Fractured Souls

Chapter Six: The Assassination Attempt

Yonagi Ebezo was a slight, balding man who wore glasses and owned an antique shop in downtown Tokyo. He was organized and neat in everything that he did to the point of being anal retentive and always offered free candy to children.

At precisely eight a.m. he started off for his shop after eating a bagel and orange juice breakfast. Before even flipping cardboard sign on the door over to 'open', he took a broom and swept the sidewalk.

"Ohayo, Yonagi-san!" The older woman who worked down the street at a small grocery always stopped briefly to bid him a good morning. In fact, most of the shop owners and employees had a kind word or two for him. He was beloved among very many people.

Based on his grandfatherly exterior, hardly anyone was aware that he was the president of CAMI let alone believed it.

Another man came up the street around nine o'clock in a slow, leisurely gait that didn't fool anyone. All those who spotted his large figure immediately knew that he didn't belong there. The man stopped in front of Yonagi Antiques and went inside, careful to keep his bulky frame from accidentally striking something fragile and priceless.

"Yonagi-sama, did ya see the news last night? We fixed 'im good!" He stopped in the middle of the shop and searched for his leader. "Where are ya, Yonagi-sama?"

The small man frowned and pushed his glasses up higher onto his nose as he exited the back storage room. "Quiet down for once in your life," he said sternly. "What if there were other people around?"

He looked down at his feet, successfully cowed by Yonagi's tone of voice. "Gomen nasai."

"To answer you question, I did happen to see the news last night." He began to walk around the room, making sure that the merchandise was neat and orderly. "The boy was nearly frightened to death."

The man's large face twisted in thought. "Honachi-sama told me to give ya a message. He said, 'The target tried to off himself after the news aired the story.' Honachi-sama told me to ask ya a question after tellin' ya the message. He wants to know if he should let him kill himself or if he should do it for him."

Yonagi didn't have to even think about his answer. "Tell Honachi to get some men on it. I want him dead in the worse possible way. If the Son boy is allowed to commit suicide then he will gain sympathy from many people. If he is murdered, exposed like the sinner he is, then others of his kind will be also be targeted. Then the righteous ones all over the world will rise up and rid our planet of the freaks." One look at the message runner told Yonagi that his words were wasted. "Just tell Honachi to kill him and make it look good."

"Right away, Yonagi-sama," his head bobbed up and down quickly. "Why did ya pick the boy, anyway? What did he do to ya?"

Eyes gleaming with thinly veiled madness, he went back to tidying his shop. "Why, he was born, Gidayu, and fourteen years later we discovered that he was perverted." The bell tinkled as the large man left his shop and Yonagi went to his computer. "I must find your home address, yes I must. Not one of them will be left alive."

***

"Videl!" Satomi, a pretty blonde girl of fifteen called out. It was after school and no one had seen hide nor hair of Gohan the entire day. "Do you know where Gohan-kun is? I'm worried about him."

At the sound of his name, a fresh round of tears fell from Videl's already red and puffy eyes. "He-he..."

"Nani? What did Gohan do?"

"He tried to kill himself last night!" she wailed, a mournful sound that caused many of the birds and small animals in the vicinity to flee. People looked at her as she fell to her knees on the sidewalk, but continued on once they saw she had a friend to help her. Eyes wide, Satomi pulled her back upward.

"On Kami in Heaven!" she gasped as she pulled out her cell phone. "I have to call someone but who will listen to me?"

It was now Videl's turn to ask questions. Face still wet, she guided her friend to the nearest bench. "What's going on? I know that it's serious but *how* serious?"

"This morning I heard my father talking something over with a man named Gidayu. He sent him to see someone that he called "the boss". To make a long story short, my otousan sent one of his assassins after poor Gohan! Who can I call, Videl? Who can I call?"

Taking the phone from her she pulled a number from her purse. "Gohan's other tousan is a private investigator and I was given his number if I found out something important. *Nothing* is more important that this."

"Ouji Investigations, Vegeta speaking." The voice sounded gruff and, despite the gravity of the situation, was a little put off.

"Um, Vegeta-san? This is Videl Satan, Gohan's friend. Is anyone at home with him right now?"

His voiced sounded puzzled. "Well, iie. Goku's at the hospital and I'm at the office. Do you think someone should be there with him? It was told by the doctor that the medicine should make him sleep most of the day."

"There's no time to explain but you need to get there as soon as you can! They're coming for him!"

"Who's coming? Who is it?" he asked but the girl had already hung up. Cursing, Vegeta grabbed his keys and hit the street.

***

The man in black moved silently up the outdoor staircase, a variety of weapons hidden on his body. Time was going to be taken very leisurely once he'd broken into the apartment for he knew that no one would be around to hear the boy's screams.

