Chapter 3: Beat Me If You Can, Survive If I Let You

"All right, we’ve all gathered here to try and figure out how we are going to handle this." Son Gohan said. The remaining Z Fighters nodded at him as they sat or stood around the table at Son Goku’s house. It had been a few days since the horrific massacre that had begun with Bra and ended with Tien. The dead had been buried and their hearts were mourning, but it didn’t stop the Z Fighters from looking at the problem. Who had done this, why, and where had he gone?

He, supposedly, because Vegeta insisted he had tussled with the killer at the morgue where his daughter had been. However, several things shot his theory to pieces. They had the morgue security camera videotape of the event, where the man in black had somehow overcome Vegeta, and then done some mysterious thing over Bra’s face. He’d moved out of shot for a minute, then came back in and took Bra’s hand as he kneeled. The man in black hadn’t damaged the hand in any way, and his back was to the camera so you couldn’t see what he was doing or saying. He’d then rose, said something to Vegeta, who had missed him by a minute, and left.

The kicker was from tests done on Tien, Chaozu’s, and Lunch’s bodies, the man in black was in the morgue at the same time that whoever had killed Tien, Chaozu, and Lunch was doing the horrible deed. Vegeta had argued that the man must have possessed some kind of teleport power like Kakarott’s Instantaneous Movement power, but even if that was true, another thing Vegeta had seen, or more precisely, sensed, was even more damning to his vehement theory that the man in black was the killer.

The man in black had a ki. Vegeta could sense it because it was so strong for a human. It certainly put Mr. Satan to shame, and might have even been at the level of Tien or Yamcha.

When the police had come for the bodies, every one of the Z fighters tried to distract themselves from the terrible tragedy by hunting for the ki of the killer. If he could overcome Chaozu and Tien, he had to have a ki.

But they had sensed nothing, and they had burned themselves out trying. Vegeta had even brought a scouter. There was nothing. The killer had no ki, instead drawing his power from something else.

If the man in black had been the killer…they would have sensed him.

Gohan was sure even Vegeta knew this, deep down. But he let him cling to it. In the past few days Vegeta had been more vunerable then ever, and he needed his friends and anything else to keep him sane. Because if Vegeta fell apart, the earth was going to feel the consequences.

"Ok, first item: The man in black who Vegeta fought. He’s our strongest suspect. Any ideas on how he managed to accomplish…his tasks?" Son Gohan said, pushing his glasses back up his nose.

Several came, most from Vegeta, who stood in the corner not looking at anyone unless spoken to. Trunks pitched in a few too. In a way, Trunks was even worse then his father. Vegeta had had several fits of fury that had reshaped a few landscapes to try and work through his grief, but Trunks had locked it away after his crying jag in Gohan’s arms. Instead, he had sealed himself away in his mother’s lab, refusing to see anyone, even his best friend Goten, who was hurt. Indeed, his little brother was visibly affected, sitting on a couch next to Marron. Normally, he would have an arm around her, or be holding her hand, but instead he sat, not even looking at her. Marron kept glancing in his direction, worried glances, but Goten was fully focussed on his older brother.

The rest of the fighters sat around tables and chairs, all with a range of emotions. Goku sat with Chi-Chi, who had been wringing her hands every ten seconds. She’d known Bulma best of all of them, and she had taken it hard. Goku comforted his wife as best he could, while paying solemn attention to his oldest son. Vegeta stood in his corner, eyes downcast. It was such a change from Vegeta’s usual arrogant lean and cocky grin that Gohan had to resist doing a double take every time he looked at him, to make sure it was Vegeta. Trunks sat in a chair, his face looking about a hundred years old and his hands frequently supporting his head up via fingers on his forehead and temples. Yamcha sat in another chair. Bulma’s condition had hit him hard as well, for despite their breakup, he still loved her in a way. One couch was occupied by Goten, Marron, Eighteen, and Krillian. Videl sat in another chair, Pan sitting in her lap. Ubuu stood in another corner. The only one missing was Piccolo, who was off on a mission to New Namek. Goku, via Kaiou-sama, had told him of the events, and he had said he would try and get back as soon as possible. Gohan had even thought of contacting Mr. Satan and Fat Buu, but decided not to. Tien, Chaozu, Lunch, and Bra had been their friends, not his, and in this incident, it was a matter of family.

"Ok. Now supposing this man in black is not the killer, we need to know who is. Anyone?"

"I’ve spoken with Dende and Kaiou-sama. They’d tried to find him, and had no luck. Dende says as far as he can tell, after…Tien…the killer went on into the Refout woods. Those woods are huge, and he could be anywhere in them…" Goku began.

"Then let’s raze it to the ground!" Vegeta yelled, getting out of his corner.

