[Stalled] The Tournament of Power (Patreon)

“Yo! There you are, Hit!” Goku waved as he saw Universe Six enter the battlefield in the same flash of rainbow-tinged white light that had brought them to the World of Void. He was eager to see his rival from their sister universe again. He snickered as Champa popped up, sticking his tongue out at them and pulling his eyelid down.

“Master!” Cabbe – the Saiyan they had fought against during Beerus and Champa’s battle for the Super Dragon Balls – waved as well as he walked over. “How have you been, Master Vegeta?”

“Don’t call me Master.” Vegeta grumbled, still irritated at what he felt was the wrong attitude for a Saiyan to have. Bad enough Kakarot was such a goofball himself.

Goku grinned and clapped Cabbe on the shoulder, “How you doin, Cabbe?” He stopped and glanced at the two behind the shorter Saiyan, “Huh? Who are these two, Cabbe?”

“Ah, forgive me.” Cabbe turned and introduced them, “This is Caulifa-san, another Saiyan from my home world. Behind her is Kale-san, who is also a Saiyan. Caulifa-san, Kale-san, these are Son Goku and Master Vegeta.”

“Wow!” Goku grinned cheerfully, “Never met a girl Saiyan before. Nice ta meet-cha!” He held a hand out, which the girl with very spiky hair slapped away.

“Get real. We aren’t here to make friends, old man.” She put her fists on her hips and cocked to one side, “We’re here to decide the strongest in the Universes.”

Goku grinned cheerfully, “That’s no good. What’s a good fight without having some fun and earning a few new rivals?” He chuckled at her look, “Still, looks like you’re just like me, huh?” He tilted to the side to look at Kale, “And how about you, Kale?”

“Eep!” The girl actually squeaked and hid behind Caulifa. “…A-ane-san …”

“Come on Kale.” Caulifa says, grabbing her arm and dragging her away, “I’ll be looking for you on the field, old man!”

“Can’t wait!” Goku shouts at her back cheerfully.

-]|[-

The next time Goku saw either of them was a few minutes into the tournament. The stakes had already been raised, with Zen’ō proving once and for all that this was real. Universe Nine – the same one that Goku, Buu, and Gohan had fought in the Preliminaries days ago – had all of their members taken out. They were just the weakest universe by far and had proven it with their dirty tactics. Tactics which had not worked in the slightest, and now their entire universe was gone. Just like the universe Zen’ō had erased in the future, to get rid of Zamasu.

He wasn’t entirely sure why he jumped in and kept Kale from getting eliminated, but he had. She had been fighting a… large pig-looking man and also a humanoid crustacean. Half of him wondered why she had been brought, since she showed neither a ferocity like Vegeta at times, nor a love of fighting like him. She had punched the crustacean once, and then had been punched in the gut and hung by her ponytail by the huge pig guy. She’d been totally unable to defend herself and had taken body shot after body shot from his extendable arms.

When the pig had tossed her towards the platform’s edge, Goku had caught her and brought her back to the ground, “Hey, you okay, Kale?”

She groaned as she opened her eyes slightly, before they widened, “Eep! G-Goku-san?” She squeaked in his arms.

“Kale!” Caulifa landed next to him, a worried look on her face. She begrudgingly turned to Goku when she saw her protégé awake, “…Thanks, old man.” She mumbled, “I probably could have caught her, but thanks.”

Goku laughed cheerfully as he put Kale down and rubbed his finger under his nose, “No problem.”

“SON GOKU!!! Just what are you doing?!” Goku flinched when Beerus’ voice slammed into his ear, “Why are you saving other combatants! They’re enemies! ENEMIES!”

“Oh, lighten up Beerus-sama.” Goku yelled back with a small flash of irritation. “It’s too early for a fellow Saiyan to get eliminated, you know!”

“DAMN IT GOKU!”

Caulifa quirked her lips as she watched Universe Seven’s antics, “Rest, Kale. I’ve got this.” She smiled down at the other Saiyan and stood, glaring at the two who had beat on her Kale, “How dare you hurt my protégé!” She seethed.

“Heh, stupid weakling had to get saved by an enemy. If she’s what you consider strong, then we’re gonna make you cry, little girl.”

“EHHHH?!” Caulifa snarled, her face warping in rage. A second later, golden power had enveloped her body, turning her hair gold and her eyes teal. “I’M GOING TO SHUT YOU UP!” Before the crustacean had blinked, her fist was buried in his carapace. “ORAORAORAORA!” She roared, throwing lightning-fast fists into his body, before switching things up and upper-cutting him into the air. As he rose, she grabbed a leg and whipped him over her head, slamming him onto the ground. With another grunt, she did so again, and again a third time. Finally, she started to spin and then threw him over Goku and Kale’s heads, finishing him off with a blast. The cooked meal fell off the side of the stage.

“WHY YOU!”

Caulifa whipped around to catch the stampeding pig in a sumo hold as he tried to crush her with his bulk. But before he even reached her, he gagged, spittle landing right before Caulifa’s feet. She watched with wide eyes as a fist marking about a foot wide appeared in his distending side, before he rocketed out of view and through one of the rock faces that had already been raised from the fighting. She slowly turned her head, still in shock. “W-with just the air pressure from his fist?”

Goku was standing there, grinning cheerfully with his fist extended. Kale was sitting up and also staring at him in shock, “Sorry Cauli, you snooze you lose.”

Caulifa blinked, “Cauli?” She shook her head, “Never mind that!” She slapped a grin onto her face, “We’re gonna fight, old man!”

Goku grinned, “Sure. I was looking forward to facing you two as well.”

Caulifa walked closer and kneeled next to Kale, “Come on Kale. You have to be more confident! I believe in you!” She patted her friend on the cheek.

“Ane-san…” Kale grabbed her finger and almost nuzzled it.

Caulifa stood and helped her protégé up, “Let’s go, Son Goku!” She got into her stance. “Go ahead and turn Super Saiyan! I know you can if that Vegeta guy can!”

Goku chuckled in response, “Sorry Cauli, but I don’t think you’re quite ready for that yet.” At her look of affront, he cut across her angry tirade, “You Universe Six guys didn’t even know about Super Saiyan until after our fight with Champa-sama. If I go all out it wouldn’t be any fun! I can tell you’re already stronger than you were when this whole thing started, so your growth rate is awesome!” He uncrossed his arms and got into a stance, “In other words… why dontcha make me?”

“I’ll make you eat those words, Son Goku!” She turned to Kale, “Come on, Kale! Just transform already! Let’s take this joker out!”

Kale nodded and whispered out a yes, before clenching her fists and starting to strain, “My back… tingly feeling!” Her pitched straining increased, but she let out a gasp and let her fists drop.

“So much for that.” Caulifa let out a sigh. Why couldn’t Kale believe in herself like she believed in her?!

“Huh, Kale can’t transform yet?” Goku scratched his head, “I’m surprised.”

“She did!” Caulifa yelled, “But I guess she can’t… do it again yet.” She groaned, “Right, I’ll show you a transformation!” She clenched her fists and went into Super Saiyan but kept going further and screaming her lungs out.

Goku watched and let out a little frown when he saw her starting to bulk up. Her muscles all increased in size and she even got taller. He let out a little chuckle, ‘Little disappointed here, Cauli. Guess you’re less like me than I thought.’ His eyes dipped to her chest, “Huh, they got bigger?” He mumbled to himself.

“J-just where are you staring at?” Caulifa noticed his eyes and blushed a bit, “Let’s go!” She jerked forward and took off, cracking the stone beneath her feet. She threw a jab and was amazed that – despite her vastly increased strength over even the regular Super Saiyan form – Goku was able to evade it. She threw a kick and he ducked underneath it. In an attempt to change things up, she went for a grab. Even that got reversed, with him grabbing her wrists and almost playfully tossing her to the ground. “W-what? Why can’t I hit you?!”

“You sacrificed speed for power.” Goku told her helpfully, “We call that form Super Saiyan Grade Three. The one fight it was ever used in went pretty badly for us. I never even tried to use it against an actual opponent myself, since I knew it was useless. Gotta say Cauli, I’m a bit disappointed.”

“It was my first time trying it.” She admitted with an embarrassed groan as she shrunk back down, “Had no idea it would suck so much.” She stood and took a deep breath, “Damn, I feel like we were fighting for ten minutes, not ten seconds!”

“It’s a huge stamina hog too!” Goku confirmed, “So I wouldn’t recommend ever using it again.” Caulifa took an involuntary step back with wide eyes as Goku went Super Saiyan. It wasn’t just the huge amount of power she could sense coming from him, but the sheer ease with which he had assumed the form, “So here’s what you should be aiming for next, Cauli.” Her eyes lit up, “Watch closely! HAAA!” He grunted, and all of a sudden his hair changed. It looked even spiker than in his first form, and bolts of bioelectricity crackled in his aura. He grinned at her, since she was almost drooling over him, “This is Super Saiyan 2.”

She was beaming at him and rushed over, “That’s it!” She grabbed two handfuls of his gi, surprising him, “I was able to do it once but haven’t been able to do it again!”

“Wow, really?” Goku was astonished, “You Universe Six Saiyans…” He paused and glanced over towards where Cabbe’s energy was. He was stronger than he’d been the last time Goku had seen him, but not by an overwhelming amount. He clearly hadn’t reached 2 yet, “Okay, you have some pretty insane growth. It took years for us to touch 2. You’ve done it in… what… a couple months?”

“Less!” Caulifa smirked haughtily, “We only learned how to do it from Cabbe when this stupid tournament was announced.”

Goku blinked, “…Holy crap. I’m officially impressed.” He smirked back at her as he powered back down into regular Super Saiyan, and his smirk widened when she became inquisitive.

“Ehh? What the hell?! You’re in Super Saiyan but you feel like you haven’t even transformed! No, you’re even weaker than in normal form! What did you do?” She blurted out as she leaned her torso forward, fists on her hips.

“This is Grade Four.” Goku told her, “The final form for the regular Super Saiyan transformation. Super Saiyan throws your emotions and instincts all out of whack. It makes you more aggressive and it burns through power quicker.”

She had a light bulb go off above her head, “Oooh, I get it! You guys trained to make it so that all your power is tightly controlled! That way you’re not wasting any power! You don’t have to worry about igniting the transformation which wastes a bunch of energy! Am I right?”

He grinned brightly, “I think you’re gonna be amazing, Cauli, once you have more time to grow. That’s right! Once you’ve mastered Super Saiyan like this, you can keep it up even while napping!”

She frowned, “Time’s something we don’t have with this stupid tournament.”

“Well then, we better get started!” He powered down again back into base form, surprising Caulifa.

And then she gagged when his fist buried itself into her gut, spittle flying from her mouth, “C-cheap shot!” She wheezed.

“Only way you’re gonna get stronger is to keep pushing.” Goku replied, “So let’s go, Cauli!”

She powered up as much as she could and balked at the fact that he was still beating her ass like a drum in his base form. She took shot after shot, and even when she took her opportunities – which she later realized were being given to her on purpose – her hits did nothing. She was going to be black and blue when this was all over. She desperately parried a punch and wailed on his face, but if anything, it was her knuckles that hurt! She desperately dodged a kick by rolling out of the way and gaped when the entire rock face nearby crumbled. ‘H-holy crap! This is crazy! The gap between us can’t really be that large, can it!?’ She panted as she got to her feet, but the second she was up she was down again. She felt like he’d dropped an entire mountain on her head with that hit. Her vision swam and for a second she didn’t even know where she was. She blinked furiously, before rolling out of the way of a punch that put a crater where her head had been, “No way! I can’t be this far!”

“That’s not all you got, right Cauli?” His patronizing tone made her snap.

She ground her teeth together and dug as deep for power as she ever head, “IT’S NOT GOING TO END LIKE THIS! DO YOU HEAR ME?!” She screamed towards the empty void above as her golden aura started to pulse at a faster and faster face. Some little sparks of bioelectricity started flowing in her aura as well, “HAAAAAAAAA!” She roared and felt something click. The tingly feeling in her back was different now and her power was exploding far more than it ever had.

“Oooh, there we go! Congrats, Cauli!” Goku called out cheerfully, “Remember that feeling. That’s Super Saiyan 2. Ya still have to work on mastering it though. You should practice trying to get to Grade Four too.”

