Archive of Our Own

So, what is love. Chemicals, Bulma argues, even as she cradles Trunks in her arms. Hormones designed to assure procreation. Love is patient, Krillin assures. It overcomes so many boundaries. Love is respect, 18 says, kissing her husband on top of his head. It's rash, Yamcha laments with a sigh as he watches his on-and-off-girlfriend marry the man who'd wanted or attempted to kill them all at some point.

Over the years, people have tried to explain to Goku what love is, starting at the first mention of it back when she studied under Master Roshi. The great philosopher Chenn had mused on about love in its many forms for endless pages, all of which Goku and Krillin had had to read.

People tell Goku that as a girl, she should crave love above all. It's her destiny to fall in love with someone and she'll have a kid and take care of it and nurture it – chemicals – and as long as she finds someone to spend a life with, happiness is guaranteed.

Things… didn't exactly work out that way.

“When we're older, you'll ask for my hand, right?” the young daughter of Gyumao had asked as Goku hopped onto Kinto'un. Her black hair was hidden underneath the pink helmet but it was the same shade of her own wild locks and Goku liked the color.

“I don't know what that means, but sure,” Goku replied and the resulting gleeful laughter followed her all the way up into the sky.

When the two ran into each other at the World Tournament when Goku had 'filled out' according to Master Roshi, she'd hardly recognized the young woman coming at her so fiercely. Over the past years training under Kami she'd had to find her balance again as her hips widened, her legs grew longer. She sorely missed her tail as a counterweight against the added weight of her breasts but she had all of these changes under control now. It led her to the first round of the World Tournament as a formidable warrior, facing a black-haired woman wearing a blue dress and a scowl on her face.

“You really don't remember me?” the woman asked, shifting into a ready stance. Goku studied her, first her form – her power didn't seem great and she favored her right side – before shifting to the woman herself. Her black hair, the same shade, was combed back in a ponytail and she did ring a bell, somewhere deep down below. Not enough to give a name to it, however.

“I'm sorry, I really don't,” Goku replied and the woman snapped.

“Let's just get to the fight, then!”

She sprang forward without warning and she was good. No wonder she'd made it to the finals, she was aggressive and quick, her technique suited against stronger opponents than her natural strength lent her. Goku didn't attack, she evaded, digging deep into her memory. Was this girl from West City? Muscle Tower? Her face wasn't as tanned as Goku's own, so she didn't till any fields or travel the world.

“I'm sorry, I really don't remember you!” Goku cried as she blocked and evaded, dancing around the ring. “Why won't you tell me your name?!”

“You'll have to defeat me, first!” the woman cried and launched another barrage. Well, that was easy, then. The woman was good, but Goku had a natural strength and eye for techniques that no one had given her, despite people claiming that she'd stolen many moves. Her repertoire did consist of things borrowed from many masters, each more powerful than the last. But wasn't that why they were masters for, to teach students?

Goku drew her hands back, pressed them into her sides, quickly gathered some energy and pushed it all out with one hand, lifting the woman clean off her feet and off the side of the ring. She slammed into the wall with a sickening crunch and Goku rushed over, squatting on the tiles to make sure she hadn't accidentally killed the woman.

“Are you alright?” she asked, but thankfully there was no smear of blood on the wall and the woman sat up, rubbing her head. “Will you tell me your name now?”

“Chi-chi, daughter of Gyumao,” the woman replied and it clicked. “Are you still going to ask for my hand?”

She'd made a promise, hadn't she? Back when she still had a tail and had never heard of the name 'Piccolo', not even in whispered conversation. Even if she didn't understand what that promise meant… But wait, she now had more resources to plunder about this kind of information.

“Krillin!” she shouted, turning around on her heels. “What does 'asking for my hand' mean?”

The crowd began to chitter and laughs broke out here and there. Krillin facepalmed and shouted back: “it means marriage, idiot!”

Oh, she'd heard about that one. People had asked her that all the time. Was she married? Where was her husband? Did her husband know that she's out in the wilderness? She'd assumed marriage was between a man and a woman but if Chi-chi thought they could get married, maybe that was okay.

“Alright,” Goku said, turning back to the woman now hoisting herself back up onto the ring. “I'll get married to you.”

The announcer just about had a conniption as he announced that Son Goku, the youngest finalist to ever grace the tiles of the World Tournament, was now engaged. To a woman. The crowd roared but not all of them did.

“Dude, you're a lesbian?” Krillin asked, gaze shifting from the woman hanging off Goku's arm back to the warrior herself.

“I guess,” Goku replied. Chi-chi was clinging tightly to her and it annoyed her, but she turned that frown onto Krillin instead. “Go all out on your next match, don't take your opponent lightly.”

“Sure,” Krillin said, but his mouth was still hanging open as Goku made her way to the wall where they could watch the tournament from up close.

Master Roshi had to be laid out on a stretcher for a bit because of blood loss when he found out that Goku got engaged to Chi-chi.

In the ensuing fight with Piccolo, the one which destroyed the stadium and sent the onlookers packing out of fear for their lives, Goku found the first inkling of what love meant to her. She'd been in many fights, some for life and limbs, some for information, some just to pass the time. But this was one that mattered, because people she cared about were involved and she was the strongest amongst them all.

XXX

For Piccolo, love is redemption.

XXX

Love was to sacrifice, Kami told her.

It was a big part of the reason Goku argued at length with Chi-chi that the warrior should carry the child, not the wife.

“I'm just as healthy as you are, Goku!” Chi-chi screeched, slamming the plastic lid of the container down onto the counter. “Maybe even more so! I didn't have a hole blasted into my chest!”

“The Senzu fixed that,” Goku retorted in a grumbling tone. “But I don't want to see you in any pain. I'm used to it, I can deal with it.” She hunched over the kitchen table, voice getting smaller. “I don't want you to die.”

“Because who else is gonna cook for you?” Chi-chi sneered but she was no longer screeching and slamming things around. “But Goku, there's so much you need to think of. You won't be able to train for five months and you could permanently damage your body.” She walked closer to the kitchen table and lifted Goku's chin up with her finger so her wife would have to look her in the eyes. “I don't know who you'll become if you can't be a fighter.”

Goku swallowed and she rose, taking Chi-chi's hand into her own two hands. “It'll be worth it if I don't have to see you suffer.”

The war was far from over but Goku won that round. Her stubbornness won out over Chi-chi's in the end and although needles were involved in the process, she didn't back down. Not even when the needles turned out to be long and thick and she needed to get a shot every single day. It only made her more determined to follow through because she had to spare her wife the pain. Chi-chi could handle it, but Goku simply didn't want her to.

Truth be told, she did waver when they introduced the needle as long as her forearm and she felt the nerve endings where her tail should be tingle when they told her they were going to stick it in her belly and suck out some of her eggs. Chi-chi had to undergo the same procedure if they wanted a baby which was a true mix of both of them, though. Luckily they only had to do it once, they could freeze the rest in case baby number one was followed by baby number two.

“You didn't squirm this much when you had all of your limbs broken,” Chi-chi observed. Goku smoothed the weird crinkly gown down over her legs but it wouldn't stay put. The hospital smelled like something rotten underneath a veneer of strong chemicals which made her nose itch.