"I’m with my father!" Trunks said, getting up.

Goten was shaking. According to the map that his brother had drawn of the killer’s best estimated path after he had killed Bra, he had been right in it. He might have missed him by minutes or seconds, and it unnerved him greatly.

"Vegeta, it won’t do any good, because we don’t know if burning it down will uncover him, and two, we might kill him in the process. Does anyone want to give this bastard a quick death?" Gohan said.

"NO!" came the chorus. Chi-Chi wrung her hands at his son’s angry words, but she didn’t say anything. In her heart, for what the man had done to Bulma and her daughter, she wanted him to have a fate just as cruel as the one he had inflicted apon them.

Vegeta was back in his corner, Trunks was back in his seat. Gohan made a noise of relief.

"Ok, besides burning the forest to the ground, does anyone have any idea on how to find the killer?"

The debate went into the night.

Elsewhere, Vengeance was holed up in a laboratory he had broken into, some company called Capsule Corperation. Now he was downloading all the information he could about this strange new world, especially everything he could find about its defenders.

Slowly, Vengeance learned of the Z Fighters, their adventures and battles, the way the world saw them (some weak moron named Mr. SATAN, of all things, took all the credit), and everything else.

"No wonder that shrimp took so many taser shots." He muttered, eluding to his fight with Vegeta. Vegeta had more power then just about anything he had ever seen, except for the greatest fighter on the planet, and maybe the universe, Son Goku.

But Vengeance doubted they had ever met anyone like Agony. Sure, they’d fought beings that could regenerate, notably two warriors named Perfect Cell and Majinn Buu. He’d studied those files the closest, praying that the warriors might have some familarity with the threat they now faced. But his heart sank as he read of the exact details of the regeneration powers of those foes. It was nothing like Agony’s. She was in a class all her own.

Vengeance read on into the night, thanking the woman known as Bulma Briefs, whoever she was, that she had compiled all this information.

"Ok, that’s all. We’ll meet tomorrow and see what else we can do. Remember, stick together, be on guard, and keep alert for ANYTHING." Gohan concluded. He hoped that these words would be enough to protect them, and he prayed that whoever the killer was, that they could find him before he took any more lives.

Trunks slowly walked back to his mother’s lab, his mind occupied with dark thoughts the whole way. No one, not even his father, knew of the rage that burned within his heart.

Letting himself in with a key, he turned on all the lights.

The first thing he saw was that the computer was on.

And the second he saw was that someone wearing black was vanishing out a window.

"HEY! COME BACK!" Trunks yelled. Within seconds he was out the window and down on the ground below it.

His eyes darted about, but whoever had leapt out of the window had just…disappeared.

His mind wild that he might find the killer, Trunks proceeded to turn the entire Capsole Corperation building and ground upside down over the next hour. He didn’t find anyone except night security guards and janitors, none of whom had seen anyone or anything.

Stewing in the fact that he might have let the killer escape, Trunks’s rage exploded as his mind focussed on one thing. He stomped back to the laboratory, not planning to eat or sleep until he finished it.

Elsewhere, Marron was lying on Goten’s shoulder as they sat on the roof of her house. Goten was strumming a slow tune and singing a song he claimed was about her hair. But Marron’s mind was elsewhere, thinking a whole different thing over.

"Goten?" she said softly.

"Golden wheat in the sun…yes, Marron?"

"I need to ask you something."

"Ask away, Lovely Locks."

Marron smirked. That was his nickname for her, and she thought it was incredibly unwieldly. But she loved it none the less.

"Uh…well…you see…" Marron stammered, as Goten, his hair being swept in a soft breeze, listened.

"Wanna move in together?" she suddenly blurted out.

Goten was floored, or roofed, or whatever else could be used to describe his shock.

"Move in…?" he said, slowly, as if the words were food he was having trouble swallowing.

"Yeah. I mean we’ve been dating for so long, our parents get along, I’m sure they’d help us set up…" Marron said in a torrent as her lack of knowledge on how to phrase her plea of commitment caused her to overdo it.

But Goten didn’t seem to be paying attention. In the middle of the torrent he put his finger to her lips in a gesture to be quiet.

"You feel that?" he whispered. Marron, a bit stunned, shook her head. She didn’t feel anything.

"I can sense immense waves of ki washing across the land. It’s loaded with anger and rage. Normally ki can’t convey emotions, and if the emotions are strong enough to, the person usually reigns it in. But this one is coming unchecked, like the person can only focuss on one thing and is ignoring everything else…dear god, I think it’s Trunks. I’ve never seen him so angry!" Goten said in a worried tone. He sprang to his feet, slinging his guitar over his back as Marron got to her feet.