She stopped powering up and began to pant, “This. Feels. AWESOME~!” She exclaimed gleefully and clenched her fists together, staring at her hands. She turned a glare at him, “Thanks! Now I’m going to kick your ass!”

Goku chuckled at her, “I love that attitude Cauli! Keep that up! Hell, maybe you’ll even hit 3 by the end of the tournament.”

“There’s a 3?!” She blurted in shock and anticipation.

“Sure.” Goku replied indulgently, “It sucks though. It’s four times stronger than two, but it’s such a heavy stamina drain that it’s not even really worth using. I’ve been trying for years and I still can’t use it for more than ten minutes. And that’s if I just do some light exercises.”

“Maybe you’re just too old, Son Goku!” She called out playfully.

Goku started to laugh happily, “Nah, it really just sucks. Vegeta took one look at it and called me an idiot for it. It burns stamina even worse than Grade Three does, if you look at the two.” He smirked playfully at her, “Really, I haven’t used it seriously in years. Not since we figured out how to use 4.”

Her eyes almost popped out of her head, “4?!”

“Yeah. Well, Vegeta actually thought it was pretty stupid to call in Super Saiyan 4 since it’s so different from the others, so he started calling it Primal Saiyan instead.” Goku started to explain, but then stopped. He looked carefully at her, and also glanced at the trembling Kale nearby, “Huh, I forgot. Maybe I shouldn’t have said anything. You two will never be able to use Primal.”

“What the fuck is that supposed to mean, Son Goku?!” She angrily shook her fist at him, “Anything you can do, I can do!”

He shook his head, “Nah, you don’t meet the requirement for it. Neither does Kale-chan.”

Off to the side, Kale blushed. For the barest of moments, she had been able to feel safe in someone else’s arms other than Caulifa. She felt bad for disappointing not only her ane-san, but surprisingly Goku as well. She had grown increasingly worried when Goku was just pounding on her ane-san, and even her temper had started to fray. Then Caulifa had transformed, and her emotions were replaced by amazement and admiration. And now Goku was referring to her so familiarly?

“Oi, oi! What is that supposed to mean?! Is it because we’re both girls, you pig?! Just cuz you have a dick don’t make you special!”

“A-ANE-SAN!” Kale yelled, scandalized.

Goku burst out laughing, almost keeling over, “Ahahaha! No!” He kept on laughing, holding his gut.

“Whats so funny?!” Caulifa screamed, still looking furious.

Goku stood, still trembling from a chuckle here and there, “No, No, nothing like that.” He let out another snort, and both Kale and Caulifa marveled as his belt unwrapped itself of its own accord.

Wait. “Is that a tail?!” Caulifa said what was on Kale’s mind.

“Yep. We never lost ours in Universe Seven.” Goku explained, “You can’t go Primal without one.”

“Awww! You damned tease!” Caulifa started to whine, “You can’t promise a girl a good time and then duck out!”

“Sorry, sorry!” Goku shot back playfully, “But hey, if you get strong enough I’ll show you something even better than that!”

“Now you’re talking!” Caulifa blasted off even faster than Kale could keep up with for a moment. She adjusted, but when she did she was amazed to see Goku was still handily beating Caulifa without even transforming himself.

“T-this isn’t fair!” Kale mumbled to herself. Even if Goku had wormed his way in a tiny, infinitesimal bit… Caulifa was still her entire world. And she was taking such a beating. “I-It’s not fair! Ane-san is t-trying s-so hard!” She hated it! She hated watching her ane-san get hurt! She watched as Caulifa coughed up another batch of spittle as Goku landed yet another demoralizing – to Kale at least – kick to her stomach. She couldn’t watch anymore, “I-I’ll support you, ane-san!” She whispered to herself as she held her palms out and a golden Ki ball formed.

She fired it, and Goku negligently slapped it away. Their fight stopped, and Kale squeaked again when they turned their attention to her, “Don’t worry Kale-chan. I’ll play with you too. But later.”

“PLAY?!” Were the only words Caulifa said, in an angry tone.

“A-ane-san?” Caulifa turned to Kale, “I… I’m… not a bother… am I?” She hesitantly turned her gaze to Caulifa. She inhaled sharply. For the first time in her life, Caulifa had ice in her gaze as she stared at her protégé. Kale was thunderstruck as her ane-san turned around and didn’t give her a second glance as she resumed her fight with Goku. Kale fell to her knees, tears starting to pool in her eyes before she clapped her hands to her face. She started to sob, wetting the floor before her, “I…I really am…” She choked out, seeing her ane-san looking happier than she ever had while looking at Goku. The two of them got further and further way in her mind, and she snapped, “Son Goku…” She hissed, “SON GOKUUU!!!” She started to scream. Lightning started to crackle all around her as her ponytail and bang lifted into the air, “SON GOKUUUUUUUU!” She stood as she bulked up, her muscles increasing in size two-fold. “YOU TOOK MY ANE-SAN FROM MEEEEEEEE!!!” She roared to the sky as she started to glow green. Her grey irises changed as she bulked up even more, becoming golden. She was now one of the tallest people on the entire stage, and her muscles were grotesquely bigger than even what you could get with Super Saiyan Grade Three. Her hair exploded from its ponytail and spiked up, though despite her transformation her locks remained black. With a final, heavenward scream, her power exploded, drawing the attention of everyone in attendance.

Caulifa finally smiled at Kale again, “You finally did it! Awesome, Kale!”

But Kale wasn’t listening anymore. She only had one objective in mind. Make Goku pay. She charged forward, and Goku crossed his arms to absorb the blow. Even still, he was forced back, his boots leaving tracks on the stone underneath.

He quirked an eyebrow when he slid to a stop, noticing that Kale had even knocked Caulifa away, “Huh? What is that form? I’ve never seen something like that before.” She… had all the characteristics of Grade Three actually, barring the eyes. He quickly ducked and weaved as she tried her hardest to knock his block off. “You’re still fast, Kale-chan. That’s surprising.” He stared at her bulging figure. ‘Did she somehow manage to make Grade Three work?’ He absently used his Ki sense to make sure Cauli hadn’t been knocked from the stage and was relieved to find her still on the platform, near Hit. He jumped back this time, and Kale’s fist cratered the ground he had been standing on. ‘I don’t believe it. How is she still so fast? She’s even bigger than Grade Three!’ He lashed out with a kick, and this time was shocked to find her shrugging it off in the same manner he had shrugged off all of Caulifa’s blows. He grinned, “Too bad you’re just brawling, Kale-chan!”

That seemed to make the woman even angrier, and her power spiked again. His eyes widened as he parried a punch and pushed her away. He had to shake out his hand that time, “SON GOKU!” She roared again, whipping around with a backfist.

‘She’s getting even stronger?’ Goku threw a quick combo into her gut and finished it off with a kick that knocked her back, but he didn’t feel good about it. “You’re not even trying to defend yourself, Kale-chan. Come on! You can do better than that!”

“AHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!” She screamed furiously, throwing her head towards the void above once more. Her power started to pulse and enveloped her in a warbling green aura, before she exploded. Thousands of little green Ki blasts started flying from all over her body and great speeds, and each one of them carried a shocking amount of power. Each little blast exploded and pockmarked the landscape, leaving behind little craters. This one attack knocked out three other competitors.

Goku used Instant Transmission and landed next to Caulifa, “Wow, she sure is something, huh? That power is pretty intense. She’s way stronger than a regular Super Saiyan 2 and I’m not sure she even really transformed into one yet.” He eyed the woman as the blasting continued, ‘If I didn’t know any better… I’d say she transformed into an Ōzaru while remaining in her regular form… but that can’t be right. She has no tail! They lost their tales ages ago!’

“Yeah, no kidding.” Caulifa agreed, “I saw her do this only once and it was a real pain calming her down! I always knew she had potential, but she’s stronger than me!” That was an… annoying admission to make.

Hit eyed the two Saiyans with passive nonchalance, “You do remember that we’re supposed to be enemies, right?”

They both ignored him, “Too bad Kale-chan can’t control it. She’s totally lost it.” Goku frowned as he stared at the indiscriminate attack.

“That girl! She’ll get disqualified if she kills someone!” Caulifa realized with a start, “I have to stop her!”

“SON GOKUUUU!” The heard her scream when the blasting stopped and watched as she was enveloped by a whip-like beam of Ki by one of the Universe Eleven Pride Trooper guys. They couldn’t hear what the dinosaur-looking guy was saying, but Kale simply ripped right through the whip and turned on her heel. She charged forward and knocked the guy through three walls and right off the platform in a single punch.

“Okay.” Goku took a breath, “Time to put her to sleep for a while.” He went Super Saiyan and before Caulifa knew what was happening, Goku was holding Kale above his head. The massive woman had practically been turned into a folding table. She went limp and started to steam, transforming back into her regular self. Goku immediately switched her into a bridal carry and used Instant Transmission again to get close to Caulifa.

‘S-so fast! He really was just playing around with me!’ It burned Caulifa to admit that, “Is she okay?” She forced out when she saw her protégé.

“She’ll be fine.” Goku answered, “But she really needs to get that power of hers under control. Come on. Let’s let her get some rest.”

“Again, you do remember this is a competition where the losers are wiped from existence, correct?” Hit refused to show his own bemusement. Really, why was he at all surprised? This was the same guy who had hired him for an assassination on himself just for a good fight.

He may as well have been speaking to nothing. They were already gone.

…

They landed in between a couple of giant slabs and boulders from the previous fighting, and Goku set Kale against the wall before standing and stretching for a little while. While he was doing that, Caulifa crouched down next to Kale and quickly redid her hair. “You know, Hit’s got a point.” The currently black-haired Saiyan said, “What’s your deal? We are supposed to be enemies here. Why are you helping us?”

Goku sat next to Kale and shrugged, “Not really sure myself.” He snickered at her unimpressed look, “I guess I just see a lot of myself in you and want to see how strong you can get.”

She snorted, “Oh please, there’s got to be more to it than that.” She leered at him, “And even if that’s the case, shouldn’t you still be helping your team out?”

Before Goku could answer, Kale let out a little moan and opened her eyes. She twitched when she turned her head and the first thing she noticed was Goku sitting next to her, one knee up and the other leg straight out, “Eep! G-Goku-san! Wh-”

“Kale!” Caulifa stopped her questioning immediately and got in her protégé’s face, “You really are amazing! You totally went wild! I told you you could do it!”

“W-what?” Kale gasped and blushed a little at her ane-san being so close, “Wh-what do you mean?”

“You don’t remember a thing, do you Kale-chan?” Goku laughed, and she turned to him with some confusion (and a slightly deeper blush) obvious on her face, “Thought so. You transformed when you got angry… but it was totally different from any transformation I’ve ever seen. You knocked out like four people before I stopped you!”

“H-huh?” Poor Kale looked utterly befuddled.

“That’s my protégé for you!” Caulifa clapped Kale on the back, earning another squeak and a massive blush from the girl. Caulifa then stood and cocked her hip again as she stared at Goku, “Anyway, you never answered my question. Why are you here with us and not helping your team?”

“Like I said, you’re interestin!” Goku grinned at them, “Besides, I trust my team to handle things. If nothing else, Vegeta and my son can hold down the fort.”

“Son?!” Caulifa and Kale both exclaimed, “You have a son?” They both wondered why the though gave both of them some sour pangs in their guts.

“Mhm! He’s the one in the purple gi! Gohan sure is strong too! For a long while he was stronger than even me!” Goku told them, “Kale-chan reminds me a lot of him actually.”

“M-me?!” Kale pointed at herself.

“Yeah, he used to do the same thing you do to Cauli!” Goku laughed with his eyes closed, reminiscing of… quieter times, “He used to be so tiny and shy. The first time I introduced him to my friends he hid behind my leg!”

Kale pouted and started poking her fingers together, “That’s mean, Goku-san…” She whispered.

“Bwahahaha!” Caulifa laughed, “Yeah, that sounds like Kale, alright!”

Kale flinched at her words, “A-Ane-san!” She raised her voice in a semi-embarrassed, semi-betrayed tone.

“Still, it looks like he turned into a real badass, huh?” Caulifa watched as Gohan kicked his opponent through the floor and straight off the platform, “That means Kale can do the same!”

