BEGIN![Using Weighted Armor]
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All seemed right with the world. Goku and chi-chi left Gohan with piccolo to go on a second honeymoon. Piccolo and Gohan were training in their usual spot in the woods. The roar of the waterfall was drowned out by the roar of the two Z fighters. Seven-year-old Gohan was an easy match for an 11-year-old Piccolo. After hours and hours of Makankasapo, Masenko, and Kamehameha the two fighters both opted for a night break. A large blaze smoked between the two fighters. Gohan sat on his usual side and piccolo on his. Piccolo was wearing his usual outfit and gohan wore a similar outfit with everything but the turban. Both stared into the blaze that seemed to beckon every living thing into its destructive path. Suddenly gohan heard a crack behind him. Piccolo was already awake and his eyes focused on the sounds direction. "What was that?" gohan asked nervously. Piccolo scoffed at the boys fear. Then he felt it; this high, evil power. There had to be thousands of them out there. The oddest thing seemed to be the feeling that had been consuming piccolo's mind. It was a feeling of dread that something horrible was going to happen.
"Gohan, stand up and get ready to fight." Piccolo said unemotionally. Gohan hesitantly stood up. He was shaking all over. Piccolo felt his students' fear, and although they were friends, gohan heard his masters sharp, piercing words. "Gohan if you're afraid you'd better go home now. I won't bail you out if you're to scared to fight." Just as the little warrior prepared himself, eleven or twelve creatures jumped out. 'Creatures' was the only word to describe them. They looked like saibamen, but they were bigger with longer fingers and they were blue, with large red eyes. "Who, or what, the hell are you?" piccolo snarled. One of the creatures in the middle snickered. It was high pitched, like a squeal almost. "We are the lianas," it snickered. "We have come to exterminate all being with potential to be stronger than us. We've taken care of your squad." The leader snickered again. This time it was almost too high for piccolo to stand. "Dead or alive?" piccolo asked. "Are they dead or alive?" "Oh they're alive, it's just you two we have to deal with. We cut you off from them." The leader said. Without one more word large knife-like fingernails sprung out from their fingers and the lianas sprung into the air, poised for attack.
Piccolo joined them in the air. Their battle cries covered the air like a blanket. Gohan watched in half amazement, as piccolo seemed to be giving them a run for their money. He turned just as three sets of fingers came at him. He jumped and dodged with all his might, but he just couldn't keep track of them all. Just as he forced two to retreat he turned around. A burning, white-hot, sensation rushed from his chest to the rest of his small body. At first it was just the four individual sensations, but then they all drew together in this one swift, cracking swipe. He saw the world beginning to spin as his face met the ground. "HA HA! KILL HIM! KILL HIM NOW!!" cried a shrill, evil voice. Piccolo turned just in time to see gohan lying on his face with one of the lianas poised with it's poisonous nails ready to slice into gohan's back. Piccolo kicked one of the creatures away from himself and flew towards gohan's attacker. The creature had its nail tips in gohan's back. "This is going to be fun." It thought. But just as it was about to plunge its poison even farther into gohan, it was kicked away. All the creatures gathered into one place in the air. That high- pitched squeal laughter came from the leader again. "At least we got one of you. We'll be back." It sneered. All of the creatures flew into the woods like roaches from the fire.
Piccolo turned and kneeled next to gohan. "Oh, please kami. Tell me they didn't slash him." Piccolo thought. He turned gohan over. The ground underneath him was a thick unnatural mud of blood. In the fabric right below his collarbones, piccolo could see there was a circle with slashes in it. Piccolo seemed to be able to sum up all his fears in two words: "oh, fuck." He could feel his own tears begin to well into his eyes; only gohan would make him cry at death. Suddenly he heard something, something like a moan. He looked down to see gohan's half-cocked eyes staring up at him. "Now what?" he asked himself. He was hesitant at picking up gohan; it might just make his injuries worse. But then again, he really didn't have a choice. It was either risk carrying gohan over to the fire, or leave him there for those things to kill. Piccolo carefully put his hands under gohan to carry him. Just as gohan's body lifted off the ground he flinched in unbearable pain. Piccolo sat with his back against a rock and let gohan down next to him. Gohan opened his mouth and began taking deep, gasping breaths. The poison was noticeably beginning to take effect. Blood dripped out of the corners of gohan's mouth as his ragged breaths continued on. Piccolo reached over and pulled off gohan's cape and his neckpiece. "Mr. .heavy. " gohan sputtered. His hand was over his chest and he began to lean forward. "Gohan," piccolo began, "try to get some sleep, your body might be able to counteract the poison on it's own."