“I know, but I was fighting back then,” Goku replied. She had learned to power through pain a long time ago but it took a different kind of courage to lay back and allow someone to hurt you. Every serious pain in her life had been things she'd chosen to do – from drinking the Holy Water to taking on General Tao, but they'd all been in the context of taking on a stronger foe, of bettering herself so she could defend someone. This would be one of the first times she was being selfish in her chosen pain and it gnawed at her.

“At least we'll be done at the same time, and then within a year we'll have our own baby. Can you even imagine it? A tiny little boy with your wild hair-”

“Or a girl with your hands,” Goku said, getting up from the bed and grabbing the hands of her wife. She ran her rough fingers over the relatively scar-free skin and sat next to Chi-chi on the hospital bed, which still smelled like spleen juice even though it shone white in the bright sunlight streaming through the window. On any other day Goku would be outside but this time she was going to be sedated, and she hated the thought of losing control. Every time she fell unconscious, bad things happened. She killed her grandpa, got her dragonball stolen by King Piccolo, so she certainly wasn't looking forward to that part.

“You look ridiculous in that gown, by the way,” Chi-chi said with a smile in her voice. Goku plucked once more at the stupid thing before poking Chi-chi in the thigh.

“You're wearing one too.”

“Yeah, but I look good in a dress. They don't fit you.” Goku crinkled her nose.

“I don't even own a dress.” Chi-chi poked right back.

“Yes you do. I bought one for you a couple of months ago.” Goku tried to picture the clothes in her wardrobe but could mostly come up with orange. “For the feast at my father's castle?” Chi-chi said, although it was more of a statement than a question. “The one where I present you as my wife to the kingdom.”

“Will there be roast pig?” Goku replied and Chi-chi started muttering under her breath. Goku, by now familiar with these habits of her wife, mentally once again went over the conversation to see where she'd gone wrong. It took her a few moments, but she steered the conversation in a different direction. “What color dress did you buy?”

Chi-chi stopped muttering and ran a hand through Goku's hair. “A red one. And it's not tight and you can move in it, although you will have to wear a regular bra instead of a sports bra. And yes, there'll be a whole roast pig.”

Goku swallowed the saliva pooling underneath her tongue away at the thought of a feast like that. She'd been ordered not to eat after the last shot she'd received last night. Her head snapped to the doorway right before the nurse entered and the hunger in her stomach turned into a nasty hole.

“We're ready for you, Ms. and Ms. Son.”

Goku got ready to offer up her body so someone she'd meet in nine months could have a chance at life, and Kami smiled down at the thoughts circling around Goku's mind as he watched her freak out at the anesthesiologist when he had to dose her five times the recommended amount. The defender of the world was not easy to put under.

XXX

To love was to take care of someone, Dende thought. To heal them when you could.

The door opened prematurely, spilling the blinding white light from the inside of the Hyperbolic Time Chamber into the dark corridor. Night had claimed the Lookout and the ones who were waiting for the pair to emerge had retreated to their respective homes to get in a few hours of relationship time before Cell destroyed the world.

The staggering footsteps alerted Piccolo that something was amiss. He had been 'meditating' on the outskirts of the Lookout – dozing because there was little else to do – but his ears were attuned to the sound of snores from the lone occupant of the Lookout besides himself. When something broke that tranquility, he rushed down to the source of the white light.

Goku's energy weaved its way across the pillars, as unrestrained as ever, but there was a new energy  intertwined with the golden Ki, one that Piccolo had never sensed before.

“Oh, hey Piccolo,” Goku greeted when the Namekian finally had the warrior in his sight. “Could you get Dende? I might need him.”

Things clicked into place when Piccolo spotted the enormous belly hiding underneath the stretch material of the blue suit the Saiyan had worn when she went into the chamber. There was a wet patch on her left thigh and a thin sheet of sweat was visible on her brow. She grimaced and her Ki spiked for half a minute before leveling out. The fresh energy inside her belly was getting tumultuous and it was already so strong it'd eclipse the Ki of a normal human warrior.

“How did you get pregnant while you were in there?” Piccolo asked. Surely Gohan hadn't… no. That was too alien to think about for the Namekian.

“I already was before I got in,” Goku answered. She began to walk down the corridor and Piccolo followed, unsure whether he should hurry and get her to a hospital – that was what humans did, right? Give birth in those places? - or let Goku set the pace. After all, she'd done it before. Then again, it was Goku. She knew so little about the learned world, she just followed her intuition and somehow it had worked out for her.

So far, Piccolo had done a bang up job keeping far away from any pregnancies and babies, but now it got dumped into his lap as if it was a problem he could solve. Not that Dende would fare any better, he knew, if possible, even less about mammalian reproduction.

Goku wandered into the nearest room containing a cot and squatted against the wall, head hanging low. Her breath hitched, her energy spiked and Piccolo flinched at the severity of it. She was on the verge of Super Saiyan and her brow was knit in obvious pain. Was that supposed to happen?

“Just – stay there,” Piccolo told her and did his utter best not to run in his search for Dende. The small guardian blinked up at him from his sprawl on his bed when Piccolo threw the door to the room open.

“So, Goku's in labor,” Piccolo announced. Dende's puzzled look lasted a few seconds before he remembered that humans and Saiyans gave live birth instead of the much cleaner and faster process of making an egg and spitting it out, imprinting it with instructions and memories if necessary.

“What can I do?” Dende asked and Piccolo dug deep down into his memory and could only remember the tiny deer he'd seen born in the woods.

“Make sure she doesn't bleed to death,” was all he could come up with. He quickly turned around as Dende began to sputter at that statement. The guardian rushed past Piccolo towards the new energy spike and the first grunt of pain.

They should really find a human who had some idea what was going to happen, because this was one thing no Senzu would be able to fix. Piccolo briefly wondered what effect the Hyperbolic Time Chamber would have on an unborn baby before Dende once again ran past.

“We're going to need towels and hot water and food!” Dende called. Another devastating spike erupted from the room Goku had holed up in. 'We?' Piccolo might have basically lived at the Son residence for the past three years, he had absolutely no desire to witness Goku give birth. With spikes coming that fast and hard it wouldn't be long before one of the humans showed up and they could shoulder the burden this time.

But he couldn't leave Dende to deal with this on his own, the kid was already panicking with Goku barely in labor. Or was she further along than she appeared? The spikes were pretty rapid but then again, just a few moments ago Goku had appeared all casual and cheery.

Against his better judgment he put on the kettle and grabbed the stash of rags Mr. Popo used to let the tiles of the lookout really shine. Where was the guy, anyway?

When he made his way to the room he saw that Goku was laying flat on her back on the cot, pressing fingers against her sternum. She was staring at the ceiling, her gaze intense and a storm of wild Ki raging around her. It dropped flat seconds later and she held up two fingers for the Namekian to see.

“That's two, right?” she asked for some reason.

“It is,” Piccolo confirmed, dropping the rags and kettle onto the bare-bone table. The room Goku had  chosen was nothing but a spare bedroom, abandoned because not a lot of people lived on the Lookout and it had subsequently been used as a storage space. The cot was made of wood and had, in some ancient times, been covered with a mattress. The table lacked a chair and was stained with mysterious circles and the entire room went without a working bathroom.

