Part 3

"OK, this is no big deal," Gohan was telling himself, "it's only reaching about the point I keep it at while in school. THE BIG FRIGGING DEAL IS THAT I DIDN'T SAY IT COULD DO THAT!" Gohan felt himself getting more flustered as the power spiked again a bit higher. "Calm and control, calm and control, calm and control" Gohan started to repeat as a mantra to himself. By this time he had virtually shut out everything else going on around him.

Videl was worriedly watching the doctor's lackeys running around adjusting equipment. She was scared and frustrated. She didn't understand what was going on and could think of nothing to do to help. Gohan was ignoring her queries so deep was he in concentration. When the lackey named Soda yelled, "Ready Doctor!" he pulled Videl from her concerns. At that moment Cola and Pop walked up to Gohan. She assumed they intended to escort him to the platform, however they didn't seem to be having much luck with that task. With an "Outta the way boys," she pushed her way past them. She knelt in front of Gohan and raised his chin enough so that they could look at each other if only Gohan would open his eyes.

Gohan could sense a scurry of activity around him, but wasn't really paying attention. He ignored it all until something tugged at his attention that was truly unusual and worth noticing. He thought he heard a whisper of his name and gradually became aware of a soft caress. Slowly, Gohan pulled himself back to the world going on around him and found himself drowning in a pair of worried blue eyes. Videl was whispering his name as one hand stroked ever so softly against his face. Unable to help himself he tilted his face into her hand much like a cat and for an instant everything else was gone from his mind except her touch. Yet her words were insistant, penetrating even that moment and her whisper of "Gohan, please stand up," bid his mind to wake to the situation.

Gohan finally stood much to Videl's relief. In the back of her mind she noticed the mutilated arms of the chair, but they were dismissed in favor of other matters. She continued her soft murmurs of encouragement as they advanced towards the platform step by step. She could have likened herself to Mohammad with Gohan as the mountain, so slow was their progress.

When they arrived at the platform she helped position him. The groan the structure made when Gohan clutched the handrests alarmed her. Looking at him to see if he had noticed the damage he was causing, she found that she had lost Gohan to his focused concentration again. Dr. Pepper was asking her to move out of their way, so once again she let them work on Gohan by pointing a machine his way. This time there were no visible beams at first, then she noticed a faint golden glow in the air between Gohan and the collector. The longer Videl watched the brighter it grew.

Gohan was not trying to fight the machine. In fact, he was steadily force feeding it the energy. Even so Gohan felt like he was bailing water with a thimble when what he really needed was a bucket. With every step he had taken with Videl to the platform, his power had risen. Right now it was hitting a point of uncomfortable that made the urge to transform really tempting. However that wasn't an option he wanted to consider with Videl in the room. He wasn't ready to give away one of his secrets to her quite yet. If this kept up though, Gohan didn't know if he was going to be allowed a choice.

There was a tremor from within the collector.

Evidently the collector felt it needed to help him come to a decision.

Several words immediately came to mind, most of which Chi Chi would chase him around with a frying pan for even knowing, but only one word crossed his lips.

"Videl."

Meanwhile, Cola had been watching the collector's gauges from the start of the siphoning process. The initial results brought a wide grin to his oafish face. And the numbers kept climbing. "Amazing," he thought, "Gotta love those book worms!" And the numbers kept climbing. "Wow, we've never had this much luck before, Dr Pepper will be thrilled." And the numbers kept climbing. As they edged into the yellow warning zone, Cola's excitement dimmed. The unusually high activity made him call Pop over to confer with him. They watched it move decidedly through the yellow zone towards the red zone. After a brief discussion they decided to call Soda over as well. And the numbers kept climbing. Soda had been standing to the right of the Doctor and looked annoyed to be called away by his compatriots in the middle of the Doctor's moment of glory.

He took one look at the gauges, made a few hurried adjustments, stopped to check for the affect, and then made a few more adjustments. And the numbers kept climbing! He scurried quickly back to Dr Pepper's side. "Sir, we have to abort the process."

"Nonsense, he has plenty of energy yet to share."

Soda glanced quickly at Gohan and then at the gauge clutched in his sweaty fist, "I see that sir. That's exactly the problem."

"What are you blathering on about? How can that be a problem?"

"As you can see Sir, the energy readings are well into the RED!"

"Quit waving that in my face, you know I don't deal with the technical aspects, that's what I have you for."

"In that case, I recommend that we turn the collector off NOW!"

"Poppycock, who's the Doctor here and who's the assistant? Quit trying to spoil the beauty of this moment. The moment of my glorious success. I am the greatest mind this planet has ever known and now I will be the most powerful. Hah! And Dr Gero said I would never amount to more than the lab janitor." He reached into one of the large pockets on his lab coat and pulled out a shiny flask and proceeded to congratulate himself.

"SPOILING YOUR MOMENT OF GLORY! IS THAT WHAT YOU THINK OF ME? After the three years of dedicated service I gave you….I cooked all your meals, I washed your lab coats, wrote your papers, filed your taxes, hid a few a bodies, stole some research, and tucked you into bed at night. The best years of my life and this is what you think of me? That's it! WE'RE THROUGH! AND YOU CAN HAVE THIS BACK SINCE I DON'T WANT IT ANYMORE!"

As Soda chucked the name tag at Dr Pepper's head, he joined Pop and Cola in the doorway leaving the room. If the doctor had been listening to their conversation as they left he would have heard Pop and Cola consoling Soda with thoughts of the future, "Don't worry, Soda. There are plenty of other mad scientists we can work for. I'm sure the next one will appreciate your hard work."