at-" but before he could even finish speaking the boy tore loose of his grip--the doctor could have sworn he almost tore his fingers out with it--and went rushing back into the mob, his fist smashing in the face of an Aeesu-jin as he passed him, his tail flying out behind him like a Saiya-jin banner.

"Gohan!" The doctor called after him, pursuing the boy into the heart of the riot. Bodies were slamming into everything, eachother, the walls, the floor, the cealing. Some dead, some getting up only to rush back into the fight, some curling into a ball as they realized they were fatally wounded. That's how it was for the Saiya-jin. They faught, and faught, using every shred and fiber of their being to attack the Aeesu-jin and the other aliens trying to dominate them, but it was Saiya-jin that were dying. One hit was all it took for them to be out of the fight. For every Aeesu-jin that died, fourty Saiya-jin went with him.

People were screaming. Horrible screams of revenge and rage, other mortal screams from victims as the agony of death set apon them.

The doctor heard Gohan screaming, as well. It wasn't a pained scream, or one of fear or grief. He was screaming as he gave into wild abandon, so hard and so loud that he sounded like he was tearing his throat bloody. And each time he drew a breath to further his battle cry he never paused. He was the champion of the Saiya-jin, dealing death freakishly to anything other than Saiya-jin that came near him, his face excited, exhilerated, if not joyful, but his eyes dark, as though thought had been banished from him.

He looked scary, splattered in blood, his eyes burning with black fire as his opponents died instantly, falling at his feet only to be stepped on by the insane, mindless mob.

Pushing his way through the crowd, uncomfortable with having to roughly shove people out of his way as he did so, the doctor forced his way to Son Gohan. As he reached the boy, luck gave him a small wink of forture, for Gohan's back was to him. Taking advantage of everything he could, the doctor lunged forward at the boy, hands outstretched from his sides as far as they could go, and with one swift sweep he wrapped his arms around the boy, pinning his arms to his side.

"Gohan!" the doctor screamed into the boy's ear, but Gohan himself was screaming and did not hear him. Thinking he was being attacked from behind, the boy kicked and faught harder, straining his arms against the doctors powerful bear-hug, banging his head backward against the doctor's collar bone. He was fighting like a wild animal.

"Stop, it's me!" the doctor yelled again, his voice finally penetrating through the boy's own yells. Recognition set in, and he stopped kicking, but he continued to strain against the doctor's crushing arms, getting horrible senses of deja vu from the last time someone large and strong had managed to wrap their arms around him.

"What are you doing?" Gohan yelled over the roaring din of other battles, "Let me go!"

"Listen to me!" The doctor said, not letting the boy free for fear he go running back into the crowd. He was interupted as an Aeesu-jin rushed toward them, attempting to attack the boy while he was helpless. Acting half on instinct, the doctor whipped his tail forward and belted the Aeesu-jin over the head. The attacker was stopped short and fell to the ground.

A Saiya-jin attacked the doctor from behind, and as though on signal, ten more swarmed in behind him, attacking the doctor unmercifully, their faces desperate to kill just one more Aeesu-jin before death took them. Many of them were bleeding badly. Some had gaping wounds and slashes across their stomachs, fatal wounds that no doctor in the world could hope to fix.

The doctor ran, keeping Gohan crushed to his chest. The attackers were swallowed up into the heaving throng and the doctor stopped looking behind him as he looked ahead for some place safe.

He eventually came across a door where training equipment was kept. The door wasn't electric, so the doctor had to slid it open with his tail, for he was using the last shreds of his muscle power to keep Gohan from breaking free. He rushed into the small room, closing the door behind him, before finally releasing the boy.

Gohan instantly spun on his feet, his tail seemed twice its normal size, every hair pointed outward into razor-shart tips, "Why did you do that?!"

"There were Backlash and Heng people swarming all over out there! They were everywhere! All over you! That's their blood on your clothes!"

A sudden, uncontrolable wave of anger rose in the boy and he turned in the room, driving his fist into a punching bag, which exploded, showering him with grains of sand. He punched the wall behind the destroyed equipment, driving his fist through it. He punched it again with his other hand. It was all he could do, all his body would allow. Hitting the wall over and over.