And it was a good thing Goku had chosen this one, because they could scrape out the contents and burn it all.

“Okay good, almost there,” the Saiyan said and resumed her unusual focus, staring up at the ceiling. How exactly fingers on a ribcage correlated with progress was beyond Piccolo, but he knew a few things about Saiyans. Without a word he walked over and raised a hand over the laboring woman, picturing the garish orange clothes she usually wore. He remembered just in time to leave some room for the giant belly before he switched her soiled clothes out for her usual outfit.

“I've made some soup!” Dende called and ran into the room, nearly tripping over his own feet.

“Thanks,” Goku replied, letting her gaze slide from Piccolo to Dende. She began to get up but she was so wobbly and awkward that Dende offered his hands to her after putting the soup down on the table. It was still steaming hot so Goku paced around, pausing only to lean her hands against the wall and bend forward, releasing a shuddering breath before the storm turned on again. Red-tinted Ki washed all around her in an uncoordinated pattern but she didn't cry out like before. It lasted longer than a minute and judging by the screwed up face, it hurt.

When Goku shut down her aura she grabbed the offered bowl and drank it all down before she resumed her pacing. Piccolo still had no idea what to do with the rest of the hot water and how the rags would come into play so he just stood there, eventually crossing his arms because there was little else to do but wait for some kind of instructions. He loathed not knowing and situations like these were nightmare fuel, but there were still no humans to offload the responsibility onto. He didn't exactly have a duty of care for Goku but he didn't want Gohan to lose one of her mothers because Piccolo didn't assist during her labor.

“Won't be long now,” Goku said, her voice higher than it should be. “I'll be going into transition soon and after that I can start pushing.”

“We don't know what any of that means!” Piccolo exploded, adding a grumble at the end. Goku couldn't reply in time, she was gripped by another of those raging storms, this one lasting longer and gaining even more in power before suddenly dropping down. She'd already bled through the fresh pair of pants Piccolo had gifted her.

“Right,” Goku finally said, lowering herself down onto the cot before she sprang up again. She jiggled her left leg for a bit and Piccolo gritted his teeth not to beat the answer out of her. The Saiyan was in enough pain as it was but if she didn't start explaining…

“Means I'll lose my mind for a bit before I can finally deliver the baby.”

“Lose your mind – how?” Piccolo asked, shifting in front of Dende.

“Last time I wanted to go home so I climbed onto the windowsill, but I already was at home. Chi-chi had to talk me down. I might get confused like that again.”

Piccolo relaxed his own gathering energy levels and gripped his arms tighter. He really was going to have to beat the answers out of Goku, wasn't he? “So stop you from swandiving off the Lookout, got it.”

“What happens during the rest of your labor, Goku?” Dende interjected. The Saiyan slowly shifted her gaze from Dende to Piccolo, saw the same expression of panicked interest on both their faces and gulped.

“I think I-” Goku dropped down into a squat and roared in earnest, startling Dende. Maybe they had a book in one of the libraries about mammalian birth, maybe even about human birth. Piccolo had overheard snatches of it when Gohan had read out loud from his biology textbook but those snippets of information had never been relevant for Piccolo to retain, so he simply didn't.

“Gonna have to call Chi-chi or Krillin,” Goku panted once whatever was happening to her had died down. She sat down and began to unlace her boots, working around the large belly as if she'd done it quite often. And she probably had, because something like that didn't pop up out of nowhere. Well, for Gohan it hadn't, but for Piccolo…

“We don't exactly have a working telephone,” Piccolo reminded her.

“Maybe we can get through to her via King Kai,” Goku said, now wriggling her toes while simultaneously jiggling her legs. She began to pace again, bare feet slapping against the tiles in a rhythm.

“You want to bother the Kai of the entire northern quadrant because you couldn't be bothered to think ahead?” Piccolo replied in a low tone. Goku whirled around, stalked up to him and poked him in the chest. She reeked of blood and sweat and ozone.

“He does stuff like that to me all the time. Can't read a jokebook without him butting in. He owes me a few favors. I'm gonna contact him.”

She sank down onto the cot once more and stayed there this time. She attempted to cross her legs but a full body shiver made her plant her feet down. Goku closed her eyes and settled into a deep breathing pattern. A minute or two passed and the … labor issues began anew, making Goku's energy ripple and blaze out in a wide arc. She made a valiant attempt to breathe through it but the last ten seconds overpowered her resolve, making her cry out.

“Goku,” Piccolo finally snapped. “There's no help coming, you can either teleport yourself to your wife or finally tell us what you need before you die on us. Again.”

“Is she-” Dende began but Piccolo shut that down with a sharp “no, she's not going to die.”

“I can't!” Goku yelled, jumping to her feet and the pacing began anew. She gestured wildly as she spoke. “I can't focus on her, on King Kai, I'm too far along, can't use Kinto'un to get home, it'll take too long and can he even hold on to a baby if it isn't pure? Don't have a phone, the others are asleep or dead, did Cell kill them in their sleep? Why would he do that? We still have five more days until the Games even begin and the only reason I got back in the chamber was so I could give Chi-chi another kid before Cell kills me-”

Piccolo had heard enough. He reared back and planted a satisfactory punch into Goku's face. The woman's back slammed against the wall and she left a Goku-shaped indentation in the plaster. She was going to repair that later on, when she was no longer bleeding through her pants at an alarming rate.

“Mr. Piccolo!” Dende gasped, rushing over to Goku as she slowly slid down. The Saiyan hung her head down low and took a deep, shuddering breath. She held that for ten, fifteen seconds before she slowly let it out, Dende fussing over her the entire time.

“Get up, Saiyan, and tell us what to do,” Piccolo commanded. So this was Goku losing her mind, huh. It could be a lot worse, she hadn't attempted to make a break for it yet. Piccolo would have to actually beat her down in case that happened, labor or no labor. Right now the Namekian was the stronger of the two, or at the very least, the more focused one.

Goku cracked her neck – just to antagonize his sensitive hearing, no doubt – before wiping the spittle from her lips.

“More food,” she started, before her eyes moved up and to the left, clearly accessing her memories from the previous time this happened. “Cold compress, a bed or something to lie on, oh, and gloves.”

“Yes, because gloves fit me so very well,” Piccolo replied, holding up his hands, long, pointy fingernails and all.

“I'll go get all that! Mr. Piccolo, please keep an eye on her,” Dende replied simultaneously with Piccolo, marching out of the room with new purpose. Goku worked herself to all fours and the storm began. The longer it went on, the more the red-tinted aura turned yellow. Sweat dripped from her brow and when it was over she sagged down and it was a pathetic sight. It reminded Piccolo too much of the Super Saiyan doggedly fighting android 19 while having a heart attack. She'd slumped to the ground much the same way, betrayed by her own body.

“Get up, Goku,” Piccolo said, pulling the Saiyan to her feet, but Goku pulled away and dropped back down to the ground.

“This's better,” she slurred. She put her forehead against the cold tiles and heaved a deep sigh of relief.