"But Goten…"

"Sorry Marron. We’ll have to discuss this another time. I have to check this out. Trunks has been so distant lately, it could be a silent plea for help. See you tomorrow. Love you." Goten said, giving Marron a quick peck on the lips before flying off towards the Capsule Corperation.

Marron stood, confused over what had just happened, before her mother suddenly slammed open the trap door that led to the roof.

"MARRON! GO…hey, where’s Goten, Marron?" Eighteen said. Marron looked at her mother, a confused sadness on her face.

"He had to leave…something about Trunks…" she said unhappily. Had Goten really been concerned for Trunks, or was he lying to get away from her? She couldn’t tell, and that scared her. She could usually read Goten so well.

"I see." Eighteen said. The look on her face showed that she understood in a way that only a mother could.

"What is it mom?"

"I was going to tell the two of you to get down here and look at the TV. The news just broke. There’s been another massacre."

"OH NO!" Marron said, as her hands flew to her mouth. "Where?"

"Reports are sketchy, but it was on the other end of the Refout forest…a college…" Eighteen said. "Reports are saying…there aren’t any survivors."

"Oh god, how many?"

"Including students going to night school and staff…over five hundred."

Trunks gave the table a bitter smile as he completed the last circuit. In his hands was a device that looked like a cross between a TV remote control and a portable TV. A small slot was open in the side.

Silently, Trunks reached under the table and brought out the chilled box he had slid under it as he had went back to work. He entered in the security code that made it unseal, opened it, and reached into it, removing four vials. Within each one was a blood sample, all of them labeled with a name.

Lunch.

Chaozu.

Tien.

Bra.

Slowly, Trunks inserted each blood sample into his device, his eyes tearing a bit when he put in his little sister’s blood. But he shoved his feeling aside and began entering commands.

On the monitor a map of the world appeared. On it a blinking dot indicated Japan. Trunks tapped a button repeatedly and the map began to scale in, closer and closer, until it was down to a small enough map so that Trunks could recognize the area.

Now several dots blinked on the map. Trunks entered a command to eliminate several locations on the map, which just happened to be the locations his friends and sister were buried.

That left one single blinking dot.

Trunks’s mouth opened in a grin so fierce and hard it may as well have been a snarl.

"Now I have you."

Gohan was glad he had missed dinner. It would have been on the ground within seconds as he looked around the college.

It was the same. Horrible, monsterous murders. But these were the worst of all, and what made Gohan so sick was that so many of them seemed to be IMPOSSIBLE.

Like the first one he had nearly thrown up at. It had been a woman, about 20 years old. She had been dangling off a street light. That might not have been so bad, except what had been used to hang her: her own intestines. Her stomach had seemingly exploded from the inside and her guts had wrapped around her neck and the pole, jerking her off the ground and hanging her. To apparently ensure that the woman didn’t get down, her arms had also been torn right off.

Horrible variations and other deaths were strewn about the campus, which had been burnt down and torn apart. One that Son Gohan couldn’t get out of his head was the parking lot one. Someone had seized a male teacher, somehow liquified the tar road, and then shoved the man’s face into the bubbling red hot mass until he suffocated or drowned, the police weren’t sure which one had been his fate.

This wasn’t some ordinary killer, but Gohan had deduced that long ago. But whoever it was, he definitely had powers beyond any human. The power to set things on fire at will, make a body rebel against itself, and throw things and tear them down like they were made of matchsticks.

"Saiyaman, here’s another one."

Gohan looked over to the policeman and went over to check. His stomach luched. Another kid, this one had been pinned to the wall, by what looked to be hundreds of spoons. The dull instruments had been thrown through the boy with enough force that they were impaled into the stone wall behind the boy.

As his stomach flip-flopped even more, Gohan added that the ability to tear material things apart and throw them so hard and accurately must be some kind of telekinesis. An immensely powerful kind.

Then Gohan realized that the killer had also used a spoon to rip open the boy’s chest and take his heart.

For the second time in a few days, Gohan lurched to some nearby bushes and threw up.

Trunks was walking out of his mother’s laboratory, pushing buttons on his device and cursing a blue streak when Son Goten dropped down in front of him. Trunks nearly brained his best friend until he realized who it was.

"Trunks!"

"Goten! What are you doing here?"

"I came to see you."

"I’m busy, Goten. Maybe another time." Trunks started to push past Goten before the young hybrid grabbed Trunks’s elbow.

"Trunks, I know something’s wrong. I could sense it all the way from Marron’s house. I know you’re angry, I know how bad it must hurt to have lost your mother and sister like that. But if you lock it away, you’ll turn into your father!" Goten said. Trunks brushed Goten off as he turned around.

"Goten…" he said, in a "what am I going to do with you?" tone. Goten noticed the device in Trunks’s hands.

