Instantly entrapped by her appearance, Gohan faced the newcomer with an expression of awe and confusion. After gazing into her one red eye peering from beneath the wide brim of her headwear, he then whispered in a stunned voice, "It's you." Seeing her lower her head at his greeting, the young man continued to stare at the projection in deathly silence, completely ignoring the nightmare taking place behind him. It was until his eyes consciously narrowed that he then spoke, addressing the stranger with a hard, cold tone, "What are you doing here?"
The lengths of fabric curled around her body wafted on the breeze behind her as the blonde slowly turned and pointed in another direction.
When Gohan looked, he suddenly saw the surrounding, earth valley bleed away into darkness, before being replaced by another familiar setting. The blue sky, mountains and greenery were quickly overtaken by the aqua, plateau covered landscape of the former planet Namek. Blinking in surprise at the sudden swap in scenery, the demi-Saiyan took a moment to adjust to the light of the new world, before his gaze was drawn to a nearby valley. It was there his eyes widened when he once again saw his child self locked in combat, this time with the hulking form of Recoome of the Ginyu Force.
Despite suffering an insane amount of punishment from Vegeta in the previous round, the massive, humanoid-alien of Frieza's elite crew still had enough energy and dexterity to deliver the beat down of a lifetime upon the other remaining fighters. The sounds of battle rang out over the entire planet as the large man chased after his tiny opponent, smacking the five year old left and right across the valley. Though the young demi-Saiyan stood up to the man's assault and attempted to fight back as best as he could, his efforts were rendered completely useless as the powerful fighter walked through every single attack sent his way.
Dropping down to a safe distance, the battered, brave boy, bleeding from a concussive blow to the head, brought his hands back and, powering up, thrust them forward with a mighty roar. "MASENKO!" His orange-purple blast exploded from his hands and shot towards Recoome at breakneck speeds.
However, much to the boy's dismay, he saw the orange haired fighter inhale deeply before blowing the beam of energy right back at his opponent. Gohan barely had enough time to dodge his own attack, leaping into the air to see it explode against the ground. But just as he was climbing to escape the fire generated by the blast, he was unable to respond in time when Recoome sped after him and intercepted him in midair with a well-placed chop to the back. The blow smashed into the poor child like a train, landing with a terrifying crack that sent the Z-fighter flying.
Adult Gohan continued to watch his younger self receive the man's attacks without mercy, right up to the point the five year old tried one last ditch effort to hit the hulking fighter. With a sickening crack, Recoome managed to jump over the tiny warrior and land a crushing kick to his neck. The force sent the kid flying across the grass to land on the ground with a dull thud, where he lay twitching and choking up blood. His life was hanging on the razor's edge.
Seeing the large fighter tower over him, ready to finish him off, Gohan then watched the scene change drastically once more. All of a sudden, the disembodied demi-Saiyan saw Goku, Piccolo, Krillin and his younger self standing on a tiny island in the middle of Namek's ocean in the minutes following his father dropping the Spirit Bomb on Frieza. His eyes moving upwards, he saw the alien tyrant himself standing at the top of the nearby ridge, glaring down at them hatefully, missing half of his tail, and covered in horrendous bruises and scratches.
In a matter of seconds, the white alien with the purple carapaces proceeded to cut down each of the demi-Saiyan's friends one after the other; first shooting Piccolo through the chest with a Death Beam and then propelling Krillin into the sky, where the poor Z-fighter exploded with a cry of terror. The sight brought shock and despair to the two Saiyans standing on the small scrap of land far below, with the event ultimately serving as the trigger to Goku's transformation to a Super Saiyan.
While all of this was going on, the older Gohan, just like his younger counterpart, could only watch helplessly from the sidelines as all of these events unfolded in rapid succession. Shortly thereafter, after seeing Krillin meet his end on Namek, the scene once again faded away and cut to another event a few years later.
This time the demi-Saiyan was shown a memory of his battle against Perfect Cell before his eventually transformation to Ascended Saiyan. The android was attacking him viciously, attempting to force the young warrior to unleash his so-called 'Hidden Power'. He chased and harassed the youngster without remorse or hesitation, before eventually catching the child in a bear hug and proceeding to crush him against his chest.
The teen Gohan's bloodcurdling scream filled the adult version's ears with the sounds of torment, drawing on several phantom pains from that terrible day that had the young male's bones ache. Moments later, the adult Gohan then saw Android 16 dart down from the nearby plateau where the other Z-fighters were stationed and grabbed Cell from behind, in a brave attempt to finish the biological abomination with one last, kamikaze attack. But as the demi-Saiyan watching from his place several feet away predicted, he watched the tragic event play out in full as Perfect Cell snapped out of the android's grip and nailed the cyborg with a critical blast to the chest. The explosion sent the automaton's body scattering across the field, marking the first great casualty of that day.