“It's pathetic,” Piccolo muttered and nimbly dodged a kick aimed at his shins. Goku grumbled at the miss and got her leg back underneath herself just in time for another full body shiver to hit.

“Shut up I've been at this for eighteen hours, nurse said I should rest whenever I can.” The words came quick but the mind boggled, stuck on the statement of fact.

Eighteen hours? How – why – who on earth would -

“What for?” Piccolo growled, wrestling his involuntary expression of shock back under control. Goku had spotted it, however, and there was a definite grin on her face which made the Namekian want to place a swift kick under the ass sitting right in range.

“My body's gotta widen, Piccolo. Can't cough up a baby without some preparation.” Piccolo was determined never to find out what exactly needed to widen. Goku's grin disappeared and she looked over her shoulder. “But could you go wash your hands, really, really thorough? If we're gonna do this-” Piccolo snorted at all this 'we' business, he didn't exactly have a choice in this matter - “then… I kinda don't want to die of an infection. Cell would be pretty pissed, I think.”

Piccolo glanced at his nails and did see an edge of black underneath the white. Ignoring Dende's request to stay with the Saiyan he whirled around and headed for the nearest bathroom. Goku had weathered this for the better part of a day, she could deal with it on her own for a few minutes.

When he returned Dende had done a bang up job of preparing the room a little better. The cot was now covered in an old mattress along with some fresh linen. Mr. Popo would be disappointed when he found out they'd ruined the new sheets but Piccolo was still determined to incinerate everything in the room. The table was laden with tissues, water, ice, protein bars and chocolate and towels. A brown bag filled with Senzu lay apart from the mishmash of items Piccolo couldn't see the purpose of yet.

Goku had claimed the cot, now more properly called a bed, but she was still on hands and knees and screaming now as whatever the labor was doing to her did its thing. When it was over she rolled onto her side, getting her breath back. Dende gently sponged the sweat off her brow with a concerned expression on his face.

“This is normal, right?” he asked once Goku had regained some of her strength. Piccolo stood guard at the entrance, no idea what to do. There'd been no book about giving birth as far as his hurried search through the library could turn up. Eighteen hours of labor. Why would Goku do that to herself? Why would any human or Saiyan female do that to themselves?

“Yeah, pretty normal,” Goku replied. Her voice was growing rougher but it was still high-pitched with pain. Piccolo couldn't have been gone for more than twenty minutes but it seemed that things were moving fast now. Goku had kicked off her pants and Piccolo resigned himself to the fact that if he was going to help, he'd have to get even more up close and personal than he'd ever had the desire to do. Then again, he'd killed her. There was little more personal than that. Maybe karma had finally come around and get him to bring some life into the world instead of helping it out of it.

“Want some water? Soup? Anything?” Dende asked and Goku opted for water. Her hand shook as she took the glass but her grip was still sure and her power level was steady. Goku closed her eyes and laid on her back, once again putting one hand against her breastbone and she waited. Along with her pants she'd lost the orange top and had her blue shirt shoved above the bulge of her belly. The next storm came and to Piccolo's horror Goku both whimpered pathetically and he could see her belly ripple.

“Half a finger,” Goku breathed once the storm had passed. She groaned as she somehow managed to work herself to her feet and she once again began to pace. “Okay, okay, I can do this,” Piccolo heard her mutter to herself. “Almost there, won't be as bad as the last time.”

Dende poured a fresh glass of water and regarded the pacing woman curiously. “What happened last time?” he asked.

“Contractions took thirty hours and the drugs the nurse gave me to speed it up didn't work. Probably cause I'm a Saiyan but we didn't know that back then. At least things are moving faster. Although,” Goku gave a mighty groan as she put her hands in the small of her back and attempted to crack her spine, “the pain is just as bad. Can't believe I forgot that.”

“You forgot? You're pushing a kid out of a hole the size of a grape and it's thanks to you I even know it is that size!” Piccolo snapped.

“Sorry?” Goku said with a puzzled look on her face. “Won't be long now,” she assured them, and perhaps herself as well. At least the focused look replaced the mask of pain she'd worn earlier. She jiggled her legs at every step and rubbed the small of her back in rhythmic strokes, kneading the muscles every now and then.

“And how do you know that?” Piccolo demanded. Goku lifted one finger.

“Only half a finger – hold on,” she said, dropping down low and grunting like an animal (or a Saiyan powering up to max) as the pain gripped her. Piccolo stepped back from the definitely yellow aura and waited for the twitch into her superpowered state but it didn't happen. Dende rushed forward with a fresh washcloth when it had passed. Goku took a moment to regain her bearings.

“If I can't fit any more fingers I'll be ready to push. The baby is already in the birth canal, that's what's been happening the last eighteen – nineteen now – hours. And that's when you're gonna have to tell me to push, Piccolo.”

The Namekian stared at her. “I will do no such thing,” he replied. Contractions, birth canal, he felt like he needed a dictionary to understand what Goku was talking about. And it was Goku. The woman didn't have the most advanced vocabulary in the world and she was likely to greet the king with a casual wave and a 'hey'. Hell, she greeted gods like that.

“The faster I push, the faster I'll be out of your hair,” Goku said. Piccolo leaned closer to the Saiyan and smirked.

“Push!” he said in a bland voice and Goku threw him an annoyed glare and tried to find something to throw at him but there were just tiles where she was at. It did spur her back to her feet and back onto the bed. The strain of continuous pain was now really beginning to show itself and slowly the prattle between these contractions Goku mentioned ceased as her focus drew inward. It took another fifteen minutes of on-and-off-again pain before she could no longer fit a finger between sternum and the top of her belly.

“Okay let's do this,” she said, her voice growing hoarser as she'd screamed at the peak of every storm. Piccolo was already nursing a headache but he guessed it was going to get much worse before this was over.

Goku gained a glint in her eyes Piccolo usually only saw in battle, and he'd been the cause of one of  those times. It was do or die, all or nothing, Goku facing an opponent she wasn't sure she'd be able to beat but she sure as hell was going to try because what else was there to live for? Piccolo didn't know how the Saiyan could punch childbirth in the face but if there was a way to do it in this universe, she'd find it, learn it and then outdo the master.

She squatted on top of the bed and leaned against the wall. As an afterthought she tore off the utterly useless panties she still wore and they went flying somewhere.

Dende snuck a glance towards Piccolo and the larger Namekian stepped forward. He couldn't leave it all up to the young guardian, he'd done enough already. Not that Piccolo was going to sponge Goku's forehead but at the very least he could command her to “Push, Goku.”

And the Saiyan did, closing her eyes and gritting her teeth, the tendons in her neck standing out. The aura had shrunk to just a glow around her, but so intense it was like a tiny Solar Flare. When the urge had passed she took a few deep breaths. She opened her eyes and they bled from teal to black.

“No no no it's not right,” Goku said, sitting back down on the bed. With the nimbleness she usually possessed she rolled off it and sat against the wall. “Piccolo get over here,” she said, pointing right in front of her. When he hesitated, she used the tone of voice she only used mid-battle when shit got serious. “Now.” She panted, then continued. “I'm going to -ngh- lean against the wall and you're going to catch it. Make sure I don't fall.”

