Oceans

*Disclaimer – yet again, I own none of these characters.

Important note – almost the last chapter! After this, there is only an epilogue. Enjoy, and pardon the mush.

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Doing the right thing was harder than Piccolo thought it should be. Not that the shock was all THAT bad. He’d always thought that the old “virtue is its own reward” saying was bullshit. He’d thought so from the first time he’d ever heard it, from KAMI of all people, who mostly said it down his nose at him when he asked what the old coot owed the world, anyway. Why he always felt like it was so important. And of course, Kami would give him a line like that.

Then again, coming from Kami, that was probably just another fancy way of saying “I am holier than thou art,” which was the one thing Piccolo never bothered disputing with him. It didn’t take a lot of celestial divinity to be holier than the devil.

So yes. He’d always thought that virtue would make for a shitty reward. It did.

Which was even more reason to be angry. Because damnit, it wasn’t fair. Everyone told him – everyone who hadn’t been too scared to talk to him, anyway – that being “good” was a wise life decision. That he’d like it better, that he’d be happier. It just wasn’t true. Piccolo was learning that the right thing actually sucked sometimes.

Like now. Like right now, sitting lotus-style in one of the most remote and (alright, he’d admit it) miserable places on earth, something between a tundra and an ice cube. Even with his arms crossed, even with his aura flared, he felt the cold all the way to his bones and asked himself for the hundredth time why he couldn’t pick somewhere pleasant to mediate. And the answer was that if he did, he wouldn’t meditate. He’d think.

He’d think about…[the big bay window, covered in fingerprints from where Son would point out this star or that star, ask him if he knew its name.

How it felt to have someone jump on his back as he walked down one of the long hallways of the ship, and wrap his arms around his neck, and know for sure that he wasn’t going to have to fight him. To just stumble a little, catch his feet, try his damndest to keep a straight face when he glared over his shoulder and told him to stop being a child.

Whether or not, at that very moment, that woman was touching him. Sliding her pale hands up and down his chest, finding that spot below his ears with her lips, the one that always made him…]

Anyway. Sometimes the best way to concentrate is to introduce another distraction. So that’s what he was doing.

And he *was* meditating. He was not thinking about Son Goku. He had no reason to, as he hadn’t SEEN the monkey-tailed little freak in over a month. Which was just fine with him. In fact, he was kind of making sure of it.

“Hey, Piccolo.”

Because if he saw him, he’d have to actually face all the noise in his head. All the questions about what to do, what he wanted, what…wait a minute.

“Hello, Earth to Piccolo…are you really meditating, or are you ignoring me?”

Piccolo opened one eye. Dubiously.

And there was Son Goku. Sitting right in front of him, legs crossed, effectively mirroring his posture in what looked a helluva lot like beachwear. As if he’d come the moment he sensed him, no matter what he happened to be wearing at the time. Piccolo stared at his sandals for a moment in disbelief. Meanwhile, Goku grinned a little, though to Piccolo, he actually looked nervous. “Hey,” he said.

Piccolo barely prevented a shocked little flail. “Son,” he said, managing to hold onto some composure. “What’re you doing out here?”

“Looking for you,” he said. Looked around. “Wow,” he said amiably, “this place sucks.”

Piccolo closed his eye again. “You could always go somewhere else,” he suggested.

“Pic, look, have you…,” then, more hesitantly, “are you avoiding me?”

Yes. “Don’t be stupid,” Piccolo huffed, keeping his eyes closed. “Why would I avoid you.”

“I don’t know,” Goku said. “Are you?”

Piccolo opened his eyes again. He deliberately made his voice harsher. “Don’t you have something better to do? Harassing the old turtle master, breaking more of Bulma’s security robots…”

“I do,” Goku said.

“So why the Hell are you disrupting my meditation?”

Goku’s eyes narrowed slightly. “I dunno. What’s got you so scared you’re hiding in Siberia?” His tail bristled slightly.

“Look, Son,” Piccolo said. Fought to keep the growl out of his voice. “I needed – need – some time to clear my head. That’s all.”

“Clear it of what?”

Piccolo looked away for a moment and tried to decide how to answer that question – or if he even could. Finally, he said coolly, “What the Hell are you asking me, monkey. Stop dancing around it.”

“You’re avoiding me,” Goku said, matter of factly. “I just want to know why.”