Piccolo looked over at gohan, he had shifted from his sitting position to a laying-down position. His head rested near piccolo's left leg. He had fallen asleep a few hours ago, but his ragged breathing lingered on. It killed him to see gohan this way. Worse, he blamed himself for his friends' pain. Piccolo reached over with two of his fingers and felt gohan's forehead, he had a noticeably high temperature. Piccolo even opened the mind link that he had established between the two, he saw horrid hallucinations gohan was having. Mostly they were flashbacks, but everyone died a little more horrendously. The vision piccolo walked in on was similar to the saiyan battle. Gohan was kneeling beside his dead sensei, screaming over and over again in agony. Piccolo pulled out of the dream as quickly as he could. A snap of a twig. Piccolo's eyes flew to the general direction of the sound. Hundreds-of-thousands of red eyes glared at him from beyond the fire. An evil, familiar snicker. Piccolo rose, he knew it was one of the lianas. Revenge was the only thing on his mind now; he had gone berserk on freiza, now these freaks would too feel his wrath. As piccolo stood up he heard the small voice. "Mr. Piccolo! Please! Don't leave me!" piccolo knew, somehow he knew that this cry was not from gohan's dream, but from his fear.
Piccolo's eyes went from the woods to his student. He bared his fangs in frustration. After considering the circumstances piccolo sat back down near gohan. He still remembered that promise he had made three years ago, and he had swore to himself that he would fulfill that promise if it cost him his life. He closed his eyes, drinking in the memory: "Don't worry kid, I won't let anything happen to you. " another snicker, one that he had heard hours before. Piccolo opened his eyes to see the lead liana. It was just beyond the fire, and it had this evil look in its eyes. Slowly it crossed along the outer-rim of the flames light. Piccolo stood and glided in front of gohan's lifeless form. "What do you want now?" piccolo said fiercely. The leader simply giggled. "I just wanted to see how the transformation's coming along." It spoke. "What transformation?" Piccolo asked, and yet, as the words rolled off his tongue he'd already guessed the answer. "We'd realized from the very beginning that your friend had incredible power. Why do you think we attacked him?" piccolo's eye's went from squinted to wide as he tried to guess the rest. The leader kept on talking, "he has at least ten minutes left as your friend. Use those minutes wisely." In a fit of rage piccolo threw a ki blast at the leader. It simply retreated back into the woods, laughing all the way.
Piccolo turned and kneeled next to gohan. He placed his hands on his only friends' shoulders and fought the urge to shake him. "Gohan" Piccolo thought, "gohan, you have to fight this!" Gohan's back arched and his mouth opened, as if in a scream. Only a low hissing sound came out. A shrill voice came from the woods "Five more minutes!" Piccolo now found it safe to panic. He again opened the link of their minds. There were a thousand things in gohan's mind. All of them swirling and twining together until there was nothing. Darkness. Piccolo pulled out. Gohan's eyes opened and stared at his mentor. At first piccolo thought they had won, gohan had beaten the poison, and then he saw his young students eyes. There was something wrong with his eyes! Piccolo backed away as this being that was gohan jumped up. Gohan's once deep black eyes were now red. They seemed to hold now light in them, only red. Piccolo unknowingly took a step back. Gohan's body smiled. If piccolo didn't know better, he'd swear gohan now had fangs. Gohan's body leapt at piccolo. It landed nine square punches to piccolo's stomach and a well-placed mesenko to his face. Piccolo fell backwards against a tree, far from the fire. The lead liana fell from the sky behind gohan. It made a motioning signal to gohan's body. Gohan's body looked from where piccolo lay stunned and broken to back to the leader. The leader and gohan's body both flew off, leaving piccolo broken and raging in the brush.