“Ane-san!” Now her eyes watered. Her ane-san really believed in her! She bit her lip, and at Caulifa’s encouraging look, she spoke to Goku. She didn’t really know why she felt so comfortable around him right now, but it probably had to do with him not being a jerk to her like all the other Saiyans, “You and his mother must be really proud…”

Both of the girls watched as Goku’s smile turned a little bittersweet, “Yeah, I sure am. He was actually the first of us to go Super Saiyan 2.”

“G-Goku-san?” Kale asked, wondering why he looked like that.

He started to stare up at the void, “Chi-Chi passed away quite a few years ago.”

“O-oh.” Well that sure took the wind out of their sails. And now Kale and Caulifa both felt bad for the guy…. And secretly, maybe a little disgusted with themselves when the news made their stomachs stop twisting into knots.

Goku shook himself of his melancholy, “I don’t know how things worked for you girls in Universe Six, but back home we seemed to have some new jerk popping up trying to destroy the world every few years. When I was a kid, there was this group called the Red Ribbon Army that had been trying to take over the world. I didn’t really know anything about them since I lived alone for years before that. I was just interested in finding something my grandpa left behind for me when he died. But they were looking for it too, and since I kept getting in their way and kicking their butts, they started trying to have me killed. Even hired an assassin to try to beat me. Eventually, I ended up destroying them entirely after their assassin killed a friend’s father in front of me. But one person survived, and he started building androids to try to kill me!”

“Ha! What could some dinky little robots do against a Super Saiyan?!” Caulifa scoffed, but she was getting into the story. Kale was also listening attentively.

“You’d be surprised!” Goku grinned, “Two of them are beating some butt right now for my team!”

“EHHHH?!”

“B-But Goku-san, weren’t they supposed to kill you?” Kale exclaimed, so into it that she didn’t even realize she was starting to join in without prompting. Caulifa’s eyes lit up, ecstatic that her little protégé was finally being the person Caulifa knew she could be.

“Yeah, but they didn’t really care about that. First thing they did when they woke up was kill the jerk who had kidnapped them.” Goku waved his hand negligently, “Anyway, there was also some time travel stuff.”

Both of the girls choked, “Wait, wait, wait, back the bus up!” Caulifa tried to get him to stop after dropping that bomb, but he was on a roll.

“Basically Gero – that was the jerk’s name – had thought his androids were too hard to control, so he took that DN…D… Stuff inside people!”

“DNA?” Kale hesitantly offered the word.

“Yep! That’s it! He used that stuff to basically make a super android that was supposed to eat the two androids on my team cuz they had some infinite power machine or something and get crazy strong! So, a Cell came back from the future after Gero’s computer finished building it by stealing Trunk’s time machine, and then it ate 17 and 18 to become “perfect” and was SUPER strong! Even after getting as strong as I thought I could get in such a short amount of time, I was still no match for Cell! He was WAY too strong. It was during those fights that me, Vegeta, and Trunks came up with Grade Two and Grade Three. None of them worked.” Goku recanted.

“Your story is all over the place!” Caulifa yelled, incensed, “Where the hell does the time travel come in?!”

“Ehh? It was just some time travel, Cauli. Not a big deal.” Goku’s response had them both goggling at him.

“Just what kind of life have you lived, Goku-san?!” Kale blurted out, totally engaged now.

“Ehehehe!” Goku chuckled again, “Anyway, remember when I said Kale-chan reminded me of Gohan? When Gohan got really angry, his power would explode as well, just like Kale-chan!”

“Eep!” Kale again defaulted to her nervous state when Goku nudged her and turned a brilliant grin on her.

“So, when I failed to beat Cell and he was threatening to destroy the planet, I knew that Gohan could beat him even if I couldn’t! When Gohan got really angry, he went Super Saiyan 2 for the first time, and his power was insane! He beat Cell so badly he basically threw up Android 18.”

“Yuck!” Caulifa almost gagged at this point in the story.

“I…I don’t think I like this story.” Kale looked a little green.

“Aww, don’t be like that!” Goku laughed, “It’s not like you had to see it. Now that was nasty.” Both of the girls stuck their tongues out with disgusted looks on their faces, “But yeah, after it happened, Cell went from his perfect form to his second… kinda-perfect? form and he got waaay weaker. So Gohan punched him in the gut again and made him cough up Android 17 too. Cell tried to turn himself into a bomb to just blow the planet up in revenge, but Gohan grabbed him by the tail, tossed him off the planet, and turned him to dust!”

“Whoooo!” Caulifa cheered, “Man, that got my blood pumping!”

“Didn’t it?” Caulifa was totally caught in his pace now, and happily returned the fist-bump he offered. He let out a sigh then, which dimmed their enthusiasm, “We had won, and thought we would have some peace for a while! As far as we knew, there were no more enemies coming for us. We had destroyed all of Gero’s labs so we knew there would be no more androids… But…” He frowned, “When Trunks originally came from the future, he came to warn all of us. In his timeline, the Androids came out of nowhere and killed most of our strongest warriors before we even had a chance to get stronger and fight back. So he came from the future to not only warn us… but also to give his mom something. In his timeline…” He frowned a bit harder, “I never even got a chance to fight. A disease sprang up on earth which even Senzu Beans couldn’t heal, and it didn’t care how strong you were. I actually died to it in his world.”

“Holy crap! What kind of disease could take a guy like you down?!” Caulifa balked, knowing that as much bravado as she showed, Goku was stronger than her.

“It basically made your heart explode.” Goku told her making both of the Saiyan girls cringe. Kale even clutched her chest in phantom pain, “So Trunks’ medicine helped me survive and Bulma also managed to make a lot of it for all the other people that got sick too… but that changed something. The virus changed, and a new one that ignored the medicine popped up until Bulma could figure out how to beat that one too. And it didn’t take long for Bulma to figure it out… it was just…” He closed his eyes.

“Too late.” Kale whimpered, holding out a hand hesitantly and going to touch his arm, before jerking back.

“Your wife caught it, didn’t she?” Caulifa had an uncharacteristic look on her face as she stared at him.

“Yeah…” Goku confirmed, “She didn’t make it.”

“I… I’m sorry, Goku-san.” Kale finally summoned up the courage to place a hand on his arm, and then let out a loud squeak when Goku pulled her in for a side-armed hug, “G-GOKU-SAN!” Her face flamed red and she squirmed in the embrace.

Caulifa was frowning, and not really sure why the image was making her stomach twist. With a huff, she grabbed Goku’s other arm and put it around her shoulders. If ever asked, she would adamantly and absolutely deny that her face was also red.

…

“Whis.” Beerus’ voice was painfully calm.

“Yes, Beerus-sama?” Whis asked cheerfully, thoroughly enjoying the show.

“Is Goku really COURTING THEM DURING A BATTLE FOR THE UNIVERSES?!” He shouted at the top of his lungs.

“Goku doesn’t even know what courting means.” Krillin – the only warrior from Universe Seven that had already been eliminated – deadpanned. “When he was younger, he thought marriage was something to eat.”

“Ohohohoho! And two of them too!” Whis just laughed merrily into his palm.

“SON GOKUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU!”

…

“After Chi-Chi died, Gohan and me couldn’t stand being in our old house anymore. We moved in with Bulma and Vegeta. Bulma and me had been friends for more than like twenty years by then, and she was rich, so she didn’t mind. Gohan didn’t train as much as he used to. Chi-Chi always wanted him to be more than just a fighter, so he wanted to go to school and make her proud too.”

“How precious!” A voice interrupted them and knocked some sense into both girls, and they both scrambled away from Goku – their faces both still very hot. The speaker was one of the Pride Troopers; the one wearing the beret.

Another of them – the muscular guy with the teal skin and a beard – sneered, “We know full well this tournament was your fault, Son Goku! A villain like yourself who cares naught for the other universes should stop pretending to have a heart! I wonder what the poor woman you fooled felt after she died and saw your true colors from the Beyond?”

“What was that, asshole?!” Caulifa snarled at them, turning Super Saiyan in her anger.

Even Kale was glaring daggers at the man who insulted her… her… her new friend! “H-how dare-”

Goku brushed past the both of them.

“Eh? H-hey Goku! Wait a minute. We’ll take these jokers down!” Caulifa told him.

Goku took another step, and Kale and Caulifa – as well as the Pride Troopers – felt as if they had been punched in the chests. Caulifa was even shocked right out of her Super Saiyan transformation. Goku’s hair had spiked up as if he had turned Super Saiyan. Only that was totally not right. Goku was in front of them, and yet he was gone from their senses. It was as if he wasn’t even there. His hair was a shining red, and his aura looked like a shimmering flame surrounding his body.

Tupper – the one who had spoken the hurtful words – reflexively turned into his Petrified form when he saw the deep glare in Goku’s eyes.

It was the only thing that saved him.

Goku’s fist slammed into his face so hard that any who had been able to see the moment would have sworn he punched the color right out of the man’s stone skin. As it was, one moment Tupper was there, and the next he was impacting the stands and shattering Universe Eleven’s section. Chunks of the Kachi Katchin rained down into the void, along with Tupper’s broken body. It was the work of seconds for the Universe Eleven Angel to reverse the damage, and then Tupper dropped into the stands again. His body was mangled, and every bone was broken. Even after he was healed by his Angel, he simply lay there and stared out, eyes unseeing.

“Tupper has been eliminated.” The Grand Priest called out helpfully, as the Zen’ōs pressed his button on their tablets.

Goku lowered his fist and powered down, as the other Pride Troopers slowly and nearly mechanically turned to stare at the stranger in their midst, “H-h-h”

“HOLY CRAP?! WHAT WAS THAT, SON GOKU?!” Caulifa screamed and pointed at him, stars in her eyes.

“Hey Cauli, Kale-chan.” He spoke seemingly without a care in the world despite being surrounded by enemies. Although, his voice was a little too even, “I’m a little angry now. I’m going to go find Jiren.” He turned and at Kale, making her let out a little squeak at his intense gaze being directed at her, “Kale-chan.”

“Y-yes?” She trembled, even though she knew his anger wasn’t directed at her.

“Cauli ain’t the only one who believes in you, you know.” And with that, he was gone.

Caulifa started to sputter, “HEY! GET BACK HERE, OLD MAN! I WANT TO KNOW WHAT THAT FORM WAS! DO YOU HEAR ME?! GET BACK HERE!”

“G-Goku-san…” Kale felt like the waterworks were about to turn on again. She… she couldn’t believe her ears. She really couldn’t.

“Tch.” Kahseral clicked his teeth, “He got away.” He had to put on some bravado. He had to. He had to keep his troop’s morale high. He stared down at the two Saiyan girls, “Such tactics are deplorable, but we would be doing the universes a favor if we got rid of that beast.”

Caulifa glared at them as she stepped in front of Kale, “Don’t you even look at her, bastard!”

“You think you can defend her against four of us?!” Kahseral roared, before his hands glowed golden and turned into sharp blades, “Pride Troopers! Mobilize! Take out these two pests so we may continue our hunt for Son Goku!”

“Ane-san!” Kale screamed as Caulifa was engaged by the two big guys on the enemy squad. Caulifa cursed when she realized that they weren’t even giving her a second to breathe so she could power up into Super Saiyan. A few wisps of her hair floated around them as she desperately tried from getting cut by Kahseral’s blades. The man’s partner Kettle was even faster than the Pride Trooper leader, and it was everything she could do to keep from getting him. “Ane-san!” She screamed again, ‘I have to help ane-san!’ She tried to run forward, but was stopped by Zoire, the tiny imp-looking trooper!

“Not so fast, beast!” Zoire stood in front of her imperiously, despite his small size, “I won’t let you interfere! Justice Spin!” He literally turned himself into a tornado in front of her.

She grimaced and covered her face with her arms, the intense winds making her eyes sting. “N-No! I have to help her! M-Move!” A tiny green Ki ball formed in her palm and she shot it off. It hit the dervish and ricocheted away, doing no damage whatsoever. The force knocked her to her knees.

“Ha! You can’t possibly penetrate this defense!” Zoire’s annoying voice rang in her ears.