Much to the young warrior's anguish, he then saw his old nemesis eject several miniature clones of himself to administer agonizing pain upon the rest of his friends. The Cell Juniors all leapt into action at the command of their father and proceeded to beat the living hell out of Goku and the heroes of earth. The maniacal android aimed to make them suffer in order to draw out the young warrior's power, before ultimately killing them.
Though it pained the older Gohan to watch this memory play out, he couldn't help but notice the one thing that stood out from all of the chaos and pain unfolding around him. He saw his younger self, kneeling uselessly on the ground behind the monster that was causing his friends to suffer. Despite his great strength and his gifts, the young half-Saiyan was still so weak and scared, unable to do anything with his powers to save his friends. It was only through the sacrifice of one of their own that he was soon able to achieve the resolve and the strength necessary to make a difference.
But before that, even when he did have the strength to do something of worth, Gohan had been too afraid, too unsure of himself, and too naïve to use it. This fateful battle with the android marked a major turning point in the child's life, giving the hybrid the drive and self-assurance to do something with his power.
It was the day that he stepped up and took on the mantel as protector of the earth.
The feelings and sensations the adult Gohan received from this particular battle were accentuated further by the death of his father, whom he watched spirit the self-destructive biological monster to King Kai's planet at the closing stages of the memory, sacrificing himself to protect the earth.
When the scene eventually faded to black for the fifth time, Gohan thought the ordeal was over. He glanced behind him towards the one-eyed witch, whom he could see was still staring at him with her unnerving smile in play. Just before he could question the reason for her presence here and the purpose of these memories, he heard the sounds of heavy panting and battle, and spun around in the direction he'd previously been staring. A split second later, the teenager saw another hallucination bleed into view and wash over him, dropping his body right into the heart of a new setting. Gohan quickly found himself standing in the middle of a dry, barren wasteland, surrounded by mountains and long stretches of empty countryside, which dominated the area for miles.
Almost instantly upon seeing the desert appear before him, the demi-Saiyan blinked at what he made out next.
In front of him, he spotted himself, or at least another version of himself, standing defensively over the beaten, battered body of a short, purple figure with a white Mohawk, earrings, and adorned in a posh Kai outfit of esteemed design. Initially baffled by who this person was Gohan then began inspecting the version of him that was protecting said figure. Looking him over, he saw a gutsy fighter dressed in a ruined, black spandex uniform with white gloves and boots, and assumed in his first Super Saiyan form. He was also bleeding from various battle wounds and was covered in bruises, making the disembodied Gohan wonder what monstrous force could've done that to him.
"Why… am I so damaged?"Gohan thought, shaking his head in confusion at the doppelganger standing several yards from him. "Did I… get attacked from behind or something? Why haven't I transformed into a Super Saiyan 2 or Super Saiyan 3 yet? What the hell's going on?" He just could not comprehend what this vision was, nor could he recall such a battle taking place.
His string of panicked questions was soon shut down when his gaze was drawn across the battlefield his beaten down doppelganger was thrust into. Following his glare, the real Gohan's eyes then fell upon a creature that literally had him do a double-take. On the other end of the field, he spotted a fat, pink, humanoid creature with a tentacle on its head, wearing golden boots, gloves, white diaper like pants, a vest, and a short purple cape, standing on one foot several dozen yards away. At first Gohan thought it was a giant, inflatable figure or a ball of some kind, but after giving it a second look over, the young Saiyan judged from its getup and appearance that the creature was some kind of repugnant demon.
The 'M' mark on its belt indicated that it was indeed a being of supernatural origins. That was his personal assessment at least.
Before he could delve further into his investigation, Gohan then proceeded to watch the pink blob of a creature standing on one foot begin cart-wheeling across the battlefield towards his battle-damaged counterpart. The creature giggled and laughed as it did so, before eventually rolling to a stop directly in front of him. It then turned and leered at the Saiyan's stunned double, laughing all the while.
Gohan then heard his doppelganger speak, with a voice expressing nothing but shock and disbelief.
"What is this thing? Its skin just absorbs everything I give him," the Super Saiyan whispered, openly expressing astonishment at how the monster was able to heal itself from a powerful kick it'd previously received to the face.