It was all the instruction Piccolo got before Goku squatted against the wall, the thick cords of muscle in her thighs working hard to keep her in that position and she once again began to push. Piccolo knelt in front of her, got an eyeful of Saiyan crotch and oh sweet Kami-who-he'd-fused-with the opening began to bulge out.

“Oh my-” he heard Dende exclaim behind him and Piccolo mentally added a lot more curses behind that exclamation. Only one way out, now.

“Push!” Piccolo yelled, because the bulge was receding again. Goku bellowed but the baby stayed in. “Push, damn you!”

“Can't!” Goku finally screamed and sat back down. “Only. During. Contraction.”

“You're not moving your energy down enough,” Piccolo observed and this time the teal in Goku's eyes stayed longer.

“I know that!” Goku snapped but then sighed. “I know that. Failed at it last time too,” she said. It took a minute at the most before she sprang back into position and screamed her heart out again. This time her hair flickered into gold, black, gold, black. At least she didn't grit her teeth and screwed up her eyes but it wasn't the progress Piccolo wanted out of her. He knew she could do so much better.

“Mr. Piccolo,” Dende said haltingly, holding a small glass for Goku to sip on once she sat back down. “Maybe you could… move the energy down for her?”

That was exactly what Piccolo was going to do during the next contraction. He rested one clawed hand against the stretched skin of the pregnant belly and felt the life of the kid inside pulsing back against his cautious prodding. The wild energy of a Super Saiyan still coursed through Goku and this time she'd flip over the edge, Piccolo sensed it. He only had to redirect it downwards because she didn't have the necessary grip on the energy. She'd always been a powerhouse, used to taking energy from others and multiplying it within her own body. But this was the fine art of energy manipulation in its smallest form. Given time, she'd learn to master these contractions and direct them to where they had to end up. Even humans learned how to do that in a short amount of time. But Piccolo wasn't going to sit here, bathing in the Saiyan's screams and curses until she deigned it necessary to learn.

“Do it,” Goku said and the Namekian was eerily reminded of the last time the Saiyan had given him a command like that. Back then he'd blasted a hole through her chest.

He put both hands on her belly while she scrambled upwards and flipped over into her Super state before the contraction even began. The increase in power meant there was so much more to work with and Piccolo quickly grabbed hold of it all and told it to push down, work with the gravity, expel the child. Goku threw her head back and roared, expounding the headache behind Piccolo's eyes. It was the kind of roar she uttered when she was injured badly, when nothing but pain consumed her entire being.

The head of the baby emerged amidst a gulf of blood and white fluid and hung there limply. It was one of the weirdest things Piccolo had ever seen – Goku, the being he'd loved to hate until they both had bigger fish to fry, was right in front of him with an actual head hanging out of her.

Goku's belly rippled once again as the contraction wasn't over yet. One shoulder popped free but then Goku had to stop. Piccolo was tempted to reach up and wriggle the child free but the brief respite didn't make the kid slide back in. As far as he could see it wasn't breathing yet. Goku stayed in her Super state and at the next contraction Piccolo planted one hand against her belly but it wasn't even necessary because the other shoulder popped free and the baby slid out. Goku still screamed and there was a fresh gush of blood coming along with the baby.

“Catch it catch it catch it!” Goku yelled and before Piccolo realized what had happened he was holding a handful of squirming, bloody Saiyan baby covered in a white-yellow substance the Namekian never wanted to find out what it was made of. His first instinct was to drop the slimy thing on the ground, especially when it shuddered, clenched its little fists and began to wail at the perfect pitch to annoy sensitive Namekian hearing.

Goku sagged against the wall, dropped out of Super Saiyan and Dende fussed over her, wiping the sweat off her brow with a washcloth. Piccolo kept staring at the baby, unsure what to do or what to say or how he was ever going to get his hands clean again.

“What is it?” Goku asked, voice hoarse but at a much, much lower volume than the final roar which was still ringing in Piccolo's ears.

Piccolo answered with the first thing that came to mind. “A baby.” It still wailed, but there were no tears. For the love of all that was holy, there was a thick, pulsing cord coming out of its middle and it was still attached to Goku's insides. His own insides churned and he barely heard Dende chuckle.

“I think Goku meant – is it a boy or a girl?” Dende said. The Saiyan stared intently at Piccolo.

Oh right, that kind of thing mattered to them. Quickly he checked between its legs. External genitalia, so- “A boy,” he said.

“Don't let him get too cold, Piccolo,” Dende suggested and Piccolo grabbed some of the towels laying nearby, swaddling the child in them before he handed the baby over to its mother. The cord went with her and left a long, bloody stripe on her sunken down belly.

Goku's eyes lit up as she finally held her prize, the thing she'd been working on for so long. She wiped some stuff from the baby's nose and mouth and the strongest warrior on earth, perhaps the galaxy, cooed at the infant.

“Bet you're hungry,” she said. Goku had never been a discreet one so she folded her blue shirt up even higher and for some reason put her nipple in the baby's mouth. Right. Mammals. Kind of there in the job description. The baby still wailed, even as it drank, until Goku unwrapped the child and put its gory skin on her own. Then it slowly stilled and Piccolo felt the ache behind his eyes ease a little.  

Goku leaned her head back against the wall and blew out a breath which seemed to originate from the tips of her toes. A pool of blood was spreading out from underneath her and Dende gasped when   he spotted it.

He already had his outstretched hands over her belly when Goku grabbed his hands with her free one. “No, no, not yet,” she said. Piccolo turned wide eyes on her. This wasn't over? Was she going to have twins? Her belly had been big, but not big enough to house two of them.

“But you're still bleeding!” he cried. Goku looked between her legs.

“Not that much,” she said and Piccolo couldn't suppress a snort at that statement. Leave it to the Saiyan to argue about not getting healed after she just tore herself open from front to back by the looks of it. Maybe directing the entire gulf of energy generated by a Super Saiyan transformation downward hadn't been the safest idea – but it sure as hell had been the fastest.

“I still got to pass the afterbirth,” Goku said. “Piccolo, do that trick again.” Her voice was strained but at least she wasn't screaming anymore. Grumbling under his breath at being commanded like that he moved over to her, put a hand on her and waited. From this up close the baby was an ugly thing, the color of its skin so different from Goku's the father might as well have been an Ice-jin. Its skin was wrinkled and the head had an abnormal shape. The baby was definitely a Saiyan, though, because the brown tail was hard to miss, the tufts of hair were black and the eyes were as black as the vacuum of space.

Goku did her best to assist Piccolo during the next contraction but with the birth of the baby it seemed a lot of fight had been drained out of her. So he simply grabbed what available energy there was and forced the contraction down, following the curve of her deflated belly until Goku hissed a curse and the other end of the cord still attaching baby to mother slid out.

“I don't even want to know what that is,” Piccolo said and averted his eyes from the bloody jellyfish-like substance.

“Could you cut the cord?” Goku asked as Piccolo made motions to get out of the way to let Dende work his healing magic on the severely destroyed genitalia of a certain Saiyan. Piccolo obliged, activating the smallest blast he could manage and he cauterized it at the same time.