“GACK!” Kale gasped when she heard Caulifa’s agonized voice. Her only friend in the entire world for years upon years had just been bodily slammed into the hard stone of their arena. As strong as she was, she had been overwhelmed by the brutality of Kettle and Kahseral. Kettle’s ability to remotely command Ki spheres was incredibly strong. She had been engaged in close-range combat by the Pride Trooper commander while being continuously belted by his spheres. She had been tripped up by an explosion which was all the room Kahseral needed. He had grabbed her arm and performed a textbook judo throw on the Saiyan lady, which Kettle had followed up on with a sky-high knee drop to her diaphragm.

Seeing her precious friend in so much pain made something in Kale snap. She got back to her feat and started to scream, clenching her fists by her side in rage, ‘Ane-san believes in me! Goku-san does too! I can’t let them down! I can’t let them keep hurting ane-san! I can do it! I HAVE to do it!’ She continued to scream, trying desperately feel out that tingle in her back Caulifa kept telling her to reach for.

Kettle hopped off of Caulifa and kicked her in the side before she could roll to her feet.

And that did it. “STOP HURTING MY ANE-SAN!” She roared to the sky, her aura turning green once more as she continued gaining muscle mass. She sped past Zoire – who hadn’t even seen her move – and punched kettle square in the face, knocking him through one of the mountainous bits of the platform, “Ane-san, are you okay?!”

“K-Kale?!” Caulifa sat up with a groan of pain. That had hurt. “Y-You! You can recognize me! You did it Kale! I knew you could do it!” Her eyes widened, “Watch out!” Kale whirled around and with her newfound power was able to easily backhand Kahseral’s Ki blast away. But it was just a trap, “Oh shit!” Caulifa yelled as Kale was engulfed in a rainbowy, whiteish bubble.

“Cocotte Zone!” The one Pride Trooper who hadn’t yet engaged them finally did so, her speed and energy hidden by Kahseral’s blast. The purple-skinned woman started to laugh, “Ohohohoho! You’re trapped in a different dimension now, my dear. You’ll never return to this side again.” She flicked her dark pink hair with a visible look of pride.

“Let me out! I have to help ane-san!” Kale pounded on the inside of the bubble, but even with her newfound power, she could do nothing. “LET. ME. OUUUUUTTTTTT!”

“Tch. Evildoers can never lose gracefully, can they?” Cocotte scoffed, before having to leap back with a shout of surprise as Caulifa tried to rip her head off with her fist.

“Still awake huh? I admire your tenacity, if nothing else.” Kahseral complimented her, right before a purple Ki sphere impacted her back and exploded, knocking her to the ground. “Unfortunately, tenacity alone will not get you anywhere. Cocotte. Surround us.”

“Yes sir! Cocotte Zone MAX!” The same bubble that isolated Kale now surrounded all of the Troopers and the two Saiyan women.

Kettle had also surprisingly returned after taking a punch from Kale. His uniform was ruined, and he looked spitting mad. He raised his arm, drawing attention to the myriad of identical attacks above him, “Take this!” The Ki spheres rained down.

Caulifa dodged as best as she could, but she knew something had to change fast. She switched gears and ground to a halt, deciding to risk everything on a different play. She stood still and tried to power up instead. As she tried to raise her power, the first of the spheres hit her and exploded. She ground her teeth in agony but kept reaching. Another hit. And then another. Each hit disrupted her concentration with a sharp burst of agony, and her power-up scream turned to distressed ones.

The rain ended as she was flung back into Kale’s bubble, “Ane-san!” Tears were dribbling down the transformed Kale’s face.

“Kale! I’ll protect you, no matter what!” Caulifa still put on a brave face despite the disaster facing them.

“Enough of this. End them!” Kahseral commanded, flinging his hand out and charging a Ki blast. Zoire spun up into his cyclone, and the two other troopers also formed their attacks.

Caulifa turned and smiled at Kale, “You’re my protégé after all.” Her left arm was limp, she was covered in scratches, and her knees quaked. And yet she still smiled. She still tried to reassure the scared little girl Kale had always been.

Tears poured in rivulets, “I’m nothing but a burden to ane-san!” Goku and Caulifa’s words overlapped in Kale’s mind, ‘I believe in you, Kale!/Cauli ain’t the only one who believes in you, you know.’ She pounded on the bubble again, and yet it wouldn’t shatter. It wouldn’t get out of the way, “This pathetic me… I’m sick of it!” She punched the bubble again, “I hate who I am! I’m sitting here while ane-san is getting hurt!” The green glow intensified around her and her muscles bulked up even more. The whites of her eyes turned red and her corneas even seemed to explode, “I!” She punched, “Hate!” And again, “IT!” Her aura exploded, “LET ME OOOOOOOUUUUUUUTTTTTTTT!!!!!!!!”

Finally, Kale’s hair changed color. The same green of her aura enveloped her locks, and they became even more spiky than they had been when she first transformed. She felt more power than ever before flooding her veins and her muscles. The Pride Troopers all screamed as she burst out of not only her bubble, but also shattered the giant one enveloping them.

“Kale!” Caulifa was almost blown away, and her scream caused Kale to remember she needed to stay in control. She caught Caulifa by the hem of her pants, almost pantsing her friend by mistake.

“Grrrr!” Kale could only growl, ‘Control! That’s what Goku-san said, right?! Control! I need to control it, or I’ll hurt ane-san too!’ Clenching her teeth in pain, she started trying to shove her power down. Not get rid of it just… internalize it. As her aura stopped acting like a localized windstorm, she also started to shrink. Her eyes reappeared, now yellow rather than gray like in her base form or teal like Caulifa and Goku’s Super Saiyan eyes. Her muscles compressed, and she gradually shrunk into a leaner form, but one which was still significantly more muscular than her base form. She panted from the exertion, feeling the power fighting every second to burst again, “Ane-san…” Even her voice was normal again.

“You did it! You really did it this time!” Caulifa cheered her on, though she still clutched her left arm with her right. “You’re in perfect control of your energy! I always knew you had it in you!”

“N-no!” Kale shook her head, “T-this hurts. The power is t-t-trying to explode! I have to keep it d-d-down or else…. I d-d-don’t know what I’ll d-d-do!” Her whole body felt electrified as she thought to herself, ‘Goku-san believed in me too! I have to make him and ane-san proud! I have to make it perfect!’

“We’ll work on it!” Caulifa promised, “And we’ll get the old man to help too. He believes in you just as much as I do! But for now.” She turned a glare at the Pride Troopers, “Let’s get these assholes!”

“Right!” Kale agreed, clenching her fist as Caulifa finally managed to channel enough energy to turn Super Saiyan.

“Don’t lose heart, men! We’ll defeat these two beasts! We attack together!” Kahseral roared out.

“RIGHT!” The Pride Troopers chanted in response, before making a series of strange poses, “United! Justice! STREAM!” Four blasts of energy, yellow, green, blue, and purple spheres formed in their hands before they thrust them forward. The four Ki beams merged into one orange one burning like the sun and raged toward the two Saiyan women.

“Let’s do it, Kale!” Caulifa roared, her crimson energy starting to surge for her Ki wave.

“Right!” Kale formed her own green Ki sphere. With a yell, she and her best friend fired their own Ki waves. The crimson and green beams wrapped around one another, each forming a swirl with the other. It smashed into the United Justice Stream from their enemies and barreled straight through it as if it wasn’t even there. All four Pride Troopers screamed in horror as they were enveloped, with even Cocotte not having enough time to protect herself.

The Grant Priest’s voice rang in the arena, “Kahseral, Kettle, Zoire, and Cocotte have all been eliminated!”

“We did it!” Caulifa cheered, before watching as Kale wobbled and powered down. The poor girl was exhausted as she fell out of her Super Saiyan form and into Caulifa’s arms. “You did good, Kale.” She let out a wheeze as she hit her own limit, powering down too, “Shit!” She fell to her knees, cursing again as the unconscious Kale was jostled.

“Congratulations.” Caulifa stiffened as a new voice rang out. The speaker was a tallish man with sleek black hair, “That was fairly impressive on both of your parts.” His voice was lackadaisical, or perhaps just not very full of emotion. He raised his hand and a yellow glow started infusing his glove.

“Bastard! Here to take us out when we’re exhausted, huh?” Caulifa cursed as she tried to get up but failed. He fired, and she clenched her teeth and closed her eyes. “Eh?” She looked back at him and gaped. A continuous yellow beam of diffuse light was washing over them, “…The fuck?” She asked, feeling not only her own strength returning, but Kale’s as well. The girl’s eyelids fluttered opened and she let out a little gasp as she stopped hanging off Caulifa.

“Just some energy for you.” Seventeen smiled at her, ignoring Lord Beerus’ yelling, “Son Goku would be pretty disappointed if his little girlfriends were taken out.”

Both of the Saiyan girls went red, “Wh-wh-what are you saying, moron?! With that old dude?! As if!”

“G-g-gir-” Kale was a broken record, holding her face with her palms.

“You’d be more convincing if you weren’t blushing like a virgin.” A blonde woman that was obviously related to the first guy stepped next them, wearing a pink track suit. “Honestly, that man.” She huffed, looking a little annoyed, “Can never do anything normal.”

Kale shook her head, “B-but why give us your energy?”

“Not like it matters. We both have infinite energy.” Eighteen shrugged, “Even if I would love to personally shove Doctor Gero into a blender for kidnapping us and turning us into cyborgs, he at least did that right.” Kale and Caulifa gaped at her response.

“Looks like the fireworks are about to start.” Seventeen commented, turning his head towards where the latest explosion had cropped up. “Shall we watch?”

Kale and Caulifa both snapped that way as they felt a power spike unlike anything they had ever felt. Neither hesitated a moment as they jumped up to the highest nearby platform, knowing Goku would be right in the thick of it. Seventeen and his sister Eighteen followed.

-]|[-

Goku couldn’t help but let out a chuckle as his Kamehameha simply… parted around Jiren. It was like there was an invisible shield in front of the man, and his beam was just water avoiding it. “Knew that wasn’t going to work.” He transformed into Super Saiyan, and with a single pump from his right leg smashed his fist into Jiren’s chest hard enough that a little blast of wind exploded behind the man.

He was unmoving. His dark eyes simply stared straight ahead, directly into Goku’s eyes. His expression was blank, yet Goku couldn’t help but feel he was being asked, ‘is that it?’

Goku hopped back, “No point in trying 2 or 3. Let’s kick it up a notch, shall we?” His hair dimmed back to black, before he closed his eyes and let calmness engulf his mind. Jiren showed his first inkling of interest in the fight as Goku was engulfed in a red, shimmering aura. His hair was spiked again like it had been in Super Saiyan, but it was red this time rather than gold. And a second later, even Goku’s aura disappeared, now constrained within his body.

The big man uncrossed his arms, finally deigning to take things a little seriously. He raised a single finger to catch Goku’s punch, though his eyes tightened a bit when his finger bent back a tiny amount. He leapt over Goku’s head as the redhead attempted a sweeping kick and landed behind him, turning swiftly to also catch Goku’s back-kick with his full hand. A quick tap stopped the attack and then he wrapped his huge hand around Goku’s leg, hurling him over his head and trying to slam him into the ground. Goku fired two blasts to stop his momentum and also fired a Ki wave from his feet into Jiren’s face.

Jiren didn’t grimace, but he did wipe his face in irritation. He turned it up a tiny notch, burying his fist in Goku’s gut before he could react and followed it up with a lightning-swift kick that pulverized the rock beside them just from the shockwave. Spittle was flying from Goku’s mouth as he crashed into the mountainous face and broke right through it, landing in a heap on the other side. Before he has even stopped rolling, Jiren was above him ready to stomp on his back.

Goku vanished before Jiren’s foot got close, and he dropped an axe-kick right on his bald head. Jiren glared at him and just that was enough to blow him away. Jiren appeared behind him and pressed a reddish-orange Ki ball into his back, “Begone.” He spoke his first words of the night.

Goku rocketed away, carried by the blast through three of the faces. They didn’t look to have been broken after he passed. More like they had been utterly removed from existence. Such was the force of Jiren’s Ki. As his Ki sphere exploded, Jiren turned and walked away. He paused, eyes closed and a little look of irritation on his face. He turned around again and watched as Goku hauled himself back onto the platform.

The look on his face as he powered down was serious, “Where do you think you’re going?”

“This fight is over.” Jiren said, “You have nothing interesting to show me. Begone.”