The fat, pink demon then grinned in a menacing way and brought its hands forward. "You a big pest! You leave!" it shouted in a squeaky, nasally voice, showcasing a clear sense of anger towards the Z-fighter with the vernacular of a child. Its energy began to skyrocket as it prepared to attack the blonde warrior, intent of ridding him of the nuisance once and for all.
A growl left the battered Gohan's voice, before the Super Saiyan leapt at the pink monstrosity with a loud battle cry.
It was a sight that alarmed the demi-Saiyan watching from the sidelines, who stepped forward with panic burning in his eyes. "YOU IDIOT!" However, before he could yell out any sort of warning to stop himself, the purple Kai lying on the ground beat him to it.
"WATCH OUT FOR HIS BLAST!"
The warning came too little, too late, as the pink demon thrust both hands forward and unleashed a powerful blue blast directly at the approaching Super Saiyan. The beam engulfed the young warrior, stopping him dead before reforming into an enormous sphere of energy that slammed the fighter up against its surface. The heat of the attack drew a scream of agony and terror from the battle damaged Gohan, before sending him rocketing across the valley and up into the sky, where the blast exploded and sent the half-Saiyan plummeting back down to earth.
As the scene chugged to its conclusion, all the real Gohan could do was stand there gawking in the direction his counterpart had been thrown. His gaze then snapped in the direction of the demon that'd beaten him and saw the fat, pink joke of a monster dancing merrily at sending the teen flying with barely any effort whatsoever.
While the creature danced, the only thought that ran through the demi-Saiyan's head was how he could've let himself get beaten by such a pathetic attack? Why did he make such an amateur mistake, jumping into the monster's line of fire? Why wasn't he powered up to his maximum level? If he was Super Saiyan 3, there was no way he could've been taken down by such an obvious counter. In fact, the real Gohan was pretty sure he could've ripped that thing apart with a few well-placed hits and not waste any time with theatrics or needless heroism.
That being the case, why was he so weak in that vision to begin with? What'd happened to him that had him lose so much strength, sense and skill?
Before he could proceed to solving this riddle, he the scene once again changed and, a split second later, Gohan found himself standing on Kami's Lookout. At first bewildered by the sudden teleportation to the platform, the half-Saiyan then turned towards the edge and spotted most of his friends and family gathered out in the open. Clearly making out Piccolo at the head of the group, but seeing no Vegeta, Zangya or any of the other strong fighters in the area, he also noticed a tall, muscular, pink figure leering at them from the platform's ledge.
It took the demi-Saiyan a few moments of looking the creature over to realize that this menacing new face was in fact the same, fat monster that'd blasted his weakened doppelganger into the sky, only it seemed he'd gone through some sort of weird metamorphosis since that battle. He now looked like a legitimate killing machine; sleek, muscular, menacing, malicious, and even more powerful than before.
Dreading the events that were to come, Gohan looked on as the demon suddenly marched towards Piccolo. His approach caused the Namekian to freeze and stare up at the fiend in terror, sweat pouring down his face and his eyes wide in alarm.
"Time to kill," the demon with the tentacle on his head snarled, sending a chill down every Z-fighter's spine.
At first the demi-Saiyan thought the pink creature was going to kill his friend right there, on the spot, and stepped forward in panic. He was about to jump in to attack too, only to feel a firm tug on the back of his gi that stopped him dead in his tracks. When Gohan looked behind him, he saw the blonde witch with the eye-patch holding onto his top with her thumb and finger, keeping him from moving. Surprised by her sudden interference, the young warrior then stared ahead of him to see what was going to happen next.
All of a sudden, Gohan saw the pink monster raise his hand into the air and, in a flash of blinding light, began unleashing a torrent of pink energy blasts that arced down from the lookout and shot towards the planet below. The attacks rained down upon the earth like an unending river of death, trailing streaks of light that marked the path of the billions of ki attacks the monster was now letting loose into the atmosphere. The display was frightening, causing all those watching from the sidelines to take a big step back as the vortex of energy surrounding the entity continue spewing blasts out like there was no tomorrow.
However, the worst was yet to come.
The pink fiend wasn't just firing off all those shots as a trivial show of force or as a means of intimidating the heroes. Every single one of the blasts he was firing down at the earth was aimed at every single person living down on the ground. As the assault carried on, Gohan's expression twisted into one of horror when countless screams of terror suddenly filled his ears and his vision became plagued by the sight of all the innocent people of the world being cut down by the barrage of powerful energy attacks. The sight was as horrendous as he thought it was, the vision showing him people getting incinerated instantaneously left, right and center, by attacks capable of incinerating entire buildings with barely a tap.