Dende pushed past the Namekian as soon as he stepped back. He had half a mind to leave the scene and find a cool place to go lie down for a few hours and start the process of repressing these memories forever. Dende knelt in between Goku's legs and after a short pause put his hands above her crotch. The lines of pain edged into Goku's face lessened and she focused on the baby, counting its fingers and toes, running the tail between two fingers. She put a hand on its head and closed her eyes, no doubt getting familiar with the kid's Ki. It was quite strong – it'd be a formidable fighter. The babe was no longer drinking but just resting. Goku pried open one eyelid and the baby began to wail anew, making Dende wince.

“Sorry,” Goku muttered and stroked soothingly over the baby's back, feeling the spine as she did.

“It's healthy?” Piccolo asked, not even sure why he wanted to know. Its skin still looked quite purplish to him, a stark contract against Goku's tan one.

“Looks like,” Goku replied, relief evident in her voice. She lifted its head a bit and let it flop to her chest. The kid's arms and legs flew out and the grin on Goku's face only grew, her eyes regaining the sparkle it should have.

“Could you tell Gohan? I think he'd like to meet his little brother...”

Dende uttered a sound of protest. “This'll take a while to heal, Goku! I'm...” he hesitated, his skin purpling as he blushed, “not that familiar with this part of your anatomy and you managed to tear yourself open from here,” he jabbed a finger at the bottom of the baby bulge, shrinking by the minute, “all the way to your … butt.”

“Yeah, I'm never having Piccolo assist during labor again,” Goku remarked in a light tone, her voice still hoarse. “I mean I know, demons are supposed to eat babies but he tried to tear you right out of me, right, Goten?”

The baby, apparently named Goten, didn't reply.

“Next time you show up pregnant, I'm punting you off the Lookout,” Piccolo retorted. Goku began to properly clean the baby and Piccolo decided that his pupil needed him more than Dende did. It'd been about one and a half hour since Goku had shown up on the Lookout, so in Gohan's reality three weeks had passed since he last saw anybody. Piccolo hurried down to the Hyperbolic Time Chamber and the relieved face of his student when he saw who'd entered made the past few hours a bit less traumatizing.

“Mr. Piccolo!” Gohan yelled across the large, empty white space. He was a Super Saiyan – when had that happened - so his hurried flight to the side of the Namekian only took the blink of an eye.

“Is everything alright? Mom said it could take months in here but it's been three weeks and...” Gohan's nostrils flared and his gaze traveled to the blood-soaked hands. His face drained of all color and Piccolo cursed himself for not taking a moment to wash his hands at the very least. A day more or less didn't matter to Gohan now.

“It's fine, they're both fine.” Well, they would be by the time Gohan turned up. Piccolo didn't want to think what would've happened to Goku if she'd gone to a human hospital. That tear had been bad and the pained roar still echoed in his mind.

“Oh, thank goodness,” Gohan said, blowing out a sigh. Piccolo swiftly moved to the sink and did his best to get rid of the cloying smell of blood and who knows what else covering his hands. He should burn his entire outfit, probably.

“Can I come meet the baby?” Gohan asked timidly and in response Piccolo threw open the door to the regular world. With a grateful look at his mentor the kid darted out and Piccolo had to lean around the door to shout after him.

“Power down!”

When he arrived back at the room, after another powerwash in the bathroom, Gohan was holding the baby and was the one cooing over it. Goku was back in bed and a lot of color had returned to her face. Goten was rid of the white-yellow stuff but was still purple and ugly. Now it was Dende's turn to drink something and the Guardian gulped down as if he'd made a trip through the desert. Healing took a lot out of him, especially things he had never healed before. Piccolo only had a vague sense how the young adult did it in the first place – he was a warrior type, not a healing type.

“I think 'Goten' fits him,” Gohan said. He put his calloused fingers against his brother's palm and the tiny fingers gripped it out of reflex and the look on Gohan's face made Piccolo look away. It was too intimate a moment to intrude upon, so of course Krillin chose to ruin it.

The tiny man skidded to a halt at the doorway and began to stutter and stammer in that 'I can't believe what I'm seeing' kind of way which had always annoyed Piccolo. Things were or they weren't, there was no sense in denying what the eyes were seeing.

“No way!” Krillin exclaimed, stepping over the threshold. “Is that a baby? When… Just… Goku, are you okay?”

Finally the human chose a thing to focus on and he sped to the side of the bed. Goku beamed at her best friend. “Yeah! Dende healed me and I already feel so much better! It's not at all like last time.” She threw a big fat wink at the Namekian. “If being a Guardian doesn't work out, you can become the best midwife on Earth!”

Dende gave a small smile in return. “I don't think I want to make a career out of this, Goku.”

The young adult probably also needed a dark room to rest for a bit after this ordeal. Piccolo at least had a little more experience with the weird way these mammals reproduced and had an inkling what to expect, although the truth had been a lot more bloody and headache-inducing than he'd ever thought.

Krillin then turned his attention to the baby, whose eyes were open and he was studying Gohan's face, his fingers still clasped around Gohan's single digit. Krillin looked from the baby to Goku and back.

“Jeeze, did you clone yourself, Goku?” he remarked. “She looks just like you!”

“It's a boy,” Gohan corrected in a soft voice. The newborn's eyes drooped closed and fine lines appeared on the face as it once again began to cry. The young Saiyan looked helplessly at Piccolo for guidance but this time he had nothing to give. Goku stretched out her arms and with a sense of relief Gohan handed the kid back to its mother.

“What's his name?” Krillin asked, stepping closer and peering at the baby. He jerked backwards when Goku rolled up her t-shirt again and popped out the other breast. “Do you have to do that right in front of us?” Krillin whined and Goku shrugged.

“It's what they were made for.”

“Yeah, but… it's not… you.” The human couldn't put into words what he was trying to say and Gohan was looking anywhere but at his mother. He shuffled away from the bed and Piccolo was inclined to follow him.

“I breastfed Gohan,” Goku objected. Dende had healed her voice as well and it was as petulant as ever.

“Could've gone my whole life without knowing that, mom,” Gohan said. He'd continued his awkward sideways shuffle and was now by the desk, his back turned to the duo.

“What I meant was,” Krillin continued, “I never pictured you doing… that. Being a mother. Feeding a kid with your own body.”

“It's unusual,” Dende agreed, but Piccolo wasn't sure whether he meant their alien biology or the fact that it was Goku that was the one doing it.

The Saiyan's gaze slid from the baby to Piccolo to her firstborn. “I am a mother,” she said, but Krillin shook his head.

“No, you don't fuss over the kid, you don't kiss boo-boos and you don't stay awake until Gohan is safely back home again. Chi-chi's the mother, you're… Goku.”

Goku shifted the newborn into a more comfortable position without even a glance downwards. Goten didn't make a sound as he was jostled, but the movement drew the attention of Krillin, whether he wanted to or not.

“So?” Goku asked simply. “Gohan can take care of himself – I did when I was six! And a Saiyan gets stronger every time he gets injured.”

“Point in case,” Krillin replied, making a sweeping gesture with his hand. Goku grumbled a bit as she'd walked right into that one but she repeated her question.

“So?” she challenged this time, scowling at her lifelong friend. “What's it matter?”