Goku glared at his opponent, “You really are tough. But that just gets my blood boiling.” He smirked, “If my current power can’t beat you, then I’ll just have to go beyond!” He clenched his fists and began to roar. His hairstyle changed, growing far longer and thicker and far wilder. His body began glowing gold before there was a flash. The new Goku stood there with much of his torso covered in red fur. There seemed to be red outlines around his eyes, which were golden rather than his normal black or even the teal of Super Saiyan.

“So your response to being beaten is to assume a weaker form?” Jiren was unimpressed by his Primal Saiyan Transformation.

“Heh.” Goku let out a little chuckle, “Yeah, Primal Saiyan ain’t as strong as Super Saiyan God. You’re definitely right about that.” His smirk grew, “But like I said… you make me want to go even further beyond!” He closed his eyes. He had never once been able to pull this transformation off. Not once. He’d tried and failed during the Universe 6 Tournament. He’d just barely missed on using it against Black and Zamasu… But here? Now? With his Universe on the line and this massive mountain in front of him?

His golden aura was extinguished, engulfed by red instead. The energy turned opaque, before it started to shatter off of him like glass. His hair hadn’t spiked, but now his locks were as red as his fur. He had slimmed down too. His muscles weren’t as large as they’d been in his straight Primal State. His aura was calm around his body, though the look of anticipation on his face betrayed that calmness. Jiren started to uncross his arms.

BOOM

“GRKKK!” Jiren’s eyes bugged out of his face as Goku buried his fist directly in his gut. He let out a gasp of shock as his body contorted around Goku’s fist, veins starting to bulge on his neck and some color coming to his face. And then he rocketed back, plowing through dozens of tons of rock. He finally slid to a halt near the other end of the of the stadium.

In the stands, the God of Destruction Belmod had leapt to his feet, nearly yanking his hair out by the roots as he watched the invincible Jiren look mortal for the first time in decades.

Jiren got to his feet, clenching his stomach with a gritting of his teeth, before taking a breath and standing straight. He did not look happy. “…Congratulations, Son Goku.” He smirked, finally showing someemotion for the first time all tournament. “You’ve earned my attention. HAAA!!!!” He unleashed a yell, his Ki spiking and drawing looks of fear from about three-quarters of the remaining participants as the very world around them began to quake. In a blink, he’d covered half the distance to the other end of the platform, meeting with Goku with a clash of his fist.

The force from the impact created a shockwave that acted almost like a blade, emanating from the points where their fists clashed and slicing dozens of meters into the stage below. A chasm opened up between them, and then the two started to really clash. Hundreds of smaller shockwaves rang out, each of them on opposite ends of the arena. As they passed by other fighters, they were utterly blown away just from their movement, not even their blows. They were lucky if they were still on the stage by the end of their flight.

But to the sharp-eyed, it became increasingly clear that Goku was losing ground. This new power was not mastered, and it was draining him quickly. And after Jiren had powered himself up, Goku’s blows had not had nearly the same impact as his first surprise blow had. The second had managed to slice a thin cut into Jiren’s cheek, so the hulking gray man had merely spiked his power more. Then they had earned only mere grunts, and now they weren’t even landing anymore. He was losing.

Finally, a huge blow from Jiren connected, making Goku look like he’d been fired out of a cannon before he impacted the ground below. Jiren formed a Ki sphere in his hand and with a grunt, fired it directly at his opponent. The explosion that flashed made all the onlookers shield their eyes. All except for Toppo, Freeza, the two Android Twins, Vegeta, and Goku’s son Gohan. And all of the watching Angels and Gods of Destruction, of course.

Jiren landed and recrossed his arms, closing his eyes. When the dirt cloud cleared, Goku was revealed to be face down in a giant crater. He had fallen out of Primal God and simply lay in Primal Saiyan form, struggling to get to his feet. Dismayed shouts rang out from Universe Seven’s bench. Finally, after some struggle, he final managed to stand as powered down into his base form, “You’re just unbelievable, Jiren.” He took a deep breath and leapt up to the tallest peak, raising his arms into the air. “EVERYONE!” Immediately, the rest of his squad understood, though Krillin had to explain that Goku could not gather energy for the Spirit Bomb in any Super Saiyan form. They were far too aggressive in nature for Goku to gather the pure Genki that was needed to form the attack. His human friends all raised their hands into the air, little sparkles of energy starting to fly from their palms. The Androids were next, “Take as much as you need!” Eighteen yelled with a grin.

Even Freeza – malicious, evil Freeza – couldn’t help but chuckle, “I have nothing but bad memories of this attack.” He shook his head, before raising his hand into the air, “Very well! The Mighty Freeza-sama will aid you!”

Vegeta in turn scoffed, but did so as well, “Why must we always rely on this damn attack? Don’t waste it, Kakarot.”

Watching all of his teammates raise their hands and seeing the little sparkles flying to Goku and turning into a massive blue sphere with a white core made Kale and Caulifa curious. “A-ane-san…” Kale hesitantly raised a hand into the air, “I… I want to help Goku-san too!”

Caulifa grinned at her protégé, “Good on ya, Kale! Man, coming to this stupid thing has turned out to be a great decision! I’ve never seen you so lively! I love it!” She raised her hand as well as Kale flushed happily, “Take it old man! Take it and waste that guy!” To the side, Seventeen and Eighteen smirked knowingly.

Jiren simply stood and waited. The Spirit Bomb grew to truly massive proportions, completely blotting out the void from Jiren’s point of view. Goku grinned, “Don’t regret giving me the time to finish it, Jiren!” He flung his arms forward and hurled the Ultra Universe Seven Spirit Bomb at Jiren the Grey. Bricks and bits of rubble blew into the air as the attack closed in on Jiren, before coming to a halt inches before hitting the man. He had raised both hands and with a grunt of exertion, starting pushing it back.

“You’re kidding!” Goku exclaimed, before closing his eyes and quickly turning into his Primal God state. The Spirit Bomb halted between the two of them, before inching its way back towards Jiren. The gray alien smiled, before tensing his muscles. His fiery aura engulfed him for a brief moment, before the Spirit Bomb shot back towards Goku like a rocket. The platform Goku had stood on disintegrated, and Goku was engulfed.

A blinding white light nearly blinded all of the onlookers. When it faded, there was merely a gigantic crater carved into the platform. Goku was nowhere to be found. “It…it’s not possible!” Gohan stood numbly, staring at the area in shock. He was right at the edge of the furrow in the arena and stared at the crackling electricity still sparking down below.

Vegeta stared blankly, his jaw fallen, and his pupils constricted in his shock. All around, the Universe Seven fighters stared in utter disbelief at their friend’s defeat.

Yet it was not only Universe Seven that felt shaken, but others as well. Kale had fallen to her knees, horror in her eyes as she trembled. Goku… Goku had been only the second person in her entire life to acknowledge her. Only the second to ever not deride her for her shyness or call her a fake Saiyan. Only her second ever friend. He… he couldn’t be gone just like that!

“W-what the hell is this?” Gone was the bravado in Caulifa’s voice as her head snapped to the bench. She couldn’t see him there either, and yet his energy – which had been so pervasive for the entirety of the tournament thus far – was gone. Just gone. “T-this is a joke, right?!” She yelled, “THIS IS A JOKE! COME OUT, SON GOKU!”

The Grand Priest’s voice rang throughout the arena, “It appears that Son Goku has been eliminated, and unfortunately, has destroyed himself. As it was his own attack that did the deed, Jiren of Universe Eleven shall not be penalized. Regardless, until the central pillar has fallen to the floor, the tournament shall continue no matter who falls, and which universes are erased.”

A black rage started to fill Caulifa and Kale. Their teeth started to grind as they listened to these smug pricks gloss over a death in their own fucking tournament as if it was no matter to them. Electricity started to spark around them as their rage spiked. “I’ll fucking kill him!” Caulifa snarled as green started to envelope Kale’s aura again, and her eyes turned golden. “I don’t give a fuck! I’m going to rip that bald fucker’s head right off!”

The Universes prepared to fight once again… and then a pillar of white light erupted from the crater left by the Spirit Bomb. Energy slammed into their senses like they were taking sledgehammers to the teeth. All but the strongest in the arena rocked back as they felt it. Overwhelming was the only word fit to describe the feeling, and yet the energy did not feel angry, or malicious. No. The tremendous power filling the battlefield felt utterly tranquil.

Both Kale and Caulifa’s transformations ceased as blinding, relieved grins split their faces. And then they saw him, “Whoa! What transformation is this?” Caulifa asked in awe.

“He… he feels even stronger than the Primal red form!” Kale squeaked, fists clenched and trembling on her thighs as she knelt.

“I don’t know.” Eighteen admitted, “I’ve never seen anything like this from him.”

Goku was hunched over as he stood, and gradually straightened out. His arms appeared to be vibrating so fast that they almost looked like they were glitching out. A shimmering aura of sparkling silver that appeared like flames enveloped his body. His hair remained black, and yet there was a silverfish tinge to his locks. His eyes themselves were also silver, though like his primal and god forms, he still had pupils. He had a serious look on his face. More serious than any of them had ever seen from the jovial man. Up at the lip of the crater, Jiren, Dispo, and Toppo stared down at him.

His eyes narrowed, and he took a step. The world seemed to warp and then his fist was buried in Jiren’s face. The large man skidded backwards about five meters before slowing to a halt, his own eyes narrowed. He casually wiped his face off, before blurring. He rocketed towards his opponent and slammed his fist into his opponent’s nose. And yet that wasn’t what happened. Jiren couldn’t feel a connection, and then Goku seemed to almost flow around his blow so quickly that he left a consecutive series of afterimages in place of his body. And again, Jiren ate a shot, this time a kick to the side that bent him over slightly.

Growling in agitation, Jiren again stopped holding back, even more than he had against Primal God Goku. And yet no matter what he did, Goku never seemed to be where he should have been! Every blow was dodged, leaving their shockwaves to disintegrate bits of the stage away. And another kick forced Jiren back, though the large man felt no pain in the slightest from the blow.

“Jiren!” Dyspo bellowed before blurring forward. The man who had been able to move so fast he could intercept Hit’s Time-Skip threw a kick at Goku’s head. One moment he had been standing still, and the next he was passing through Goku’s afterimage with a dawning look of horror in his eyes, “Imposs-” Goku’s fist crushed into his face and buried him headfirst into the rock up to his chest. The anthropomorphic rabbit stuck straight up out of the arena like a gigantic nail, before slumping, his knees touching the platform.

“Dyspo!” Toppo yelled in shock, before he rushed forward and tried to knock Goku’s head off with his massive fist. Goku didn’t even glance at him as he landed on the man’s arm. He kicked him in the face so hard that Toppo saw stars as his head snapped back and blood stained his glorious mustache. Goku didn’t skip a beat before he and Jiren were in the air, the shockwaves from their motions enough to create air platforms to keep them in the air, gravity and the flight-ban magic surrounding the arena be damned.

The strongest Pride Trooper didn’t even glance in his allies’ directions before the fight took them elsewhere. Toppo let out a groan as he regained his bearings and pulled Dyspo from the rock.

…

“It… it can’t be…”

“Oh YES it CAN!” Whis sang like a proud father in response to what they all were watching after Beerus’s dumbfounded comment.

“What? What is it? What is this?!” Krillin had to force himself to stay in place and not whirl around, “I’ve never seen anything like this! Goku’s power is overwhelming and yet he feels as though he’s taking a peaceful nap! What in the world is this form?! I’ve never seen anything like it!”

Throughout the stands, various deities were conversing in low tones, seeing but truly unwilling to believe what they were seeing.

Beerus almost gnashed his teeth, before growling lowly, “Ultra Instinct.”

“IMPOSSIBLE!” Champa roared from nearby. Beerus’s fatter brother was on his feet holding his head in disbelief, “There’s just no way a mortal could accomplish it!”

“Ohohoho, perhaps if you stopped slacking off, you would have already touched Ultra Instinct too, Champa-sama.” Vados laughed daintily into her palm, “I must say, dear brother, you’ve done an excellent job training this mortal. For someone so young to be capable of it…”

“No.” Whis let out his own chuckle, “I’ve never seen even an inkling of it from him. I’ve been trying for… oh… a couple years at this point – time-dilation withstanding – but I’ve never even seen him come close. This was all on his own effort!” Whis was showing a surprising amount of joy for those who knew him. They only ever saw him like this with new delicious treats!