"What’s that?"

Trunk was silent for a while, before slowly starting to speak.

"It’s a device that tracks the DNA of things. I designed it to see if I could find the killer, because after what he did to Bra…he surely got blood on him. If he still has even the tiniest bit of Bra’s blood on him, or Tien’s, or Chaozu’s, or Lunch’s…I’ll be able to find him. And kill him."

Goten was startled. Trunks sounded so…bloodthirsty.

"And you were going to do this alone?"

"Yes. I have to. I share my father’s rage, but he lacks foresight. If the killer goads him he may rip the entire planet to shreds in the act of killing him. His fury is too...unstable. I won’t do that. I will deal with the killer myself…and give his head to my father. Maybe that will sait him…I hope it will sait me also…"

"Trunks…" Goten said, grabbing his friend’s shoulders

"I have to do this Goten. Please let go of me…"

"TRUNKS! Listen to yourself! You sound like the murderer, not the avenging hero! If you think I’m actually going to let you go alone, you’re out of your fucking mind!"

Trunks looked at Gohan with his head cocked.

"No Gohan. If I don’t do this…alone…I think that will be my fate."

Brushing off Gohan’s hands, Trunks turned away from him, fiddling with his device. Goten stared, his hands out helplessly.

"Trunks…"

Then his cell phone began to ring. Goten glanced at it and then at Trunks. Trunks was still fiddling with his device. Goten guessed he wouldn’t be taking off immediately. He picked up the call.

"Hello?"

"Goten? It’s your mother. Where are you?"

"With Trunks. Why Mom?"

"There’s been another…attack. At Nary College. Your older brother went there to look at it. He wants to call another emergency meeting…apparently what he saw really rattled him."

"Again?" Goten said. If the murders had rattled Gohan after he’d already seen a bunch of them, they must have been really bad.

"What do you mean, again?" Trunks said, suddenly grabbing Goten.

"There’s been another mass killing. Our madman is back in action…"

"WHERE!?!?" Trunks yelled, shaking Goten.

"Uh….Nary College…"

Trunks let go of Goten as his battle aura exploded around him causing the wind to whistle.

"Trunks, where are you going?"

"To avenge my sister and mother. Please honour my request." Trunks said.

A second later, he was gone.

"Goten? Goten? The meeting’s going to be at your older brother’s house. Are you there?" Chi Chi’s voice said from the phone.

"Yeah. Gotcha." Goten said in a dead voice, and hung up, looking at the sky where Trunks had flown off into.

He stood there for a long long time.

On a throne of garbage and scrap metal, Agony reclined. She’d taken so many hearts and souls she’d needed a place to rest so she could eat and absorb them all. She could feel each new soul as she sucked it into her, as their howls of pain charged her with power and an incredible sense of living.

"This is life. Lots of things to kill, and no annoying boy hounding me at every step." She smiled.

A rat scurried across the floor, drawn by the smell of raw meat. As it came towards Agony, she lifted her hand and pointed at it. The rat suddenly froze. She pointed upwards and it drifted up and towards her. The rat struggled until it was face to face with Agony, where it looked into her eyes and promptly died.

Agony smiled her cruel smile and flicked her fingers. A small blast of energy flew and blew the rat to bits, splattering her with newly warm blood. She licked it off her face, smirking and marveling at the abilities she now possessed.

"Oh yes. And this unexpected bonus." She said. Within her, newly imprisoned souls screamed.

Trunks flew away from Nary College, trying to hold onto his lunch. The horror he had witnessed had fully cemented his desire to do what he had decided to do.

While he’d told Goten that his device could track the DNA of the victims if the killer still had any on him, he hadn’t told him the signal had been weak and erratic, and impossible to lock down. But the murders at Nary College had been fresh. Which meant the killer was most likely covered with fresh DNA. Without the police seeing him, Trunks had sneaked another blood sample from a body and programmed it into his device. Now the signal was clear and strong.

Slowly, Trunks made his way along the landscape until he came to the outskirts of a small town. Once it may have thrived, but apparently those days were long gone. The town was practically deserted, surrounded by abandonned and crumbling factories.

The signal beeps grew louder and louder until it became a numbing buzz. He looked down on the first ghost factory outside the town. He was here. The killer was inside.

Trunks tucked away the device. He blinked and tried to sense a ki inside the building. There was nothing. Either his device was wrong, or the killer didn’t have a ki, just as was suspected.

Trunks ground his teeth, and slowly headed for the nearest door.

Agony sat up. She could sense something. Yes, someone was outside. She could feel their rage, and beneath it, their pain for someone dead and gone.

She licked her lips as her insatiable craving was reawakened. The mourning pain wasn’t good enough. She wanted more.