Bang...Bang...Bang

Ten, twenty times. His knuckles were bleeding. His shoulders ached. He was gasping, out of breath. But, finally, he was in control again. The ignited blaze in the boy's eyes dimmed to a smoldering coal, still spiting as though water was beind dripped on it.

Still gasping for air he looked at his hands, at the blood weeping from his torn knuckles. The anger on his face vanished altogether, suddenly turning into fear.

He looked up at the doctor, his eyes wide, "Did I really do that? Kill all those people?"

The doctor nodded, grateful the boy had finally calmed, "You did."

Gohan looked down at his clothes, the dark stains of blood on his gi, his boots. His cheek was splattered, too. He could feel it.

He covered his face with his hand, squeezing his eyes shut, wanting to block out the sudden tide of memories that didn't seem to register in his brain til now. Their heads exploding with red, their wet gasps as he destroyed their guts. The sizzling sound they made when his chi kissed their bodies.

He was trembling. He smelled their blood on his hands.

"I'm sorry. I'm so sorry." He said. The doctor wasn't sure if he was appologizing to him, or the people he had killed, "I didn't mean to. I didn't want to. I'm so sorry."

"Son Gohan..."

The boy looked up at the doctor, his blood smeared face horribly inappropriate for the look of terror he had. Terror of himself?

"I have to go," Gohan said.

"Back into the mob?"

"No."

The boy turned to the far wall of the small equipment room and blasted it down, "I don't want to go back."

"Son Gohan?"

The boy turned to meet his eye.

"Don't blame youself. It was...horrible...what happened back there. Those people deserved to die."

The boy's smile was empty, but his spoke truthfully when he said, "Thank you. I'm sorry for-"

"Stop appologizing. I mean it."

The boy closed his eyes a nodded. He left the room, not looking back.

Henning's face was just too close to the monitor, Joru decided. It would surely scald his eyes some day.

"Where is he? Where did he go?" Henning suddenly yelled, pulling his head away from te monitor and turning to the Aeesu-jin sentry who had been monitoring the alien sector of the Underground when suddenly a riot broke out. It wasn't long before the boy, Son Gohan joined it. It really was amazing, the Aeesu-jin decided, how that boy always seemed to find the most trouble he could get into, then make it worse.

"I don't know," the sentry addressed Henning's question, "Are you sure he's not in the room anywhere? It's rather full, maybe he was-"

"He's there," Henning insisted, "He must be."

"Maybe he was killed," Joru said, almost hoping it were true. Fighting for your people. It was a good way to go. Honorable. Far better than what his brother would do to the boy.

"He's not dead, and he's here somewhere!! You just aren't looking hard enough! He was right there! So close! Keep looking, keep looking!"

"Yes, sir," the sentry said, and started filing over all the monitoring angles he had.

It was a bitter daze. All the surroundings looked alike, and Gohan's mind didn't care which way he went. Every Aeesu-jin he passed stared at his blood-soaked gi in open horror. The boy didn't care. His mind was his punisher. He couldn't stop thinking in circles. How many had he killed? A hundred? More? Too many. His calculator mind, normally so fond of numbers, refused to give him a figure. Somewhere deep inside, he had been counting. It was an automatic thing he did. In his sleep, the number, ever rising, would plague him.

Nightmares. It had only been three months ago, before this mission, that the nightmares had finally stopped. Three months since he stopped waking up somewhere outside, the trees around him on fire, his Super Saiya-jin body soaked in sweat, with no memory of how he got there. He had stopped waking his mother up at night by screaming in his sleep. Such an awful sound, she said, it sounded like he was being eaten alive.

They would return. The Aeesu-jin he killed. All of them. And the people he killed before that. Every single one of his victims would attack him in his sleep, living on in his hellish dreams, all with Tousan's head. It was horrible. All that time, all those nightmares of pain and anger. Years. It would take years and years for them to go away. It was beyond hope.

The Saiya-jin were probably all dead by now. And some day, hundreds of years in the future, there would only be one Saiya-jin left.

A single, solitary tear slid down his cheek. It was all the mourning that escaped him. He didn't wipe it away.

To be continued........