For some reason, Piccolo felt his temper coil itself up, pointing its cobra-head Goku-ward. “Well,” he almost snapped, “what did you think was going to happen? We were going to be bestest-friends-ever and hang out at the mall? You’re NOT that stupid.”

Goku blinked. “I never…”

“It was convenient,” Piccolo growled. “Do you understand that? All that, on the ship, it was convenient. That is all. And the sooner you get that through your thick head, the sooner…”

And Son was looking at him like he did every time Piccolo said something that he knew was absolute bull. Except he didn’t say that. Instead, a little harshly, “How about jumping out in front of energy blasts and almost getting nuked with a spirit bomb – how convenient was that?”

Piccolo felt his lip trying to curl back over a fang. He didn’t let it. “That has nothing to do with anything,” he said.

“And pulling me out of the water when you thought you’d wind up drowning yourself, too?”

Piccolo snorted. “Judgment call,” he said. “And damn good thing I did, or we’d all be dead.”

“You didn’t know that.”

“Hunch,” Piccolo insisted.

Goku’s brows knit together slightly. “I’d ask if you expected me to believe that, Pic, but I don’t even…” he leaned back a little, seemed to think. “I don’t even think you believe yourself.”

“Please. Spare me the therapy crap. I get enough of THAT from Kami.”

“It’s not crap,” Son said, almost angrily. Paused. And his expression didn’t change, sure, but his eyes rounded a little more. “Pic, look, did I…did I do something wrong? Is that what this is about?”

DAMN it. “No,” he huffed, and mentally slapped himself for being too damn soft. Because if ever there was an advantage he COULD push to get rid of Son for good, that would’ve been it.

“Then why? Can’t you just tell me that?” Son leaned forward, expression so earnest it hurt. “It’s okay if you don’t want me out here. I get that. I just…I just need to know what it is, or if…I’ll go if you can tell me why, I promise, and I won’t bother you again.”

“You still don’t understand,” Piccolo said, and he hated himself for the way his voice relaxed. “It’s over now.”

Goku reached over, and touched his arm so lightly that Piccolo almost didn’t feel it. “I get that,” he said again. “I just don’t get why.”

“Because…” Piccolo took a deep breath, exhaled it in a way that was almost a growl. “Because this is a mistake I’m not going to let you make, Son Goku.”

Goku dropped his hand. Looked at him as if he’d completely lost his mind. “Mistake?” he asked.

“What did you have in mind…you stay with your wife during the week, slip out for a little ‘sparring practice’ in between, and I’m supposed to be fine with that?”

Son looked startled, rocked back slightly. Made as if to speak. “I wouldn’t have…”

“And then,” Piccolo said, feeling the words pour out of him in a way that had never really happened, tumbling over themselves like the frost grass, “what was your plan for when someone found out? How were you going to explain that?”

“I thought…”

“No,” Piccolo growled, “you didn’t think. At least not right. Because you’ve got this damn stupid idea in your head that your friends are going to stand by you no matter what the Hell you do, and they won’t. Neither will your family. Or Kami. It’s all conditional, Son. You let yourself get involved in something like this, they’ll all leave you so far in the dust you’ll be comin’ out the other end of it. And I’m not going to let you make that mistake.” He looked away. Again. Because he knew if he let himself see the look on Goku’s face after that, he’d wind up taking it all back. And that wasn’t going to happen.

More softly than he’d heard him speak in a while: “Piccolo, I…”

“This conversation is over,” Piccolo said, and he tried to focus all the ice of their surroundings into his voice. “Go home, Son.”

He felt a hand again. It touched his leg, just above the knee, hesitantly.

With yet another growl, Piccolo brought one of his hands down and caught it by the wrist, starting to remove it – but then Goku grabbed HIS wrist, and his hand, and was holding onto it, clasping it.

“Damnit, Son, what part of ‘get lost’ is your feeble little brain not processing?”

“…I never meant to hurt you.”

“Yeah, well,” Piccolo studiously avoided his eyes, “you didn’t.”

“You shouldn’t lie, Pic. You’re lousy at it.”

Piccolo turned his head, finally, to face him again. “I am NOT a…” and whether he was going to say ‘a liar’ or ‘a bad liar,’ even he wasn’t sure. Not that he got the chance anyway. Before he could make up his mind, much less say it, Son yanked him forward by means of the hand he was still holding. Leaned forward himself. And kissed him, clasping one of his hands to the back of his head so that he couldn’t pull away.