"See boy come. Come boy come. Die boy die."

The inside of the factory was dimly lit, and Trunks cast his wary eyes around it. He looked down on the floor to see a trail of drying blood leading into the shadows.

Trunks walked into the factory, looking and listening for the slightest cue that would give away the killer’s location. Once he had his hands around his neck…

"Welcome to my parlor."

Trunks whirled as the female voice drifted out of the shadows. He shuddered, the voice was so goddamn evil.

The lights suddenly came on. Since most of them had been blown out or stolen long ago, it didn’t light the factory up much. But it was enough so he could see her, slinking on a pile of metal covered with splattered blood.

Agony looked at the handsome lad with purple hair and her eyes lit up.

"Ohhhhhh, a pretty boy."

Trunks swallowed at the sight. He’d braced himself but the preperation was sliding apart as he looked at the woman. It was wrong. He’d expected a huge man, a fat grotesque creature with beady eyes and a nose that resembled a pig’s snout, or something that was simularily hideous. But this woman was thin and so beautiful. Her complexion and face were flawless, like they had been cast in stone.

Then he saw her eyes, and fear exploded in his heart. But he did not back down, even as the eyes seemed to reach into him and send daggers of ice up and down his spine.

No, he had been right after all. This wasn’t a woman. This was a demon from the depths of hell.

"Your sister’s blood tasted so sweet. Little girls always do." Agony whispered, licking her fingertips.

The words hit Trunks like blows. This woman, this bitch, had murdered his sister, and she had enjoyed it! SHE WAS LAUGHING AT IT!

"But her pain and agony now…is even sweeter. As yours will be." Agony said, and chuckled.

Trunks’s rage began to gather, a huge inferno of fury ready to burn down everything in front of it.

"Oh, by the way, your mother…? After we’re done here, I’m gonna finish what I started." Agony said, and smiled, a smile full of malevolence and horrible bloodlust.

The sound of Trunks’s snapping was almost audible.

"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" he screamed, as his hair flared straight to SSJ2 and he blasted at Agony, grabbing his head in her hand and shoving her on the ground. Then he was on her, smashing in her skull with fists, ripping, tearing, screaming all the while.

Then he felt the ripping pain as something grabbed his back and tore a line of cuts down it. He opened his mouth to scream and then he felt all his teeth shatter as Agony smashed a fist seemingly made of steel into his mouth. He reared back and Agony blasted him at point-blank range with flames, sending him tumbling across the factory, a burning marionette doll.

Trunks was on his feet, ripping off his flaming jacket and shirt, as Agony got to her feet, her caved in skull popping out and healing as her body repaired the damage Trunks had managed to inflict. She knew if she goaded him, he would snap and attack, and cause her great pain. It had been bliss as the pain from her wounds and the pain from his mixed and flowed within her, charging her very being like a kind of pleasurable electricity.

"Pretty boy." She whispered. Trunks felt his back and the four ugly wounds that now ran down it, and looked as Agony raised her hand. Her fingers weren’t there anymore, they had metemorphisized into razor-sharp barbed knives, the flesh tracing right into the steel. She lifted them, letting his blood drip onto her face and licking it off.

"You taste as good as your sister."

Trunks’s aura exploded as he made some motions before slamming his hands forward.

"FINISH BUSTER!" he screamed. His broken teeth cut his lips and gums but he didn’t care, he was beyond caring, all he wanted was for this woman to die, die for her crimes, die for existing.

The blast exploded from Trunks’s hands, enveloping Agony. She staggered and screamed, and then laughed as her flesh began to rebuild the instant it was burnt away. Trunks poured on the energy, and Agony began to walk towards him, the energy ripping off her flesh and burning it to ashes, only for new flesh to reappear and suffer the same fate. She kept coming, the agony she was in a state of utter heaven for her.

Sweat poured down Trunks’s forehead as he poured it on, but Agony kept coming, taking slow steps, and by god she was laughing, she was loving it, she was being burnt to ashes over and over again and to her it was fucking euphoria…

Then Trunks ran out of energy. Slowly, his blast faded away, leaving Agony a burnt skeleton but her flesh was healing and regenerating even as the last of the ashes fell off her skeleton and oh god she still had those eyes those horrible hell-emitting eyes…

Then Trunks’s fear was replaced by pain as Agony reached out and her bony hands transformed into blades.

"Pretty boy."

Then they slashed, and Trunks screamed as the right side of his face was torn down to the bone.

"Pretty boy! Pretty boy!" Agony cackled as she sliced twice more, tearing Trunks’s face into a blood-spurting mess. Blood soaked his now-blonde hair, and Trunks tried to back away and focus away the pain. The wounds were superficial and his good looks didn’t mean squat. He had to attack again, send this demon back to hell, for Bra and the world’s sake.