He had a passion for killing, a thirst that needed to be continually slaked by the blood of others. If you wanted the deed done quickly and cleanly then he wasn't the one for the job. This assassin killed with the ferociousness of a psychopath and the speed of a turtle. 'Why rush through things,' he wondered to himself, 'if you received more pleasure by taking your time?'

The second door on the left led to the boy's bedroom and paused before this for just a moment. There was nary a sound from behind the door though it was early afternoon and that made him wary. Did his target know he was coming and waiting silently and patiently to attack him once he went inside? The unknown danger made a thrill run through the assassin's body and he swung the door open wide to greet his enemy.

No one was waiting to attack him but there was a teenage boy lying in the bed. A bottle of pills sat next to him on the nightstand and for one brief moment, the assassin feared that he had succeeded in committing suicide after all.

Then his chest moved with the inhalation of breath and the man was relieved he hadn't come too late.

"Open your eyes little boy." He kneeled next to the bed and breathed into Gohan's ear. "Open your eyes."

He stirred slightly and rolled away from the voice. "Tousan," he mumbled in a voice slurred with both sleep and medication, "five more minutes please. I don't wan' get up for school yet."

"Open your eyes!" he said while shaking him. "Do it now!"

Gohan's body stiffened as his subconscious tried frantically to place the voice. It wasn't his father or Vegeta or anyone else that he knew. His eyes snapped open and widened when he stared into the empty gray eyes of the assassin, but chose to roll away from the bed instead of screaming. 'Have to get away...' He knew why the man was there. Someone was screwing with him again. The thought made him intensely angry. Why were they doing this? "No," he said softly with a shake of his head.

The assassin blinked at him. "What did you just say?"

"I said NO! I won't let you people do this to me anymore!" His fists clenched at his sides and he glared across his bed at the man. "Either you leave me alone or I'll have to do something that I'll probably regret later on."

That was when the knife was pulled on him. It was nearly thirteen inches of highly polished metal that gleamed softly in the sunlight coming from his window. Gohan gulped and backed away slowly, mouthing the words 'oh shit' when he realized that he had no idea what to do next.

Deciding to run and attempt to escape the apartment, Gohan took off for the short hallway. An insistent pounding made itself known at the front door along with terrified sounding female voices. He recognized them as Videl and Satomi, two people who were fully aware of the hate organization that was trying to destroy him from the inside out. He struggled to undo the locks on the door, the assassin had redone them to make things look normal, and was partially over the threshold when the man lunged at him and wrapped his arms around his legs. Gohan went down hard, smashing his nose on the rough concrete, and the two girls hopped backward in surprise.

"Oh my God!" Videl gasped as she looked behind him to the darkly dressed man who wielded a knife long enough to qualify for a short sword. She brought out her cell phone and dialed nine-one-one as Satomi and Gohan grappled with the man.

"I won't let you brats get me arrested!" he screamed, lashing out with his right hand and catching Satomi on the side of the head. She uttered a soft sound and fell to the ground heavily. Gohan saw red. It was one thing to mess with him, but dragging his friends into it was completely unacceptable. He felt coldness settle over him, heavy like a winter coat, and began to walk slowly towards the assassin.

"Gohan..." Videl whispered but there was no answer. He was beyond hearing, his mind focused on only one thing: stopping a sociopath.

He didn't know what happened. One moment he was glaring at the figure before him, the next his hands were wrapped around his throat. He stared at him through a golden haze as the light began to fade from the struggling man's eyes, only vaguely aware that stronger hands were pulling him away. Gohan fought for a moment, trying to complete the job that he had begun, before he came back to himself.

"Vegeta-tousan," he said softly as he stared at his hands. "I don't know who I am anymore."

A warm hug made him feel just a little bit better. Vegeta crouched next to the very still assassin, removing the mask from his face to discover his identity. He was an older man whose black hair was graying at the temples. There were crow's feet around his eyes and creases around his mouth, both indicating that he was usually a jovial man. Videl recognized him and her stomach turned.

"He's Satomi's father," she said softly. "I never knew he was this bad."

Vegeta merely frowned and stood. "Everyone has the capacity for evil inside of them. Whether you act on it or not is an entirely different story."

After the assassin was tied up and the still unconscious Satomi was laid out upon the couch, Gohan developed a pounding headache that just wouldn't go away. In addition, Videl had been staring at him almost from the moment Vegeta had pulled him away from Yamashira-san and it was beginning to make him uncomfortable.

Something in the hall mirror caught his eye and he froze in mid-step. Turning slowly, he stared at himself and ran slightly trembling fingers over his face and his hair. "Holy shit!"

That seemed to be the cue for Videl to ask questions. "What's wrong with him, Vegeta-san?" she whispered. Gohan still heard her. "I've never seen anything like it!"