It had an effect that no amount of energy blasts or celestial disturbances had ever had before. It completely shattered Piccolo’s concentration. Fortunately, he’d only been meditating a few feet off the ground - but they still hit it ungracefully, more a heap than anything else. And Son was still kissing him. Hard.

By then, though, the initial shock of “what the Hell” and the distracting sensations of “warm” and “oh,” had worn off. Piccolo growled, brought his hands up to push the other away – gave way to mild surprise when the other managed to pin him, catching his wrists. And kept on kissing him.

It was too surreal to keep struggling. Piccolo blew a rough exhale against the other’s mouth, and stilled. The ground was cold and uneven against his back, the other all angles against his body, his cape was bunched up under him, and the sensation of teeth against lips was less pleasant than it could have been. It was, Piccolo decided, the least comfortable kiss of his life.

It was also maybe the best.

With great effort, Piccolo brought his hands up to Son’s arms and shook him, hard. Which was enough to get him to break the kiss, and look at him – face pink around the cheeks from the cold, expression so damn serious. Vapor from his breath puffed out with every too-quick breath.

“We are not doing this,” Piccolo said firmly. “Not here. Like this. Or…or at all.”

“I know,” Son said. He leaned back a little, settled his weight more firmly over his legs.“I just…you weren’t listening.”

“What’s to listen to?” Piccolo asked.

“What makes you think it’s such a big deal? Like I’d rather have all of them than…than you.”

Piccolo made a very good effort to shove the other off his chest. It didn’t work. “You don’t know what you’re saying,” he said.

Goku’s reply was truly epic in its simplicity. “I’m saying it anyway,” he said.

“But your – “ Piccolo was cut off as Goku actually clamped a hand over his mouth.

“Will you just listen for a minute?” Goku asked. “I know you’re trying to protect me from myself or whatever, but I don’t need that.”

The Hell you don’t, Piccolo thought, and growled just so Son would get that.

“I mean, here you are all worried about what’s going to happen when everyone finds out, and we could both get into a fight with some galaxy-sized bad guy tomorrow and die.”

That hand on Piccolo’s mouth relaxed slightly. Slid its way around to his cheek, cupped, sort of. It was a disturbingly intimate gesture. As always, Piccolo looked away.

“People like you and me, we don’t always get to pick how our lives go, or what happens, and we don’t always get a chance to be happy. And…no matter what we do or don’t do, Pic, you’re my friend. I don’t want to lose you for any reason, and especially not because you’re afraid of what might happen. So…” Goku paused, took a deep breath, and Piccolo somehow kept quiet, “…so tell me what I have to do.”

“…do?” Piccolo asked after a moment.

“To make this work,” Goku said.

“You’re better off without…”

“No,” oddly sure, “I’m not.”

Piccolo closed his eyes, tried to focus less on how weak he suddenly felt in all the places that mattered. “Why,” he breathed.

Goku looked down at him with genuine puzzlement. “Because I like you. C’mon, what did you think – we were gonna get back here and I’d never want to see you again?”

Piccolo didn’t know how to answer that, so he didn’t.

“That’s right, isn’t it.” And it wasn’t a question Goku was asking him. Piccolo could see the understanding coming on his face. “This whole time, you’ve been thinking I was just going to walk away and you’d never see me again.”

There was no point denying it. “Yes,” Piccolo said.

“And that’s why you’ve been so weird about everything. Right? Because you thought it was just for…for a while.”

Piccolo sat up slowly. Goku let him, but didn’t move off him. Which made finding the words hard, but not impossible. “We were just borrowing each other, Son,” he said, and he tried not to sound like he was angry. “I understood that even if you didn’t.”

“So all this time, you’ve been thinking we were just gonna break it off after – and you were, if I wouldn’t.”

Piccolo nodded again.

“So here you are. In Sibera.”

“Yes.”

Goku smacked him upside the head. Which had NEVER happened before.

It didn’t hurt. But it sure as Hell left Piccolo pretty blank in terms of responses. Too shocked to even be mad, Piccolo touched a hand to the side of his own head, wondering if that had really happened. If Son Goku, savior-of-the-planet, had actually just slapped him. It appeared to be so. “Okay,” he said. “That signified something. I’m not sure what.”

“It wasn’t. About. The sex.” Goku said, and for once, HE sounded as if he was talking to a very small child.

