Across every screen on Earth, in living rooms and bars and crowded city squares, the same broadcast played over and over. A monster calling himself Cell, calm and almost amused, had made his announcement to the entire world. The Cell Games, he called it. Ten days from that broadcast, in an arena built by his own hands, the fate of the planet would be settled in front of anyone brave enough to watch.

High above the clouds, at the sacred Lookout, those ten days felt like both an eternity and no time at all.

The doors of the Hyperbolic Time Chamber slid open with a hiss of escaping cold, and two golden silhouettes stepped out into the light.

Goku walked out first, stretching his arms overhead with a satisfied groan, his hair standing on end in those familiar spikes. Behind him came Gohan, and for a moment, nobody on the Lookout said a single word.

Krillin's jaw dropped. "Gohan? Is that actually you?"

The boy who once barely cleared Krillin's shoulder, who used to stand somewhere around his father's chest, now stood taller and broader, his frame filled out with new muscle earned through a year of training packed into a single day. He reached his father's shoulders now, a change that seemed almost impossible given how little time had passed out here.

Chi-Chi's hands flew to her mouth. "Gohan, sweetheart, what happened to you in there?"

Piccolo said nothing at first, arms folded, studying the boy he had trained since he was small. Even he, who had watched Gohan grow and change more times than he cared to count, looked caught off guard.

"Hi Mom," Gohan said, rubbing the back of his neck with a sheepish grin. "It's still me. I promise."

Goku laughed and clapped a hand on his son's considerably broader shoulder.

"He grew up a little in there, that's all," he said. "We both did, actually. Feels pretty good."

Before anyone could ask another question, Goku lifted two fingers to his forehead, that familiar gesture that only ever meant one thing.

"Gonna go take a quick look at Cell," he said. "Just want a read on him before the big day. Be right back."

And then he was simply gone.

He reappeared on the edge of a half finished arena, pale stone gleaming under open sky. Cell stood alone at its center, as though he had been expecting company all along.

Cell's mouth curled into a thin smile. "Decided to come see me before the big day, have you."

"Just wanted to get a feel for you," Goku said, looking him over the way he might size up a new kind of food. "You've got a lot packed in there."

"More than you could possibly imagine," Cell said.

Goku only smiled, raised two fingers back to his forehead, and vanished as quickly as he had come.

An instant later he was back on the Lookout, as if he had never left at all.

"So?" Krillin asked, practically vibrating. "What'd you find out? Can you take him?"

Goku rubbed the back of his head and let out a short laugh, the kind he usually saved for losing a sparring match.

"Honestly, I don't really know," he said. "If I had to guess, I'd say he's probably gonna knock me around pretty good."

The words landed like a stone dropped into still water. Tien's eyes went wide. Yamcha took a half step back. Even Piccolo's frown deepened.

"Wait, what?" Krillin said. "Goku, that's not funny."

"I'm serious," Goku said, still smiling like he'd just commented on the weather.

Piccolo uncrossed his arms. "There's still time. One more day in the chamber, you and Gohan could push it further."

Goku shook his head without a moment's hesitation.

"Nah, we're done in there," he said. "Gohan and I are gonna train outside instead."

That answer drew even more confusion than the last one.

"Goku, this is the literal fate of the planet we're talking about," Bulma said, crossing her arms. "Why would you skip free training time?"

"We're not skipping it," Goku said. "Just doing it differently. Our bodies have been through a lot. Figured it's smarter not to push them any harder than we have to."

Vegeta had been silent up to that point, leaning against a pillar with his usual scowl. Now his expression twisted into something sharper.

"Always something, isn't it, Kakarot," he said, voice low and tight. "Always some little trick you're keeping to yourself while the rest of us tear our bodies apart trying to catch up." His fists clenched at his sides. "What exactly are you hiding this time?"

"I'm not hiding anything," Goku said, shrugging. "I just have a feeling about it, that's all."

Vegeta said nothing else. He only turned and walked off toward the edge of the Lookout, jaw set, clearly unsatisfied with that answer.

And so the nine days that followed began.

Down below, the rest of the Z Fighters threw themselves into preparation without rest. Vegeta trained alone and in silence, pushing past limits he had already broken twice over. Krillin, Tien, and Yamcha sparred until they could barely stand, determined to scrape out every last bit of strength the time remaining would allow.

Goku and Gohan did something nobody expected. They trained, but only for three of those nine days. For the six that followed, they did almost nothing at all. Goku spent long afternoons fishing by the riverbank. Gohan slept in later than he had in months and, much to his mother's quiet astonishment, actually sat down and finished his homework.

It baffled everyone who heard about it. Nobody more than Vegeta, who could only grit his teeth from a distance and wonder, again, what game his rival was playing now.

Three days before the appointed date, the phone rang at the Son house.

"Goku, it's me," Bulma said. "I need you to come with me for a bit. I think I found something."

"Found what?" Goku asked, peeking into the fridge as he talked.

"Another one of Gero's labs," Bulma said. "My equipment's been picking up a power signature out past the old Red Ribbon ruins for weeks now, and I finally narrowed it down. I don't want to go alone."

Goku rubbed his chin, then closed the fridge.

"Sure, I'll come," he said. "Could use a break from fishing anyway."

The hidden lab sat half buried beneath layers of rock and rusted metal, the kind of place built specifically to never be found. Dust hung thick in the stale air. Old monitors lined the walls, most of them dark and dead, and cables snaked across the floor like something out of a nightmare.

"Yeesh," Bulma muttered, running a scanner along one wall. "Gero really didn't want anyone stumbling onto this place."

At the back of the room stood two massive glass tanks, both filled with a thick, pale liquid. The first was clear enough to see straight through, and what floated inside it stopped Goku in his tracks.

A woman hung suspended in the fluid, curled into a fetal position, fast asleep. She wore a dark, fitted bodysuit, and her features, the shape of her face, the set of her brow, carried an unmistakable air about them, though neither Goku nor Bulma could place why.

"Who in the world is that?" Bulma asked, leaning closer to the glass.

"No idea," Goku said, tilting his head as he studied her. "Never seen her before in my life." He frowned, scratching at his hair. "Although... she kinda looks familiar, somehow. Can't figure out why though. I'm pretty sure the only full blooded Saiyans I've ever met are Raditz, Nappa, and Vegeta."

"Well, she's definitely a saiyan," Bulma said, scanner beeping softly in her hand. "Tail's tucked up around her waist there, see it?"

Goku leaned in for a closer look, still frowning, the unfamiliar woman's sleeping face tugging at something just out of reach in the back of his mind.

It was the second tank that drew their attention next. Unlike the first, its water churned with a thick haze, fogged and clouded, hiding whatever floated inside from view. Only the faintest outline of {{user}} could be made out through the murk.

"Can't really tell what's in this one," Goku said, stepping closer and squinting through the glass.

"Careful," Bulma warned, still focused on her scanner readout. "We don't know what half this equipment even does yet."

But Goku was already running his hand along the panel beside the tank, poking curiously at one of the old, half lit buttons the way he always did with things he didn't fully understand.

"Goku, don't touch that," Bulma said, glancing up just a second too late.

A low hum rolled through the floor. Somewhere deep in the console, a series of lights flickered to life one by one, climbing in sequence toward the top of the panel. The fog inside the second tank stirred, swirling now instead of sitting still, as something locked deep within the old machinery groaned awake for the first time in years.

Just what had Goku set into motion? And whatever, or whoever, had been sealed away inside that tank for so long... was it about to wake up?