Then Agony smashed a knee into his chest.

Trunks gasped and then blood flew in a torrent from his mouth as his whole rib cage shattered, puncturing his lungs. He crumbled to his knees, gasping for air as more blood poured from his mouth in a steady stream. He looked up into Agony’s face, as she smiled in delight.

Then Agony picked him up and hurled him right through the factory wall.

As Trunks smashed through the wall and landed on the ground, he tried to get and failed. Another huge jolt of pain lanced through his right leg, and he realized that having used up all his power for the futile Finish Buster, he hadn’t been able to form a ki shield around him to prevent injury.

"Trunks!"

Son Goten landed next to his best friend, and Trunks looked up. He almost smiled. Not only had he not listened to him, he’d neglected to take off his guitar, leaving it strapped to his back.

"Oh my god, Trunks!"

"Goten…get away…"

"No fucking way! Whoever did this is gonna pay, and pay in BLOOD!" Goten said as he went SSJ. He looked towards the warehouse and started towards it before Trunks grabbed his leg.

"NO! Goten, don’t go in there! She’ll kill you!"

"She?" Goten said, looking down at Trunks. His heart lurched. His best friend was an absolute mess, his face cut to ribbons along with his back. Blood kept pouring out of his mouth. Goten cursed that he hadn’t brought any Senzu beans.

"Oh pretty boy…" came Agony’s voice from the warehouse. A second later she stepped from the shattered wall she had thrown Trunks through. "Oh, you brought a friend! Two for the price of one!"

Goten ground his teeth in rage. The woman was splattered with blood that could only be from one person. Goten started to walk forward before Trunks grabbed him again.

"NO! Goten, don’t underestimate her! She’s a monster! She’s a demon straight from hell!"

"Why thank you!" Agony said.

Then her face exploded out the back of her skull as Goten sent a ki blast right through her head. She pitched backwards and collapsed on the ground.

"No, thank you." Goten hissed, and turned to help his friend up.

"No Goten!"

"What? I have to help you, she’s dead…"

"NO SHE’S NOT! LOOK!"

Goten turned as Agony stood up, her face filling out. Goten’s jaw dropped as flesh sprang from nowhere to fix the damage, and in a second Agony was again whole.

"Oh, that felt good." She whispered.

Goten swallowed and tried to pick his friend up.

"Running away? I don’t think so!" Agony said, running forward. Then she was blown off her feet and thrown back into the factory by another ki blast from Goten. Goten blasted the wrecked building and it totally collasped, burying Agony beneath it.

"Goten…" Trunks gurgled. It was getting harder and harder to talk with his injuries. "She feeds off her own pain…and our pain…"

"I know." Goten said. "With that known I think she’s gonna bust out of there any second now. If she took you apart so easily I’ll be no match for her. That leaves us two options."

"I don’t want to die." Trunks murmured, and coughed up more blood.

"Ok, then we’re down to one. Can you stand?"

"No, the fucking bitch broke my leg…and I’m out of energy…"

His hand glowing, Goten touched Trunks, and the glow suffused him and vanished.

"I gave you a little of mine. Just enough to fly. We’ll do it in the air."

"I dunno…she fucked me up pretty bad…"

Goten grabbed Trunks’s hand and yanked him fully up.

"See past the pain. Just like our fathers taught us."

The wreckage began to shake. Goten glanced and it and floated up into the air. Trunks grimanced and then floated up to his side.

"Let’s fuck her up bad now." Goten said. Trunks smiled, even though his teeth were broken.

As Agony shoved the wreckage off her and calmly yanked a rusted beam of metal out of her stomach, Goten and Trunks thrust out their arms, each the opposite way.

"FFFFFFUUUUUUUU-SION! HA!"

Agony looked up to the brilliant flash and then at the whole new fighter floating there, in white pants and a vest and with golden hair down to his feet.

"Hey hey hey! It’s time to die bitch! I, Gotenks, will fuck you up in ways beyond your imagination!" SSJ3 Gotenks chortled, and dove at Agony, kicking her right through another factory.

Gotenks followed, lazily flying up to Agony and smashing her with blows as soon as she got up, laughing as she flew through another building each time. Finally he got bored, and as she got up, he hurled a gold ki ball at her. It caught her and exploded, completely enveloping her as Gotenks flew up into the sky.

"RENZOKOKEN SHINE SHINE MISSILE!" Gotenks yelled and thrust down his hands, throwing about a million ki blasts at the spot where his ki ball had exploded. The area erupted in new explosions that spread out and enveloped the surrounding factories. Smoke plumed into the air, enveloping Gotenks before it blew away.