“It matters because I don't expect you to whip out your boob right in front of all of us and feed the baby, whose name I still don't know!”

“It's Goten,” Gohan supplied and Krillin whirled around on his heels.

“Thank you!” he shouted. He resumed his shouting. “Good name! But it's not going to make much difference because you just gave birth and the Cell Games are five days away and we're all gonna die, including that kid!”

Gohan's face fell dramatically but Goku began to grin.

“Could you be a little quieter, Krillin?” Dende asked in a soft voice before either of them could speak. “We've already got a headache because Goku's childbirth wasn't… as tranquil as the birth of a Namekian.”

As usual, Dende chose the softest expression he could find but Gohan gasped and put one hand in front of his mouth, his eyes wide. “I forgot… you guys come out of eggs, right? Did… did you know what was going to happen?” A moment of silence stretched out languidly in the eternal sun shining down on the Lookout before Gohan whirled around and stalked closer to his mom. “I told you you should've let me help you!”

“No,” Piccolo interjected in a sharp tone. “This wasn't for you to help with, Gohan. I wouldn't wish that bloody mess on anybody. Now, Goku, what is your plan for recovering on time? Or are you fully recovered already?”

The Saiyan gave a hearty chuckle and shook her head. Goten had apparently finished because Goku pulled him off and swaddled him back up, rocking him a bit in her arms. She covered herself up again. “Takes about a month before I'm back to normal,” she said. “And then I can start training again.”

A month, maybe longer, in five days. There was only one possibility.

“Back into the Hyperbolic Time Chamber?” Gohan guessed with some dejection in his voice and Goku nodded. She beckoned Krillin closer to her and handed him the baby. He accepted it but held it like it was a live bomb, apprehension apparent on his face.

“And the sooner we finish up, the better,” Goku said. She flung the covers off herself and Krillin nearly dropped the kid as he slapped a hand over his eyes. Gohan went a bit red in the face but was far more used to her nakedness – hell, he'd just spent over a year inside and Goku wasn't known for her modesty.

Piccolo smirked. “Abandoning the kid already, Goku?”

“It's just for a few hours in this world,” she replied. She located the pants she'd wormed out of and grimaced at the bloodstain but pulled them on nonetheless. “He's already falling asleep and I'll be back before he even wakes up.”

Gohan opened his mouth to say something, looking from Goku to Goten and back. “But my biology textbook said that, well, if you don't breastfeed, you'll stop… producing.”

The full-blooded Saiyan stopped lacing up her boots and looked up at her firstborn. Piccolo resisted the urge to smack Goku when he saw the look on her face.

“How much thought did you put into this plan?” he asked. “Because this is even more hare-brained than your idea to send Vegeta and Trunks in first. Look how well that turned out. Or did you just decide one day that you wanted another kid?”

The newborn kept silent and its black eyes slid shut. At least Goku had been right about that, although Piccolo feared that it'd wake and start wailing again.

Krillin was still holding the baby in the position Goku had put it in, too frightened to move it. He winced at some realization he came to. “Does… does Chi-chi know? About this baby?”

Goku's guilty silence said that she knew perfectly well that she'd done something wrong, but she wasn't going to apologize for it because she did it for a good reason, she just wanted a little more happiness in the world or some such nonsense.

“Oh no no NO!” Krillin yelled but lowered his volume as Goten scrunched up his face. His words turned into a hissed whisper instead. “I am not telling your wife that she's got a baby she knows nothing about. I've already had to tell her that you were dead and that her son had been kidnapped by a demon. I barely survived.” He shifted the baby to one arm so he could gesture with the free one. “Next thing you know she's accusing me of being the father or something and that is something I won't survive. She hasn't even had time to prepare anything.”

“Don't they sell pumps? For… y'know... breastfeeding?” Gohan interjected, ears reddening since the kid probably had never spent a moment's thought on his mother's breasts. Even half-Saiyans were too obsessed by food in Piccolo's opinion.

“Good idea!” Goku replied, continuing lacing up her boots. “We'll pop down to a baby store and-”

“You're not making me a messenger for your poor life decisions again, Goku!” Krillin shouted. Goten opened its eyes and took a deep breath. Piccolo, tired of all these noises, interrupted the bickering before he'd have to resort to sticking his fingers in his ears.

“Enough!” he bellowed, followed by the cries of the newborn. Krillin tried to shush him, cradling him and rocking the tiny child but Goten was having none of it. Goku got up and held out her hands. The second Krillin had put the baby back in her arms it stilled, closed its eyes and fell back asleep.

“Goku, go buy some of those breastfeeding things before you abandon your kid to Krillin for the next few hours. Krillin, stay on the Lookout until Goku is done training. Gohan, get back inside the Hyperbolic Time Chamber and make sure you progress a lot more so your brother gets a chance at life. Dende, you're going to lie down in a dark room for a few hours and I'm going to meditate at the edge and none of you will bother me unless Cell shows up.”

With a whirl of his cape, Piccolo turned around and walked off, leaving the entire mess behind.

XXX

For Son Gohan sr., love is forgiveness.

Like he'd told Master Roshi many years ago, there were plenty of women in this heaven to keep him occupied. The last time he'd been on Earth he'd hugged his adopted child after he'd torn off her tail and admonished her for not having trained her last weakness. After that it had been a long stretch of indulging himself in heaven, eating and partying and making sure that the blue-skinned Oni were always on their guard around him. Because there's plenty of fun to be had if you know how to bend the rules a little.

There are these windows into the world of the living the dead can consult. Little spheres which you have to touch to locate someone, but Son Gohan has never felt the need to touch it. Despairing ghosts surround these spheres, wiling away into wants, consumed by the world of the living. Gohan is not ready to give up on this feast of being dead – never having to worry about food, about shelter,   safety, enough firewood to last the winter. He's finally free from his responsibilities – but in a few hundred years he knows he's gonna turn to the reincarnation center and do the whole living thing all over again. Death is too boring. Right now he's content to stay where he is.

Which makes it easy for his killer to find him.

She's confident in her stride, her muscles scream 'powerful'. Her black gaze sweeps over the various ghosts before she settles on him. The three girls he's surrounded himself with scatter before her intact body – not many have an intact body in this place, he himself has forgotten what it's like to have feet. His ghostly tail whips around uncertainly as she strides up to him, a scowl marring her pretty features. In her orange clothes she's hard to miss, but it's the wild black spikes which makes her easy to place. She's all grown up now, in all of the right places. He tears his eyes away from leering at her – she's his adopted daughter, of all people, but he can't help but admire her grace.

So she's continued her training. Her orange gi shows no symbols but there are scars on her arms, her face, to indicate that she's been in many battles. She's grown beyond the need for schools, judging by the wild power emanating from her, even in death.

Gohan's mouth curls downwards at the thought that his daughter died this young. There's no ring around her finger, but that doesn't mean anything – martial artists often don't wear rings, they just get in the way. She only has a ring above her head. She doesn't have her brown monkey tail either and there's a slight pang of guilt as he remembers tearing it off of her during their bout back when she was but thirteen years old.

“Grandpa Gohan,” the woman says before prostrating herself before him, touching her forehead to the floor. There's no symbol on the back of her gi, either. “I'm sorry I killed you.”

