Chapter Text
For three days Hercule went over and over his employee files, and none of them shed any light on who the culprit might be.
Caroni was a bit of an airhead, but he was a diligent pupil and dedicated to becoming a real hero. Sure, he got distracted by a pretty face now and then, but Hercule didn't think he could be convinced to betray him.
Pirozhki was a damned fine man, and had proven himself time and again. He'd been a part of the team nearly as long as....
Piza.
She had been with him since the very start, before Pan was born. One of his closest friends and confidant. If any of his team could have learned the truth, it would have been her. Could she have been working with them after figuring out the truth? Or had she been lured into it with promises?
But promises of what? Hercule paid all his people well, they had great benefits packages and he did his damndest not to overwork them.
She was his age, and had no husband or family. She'd once said she had no time, her work family needed her. And an awful feeling filled him.
Had her loyalty to him, the saviour of the planet, caused any of them to feel like they needed to put aside their own lives for him? To put aside their wants and needs to help him. If they had discovered his secret, how could he blame them for turning on him? How could he blame any of them?
He eventually shoved the files away and got up. He needed water and a break.
He wandered to the living room, where Buu was reading with Bee at his side. He looked up and gave a smile.
"Heya bud. Are you doing well?"
"Finishing book. It's good."
Hercule looked at the title, "Murder mystery huh?"
"Yep. Good story."
Hercule went through into the kitchen before coming back, drinking the chilled water and sighing as he sat. "I have made no progress Buu. I'm wracking my brains to figure out who the mole is."
"Thought you had a spy?" Buu said, and Hercule shook his head, "No Buu, A mole is-" he looked over at his pink friend and saw the smirk on his face. "Oh you jackass." Hercule laughed hard. "Man I needed that. Today has been long."
Buu put the book down. Bee re-arranged himself so he could snuggle closer to Buu, and received pets for his effort. "Maybe you forget them. Try to rest."
"I wish I could, but someone in my camp has betrayed me. My family. They've put my baby girl and Pan at risk. I can't let that stand."
"Then Buu can try and find them for you?"
Hercule looked over at him, head tilted. "I don't want them knowing I know it was them Buu. You think you can find out without them knowing?"
"Maybe. Give Buu time."
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Vegeta stared at the image on screen with absolute shock. Words would not form.
"From what we can tell he was semi conscious during his time in the tank. He spent his time pulling apart the constraints on his mind to get through the computer's safe guards." Dr Briefs explained. "I have no idea how he retained his memories. The Cybering process is incredibly stressful on the huma- well, I guess a Saiyan brain is capable of surviving it."
It could.
But that didn't explain anything else. Could he be real? Or was his soul in hell, and this an empty android carrying memories that didn't belong to it? Was it a threat?
Or was it Raditz?
"How did he get the body?" Vegeta said, voice strained, "I thought Bulma or yourself would have taken it."
"No. Bulma took samples and scanned the site but....she felt he didn't deserve to be disposed of properly."
Anger welled up inside him then, but he shoved it down. He could rage about the hypocrites of these humans later.
The first meeting of Kakarot and his brother had been stressful and complicated. Kakarot was not a normal Saiyan, and Raditz was. Despite his inadequacies he was a survivor. He wasn't expecting his brother to team up with a Namekian of all things. So far as any of them knew at the time, Nemakians were farming, peaceful beings. They never gave a damn about them until they had learned of the dragon balls.
Upon learning just how powerful Piccolo was, Vegeta had regretted his final words to Raditz. But not enough to give up a wish to bring him back.
This could go bad so very quickly if Raditz was in a vengeful mood.
“Where is he?”
Hedo scratched the back of his head. “Well, once we let him out, he freed the other androids and said to tell you ‘You know what he’ll want after so long cooped up.”
“You didn’t try to stop them?”
“I sent Gamma, and he was able to catch up to the human androids. They went straight to a bar for a beer. He ended up losing track of Raditz.”
Vegeta racked his brain, trying to figure out what Raditz had meant.
‘You know what he’ll want after so long laid up’ before they flew off.’
What the hell did that…
Vegeta was gone in a flash, but returned a second later, “Don’t tell Kakarot yet. If I don’t contact you by 10pm, tell him, but keep this quiet.”
Then he was gone again, flying fast and mind racing.
‘You know what he’ll want after so long cooped up.’
He racked his memory for everything Raditz could mean, and it struck him.
If they had started off at Gero’s lab, then Vegeta knew where he would go. He stopped flying and pulled his phone from his pocket, and quickly searched for what he needed before figuring out what direction he needed to go and setting off.
The nearest coastline was a 30 mins flight at half speed. He went at quarter because he wanted time to think. To think about what Raditz may want. He'd known the man since they were six, had spent his teens being as close to friends as you could be with someone on Frieza's ship. The schism as they had grown older had been caused by a dozen different things, and all of them a good reason for Raditz to want to cause him harm. And Raditz may have the power to do that now.
He stretched out his senses and tried to find Raditz, knowing full well it was not going to happen. He couldn't sense 17 or 18, so why would he sense Raditz? So instead he searched for humans, or the sudden disappearance of them. Vegeta doubted that the newly discovered Saiyan would end up going on a killing spree if he didn't know the opponents he might face.