Piccolo slowly sat up from his knockout spot under the tree. "Gohan." Piccolo said under his breath. A million thoughts of guilt rushed through his head at the same time. How could he let this happen? Why did he panic? Why didn't he use their mind link to try to help gohan? Piccolo rose to his feet with support of the tree. As soon as he was up he began to focus on the power that belonged to his friend. Piccolo knew he had to face the lianas to win back gohan. But just before he took off he made another call to his friend, whether he heard it or not piccolo didn't care "I will keep my promise gohan, I will! " he took a few running steps before he left the ground, all the while focusing on how to accomplish his new task.
Piccolo landed a short time later in the liana's camp. They had him circled the instant his boots touched the ground. The leader came forth, his red- orbed eyes gleaming with amusement. "Why good namek! What brings you to our camp?" the leader asked sarcastically. Piccolo clenched his fists and teeth. "Give me the boy." Piccolo boldly stated. "Oh, I'm sorry. He doesn't seem to want to leave." The leader said in mock sorrow. Gohan's body parted the group and he came face-to-face with piccolo. "Gohan! Gohan it's me!" Piccolo tried. He soon found he had cried out in vain. Within a matter of seconds gohan's body had him in a flying tackle. Piccolo was down on the ground with his former student struggling with him on top. Punches rained on piccolo's face. Piccolo knew this was going to hurt gohan like never before, but he had to rescue gohan now. Piccolo grabbed both gohan's wrists in one hand and forced his free palm onto gohan's forehead. A light shock of energy went from piccolo's hand to gohan's head. Gohan fell unconscious next to his mentor. A black, tar-like substance dripped out of gohan's mouth and onto the cold forest floor. Piccolo lifted up his student to make sure all the poison drained.
Piccolo felt gohan's ki lower, and he heard the sure sign his friend was back. A weak voice called up to him from his arms, "Mr. Piccolo?" Piccolo would have rejoiced if not for the fact that he had close too a hundred thousand alien creatures moving in on him. Unconsciously piccolo tightened his grip on gohan. "Give him back to us!" the leader demanded. "Over my dead body!" piccolo retorted. "With pleasure!" one of the lianas shouted. Piccolo's eye lasers sliced through its skull. All of the lianas jumped at him at once. Piccolo used every aspect of his being to ward them all off, and in the end it worked. After an hour of one-handed ki blasts and punches, and various kicks it boiled down to just him and the leader. Piccolo still held gohan in the crook of his left arm, the other hand he held an unknown surprise. The leader tackled piccolo, gohan tumbled out of his arms and landed dead weight near by. The leaders nails slid out of its hand. The leader's arm rose, prepared to administer the fatal blow. "Any last words?" the leader snarled. "Just one" Piccolo stated, "MAKANKASAPPO!" Piccolo called.
The leaders head disintegrated off its body, and its body flew a few feet away. Piccolo wasted no time in crawling over to gohan's life-less body. He picked up gohan's body once again, all the while staring at his students face. Two normal, ebony eyes cracked open to stare at his first friend. "You did it Mr. Piccolo. You did it." gohan's small voice whispered. Piccolo then noticed gohan's small form fighting sleep. "Sleep well kid. We've got a lot of training to do in the morning." Piccolo said comfortingly. "Thank you Mr. Piccolo." gohan whispered before his head lolled back into the crook of piccolo's arm. Piccolo stood there on that spot for several minutes, staring at his students sleeping body. "You're welcome kid" Piccolo whispered before he flew back to their old training grounds.
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COMPLETE!