Shock sets in and Gohan sputters. He doesn't know how or when she found out, but he's come to terms with it long ago.

“Get up,” he commands, and she rolls to her feet, keeping her eyes downcast. She's taller than he is, with strong muscle definition, calloused hands, showing every sign that she's kept up with his chosen assignment of becoming the best martial artist she could be. When he'd sparred with her when she was but a child she was already formidable – he longed to see what she'd done since.

“You don't have to be sorry,” he finds himself saying, because what else can he do. “It was an accident – you were not in control of yourself. I'm quite happy here. I'm just sad that you died as well.”

Goku gives him a wan smile. “I did save the Earth,” she says, and he isn't surprised to hear that. “And with my death maybe there won't be that many bad people interested in it.”

Her voice is a little hoarser than it was when she was a child, but it fits her. He gestures for her to walk alongside him, her real legs striding along while he bobs and floats. Only a chosen few get to retain their bodies. Goku has always been someone special, he knew that from the moment he first watched her transform from a wee babe into a raging monkey. Maybe she finally has some answers, some closure, for him.

She does not disappoint. Her accent is as thick as his own and she has trouble sorting the important facts from the not-so important ones – like that someone called 'Vegeta' has a son who came to visit from the future, and oh yeah, she has two sons of her own, and a wife – and she lives not far from her old house – she had to wear a dress for her wedding but it wasn't scratchy or anything – and it turns out she's not human after all. She's from planet Vegeta, not the same as its prince, she hurries to add, and that's why she had a tail and the ability to transform into a giant monkey.

Gohan stares at her for a while after that tidbit gets revealed amongst her life's story. He's always thought that she'd been abandoned in the woods by a couple of scientists, but the little pod he'd found her in was an actual alien vessel.

“It's alright though,” Goku hurries to assure him, “I found another Saiyan. And I think I like being a Saiyan better than being a human. And I can transform into a bunch more things because of it.”

The adopted daughter he'd cared for for six years stops walking, yells a bit and the next second she's  wreathed in so much golden power it makes his eyes water. She drops it after a few seconds.

“Neat, huh?” she asks.

The blue-skinned Oni are not happy that she's here, in heaven. They continually remind her that she should be at King Kai's, there where she died, and trains. She might have saved her planet, earning her the right to a solid body, but that doesn't give her the right to jaunt into heaven and make it her playground.

“But this is important,” she says. Gohan watches her, absorbing all of this new knowledge. Master Roshi would have been happy to train her, her rack is perky, her determination strong. She's grown into a fine woman – even if she turned out to be a butch lesbian.

He loves her, he forgives her, but he knows her story is not at its end. If these dragonballs can truly revive someone, he does not want to be on that list. The Earth he's known is gone, replaced by a place where his daughter thrives, where green-skinned aliens live and terrorize entire countries. Gone are the days when things were simple inside his little hut.

Maybe he's getting too old for death. After Son Goku leaves, he tries to remember where the reincarnation department is located again.

XXX

The next time Piccolo sensed a Ki-within-a-Ki on his Lookout, he stormed outside. Granted, it's not technically his lookout anymore but it was his/Kami's for a century, that's got to count towards ownership rights a little. There's an orange blur standing near the palms, conversing with her son. That's where the Ki signature came from so he rushed over.

Goku raised her hand in greeting but Piccolo spin-kicked her in the face before she finished her greeting. She sailed over the polished tiles and disappeared over the edge in a perfect arc. She didn't even catch herself in mid-air.

“Mr- Mr. Piccolo?” Gohan asked, intimidated by the sudden display of unreasonable aggression.

“I warned her,” Piccolo grunted. It wouldn't be long before the Saiyan would come back up and whine at him for a bit. He hadn't kicked her that hard. “She's not being pregnant all over my Lookout again!”

Gohan's awkward laugh made Piccolo pay attention to the kid – and the girl behind him. The half-Saiyan maneuvered himself in front of her and a second later Piccolo understood why. The Ki-within-a-Ki was not emanating from Goku. It came from her.

“Relax, kid,” Piccolo said, turning around, letting his cape billow behind him. “I only promised to kick your mom off if she showed up her while pregnant, not your girlfriend.”

“Mom's pregnant?” Gohan bellowed, startling Videl. She stepped out from behind Gohan, the brave girl. Her belly was as taut as it had ever been but the Ki growing inside her was unmistakeably that of a quarter-Saiyan.

“Gohan wanted you to be one of the first to know,” she said, then her tone grew defiant. “But if you're not happy about it-”

“I'm pregnant?” Goku interrupted, rubbing her cheek where the kick had landed as she rose from below the lookout, landing with a squeak of her boots on the tiles. She put one hand on her belly and focused her energy inwards, but shook her head when she couldn't find anything.

“No,” Piccolo growled, keeping his back to dumb-dumb number one and two. “Videl is.”

“I know. Awesome, right?”

Piccolo glanced over his shoulder at his protege. His cheeks lit up red but his shoulders were relaxed, his energy steady. He was happy with this development.

“Yes,” Piccolo agreed. He turned around and regarded Gohan and Videl, two of the most unlikely people to meet and fall in love. “Congratulations.”

“Thank you Mr. Piccolo,” Gohan said, keeping his eyes trained on his pregnant girlfriend. Wait, they were soon going to be married, so the term was fiancee, right? Whatever the right word, it made Gohan happier than he'd ever seen the kid. So maybe that was what love was to him – steadiness.

“But my promise still stands, Goku,” Piccolo added.

“Oh, I think I'm done having kids,” Goku said, cracking her neck just because she knew that that was a horrid sound to Namekian ears, walking towards the small group. Her revenge lay in the small things, things she could shove under 'oops, sorry, I didn't realize'. “I mean, I tore from front to back giving birth and when you were born, Gohan, I actually broke my pelvis. Also, you're going to leak from places you didn't even know you had. And-”

Gohan held up a hand as Videl blanched while Piccolo stepped forward and curled a long-fingered hand around her babbling mouth.

“Nobody wants to hear that, Goku,” he admonished. “Seeing it once was enough.”

“Piccolo is actually a decent midwife,” Goku said, tearing herself free from his grip with long-practiced ease. “Maybe he can assist- ack!”

And there she went sailing over the edge again, but Piccolo didn't miss the grin on her face before she let herself fall past the edge.

“Congratulations,” Piccolo said again, turned around and strode back into the main building of the Lookout. For the love of god, Gohan was going to be a father.

XXX

Goku felt pretty sure that she didn't love the same way humans did. There were no butterflies for her, no constant need to be around her object of affection. But she did love – she protected, she provided. She couldn't always be there on time, she couldn't fight everyone and everything to make sure there was no danger, but when danger arose, she dealt with it. She sought companionship and kinship more than she sought love, but the longer she knew Vegeta, the more she saw that maybe it was a Saiyan trait thus far unfamiliar to her, and nobody had been around to tell her about it. All she'd ever heard was that she'd have to marry the love of her life, that she'd love her kids, that love was hard and easy. Whether it was chemicals, respect, forgiveness, rashness, or redemption, Goku loved. She just did it in her own way.