The Saiyan Heritage and the Loneliness of the Warrior [Piccolo x OC]

Chapter 10

PICCOLO

It had been a week since Gohan had disappeared.

It's safe to say that Lettie kind of... freaked out. It's safe to say I almost freaked out because we just couldn't find the kid anywhere.

We would spend the whole day looking for him, flying over that entire region, calling his name and trying to track his Ki. It felt like we were trapped in a maze because we felt Gohan's Ki, but its location was very uncertain and confusing.

We both didn't train during that week. Our routine was to just look for him and return to Camp to try to eat something. I say try because Lettie couldn't eat anything, and she would just stare at the fire with a terrified look due to thinking she had lost her nephew for good.

And then, she would lie down next to me, as she had done on the first night we lost him, but who said she could fall asleep? The worst part was that I heard her crying softly in the middle of the night, standing guard in my spot next to the fire, and I felt like the most useless of men.

I tried to hide that I was worried about Gohan's well-being as much as she was. He could be a Saiyan, he could be a boy with spectacular powers and strength, however, the image I had of him was that little child I afflicted in the first two months of Training; the one in which I saw the bruises and wounds marking his entire little body, and fear invaded me at the thought that he was lost out there, alone and without any support.

It was impossible not to think about Lettie's words, that I was practically a father to Gohan. I tried to avoid that acknowledgment, however, the more I avoided it, the clearer I realized how, during these eight months of coexistence, a deep paternal feeling towards that boy gradually filled me.

I felt very strange. Gohan was the son of my arch-enemy, the son of the man that, not long ago, I wanted to overpower, but now, it seemed like such a... pointless ambition.

All that made me think of Lettie, who was suffering in silence, deep down blaming herself for losing Gohan, and day after day of his disappearance, she began to get into an intense state of depressive lethargy.

And seeing her in that state hurt me more than her, but I needed to stay strong. For me, for Lettie, and for Gohan.

Exactly seven days after his disappearance, the two of us were back at the Camp at lunchtime, after searching for him all night and morning. The day was cold and cloudy as if reflecting our spirits, and Lettie was sitting in front of the fire I had lit, wrapped in Gohan's blanket, while I filled a bowl with some soup I had prepared.

Her eyes were swollen and red, with streams of silent tears marking her pale, thin face.

I crouched down next to her with the soup. "Lettie..." I gently brushed a strand of hair out of her eyes. "Come on, you need to eat. We'll still look for him some more today."

Slowly, she turned to me with a blank, lifeless look, and my heart ached. I felt a strong desire to hug her, to cuddle her to my chest and tell her everything would be okay. But I didn't. I didn't have the courage.

What was left was the two of us looking at each other for endless seconds, with our minds in a whirlwind full of worry and tiredness.

It was then that, suddenly, our eyes widened and we straightened up.

Lettie threw off the blanket and jumped up. "D-D-Did you feel that?!?!" She looked around.

"Yes!" I placed the bowl on the ground and got up with her. "It's Gohan's Ki! It is... getting closer!"

We exchanged attentive and alarmed looks, and then we heard, "AUNT LETTIE!!!!!!!! MR. PICCOLO!!!!!!!!!"

Someone was flying quickly towards us.