“It wasn’t?” Piccolo asked before he realized how damn terrible an idea that was. Thank the gods for small favors. Any woman in the world would’ve neutered him for a slip like that.

“No,” Goku said. And looked a little bit like he was going to hit him again.

“Then what was it about?” Piccolo asked.

“I don’t know,” Son said. “Not that.” More carefully, “Not that, because I can definitely live without it, you know? And if that’s all it was, then that’s all I’d care about. But I want you back, even if we don’t ever stand within arms’ reach of each other again.”


“For me,” Piccolo said seriously, “that’s about fifty feet.”

“This isn’t funny, Pic.”

Pause. “Yeah. I know.” Pause again, and Piccolo looked around them – at the fact that they were still sitting more or less in a heap in the middle of the tundra, his turban askew, his cape everywhere, and smirked slightly.

Goku sat back a little more. “Okay,” he admitted. “Maybe a little bit, it is.”

“So you want…what, exactly,” Piccolo said.

“It’s…gosh, I don’t know,” Goku said. “Here’s where it’d be good to actually be able to talk.”

“You talk just fine. It’s shutting up that’s always been the problem.”

Goku put a hand to his forehead. “Pic, I’m kinda in a bad place right now. I’d really like to not have to hit you again.”

“Point taken,” Piccolo said. And, accepting that Goku wasn’t going to let him up any time soon, he leaned back on his elbows to wait. The ground, he noticed, wasn’t getting any warmer.

“I got used to having you there,” Goku said, at last, and too quick. If Piccolo hadn’t been just coming off a year of practice, he never would’ve been able to keep up with the flood of words. “I mean, always. I keep talking to myself now, except I’m actually talking to you, but you’re not there.”

Piccolo sighed. “Habit isn’t the same as…”

“Pic, it’s been a month. I miss you, okay? And it’s not getting better.”

Piccolo nodded slowly. “Alright,” he said. “But what about…”

“The rest, huh? I don’t…”

“Don’t say you don’t know,” Piccolo said. “That’s not good enough, Son. You’re going to have to know.”

Goku looked up at him, meeting his eyes with unexpected ease. “I know I don’t feel about anybody the way I feel about you,” he said.

Piccolo’s chest did something weird which, as always, he ignored for the moment. “She’d leave you,” he said, matter-of-factly. “Or make you wish she had. Are you alright with that?”

“I might tell her,” Goku said. “After Gohan’s a little older. She’s not a bad person, Pic. We just don’t work like we should.”

“She’ll love that,” Piccolo said, envisioning a literal storm of cookware and expletives.

Goku chuckled. “Yeah, I probably won’t walk straight for a month. But we’ll see, alright? She might not take it as bad as you think she will.”

“And the rest of them?” Piccolo asked.

“My brother and his friends just tried to blow up the planet. I think my dad caused Frieza to blow up another planet. I think we’ll be okay,” he said, with more sarcasm than Goku usually displayed. “And if not – I guess there’re worse things.”

“You’re sure,” Piccolo said again.

“Pic – I’m in Siberia in shorts and a t-shirt. I’m sure.”

Piccolo rolled his eyes. “Absorbed nothing I ever said about being prepared, did you?” he asked. Even as he shrugged out of his cape and draped it over the other’s shoulders, so that the fabric fell around the both of them, almost like snow. Then he slid his arm around the other’s back, subtly pulling him closer. The cold had never really bothered him like it had Son.

Goku seemed to sink into the fabric, and didn’t resist being pulled against his chest. “You didn’t have to do that,” he said.

“I know,” Piccolo said.

“I mean you could’ve just materialized…”

Piccolo’s lip twitched in spite of himself, as he settled his weight back and propped his chin on top of the other man’s head. “I know,” he said again, closing his eyes, taking a moment to appreciate how much he’d missed just that – the sensation of the other’s heart tapping against his chest like a bird’s wings. Slowly, without letting himself think too much, he fisted his hand lightly against the small of the other’s back.

“Oh,” Goku said, very softly. Then, for once seeming to understand that more talk would just get in the way, he slid his arms up and wound them around Piccolo’s neck. “Should I teleport us somewhere warmer now?” He asked after a few seconds.

“Not yet,” Piccolo said. He tightened his arms, felt the familiar brush of the other's hair against his cheek, his warm breath against his shoulder as Son tightened his grip in response. And for a moment, finally, everything was perfect.