"Hey hey! Regenerate from THAT, bitch!" Gotenks quipped, flashing the peace sign. He then flew down to the ground.

"Ok, now I must get back to my father’s house so one of my sides can be healed…eh?"

The smoke cleared, to reveal Agony, now a complete skeleton except for a patch of burnt flesh and smoking hair on the upper right side of her skull.

And her eyes.

She was still standing, looking at Gotenks with her cursed eyes and then suddenly her whole body erupted in black energy, as it flowed over her like an evil tide.

"N-n-no…not possible…!" Gotenks stammered, and began throwing more ki at the figure covered in black energy. The bones broke and shattered to pieces under the blasts, but the pieces didn’t fly more then two inches before the black energy snatched them and snapped them back into position and sealed them back together. Faster then Gotenks could blast, flesh began to erupt on the bones, at a speed beyond imagining.

The whole process took less then two seconds to regenerate Agony fully. Despite Gotenks’s constant blasting, he couldn’t blast it away faster then it could heal.

"YES! YES! OH I LOVE IT!"

Gotenks stopped as he realized that all he was doing was giving Agony pleasure. The wounds he inflicted healed up.

"Nooooo…even with your ability…how…?"

Agony smiled and licked her lips.

"Because you asked so nicely."

And then the ground erupted with sharp shards of rock and edged pieces of metal shrapnal. They flew into the air, powered by Agony’s supreme mastery over pain, and began flying at Gotenks. He squawked in fear and went into a mad dance to dodge, but they just kept flying, more and more. Finally he just formed a ki shield around him and watched as they bounced off.

"Nah nah!" he taunted.

Agony stared.

And then she raised her head and hands and screamed mad laughter to the heavens as black energy erupted from her hands and formed into deadly spears. The spears flew at Gotenks.

Gotenks tried to dodge away.

Too late. Gotenks screamed as one of the spears flew right through his shield and impaled itself though his side. He brought his hands down and tried to clutch at the wound as blood began to pour from it, but the black spear was still there and it burned his hands. As blood from the mortal wound rained down into the ground, Gotenks lost concentration and began to fall, the spear yanking him towards Agony.

Gotenks’s eyes widened as another blade of black energy materilized on Agony’s hand and she she made a "come hither" gesture, and he knew that she was going to carve open his chest and steal his heart just like all the others. He tried to get away, but the spear had sealed itself inside him and brought him to Agony.

"Come here, Pretty Boy." She purred, licking her lips.

And then inside Gotenks’s head, a voice came.

Goten realized that he was back, his personality no longer fused with Trunks. Then he realized what Trunks was going to do.

And then Goten was himself again as he tumbled away from Agony, the spear no longer in his side. His eyes widened in horror as Trunks fell towards Agony.

Agony smiled and brought her blade up as Trunks was impaled on it. The blade burst from his back, Trunks’s blood sizzling on it.

"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" Goten screamed as Agony swung his best friend down to the ground so that he was before him, impaled on her dark blade. Goten landed on his feet, his eyes as wide as saucers at the horrible sight.

"TRUNKS, NOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!"

Slowly, Trunks turned his head, looking at Goten with the ruin of his face as Agony’s face lit up with delight at her catch.

"Run Goten…get toussan…kill her…" he said in a weak voice.

Then Agony reached forward and seized his hair.

"Pretty boy." She whispered.

And then she tore Trunks’s head right off his body. Blood sprayed from the stump like a geyser, splattering all over Goten and Agony.

"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" Goten screamed as Agony yanked her blade up, reached into Trunks’s chest, and tore his heart from his body. She tossed the decapitated hybrid aside and raised her heart above him, crushing it in her hand and letting the blood flow into her open mouth, as she lapped at the air to get all of it.

Goten screamed in utter rage as his hair exploded into Super Saiya-jin Level Two.

"YOU FUCKING BITCH!" Goten roared in rage over the death of his best friend as he brought his hands to his side. Agony tore a bite from the heart and looked at Goten.

"KA-MA-HA-MA-HA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

Goten thrust his hands forward and let loose with his family’s traditional attack. The explosion rocked the earth and sent Goten flying backwards from the point blank range. He tumbled, like a rag doll in the wind, before finally hitting the ground and bouncing across it, finally coming to a stop.

Goten leapt to his feet, whipping up a wind to blow away all the dust. If Agony was still alive, he was gonna know right away.

The smoke cleared, and Goten thrust out his hands, prepared to throw enough ki to crack a moon in half.

Nothing.

Slowly, Goten flew up into the air, his eyes darting everywhere crazily.

Nothing.

Goten scoured his eyes everywhere.

Nothing. No skeleton, no Agony, nothing. She was completely gone. He’d done it.