“Grrrr!” Belmod was grinding his teeth together, “Who cares about Ultra Instinct!” He blurted out, “Jiren can’t be beaten! Jiren! DESTROY SON GOKU!”

“Every single one of his strikes are landing more precisely than the last.” Master Roshi exclaimed, watching as Goku grew stronger before his very eyes.

“He hasn’t taken a single blow from Jiren ever since the fight restarted!” Tienshinhan exclaimed, “He’s gaining on Jiren every second!”

“That’s right…” Whis agreed, “Although this presents a problem. Is he gaining fast enough?”

“No.” Beerus growled out, “He did not enter this state of his own accord the way I can. The Spirit Bomb must be acting as a temporary power source for his tired body. He’ll need to rest once that source expires.”

“That’s correct, Beerus-sama.” Whis agreed, much to the dismay of their bench, “When he fell into the chaotic tides of the Spirit Bomb, it attempted to destroy him just as he attempted to resist his own destruction. That must have been the catalyst for his transformation. However, that means that most of the energy was wasted. I suspect not even a quarter made it in to Goku-san’s body to power him up.”

Goku was indeed getting stronger. Where before, every impact of their fists had thrown shockwaves around, now the very friction was creating powerful lightning bolts that were striking the platform. And yet despite Goku’s growth, Jiren seemed content to simply match him. They had no idea if Jiren simply had the same insane capacity for growth that Saiyans had, or if he truly was just that strong that he could still hold back against Ultra Instinct, but it was clear he wasn’t feeling too bothered by the fight. No, the man had a small smile on his face.

“Damn.” Beerus let out a curse as his eyes narrowed, “It’s over.”

…

Goku rocketed towards his opponent who was once more on solid ground. There was a strange reverberation effect on his voice as he screamed, putting everything into one final shot. An explosion once again engulfed the stadium. When it cleared, Goku stared in both shock and annoyance as Jiren was back to stopping him with a single hand. Jiren’s reddish aura had engulfed him again, pulsing angrily this time. “You Saiyans are interesting. It’s been decades since I’ve been pushed this far.” Jiren’s smile dropped, “But now it’s over.”

Goku was engulfed by a Ki sphere and rocketed away, screaming in pain. He crashed to the dirt once the energy expired, his body in agony. Vegeta was by his side in an instant, “What was that power, Kakarot?”

Goku let out a groan, “Good to see you too, Vegeta.” He struggled to get up, before falling back down. He let out a chuckle as he lay there, spread-eagle, “Can’t say. I’ve got no idea.”

“Tch. What a waste of time.” Vegeta growled, before smirking, “I see you figured out Primal God though.”

“Hehe!” Goku scrunched his face. His nose was itching but his arms felt like lead. “Hey Vegeta, I kinda can’t move. Can you scratch my nose?”

“No.” Vegeta’s response was flat and dry, “Scratch it yourself. I have other things to do.” A crash revealed Ribrianne standing there in all her… glory. “Like that.” He cracked his knuckles, a grin forming on his face, “I’ve been itching to crush that gaudy eyesore for a while now.” A sound distracted him, and he whirled around, “Kakarot?!” Goku was gone.

-]|[-

“Ohohoho!” Freeza laughed menacingly, “My, this is certainly an odd position we find ourselves in, isn’t it, Son Goku?” He spread his arms, “All alone here, with not a soul watching here in this blind spot.” He raised his arm and his purple aura started forming a diffuse Ki sphere pointed directly at Goku, “And you don’t seem to have the strength to escape at this moment. How very convenient.” The Ki sphere grew.

“Goku!” Kale arrived in full Super Saiyan glory and buried her fist into Freeza’s face. The tyrant jerked back and crashed into a pile of rubble, before flipping over it. Kale was in her skinny form, not her hulking form.

“What the hell was that, old man?” Caulifa – also transformed – landed near him and helped him up, “Acting all cool and then getting owned!”

“Hehe, sorry Cauli.” Goku smiled as he felt some of her energy entering him.

“Ane-san, let me.” Kale knelt and Goku immediately sensed more energy entering him.

Kale’s power was unlike any Saiyan power he’d ever felt before. “Thank you, Kale-chan…” Kale blushed prettily, smiling at him. Goku had already recovered a fair amount of his strength too. “Aren’t ya getting tired though?”

Kale shook her head, “N-no. Take as much as you need, Goku-san.” She continued smiling gently, “T-this power… I feel l-like I need to get rid of it. L-Like it’s constantly just g-growing and I need to let it out or… or I’ll explode. I… My energy isn’t dropping at all.”

“Wow, you sure are amazing, Kale-chan.” Goku exclaimed, a giant grin on his face. Her blush deepened.

“Yeah, she sure is!” Caulifa rubbed her nose with a finger, smug grin back on her face.

Off to the side. Freeza growled as he righted himself, “More monkeys crawling out of the woodwork.” He crossed his arms after brushing the grime off his face, “Looks like you’re saved for now, Son Goku. My revenge will have to be postponed once more.” No one had to know that Freeza himself was actually going to transfer some energy to his nemesis. Goku’s bitches were doing a fine job of it themselves.

“Who the fuck are you, asswipe?” Caulifa snarled, “Turning on your own teammate?! How low can you go?!”

“I am Freeza-sama.” Freeza replied, “And mark my words, for that punch I’ll end the both of you once my business with Son Goku is finished. Count on that.” And he was gone.

“What a dick!” Caulifa snarled, before helping Goku to his feet.

“He’s hated me ever since our first battle.” Goku said, getting his feet under him after stumbling for a moment. He was gradually able to stand on his own, and was able to stop leaning on Caulifa, much to her disappointment. “Your Freeza… that Frost guy…”

“Eww, he’s your version of that creep?” Caulifa wrinkled her nose.

Kale spoke up, “E-even before his crimes were revealed, A-ane-san never trusted F-Frost.” She had powered down now that the danger seemed to have passed and that Goku’s energy had recovered a fair amount. She poked her fingers together, “H-he tried to recruit us b-before. I didn’t l-like him either.”

“You got good instincts.” He patted Kale on the head, and she let out a happy little squeak. “Freeza destroyed the entirety of the Saiyan race in our universe.” Both of them let out shocked – and scandalized – gasps, “Me, Vegeta, and his brother who I’ve never met are the only Full Blooded Saiyans left, as far as we know. Freeza blew up the planet. He was afraid of the legend of the Super Saiyans, so he tried to kill all of us. When I fought him, he killed my best friend right in front of me. I transformed and kicked his ass.”

“Good.” Caulifa snarled, “I think I’ll find him later and kick the shit out of him too.” She raised her fists in front of her chest.

“Nah.” Goku mirrored his patting on Caulifa, and it was her time to squeak in shock.

“W-wh-wha-what do you think you’re doing?!” She stammered for the first time he’d ever heard.

“Hehe, your hair is so fluffy despite how it looks.” Goku smirked at her growing blush, “Anyway, leave Freeza alone. He’s way stronger than he looks. He cooked up his own transformation to try to kill us while in Hell. Last time we fought, it was a match for Saiyan God, and he’d gotten stronger since then without a doubt. You still have a way to go before you can match him.”

Caulifa growled at his words, “Then what the fuck are we waiting for?! Let’s get back to it!”

He laughed again, “Chill, Cauli. Even if you gave back my energy I still need to rest for a while. I feel like I got put through a blender.” He winced as he reached up to his neck, jerking his head back and forth and letting out three or four satisfying-sounding cracks. He looked at his hands, “I have no idea what that power was either. I have to think on it… because I know we’ll need it before this is over.”

His attention was drawn by the more silent beauty, “I-I overheard the Gods d-discussing it.” Kale told him, hesitantly putting a hand on his arm, “T-They called it Ultra Instinct.”

Goku eyes widened and he looked back at his hand, “Ultra Instinct? That was Ultra Instinct?” He asked, before clenching his fist, “So that’s what Whis was trying to show us…”

“Dad!” Their attention was drawn by Gohan. He landed their and Kale and Caulifa took him in for the first time. His Gi was all-purple and did not have an undershirt unlike Goku’s. Well, at least before the outer gi had been destroyed in the battle with Jiren. Now that undershirt was all that’s left. “Are you alright, dad?” He looked extremely worried, “You need me to heal you?”

“Oh, I forgot you know how to do that!” Goku exclaimed, “We haven’t had to use it since… what was it… Buu?”

Gohan laughed, relaxing as he realized his father was fine, “Yeah, I suppose being the Kaiōshin’s temporary apprentice did stop being useful when Buu was finished. Never really needed it again.” He stopped and took his father in, “You’ll be fine, right dad?”

“Yeah.” Goku replied softly, “Save that heal for later. We’re probably going to need it.” he grinned suddenly, “Anyway, this is Cauli and this is Kale-chan. Girls, this is Gohan, my son.”

“N-Nice to meet you, Gohan-san.” Kale bowed a little.

“You strong?” Caulifa didn’t bother with the niceties, obviously.

Gohan burst out laughing, “Oh, it totally makes sense now.” He eyed the wild woman with a little smirk, “Once this is all over, I’m sure you’ll try to find out. I don’t hold a candle to dad anymore though. Sorry to disappoint.”

“You need to train more, Gohan! You could be even stronger than me and Vegeta!” Goku whined a little bit.

Gohan smiled, “You know that isn’t my calling dad. I’ve never wanted to be the strongest. Just strong enough to defend our family and friends when I needed to. That’s always been you, dad.” He raised his fist, “Now let’s get this done. I’m itching to go back to Videl and Pan-chan.”

“You got it!” Goku yelled at Gohan’s retreating back, “And you’re right. I can’t wait to play with my little granddaughter again.” He muttered under his breath.

Kale smiled a little weakly, “You have a lot to go back to, don’t you, Goku-san?” It suddenly hit her that it was either them or him, at some point in the tournament. Her stomach tightened and a sick feeling welled up in her gut.

“Yeah.” He breathed out, before a hard look came across his eyes. “Let’s go rest up. We still have half a tournament to go.”

“Right.” Caulifa had also felt the pangs in her stomach… and also had an inkling for the first time of just what she would want to wish for, “Who the hell is Buu and what did your son mean about healing?” She asked right before Goku touched both their shoulders and the three of them vanished. A few seconds later, one of the Universe 2 ladies landed in the crater before clicking their teeth in annoyance.

…

“So… who was Buu, huh?” Goku chuckled as he sat down. They had found a little hidey-hole for themselves, suppressing their energies to the minimum to keep from being detected. “Buu… before we met Beerus-sama, Buu was the most dangerous enemy we ever faced. He was an ancient evil that had been sealed away millions of years ago, and a hateful creature named Babidi was trying to release him. This was seven years after Cell. Me and Gohan had moved in with Vegeta and his wife after Chi-Chi died, so all three of us had been training since then. Gohan… Chi-Chi had never wanted him to be a fighter. At one point Gohan was stronger than both me and Vegeta put together. He had a special ability like Kale-chan here where his rage would massively increase his strength. It was how he defeated Cell. But after that, he didn’t train quite as hard as he used to. He wanted to live up to Chi-Chi’s memory, so he studied hard instead. Me and Vegeta kept it up. About five years after Cell was defeated, we both had surpassed Gohan even at his prime, and I had managed Super Saiyan 3.”

“You still haven’t shown it to us!” Caulifa grinned eagerly, “I bet it looks totally badass!”

Goku chuckled, “No, it actually looks ridiculous.” He burst out laughing at her crestfallen look, “Your eyebrows disappear, the bones there get larger, and the hair grows to your knees. Bulma said I looked like a caveman when she saw it!” He laughed harder as both of the Saiyan women almost cringed away at the thought of the transformation. “Me and Vegeta also realized that it had the exact same problems as Grade Three. Despite the fact that I was four times stronger than Vegeta using Three than he was using Two, I never once was able to beat him. He outlasted me every time. It was bad enough that even after a year of training practically every day, I still couldn’t finish a fight in it. Vegeta never even tried to learn to use it. He felt it was useless. Super Saiyan 3 was unfortunately a dead end.”

“Damn, that sucks.” Caulifa groaned, looking incredibly disappointed.