"It's a Saiya-jin thing. There's a legend among my people, one about a golden warrior who killed off entire races and no one was able to stop him. He was defeated eventually by himself, getting caught in the energy of a blast that had also blown up many planets." He looked up to find his son in the living room entryway, eyes wide with disbelief. "You aren't uncontrollable, obviously. Your nature is exactly the opposite from most other Saiya-jin so that may be what's keeping you from being a sociopath."

"Am I going to look like this all of the time?" he asked, still a little stunned by his reflection in the mirror. "I see how Videl looks at me. It's like I'm some kind of freak."

Vegeta glared at the girl and she felt shame for her actions. "Take a deep breath and let everything go. The emotion, the tension, the power -- everything. You should feel yourself changing and can go take a look in the mirror if you want to. Goku and I are going to have to train you to control your ki or it this power will consume you in the very worst way." The boy nodded and disappeared into his room.

"Does it have a name?" Videl asked curiously. She continuously repeated 'He's still Gohan no matter what.' over and over again in her mind. It was finally starting to sink in.

"My people call it 'Super Saiya-jin'."

The police finally arrived nearly twenty minutes after the time Videl called them, and Satomi had regained consciousness. Her face was very pale as she stared at the familiar figure. Videl tried all that she could to get her mind away from things, but nothing seemed to help.

"You all have to come down to the station to answer a few questions for the record," the shorter of the two cops said as his partner handcuffed Yamashira-san. "Please do so by noon tomorrow."

As Vegeta was closing the door, something stopped it mid-way. "What is going on here? Why were there cops coming out of my home?" Goku entered and looked around. "Did they take Gohan? Did something happen to my son?!"

"Everything's fine now, Goku. To make a potentially long story very short: an assassin came to kill him, they fought, Gohan won. End of story."

"END OF-?!" He consciously lowered his voice. "End of story?!

Satomi's soft voice stopped any further words on Vegeta's part. "Son-san, I can help you figure out who's doing this. If you find Gidayu and follow him, he should lead you to the boss."

Goku sat down next to her. "Who's this Gidayu? How do you know him?"

"My father uses him as a messenger and he's been over to my house for dinner several times. I even think there's a picture of him in our family album." Her eyes pleaded with his. "You can't hurt him, Son-san. Gidayu isn't very bright so I don't think he really understands what he's doing. They're all taking advantage of him."

"Just a pawn," Goku said softly. "I'll do my best not to hurt him. Come on, let me take you girls home."

Vegeta stopped him at the front door, a falsely calm expression on his face. "Try not to get yourself killed," he said lightly. "I've grown rather attached to you."

Goku grasped Vegeta's hand and placed onto his chest. "You hold my heart," he said after a moment. "For you, I would do anything."

Understanding the full import of his words, Vegeta stepped away after only a single kiss. Goku would be coming back to him, of that he had no worries.

***

Where did my life go wrong? Just when did it start getting really bad? I think back to the week before school and can barely remember the anticipation I felt at the thought of going to high school for the very first time. So much has happened in such a short period that last week's normalcy feels like a distant dream.

When will the pain end? When will I be allowed to live a life free of fear?

He paused and sighed to himself. Gohan hadn't written in his journal since the night before school began. He'd looked back over that entry and was amazed at how different he sounded. It was as if he were reading the words of a completely different person and, in a way, he was.

I'm truly amazed at tousan's reaction to all of this. He's usually so calm and rational about everything, but I guess that doesn't apply when it comes to me. He wants to murder those hurting me and that would make him no better than they are. Why should he hurt people to show that hurting people is wrong?

The sun is breaking through the dark clouds and I see the proverbial light at the end of the tunnel. Slowly, the darkness is fading. In the meantime, I will light a candle to keep it away.

The phone rang and Gohan knew instantly who it was without looking at the caller-id. "Moshi moshi, Colby."

"Is today a better day than yesterday?" he asked.

"Hai and iie. Tousan's got a good lead, but I almost got murdered." Gohan smiled suddenly. "That's why you called."

Colby sighed. "It was the second most frightening thing I've ever felt. You were so scared and I couldn't do anything to help. Then I felt nothing, but a low level of anxiety so I knew that you had to be okay."

Gohan was puzzled by his earlier statement. "What do you mean by 'second most frightening'."

"The night you almost killed yourself I felt a sense of despair that brought tears to my eyes. I was terrified of what you would do." Gohan winced at the attempt of levity in his speech. "Don't worry about it. It's in the past."

"Colby, I apologize for putting you through that. I should have-"

"Don't worry about it," the blond boy repeated. "It's in the past."

They talked for a little while longer until Gohan heard the front door close and the voices of his little brothers. He went into the living room and hugged his father as hard as he could.

"It's all taken care of," Goku said comfortingly. "They won't be bothering you any more."

Vaguely, Gohan supposed that he should be questioning the choice of words, but it suddenly occurred to him that he didn't really care.