"Trunks…" Goten sobbed for his friend who had gone for revenge and died. It wasn’t right. The woman should have died, not survived to kill Trunks as well. It wasn’t fair that someone so evil should take a girl’s life and then have enough power to take her brother’s life as well. It just wasn’t right.

But there was nothing he could do about it.

Goten sniffed and wiped his nose. He would tell his family and friends, they would mourn, and then they could get the Dragon Balls, because no more lives would be taken by that woman with the eyes from hell.

Sighing, Goten let his hair and his body slip out of the SSJ2 state. He realized he had lost his guitar in the fight, and he looked around to see if he could find it on the ground.

There it was. Goten pointed to it, levitating it up into his hands. He turned to leave.

And Agony, with claws of black fire, slashed her hand across his chest.

Goten screamed and clutched his chest as blood began pouring from the wounds. His guitar, shredded, fell to the ground, leaving Goten clutching the handle. The blood immediately soaked his shirt and began to soak his pants as he clutched the wounds, groaning in pain as he tried to fly backwards away from Agony.

"Your friend tasted great. I expect you will too." Agony laughed, as she raised her black claws to slice Goten to ribbons.

And then Goten jammed the broken end of his guitar handle right through Agony’s neck. For the first time shock erupted on her face as the wood slashed through her windpipe, but it was only the beginning as Goten swung the handle around and hurled Agony to the ground. She hit it and vanished into explosions as Goten thrust out his hand and let loose a barrage of ki blasts where she had been thrown. Finally he stopped, panting. He’d been lucky. If he hadn’t grabbed the guitar, the slice would have killed him for sure. Instead the guitar had lessened the blow somewhat so that it had only gourged four ugly wounds in the flesh across his rib cage. They hurt like hell, but his ribs had protected him. If Agony had aimed just a little lower, Goten would be holding his guts in his hands.

But he had no time to thank his lucky stars. He had to get away, flee from this seemingly unkillable monster, get his father and Vegeta…

Vegeta…he’d just lost his son as well. Despite how much hatred now raged in his heart for her, Goten couldn’t help pitying Agony when Vegeta got his hands on her, even if she could regenerate.

"Gotta get away…get away…" Goten moaned, as he flew off into the horizon, blood dripping from his wounds in a steady rain down onto the ground.

Agony watched Goten’s flight as she pulled herself up from the crator his blasts had left. She smiled.

"Go ahead and run, boy. You can’t escape me. No one in this world can, or will." Agony said. She walked over to where Trunks’s head lay and picked it up, looking into the expression of horror that had locked Trunks’s face into an eternal scream with her soul-shredding eyes, even as Trunks joined his sister in horrible torture inside her heart.

"Pretty boy."

Goku’s face was pure white as he looked over his younger son. He’d staggered into the emergency meeting, bleeding to death from horrible wounds and screaming about Trunks being dead and an invincible woman lunatic demon. Chi-Chi has passed out immediately, and even after Krillian had hurridly produced a Senzu bean and given it to Goten he wouldn’t stop ranting about Trunks’s killer being unstoppable. One sentence had chilled Goku especially.

Gotenks was one of their greatest warriors.

Vegeta wouldn’t believe Goten that his son was dead, not after what had happened, saying that he was Kakarott’s son, he was crazy, and every excuse in the book. But Goten had told him where to find Trunks, and Vegeta had hurridly flown off.

Goku would never forget the look on Vegeta’s face when he returned with Trunks’s mutilated, decapitated body. It was a look of the deepest sorrow Goku had ever seen as Vegeta floated there, his eyes squeezed shut, head lowered.

And he would never forget Vegeta’s scream.

Vegeta had screamed something in the saiya-jin language something Goku had never thought he would hear Vegeta say.

Goten had eventually passed out himself, and Goku had put his youngest son to bed along with his wife, thanking Kami that he was still alive. Vegeta had left, his face ashen, with Trunks’s body, gone to perform an ancient royal saiya-jin ceremony for fathers who had lost their sons.

To murderers.

"Vegeta…even after what you’ve done…you’ve redeemed yourself. You didn’t deserve this. No one does." Goku murmured, stroking his son’s fevered forehead.

"Toussan?"

Goku turned to look at his older son, who stood in the doorway.

"You heard Goten. He was crazy but he wasn’t lying. Who is this woman, and god, how do we stop her? Even Gotenks couldn’t…" Gohan trailed off.

And then from the shadows, a voice spoke.

"It’s my fault."

Goku and Gohan leapt into combat poses at the sudden new voice. Silently, the man in black named Vengeance strode from the shadows in the corner of the room.

"My name is Erik Damien Ravensky." Vengeance said. "And the reason Agony is here, the reason all this death has happened…is because of me."