“H-How did you discover Primal Saiyan?” Kale asked him, drawing Caulifa’s attention again.

“Well, that had to do with Buu.” Goku smiled at Kale, drawing a small one back, “Buu… Buu wasn’t obscenely powerful. It wasn’t like with the Androids and Cell, where we were all outmatched every time and had to train to overcome it. Buu was… weird. Babidi needed our energy to resurrect Buu, and they managed to get Gohan’s energy which was about three-fourths of what Babidi needed. So Buu actually wasn’t strong to the point that we just couldn’t fight him. No, Buu was strong because he was weird. His body… If I had to describe his body, it would be bubble gum. Or taffy.”

“Huh?” Kale blinked in bewilderment.

“Come again?” Caulifa was far flatter.

“Yeah, like I said, he was weird. One of the attacks he used… he literally detached his own arms, grew a new pair, and then just sat there laughing and pointing at us while his arms beat the crap out of us.” Goku looked embarrassed just mentioning it. “He could recover from any injury without any loss in power. If even a little chewing-gum-sized piece survived, he could completely regenerate a new body. He had these magic attacks too. He could turn you into candy and eat you. He did just that to one of Babidi’s bad guys! Turned him into a giant cookie and swallowed it in one bite!”

“No! You’re lying! There’s no way something that STUPID actually existed!” Caulifa’s eye was twitching rapidly.

“It was even worse. He could learn any attack just by seeing it performed once. He could create clones of himself… he was basically a Djinn. His worst ability… If he was ever in danger, he could break pieces of himself off and use them to absorb people. He would take their power, their memories, everything. He would basically become a whole new Buu with all the power that was beating him up!”

“T-this is crazy! How in t-the world did you w-win?!” Kale exclaimed, before cupping her mouth and looking nervous. She hoped no one heard her exclamation.

Goku sighed, “We didn’t. Not at first. Super Saiyan 3 was useless. Buu just sat there taking every hit like a clown. We just couldn’t put him down. One of our friends had to sacrifice himself just to buy us enough time to escape. Buu and Babidi then went on a murder spree around the planet while we desperately tried to come up with a way to beat Buu. Buu… he was… he was the worst kind of monster. An innocent one. He was like a child. A child that didn’t know right from wrong and only had an asshole whispering in his ear. Eventually he got fed up with Babidi and killed him. He went off on his own then, and somehow even started learning right from wrong, even if it was all for the wrong reasons. A man had a broken leg and couldn’t run from him, so Buu healed his leg. A boy had been born blind, and he gave him back his sight.”

“Wait? But he was millions of years old! How is that possible?!” Caulifa exclaimed, rubbing the back of her head in confusion.

“We later learned from the Kaiōshin that one of the people that Buu had absorbed in the past was the Dai Kaiōshin. Absorbing him basically… made his mind innocent. Like a newborn. The Dai Kaiōshin was a candy-loving man, and one who embodied good. The evil in Buu and now the Good warred, and it… I don’t know… reset him?”

“And Babidi got t-to him first.” Kale said, her tone low and sad, “H-he could have b-been good…”

“He could have. That was the worst part.” Goku agreed, “He became an innocent monster. In any case, someone got to him and started teaching him. Teaching him to do good. Even got him a puppy to take care of. For a little while, we thought maybe the crisis was over… But then some thugs tried to kill him and hurt his new friend. Buu got so furious that he ended up splitting into his good side and a more powerful evil side, who then ate the good side and transformed back into the evil from before the Dai Kaiōshin was absorbed. When this new evil… Super Buu was reborn… he immediately destroyed the planet. Blew it up as easily as a toddler would blow out a birthday candle.”

“T-that’s awful!” Kale cried out, “H-how did you s-survive?”

“It was only because of the Kaiōshin. He had been injured earlier and needed to retreat. When he sensed what was going on, he grabbed me, Vegeta, and Gohan and brought us to his realm for training. Everyone else…. Everyone else was gone.”

“I-I’m so sorry.” Kale surprised herself by having the courage to hug the man. Goku smiled and pulled her in closer, putting his arm around her shoulder.

“Damn… that sucks so bad.” Caulifa looked unsure of herself. She probably wasn’t too great at the whole ‘comforting’ thing.

“It worked out in the end.” Goku said, after grabbing Caulifa’s arm and drawing her in too. Her face was a bright red as he started running his hand through her hair, but there was a pleased little smile gracing her lips too. “Gohan managed to free the Z-Sword from its prison in the Kaiōshin Realm, and we… ended up breaking it, which released a really old Kaiōshin from his prison. Apparently Beerus-sama trapped him, in the sword ages before Buu ever showed up the first time. Our Kaiōshin was basically almost an apprentice still, compared to him. Old Kai told us that he could unlock our Hidden Potentials, and Gohan was the one to do it. We didn’t have time for him to do it for all three of us, so me and Vegeta had to knock our heads together to figure something out. Meanwhile Super Buu was going around and destroying planets, so we had to hurry. Eventually Vegeta asked Old Kai if it was possible to regrow our tails. All three of us had lost them ages ago. Shin said that he could do that easily, and since Gohan was doing the other thing, he grew back mine and Vegeta’s.”

“What does the tail even do, anyway?” Caulifa asked curiously, “They’re basically legends in our universe. No one’s had a tail for millions of years.”

“Well, when you have a tail and you look at the full moon, you turn into a giant ape.” Goku answered, and both of the girls started to cough and looked at him in disbelief. He chuckled, “Yeah, I never knew. I accidentally killed my Grandpa the second time I transformed, and I never had any memory of it after it happened. Think Kale-chan before she got her power under control, except even more mindless.” Both of them winced, “So no one wanted to tell me that I was the monster that squashed Grandpa, and I never gained control over it, so Kami took it off permanently so he could bring back the moon. Vegeta on the other hand grew up with other Saiyans before Freeza destroyed the planet. He knew how to control it. So he thought that if we could combine the Ōzaru form’s ten-times power multiplier with Super Saiyan’s fifty-times power multiplier, we’d be even stronger than Super Saiyan 3.”

“I thought you said it was a giant ape!” Caulifa cut in, totally engrossed again in the story.

He started to laugh, “I’m getting there!” She flushed some more at his chiding, “So we grew our tails back and Shin took us to a planet where there was always a moon in the sky. We transformed into Super Saiyan 2, and then looked at the moons, turning us into Golden Ōzaru. Both of us lost our minds and started destroying everything. Even Vegeta couldn’t keep it together. It took our families and friends contacting us from the Otherworld to bring us back to our senses, and once we finally regained our minds, we started to shrink. All the power of the Golden Ōzaru was magnified and compressed into Primal Saiyan, though I still say it should have been Super Saiyan 4. A Saiyan’s perfect form. Every single bit of power available to us, squeezed out. Without Divine Ki, it was as far as we could go. And it wasn’t just stronger than Super Saiyan 3… it was a whole other world of power. It wasn’t even in the same league. None of us had ever felt anything like it.”

“Grrrr!” Caulifa ground her teeth together, “I’m so jealous! Neither of us have tails so we can’t use it!” He stuck his tongue playfully at her, “Why you little!” She grabbed his shirt and tried to shake him, “You damned tease!”

“A-Ane-san!” Kale squeaked, though she smiled a bit when she saw Goku was chuckling. She snuggled closer to him.

Goku shook his head, grinning, “In the end… the fight with Buu was just… anticlimactic. With me and Vegeta in our Primal forms and Gohan in his Mystic form… Buu didn’t stand a chance. All three of us were furious and we beat Buu so bad even his regeneration seemed to be giving up. Me and Vegeta were even disappointed, since it was hardly a fight. All three of us hit him with our most powerful attacks at once, Vegeta with his Final Flash, Me with my Primal Kamehameha, and Gohan with his Mystic Kamehameha. And that was that. There was nothing left.”

“Wow…” Kale breathed, “A-Amazing.”

“Hmph. So you’re a little bit of a badass? So what?” Caulifa still had some bravado in her.

“Just a little, huh?” He smirked at her, making her redden again. An explosion rocked the landscape, and their little hidey hole made up of overturned pieces of the stadium groaned. He chuckled and levitated, bringing all three of them up to their feet. Kale looked confused at his actions, though Caulifa looked excited.

“Back to full strength then, old man?” She faux-jeered.

“Yep, looks like it!” He said cheerfully, his smirk deepening. And then without another word, he pulled her in closer and kissed her. Caulifa’s eyes popped open and her face went bright red as she was caught completely flat-footed. Before she closed them, a competitive glint overtook her eyes as she reached behind Goku’s head and pulled him in, deepening their lip-lock. She pressed herself into him and rolled her hips, feeling him stiffen slightly with hidden, gleeful enjoyment. She let out a little gasp as he reached down and took a handful of her firm rear.

“Ane-san! Goku-san!” Kale gasped, feeling her heart squeeze. Feeling left out. Both of her own friends… her precious ones were indulging in one another and leaving her alone. Anger and sadness mixed in her chest and her eyes watered. She tried to pull away, to go be alone. But Goku held her fast with the arm he had wrapped around her back. She gripped his arm and tried to make him let go, yet his grip was iron.

The two backed off, and a strand of saliva drooped before breaking between them. Caulifa had a vaguely glazed look in her eyes and looked to be wanting more. Goku’s smirk widened before he turned to Kale, who had frustrated tears in her eyes. He pulled her closer as that her chest pressed into his, drawing a shocked squeak.

She could not get a single word out before he silenced her with a kiss of her own. She let out a moan of shock and rapture as she felt his tongue slip between her lips and flick her own. She reached up with both hands and gripped the back of his neck, pulling him deeper into the kiss. Their tongues dueled, one significantly more skillfully than the other. Kale was so inexperienced, and the kiss was making her so hot that she started to squirm, rubbing her thighs together.

“Stupid sexy old man.” Caulifa growled as she watched the two make out, just as Kale had done moments before. Her traitorous thighs also started to squeeze, and she muscled her way back into the embrace. Even for Goku, a three-way kiss was something entirely new. Kale practically passed out when she realized that her ane-san had embraced the both of them and joined their kiss, slipping her tongue in between. They only managed to fumble around for a moment, before Goku pulled away entirely, letting go of them entirely.

“G-Goku?” Kale dropped the honorific after their makeout session, looking utterly confused. Another explosion rocked the platform and her eyes widened as if ice had dripped down her shirt. She realized all of a sudden that she had not – in fact – been in heaven and remember just where they were; A platform for a battle deciding the fate of eight universes.

Caulifa seemed to realize it as well, her flush turning a bit angry. “You fucking tease!”

Goku chuckled, “It’s been fun Kale-chan, Cauli. Hopefully just a little preview for later, eh?” He winked at her before he took a breath as all three of them stiffened, “I wish I had met you two years ago.” He admitted and saw sadness fill Kale’s eyes as she realized they were going to go from an affectionate, wonderful embrace to combat, “But we can’t put this off all tournament. Time’s running out, after all.” He grinned almost wolfishly, “SO SHOW ME WHAT YOU’VE LEARNED!” With a shout, he transformed into his Super Saiyan form.

-]|[-

“Eyesore?!” Ribrianne snorted like a bull, steam erupting from her nostrils. “A man like you who can’t appreciate true beauty will never find love!”

“I’m happily married.” Vegeta deadpanned, causing Ribrianne to rear back as though struck. “Honestly, I have no desire to speak any longer with a fool like you. Begone.”

“You brute!” Ribrianne growled out, “Pretty Cannon!” She made a heart-shape with her hands and shot a heart-shaped Ki blast at Vegeta. His expression did not change overly much, as he backhanded it away.

“I believe I told you to leave.” Vegeta started to smirk, “Thank you for choosing the other option.” He closed his eyes, before a blackish-purple aura engulfed him, and a second later his fist was practically turning Ribrianne’s face inside-out. “Oraoraoraora!” He started pounding into the rotund woman, brutalizing her with punches and kicks. The rest of the Universe Two bench started screaming as they watched their prayer suffer. Vegeta absently heard the announcement that Universe Four’s Monna had been eliminated, followed swiftly by Cabbe. He growled lowly as he realized that his unwanted student had failed and was kicked away from Ribrianne by Roasie. “You lot just keep coming out of the woodwork, don’t you?”