However, what struck him the hardest was seeing Capsule Corp get shot to bits and the whole of Orange Star Highschool sterilized by the blind assault. He saw Sharpener, Touya and Erasa get struck down by the energy waves, their forms vanishing in a flash of fire and simultaneous cries of pain. He even saw Lime perish under the heat of the salvo, her scream of terror drowned out by the dozens of others around her.
The sight of his friends and the people he loved being killed drew panicked breaths of air from the demi-Saiyan and put tears in his eyes, which began to trickle down his cheeks without restraint. His heart burning, the teen then looked on as the vision slowly faded to black and was replaced by yet another, which made him wonder how much longer this torture was going to last.
Back on the courtyard of Kami's Lookout, he saw Krillin confronting the monster all by himself, while all the other members of the Z-fighters stood back.
"RUN!" the short fighter bellowed, a split second before taking off and charging the terrifying creature down.
Eyes widening while her arms were wrapped protectively around her daughter, Android 18 leapt forward in desperation, "KRILLIN! NO!" But it was too late.
The human warrior dashed towards the pink demon with a mighty bellow in a desperate attempt to take the creature out and buy his comrades time to escape. However, the moment the man struck at the villain with his fist, the entity's body suddenly liquefied and sprang into the sky, warping through the air and reforming above the Z-fighter when he flew past. As soon as Krillin missed, the creature threw his tentacle forward and fired a pink, electrical beam at the man. A scream left the warrior's lips when the field of energy engulfed him, before a puff of white smoke burst around his body.
Gohan watched closely as the cloud quickly vanished and a bar of chocolate dropped out of it, landing on the hard, tiled floor. The transformation was baffling, but the young martial artist quickly deduced that the attack was some form of twisted, yet incredibly powerful magic. Before he could fully comprehend the magnitude of the fiend they were up against, Gohan's expression became one of dismay and shock when he saw the pink monster begin targeting the rest of them.
"No! No, no, no, NO, NOOO!" Gohan shouted, his feet digging into the floor as he attempted to rush in and save his friends. Despite his best efforts though, he found legs rooted to the ground thanks to the ridiculous force holding him back. Glaring over his shoulder in panic, the demi-Saiyan gritted his teeth at the witch holding onto his gi and barked, "I HAVE TO SAVE THEM! PLEASE! LET ME GO!" He then attempted to fight his way out, but as hard as he tried, he could not wrench his way out of the woman's vice-like grip. "I CAN'T JUST STAND HERE AND WATCH THEM DIE! I HAVE TO DO SOMETHING! ANYTHING!" After failing several times to escape her hold, Gohan then looked back to see the next set of events.
To his utter shock and horror, the Saiyan watched as one after the other, the pink, tentacle-headed creature started transforming every single one of his friends into chocolate. Though it stunned Gohan to see all those closest to him meet the creature's twisted beam, the worst one came when he saw Videl get transformed into a piece of candy and heard her scream vanish with the others. The disembodied warrior attempted to break free one last time, his feet cracking the floor to try and get out of the girl's hold.
But he was too late. Seconds later, the teenager saw the smoke from the bombardment of electrical beams dissipate and, lying scattered across the floor, he saw his girlfriend and everybody else had been turned into treats.
Limbs shaking as tears streamed down his face, the demi-Saiyan looked on as the creature gathered up all of his comrades and proceeded to eat them. Gohan shook his head, unable to believe what he was witnessing as the scene slowly faded into darkness, with the final image being the pink monstrosity gobbling down the last of his friends.
His hands reached up to cover his face, as he knew he could not bear to watch any more. But when he pulled them away a moment later when he thought it was all over, he couldn't help but gasp in shock when he saw the faces of himself, Piccolo, Goten and Trunks, unconscious, and trapped in a series of cocoons made out of flesh, inside an enormous cave system of cobwebs and brain stems. The setting was like something taken straight out of a horror film, and he knew right then and there that he and his friends had met the greatest defeat of their lives.
However, this wasn't to be the last of the visions. As Gohan's resolve began to crumble, he saw the scene change once again. This time he was standing on a rocky shore, just several feet away from a pair of figures facing each other down, with the ocean waves crashing against the stones behind him. At first he didn't know who the people were due to how different they looked. But when the demi-Saiyan's eyes eventually focused on them, he found to his bewilderment Vegeta, dressed in a new design of armor and assumed in a bright blue, Super Saiyan form, standing over the battered body of Frieza, who was currently kneeling on the ground before him.
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