He got to the coast and began to follow it, searching for signs of...anything.
Raditz liked water. He enjoyed fish, and after a rough mission or if they had down time, Raditz would try and get somewhere with water and open air. Vegeta could see the appeal. A Lot of worlds they visited were deserts and wastelands, and those that weren't could end up that way depending on what Frieza wanted to be done with the world.
Eventually he found a rising pillar of smoke, and he could smell the scent of cooking fish. He slowed, and then landed to continue his journey on foot.
Eventually he reached a cliff edge and looked over it, to see dozens of seagulls feasting on the guts of a large fish, whilst a fire raged and said fish was half eaten. Beside the fire, leaning against a pile of sand was a figure he hadn't seen in so very long.
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Goku had noticed his Vegeta leaving, and decided to stay quiet. After two days cooped up on a ship with teenagers, he likely needed a little decompression time. Bulma wasn't complaining, so neither was he.
Goten sat next to his mother, looking weird due to the fact he was taller than her now. He still wasn't used to it.
"So what now?"
"You'll have to call the school and tell them he's ill." VBUlma said, "I can get a note from a doctor, which will buy you guys time to figure out what you want to do."
ChiChi nodded, not quite paying attention. Goku was a little worried. Normal, worried chich was loud and talkative. Quiet chichi? That was not good.
He carefully scanned her, checking for stresses that could be harmful. There were none. Her heartbeat was normal, her breathing even and the fast, fluttering noise from her belly a perfectly safe and healthy.
This quiet meant bad news, he just knew it.
And he was right. Once home ChiChi asked Goten to go to her room and find the bag Goku had given her that held clothing to donate. He should put them away in his closet for now.
And then she broke. Goku wrapped her in a hug and held her tightly, letting her get it out of her system whilst Goten was busy. She was still puffy faced when he came down stairs. She disappeared into the kitchen and Goku saw that Goten had changed into a pair of his old jeans and a blue shirt.
It was at that moment that the change really sunk in.
His son was an adult. Not a small, barely past his chest teen, but a man. He stood, a little awkward, and stared after his mother with a l;ook on his face that belonged to someone else. Someone who should be worrying about rent and shifts and whatever else normal adults think about.
A lump grew in Goku's throat then, and he went to his son and pulled him into a hug.
"I'm gonna have to put up with this for a while then, huh?" he asked, hugging back.
"Fraid so buddy." Goku said and pressed his face against his son's hair, "Or at least until we get used to this."
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They sat in silence.
Vegeta just couldn't figure out what he was supposed to say. So he walked down to the beach and sat beside the other, and neither spoke for a long while. The sun was well below the horizon when Raditz finally spoke.
"Your kids look freaking weird."
Vegeta actually laughed, not expecting the comment. "They're powerful, that's what counts."
"Yeah. That never changes." he sat up and turned to face Vegeta, sitting crossed legged. "I have that now. Actual power." He raised his hand, looking at it. "And it's not really mine. My body is...different. I don't know what that creep did to me, but I know I'm not what I was."
"How much do you know?" Vegeta asked.
"I was dead. I was in hell and then...I wasn't. It was like I was flickering in and out. One moment I had a body, the next I was a cloud, the next I was in a tank. I wound up being shoved in an admin office and left there for a lot of the time."
"Admin?"
"Yeah, the ogres had no clue what to do with me."
"Why didn't they call Yemna?"
"They didn't know what form to submit."
"You can't be serious."
"I am. The paperwork down there is ridiculous." Raditz said, "They asked around, tried to find out if it was some kind of escape attempt. "
"Was it?"
"Who knows. All I know is I woke up one day in that tank and didn't leave. Some old guy was poking and prodding me and trying to get me to obey. Didn't work too well."
"I figured as much. How were you able to get the message out?"
"After I started flickering again, after Gero got killed. Bouncing between the two places. I managed to track down Gero in hell. Didn't take much acting to convince him I was under his command. He told me how to manipulate the system and get the computer working for me."
"He's gonna be pissed when he releases you."
"He kidnapped and murdered a few hundred people to create his android Vegeta, no one's gonna care that I lied to him. Same way they didn't care that I was manipulating him. Hell doesn't care what its inhabitants do to each other so long as they don't cause the Ogres problems."
"Why contact me?"
"The computers didn't stop gathering information. I saw a lot Vegeta" Raditz sat up, "I saw you change, and I hoped that maybe you'd have enough of a change to not kill me on the spot."
"What made you think I'd kill you?"
"You made your opinion of me pretty damned clear in that last message."
Vegeta actually cringed. "I'm sorry. But in my defense I thought you'd been killed by a Nemakien. Until then I had thought they were weak."
"Me too. We were both wrong."
They lapsed into silence and Vegeta took out his phone.
"What is that for?"
“I need to let someone know you're not an immediate threat right now. Otherwise they'll send back up and I don't think you want that right now."
Raditz looked away and Vegeta sent his message. When he was done he asked, "How is my brother?"
Vegeta thought about it for a moment, "An infuriating Clown. And far more Saiyan than both of us."
Raditz looked surprised, "That's a hell of an admission.He must have impressed you."
"He's earned it. And he's likely going to be very conflicted when he learns you're alive."
"Oh, I bet he will."