“Hey Vegeta.” Seventeen and Eighteen landed near him, “Why don’t we take these two off your hands.” Seventeen was smiling, “I have my own bone to pick with them.”

“I think I owe her a bit more than you, Seventeen. She did call me an ugly whore who… ahem… stole her perfect man away.” Eighteen sounded cross, but she didn’t look it.

Vegeta let out an unwilling guffaw, before turning it into a cough, “Really…?”

“A Goddess of ‘Love’ jealous of a mortal. Who would have thought? That’s never happened before.” Seventeen replied playfully.

“Maybe that’s the reason she got so un-cute when she transformed.” With each barb directed at Ribrianne, the woman deflated more and more, “Guess she’s just bringing what’s inside out with it, since she was much cuter before.”

“HOW DARE YOU?!” That shout came from the entirety of the Universe Two team and bench.

“Whatever.” Vegeta scoffed as he powered down from his Super Saiyan God state. He leapt away, searching for stronger opponents.

-]|[-

“Ohoho!” Freeza cackled as he watched Cabbe fall from the platform, his form black and blue after the vicious beating he had delivered. “My oh my, beating Saiyans nearly to death is such a glorious pastime.” His faux-sophistication was in full working order, “My, the only thing that could have been better would have been to kill Son Goku’s two bitches, with him powerless to save th-” His voice froze. His body froze. His everything froze, breath and thought included. “GRK!” He choked on his saliva as his body developed fifteen different injuries all of a sudden before he could even blink. He sank to his knees, before staggering back up and spitting out some purple blood. “Who?! Who dares!?”

“I do.” Hit stood behind him, hands in his pockets, “That was my teammate you knocked off, and two of my teammates you’re eager to kill.”

“You!” Freeza bulked up and took a swing, but the next thing he knew, he had the taller man’s knuckles buried in his throat. Freeze staggered back, clutching his windpipe. “B-Bastard!” He rasped out, “I’ll kill you for this! FREEZA-SAMA SHALL NOT ACCEPT THIS!” With a roar of rage, Freeza transformed. Where his form had been predominantly white before, now his carapace was a gleaming gold. His face, hands, feet, and some gems were shades of purple. “Well?! Tremble before my magnificence!” Freeza spat out, before blurring into motion and chopping Hit’s head clean off.

Or rather, that was his intention, so blinded by rage that he forgot the rules of the tournament. Hit didn’t even take his hands from his pocket, and Freeza’s blow simply slipped through him as though he were an afterimage. “You’ve grown far stronger,” he commented in his monotone, “Pity I’ve already faced greater power than yours.” He jabbed his fist out, and Freeza felt as if someone had pierced his stomach with a red-hot lance.

“You!” Freeza wiped his mouth with his arm and sprang away.

“Oh, you still have the energy to move? I am impressed. How many more of those can you take though, I wonder? If you’re anything like Frost, it won’t be many more.” Hit smirked at the tyrant.

“ENOUGH OF THIS!” Freeza raised a finger in the air, and in a mere instant the largest Golden Supernova he’d ever created in his life formed, “DIE!”

As he started moving his arm forward, Hit appeared next to him and with a crushing blow, pulverizing Freeza’s arm right at the elbow. An invisible Ki blast ripped right through the limb the second Hit’s punch connected. Freeza didn’t even have time to scream, before he felt his body start breaking. First was his right kneecap shattered along with the ground behind him, then he felt a grand total of twenty blows to his chest, before his other kneecap went. Every single blow was accompanied by an invisible Ki shot, appearing like shockwaves erupting from his body. His nose shattered as a final insult, and then Hit was once again ten feet away from him.

He collapsed, “T-time.” He gasped out for breath as his Golden Supernova collapsed in on itself and evaporated, “You… you’re bending time.”

“That’s right.” Hit commented evenly, “Congratulations. It only took you several minutes more than Son Goku.”

Freeza’s face contorted in rage, and he raised his one good arm and fired a Grand Death Beam, looking to spear Hit through with the five almost tentacle-like beams. The tracking beams started encircling around Hit like the electrons on an atom, constantly entering Hit’s image and exiting from another side, “You may be intangible hiding in your little time pocket, but that means you can’t hit me either! Eventually you’ll have to come out and when you do, you’re dead! AHAHAHA!” He was bluffing of course. Doing this was continuously draining Freeza’s power.

Hit smiled again before raising his fist. Freeza’s eyes widened as Hit thrust his fist out, and then bulged out as more spittle escaped him. The latest long-ranged punch had buried itself in his sternum and knocked all the air out. He couldn’t keep his Death Beams going any longer, and they vanished. “Perhaps were you not such an awful individual, your teammates would have been inclined to share their information with you. They’ve faced me before, after all.” Hit stepped towards Freeza and – in the ultimate insult to the Tyrant – kicked him straight in the chest without even removing his hands from his pockets. The white-skinned tyrant was sent hurtling from the arena.

“Freeza of Universe Seven has been eliminated!” The call came out from the Grand Priest.

“You know, I’m not even mad I got eliminated first anymore.” Krillin had a vindictive little smirk on his face, “Beerus-sama, please tell me there will be replays.”

“You…” Freeza’s raspy voice rang out after he forcibly powered down into his normal form.

“Yeah, me. You killed me, remember?” Krillin smirked at the downed tyrant, “That was cathartic to watch, and now we don’t have to worry about what evil you’d concoct with those Super Dragon Balls.”

“I won’t kill you. No, no, no.” Freeza promised, “When I’m done with you you’ll beg for death.”

“And just for that, you’re not getting a Senzu.” Roshi deadpanned.

-]|[-

“Finally taking us a little seriously, Goku?!” Caulifa yelled as she powered up straight to Super Saiyan 2, the bioelectricity crackling around her.

‘No…’ Kale thought as she struggled for a moment and retook her regular Super Saiyan form – the relatively petite one with the greenish-tinged yellow hair, not the hulking behemoth. ‘I know you’re just being brave, ane-san, but we both saw his fight with that Jiren guy. He’s still just playing with us.’

“I better.” He teased back, “You both just keep getting stronger, and that’s a lot of fun.” He stopped smirking and schooled his features, “Here I come Cauli, Kale-chan.” He exploded forwards, and this time Caulifa was just barely able to block his punch.

Her entire skeleton felt like it rattled as she slid backwards and she ground her teeth together, trying to keep her hiss of pain from escaping. “Ane-san!” Kale yelled, before charging Goku and beginning to fight.

“I’ll follow your lead this time, Kale!” Caulifa yelled as Goku ducked under a roundhouse from her protégé, sticking her hand out and shooting a Ki sphere.

“Looks like I have a lot to teach you both!” Goku laughed a bit as he sped up, jumping the Ki sphere and grabbing Kale by the arm near her wrist and shoulder, before tripping her and forcing her to the floor, “You overextend too much on your punches, Kale-chan.” Kale groaned as she was let go, knowing full well even with her meager knowledge that Goku could have easily broken her arm if he wanted to. She rolled to her feet and caught the tail end of Caulifa trying a punishing combo on Goku, who easily blocked and evaded every hit. “You’ve got better skills than Kale chan, even if she’s stronger. But you still need some more training, Cauli.” It looked like she was pushing him backwards, but Goku was visibly cool while Caulifa looked to be putting everything she had into every punch. And She just wasn’t able to connect with anything. She was visibly getting frustrated, and Kale was itching to go help her but wasn’t sure how. With the sheer ease that Goku was holding himself with, it was clear that he was barely putting in any effort.

Her eyes widened as she watched Goku adopt an entirely different stance and started … jabbing Caulifa with his fingers and hitting her with his palms instead of his fists, “Ow. OW!” And yet Caulifa seemed to be feeling these hits even more than the previous ones. “What the fuck?! Why does that hurt so much?!” She backpedaled rapidly, and Goku switched his form again. All of a sudden he was practically dancing, his footwork much more fluid and his movements turning acrobatic. He ran forward to catch Caulifa and swung his body, pivoting and lashing out with his foot in a compass half-moon kick. Caulifa ducked it and rushed forward try to attack, but Goku merely followed it up with another one which Caulifa had to desperately block. She was still knocked away by it and landed on the ground a few feet away.

“Ane-san!” Kale yelled as she charged forward, but Goku was immediately in her face before she had even finished taking her first step. He thrust his palms forward as if he were doing a Kamehameha, but he only knocked her breath out and sent her rolling away.

Caulifa had managed to stand and rushed near her, panting as she kneeled next to the other Saiyan girl. “You okay?”

“Y-yeah.” Kale swallowed heavily, “He-He’s so good.”

He stood almost lazily as he regarded the two Saiyan girls, “You both are very strong.” He commented, and his eyes were serious despite his lazy-looking stance and lidded gaze, “You both have more power than almost every other Saiyan I’ve ever met, and definitely more than most other beings I’ve met… You’re strong… But you ain’t skilled.”

Caulifa ground her teeth together in growing anger, “Bullshit asshole! There’s no one who can beat me back home!”

He chuckled, “I’m sure that’s true. But like I said… you’re just strong. But because you’re strong, you’ve always been able to win. You’re both brawlers, which is at least understandable for Kale-chan since she’s so shy. But when you’re facing someone just as strong as you, brawling ain’t gonna help you win. And when you’re facing someone stronger?” He finished with a little shrug, “I’m sure you get the picture. You know plenty of good moves but not enough of em to not be repetitive. Mindless attacking against a more skilled opponent ain’t gonna work.”

“Shit!” Caulifa cursed, knowing he was right but not wanting to admit it. The proof was in the pudding, after all.

He grinned and took a stance, “For example…” His form blurred, and both girls squeaked as they were surrounded by hazy-looking images of Goku all around them. Caulifa panicked as one came dangerously close to kicking her in the head, but she was able to duck it and punch him in the stomach. She immediately overbalanced and almost fell over as her fist passed through nothing at all. “Wrong guess!”

“FUCK!” She screamed as a foot landed in the small of her back and knocked her to the ground.

Kale seized the opportunity, knowing for a fact that this had to be the real one. She lashed out with a kick and let out a squeak of fear when her leg was caught. He grinned at her and started to spin. She screamed as she started to feel uncomfortably dizzy and she couldn’t reorientate herself in time to land. She crashed into the rising Caulifa and sent the both of them sprawling in a pile of limbs. “S-Sorry A-A-Ane-san.” The world was swimming a bit before her vision cleared, and she clapped a hand to her mouth just in case she threw up. She would probably die on the spot of mortification if she ended up puking on her ane-san.

“D-Damn it all.” Caulifa groaned, half hugging her friend and half trying to get up again, “Nothings working damn it! He can’t be unbeatable!” She brushed her fingers through Kale’s hair, “Kale, you need to figure out Super Saiyan 2 and quick.” She huffed as the other girl blushed scarlet and helped her stand up.

“Come on, girls.” Goku chuckled, “Don’t think I’m gonna let you just lay there.”

“Grrrr…” Caulifa hopped to her feet and took off again, rushing the man who made her feel such conflicting emotions all tournament. “I’ll get you, Son Goku! One way or another!” She copied a combination that she had seen him use just moments ago, ending with a roundhouse kick that he evaded with a bit more effort.

“You really are good! You picked that up quick, Cauli!” Goku praised her, even as he grabbed her leg an unbalanced her. Only this time, she didn’t just fall to the ground. She twisted acrobatically and jumped, trying to wrap her other leg around his head. The end result being she was almost sitting on his shoulders.

“I’ve got you now!” She crowed as she raised her right arm and dropped a punishing elbow straight down on his skull. “GRK!” She groaned as she felt her arm go slightly numb, but just the tiny fact that she felt him rock a little bit sent a shiver down her spine. Clenching her trembling fist again, she raised her arm and tried to slam her elbow into him again, but he managed to throw her off. “No!” She yelled, doing her best to take him down with her, but he was just too strong.

“Owie!” Goku grumbled as he rubbed the sore spot on his head, “Damn, that was a good try, Cauli.”

“And I’m just going to keep getting better!” Caulifa called out with a smirk, raising her hand and forming a Ki ball which she fired at him.

He countered with his own, and the resulting explosion blew a dust cloud up, obscuring his vision of the two. “I can still sense your Ki even with this smokescreen, ya know.” He raised his hand and caught Caulifa’s kick, only for his eyes to widen at her cocky smirk.

“”