Artificial Love

Chapter 16: Showdown

"Dad!"

The sound of his children shouting in excitement caught his ears and even though it did, he didn't acknowledge it, a quiet rage had settled into the lone warrior who had joined the battlefield, his eyes dared to his children then to his best friend who laid on the ground a few metres behind the larger saiyan looking completely astonished at him. His eyes shifted to Nappa who stood in confusion at his sudden arrival and slowly he walked forward step by single step at the large saiyan.

"Vegeta?" Nappa called out, looking back to his short partner who stood a few metres behind him.

The prince of the saiyans looked on quietly as he watched Goku walk forward slowly, a barrage of numbers assaulted his left eye on the scouter he wore and it slowly settled into one number "Three thousand, a power level of three thousand" Vegeta stated, unimpressed. "Kakarot, how glad you could join us"

"That's all?" scoffed Nappa as he locked gazes with the shorter warrior who walked forward to meet him, slowly Nappa settled into a stance and as soon as Goku was in striking range, he fired the first punch but to be only met by air, Nappa blinked rapidly as he looked around to find his opponent, Vegeta's eyes widened on the sudden display of speed from Goku who was now behind Nappa and walked away from him.

"What was that?!" Vegeta thought out in surprise, completely shocked "The scouter blinked for a moment and his power shot up to 6000, as I thought, the scouters are completely useless when fighting these trash"

"Wha? where?!" shouted the baffled Nappa as he frantically looked around and once he looked back, he saw Goku slowly walking away from him and to the young bald warrior who laid on the ground completely motionless

"Hey Krillin" was the small sweet greeting from the young saiyan warrior who slowly knelt down to meet his bald headed compatriot, Krillin who in turn chuckled wearily at the sight of his best friend who was alive

"T-took y-you long enough...huh?"

"Yeah, sorry about that, I kinda thought King Kai would just zap me over here before the fighting started" Goku apologized as he sheepishly rubbed the back of his head and slowly brought up his right hand and scrimmaged through his little brown pouch at his side and pulled out a small senzu bean "Here, a gift from Korin" he told him and slowly slid the small bean into Krillin's mouth, Krillin began chewing and as he did, a flurry of footsteps assaulted both their ears, Goku's eyes widened as two small figures crashed into him sending him nearly faltering down

"Daaaaad!"

"Woah!" Goku cried as he struggled to regain his balance, both Pan and Gohan had crashed into him, tears welling up at their eyes as they looked to see their father who they hadn't seen in a whole year. Goku simply chuckled "Wow, guess you guys missed me huh?" and slowly stood up while he looked on at his two children who had grown over the entire year.

"Hey, are you wearing the turtle school uniform, Pan? wait, is that Kami's symbol? did you train with Kami? and you've become so tall!" asked a surprised Goku,

"Mm-hmm! Krillin and the others trained me along with Kami at the lookout, it was really fun and a bit hard too" murmured his young daughter, Goku's eyes then darted to Gohan to see him wearing a set of clothes very familiar to him "And I guess, Piccolo trained you up too huh, Gohan? you look pretty good! and you look alot stronger too!"

"Yeah! he did" Gohan replied, cheerful as tears streamed down his face at the sight of his father, his mood suddenly sombered as he looked down "but he died protecting me.."

"And so did Tien Chiaotzu and Yamcha too.." added a somber Pan as she slowly looked on to her father whose eyes narrowed "Don't worry, we'll get them back somehow" he answered, slowly standing upto his full height, a sudden thought came to him as his eyes widened "Say, where's your mother? I'm surprised she let you guys go train with the Piccolo and the others..."