Chapter Text
“C’mon Beerus, everything turned out okay,” Goku put his hands up in defense, facing the irate god in the immediate aftermath of his messing around. Perhaps, maybe, he should not have acted without putting more than two seconds of thought into what he was going to do, but it hadn’t really gone sour and he didn’t think there was any reason to be so upset about it all. But Beerus seemed to disagree with that sentiment and he was nearly steaming from the ears with how mad he was—almost bowing Goku over for how steeply he was hunched over him with his threatening gaze.
“You do not have the self awareness to know when do quit, do you!? I have all the reason in the universe to erase you on the spot. Even now, you cease to have any understanding of what you shouldn’t have done and your stupidity has no lack of depth.”
“It’s not like I went out of my way to do it...I just...Winged it…? I won’t do it again…” He cowered back even more, but Beerus only seemed to glower down at him with hotter fury than before. The long tail behind him smacked into the ground and Goku could actually feel it cause a tremble in the ground under them. Oh, he was seriously angry. Beerus had explosive moments of temper tantrums, but he’d sort of equated them to Vegeta’s in their severity, usually. Not true displays of anger, but rather just aspects of personality that wouldn’t go away. Beerus would always be a little explosive about something, right…?
No, but he was really, very angry. Goku actually felt like he’d gotten Beerus incensed enough that he had to watch his step and his words very carefully; and when Beerus got into his face, he quickly ducked, slipped down on his knees—bowed back in defense with his arms still up—and let Beerus tower over him with the dominance of a furious god that could destroy him with the flick of a finger.
“Winged it? You winged it? You did everything opposite of what I told you to do! You had no business picking fights with things bigger than you and I should have let you be obliterated,” the tremors shook them again, with the second clap of his tail swiping into the ground. “But you went and ran your mouth. If you don’t cease this nonsense of yours, I will make you wish you didn’t exist at all you absolute mistake—”
“Hey—We fixed it...Right? I said I won’t do it again, I promise. I mean it. I really do. I’m sorry, Beerus...I didn’t mean to make you mad,” he tried, aiming desperately to smooth down Beerus’s ruffled feathers, but it only appeared to accomplish the exact opposite, despite his attempts. The whole event was a catastrophe, but most things they got themselves into were; he just didn’t understand why that had Beerus so ruffled. Goku started to feel a little nervous by just how intensely he became unraveled.
“Mad? I am beyond mad. I’m at the point of debate on whether or not erasing you would be a greater benefit to me than leaving you in this universe. I’ve come across this problem with you before, and you’ve brought me here again,” he poised over him, holding his hand out—posed as if the option was presented for him to just fix what he considered the problem to be. “You are not nearly as intelligent as Vegeta. At least he has the sense to be afraid of the fact that I can and have always been able to remove you from reality—” His voice was becoming louder, shrill in a manner of speaking. His frustration was peaking. “He even warned you, you idiot—what not to do.”
“—I don’t listen to Vegeta that much thou—”
“Well maybe you should start!” He screamed in his face, stomping his foot down so hard right beside him that the ground actually cracked. Goku swallowed thickly and he put his hands together and tried to look as deeply apologetic as he could muster. Beerus stiffly ignored him in favor of continuing to berate him. “If you had listened, just maybe you both could have walked away without nearly inciting a war. But you have to be a battle hungry numbnut and quite honestly, I’m stuck on how to teach you a lesson on restraining yourself. Because telling you to stop clearly doesn’t do much for you, now does it!?”
“I...didn’t think they were going to take it as a threat...I thought it was mutual...How was I supposed to know...They weren’t supposed to be here in the first place—Why’m I the bad guy!”
“They were visiting, you idiot—you nearly ruined a perfectly good relationship and then you call solving the problem with violence—winging it. Because you want a good fight. Ignore every sliver of good advice to stop and are failing to see the actual problem...I...I am unable to actually comprehend the vastness of how stupid you actually are—”
“Ouch...I got it...I messed up…”
Beerus suddenly pressed his face so close to Goku’s face that he almost fell over from his presence. “Do you really got it? Because I think you probably don’t have it. I think your lessons aren’t ever going to connect in this thick skull of yours until you have a reason to remember them. Erasing you outright, while it would probably save me so much stress, wouldn’t do any good, because you wouldn’t learn a damn thing. And if I have to explain to Lord Zeno that you just vanished, because I destroyed you, then it would be my hide. And then you, once again, cause me grief. But, I think I have a solution, I will make you learn a goddamn lesson, Son Goku. If I have to force it. You will learn, at least to place a few more seconds of thought into your actions.”
Goku clamored to straighten himself up when Beerus stepped away, backing off of him and moving some paces away. The god of destruction turned away from him and nodded off to the angel who always stood some distance from him. He spoke to him, but Goku didn’t immediately hear what he said. Goku frowned and crossed his legs, sitting on the ground and waiting to see if Beerus was going to calm down any bit. Was he still as furious? He suddenly backed off and his tone shifted. He sounded like he had an epiphany in the middle of his berating, but he didn’t say what it was. That was more concerning than all the threatening nature of his words.
With a brief exchange completed, Whis stepped away and Beerus turned back to him, tail swishing and indicating that he was still very irate, indeed. Never mind. The fury wasn’t gone, he was just focusing it better. The weird knot in the pit of Goku’s stomach tightened a little bit and he frowned up at Beerus.
“You brought this on yourself, keep this in mind,” Beerus spoke and a cold twitch hit his spine that he didn’t care for at all. Beerus’s attention was split between him and the direction Whis left for and Goku wondered why, but he understood after some odd minutes—when Whis came back with Vegeta in tow. He was going to bring Vegeta in to scold him too? Goku whined a little inwardly. Vegeta was very likely to tell him just how much he told him not to do it, and just how right he had been about it.
But that wasn’t what Beerus meant, because Beerus held a hand out to pause Whis, who stopped and kept Vegeta at his side—confused but watching the event unfold, just the same.
“This is not what I wanted to have to do, and it’s a shame. Because there was potential. But I have reached my limits with you Son Goku and for that, you pay. And unfortunately, it looks like he pays for your blunder as well. And that’s a poor fate for him, seeing as he attempted to restrain your foolishness. You not listening to his wise advice, cost him.”
Beerus’s words took a moment to connect as he spoke them, but once they reached, each one started to hit harder and began to alarm Goku with more intensity with every passing second. The raised hand Beerus still had, was not just to pause Whis from continuing. Goku’s breath stuck in his chest and he found the energy within him to jump up from his place on the ground, wobbling to his feet and blurting a breathless mouth of words, with a lot more fear behind them than he realized he’d have. “B...Beerus, wait, don’t, that’s not fair—”
“Not fair is your reckless behavior. And your lack of learning your place So you need real consequences of your actions. And so you will get them.” Beerus showed him no warmth, his willingness to back down had been completely dissolved. Instead, he took several steps to face the other saiyan and Goku was almost ready to pick a fight with Beerus at that very moment, if he didn’t already know he would lose immediately. If he wasn’t stunned, knocked wordless and motionless at what felt like a betrayal, in a way.
“L...Lord Beerus?” Vegeta must have felt similar, though he always knew that Beerus would do it at any moment, under any circumstance, for any reason. He was the smarter one, Goku knew that. But Goku just didn’t think that…
“It’s not personal, you’re just a necessary sacrifice to prove my point.” Beerus didn’t give Vegeta the chance to actually respond.
Goku tried to yell something. Anything. But he was struck by the reality that the god of destruction actually placed his hand in front of his friend’s face and pulled his god of destructions powers out to destroy him—his physical body seeming to come apart in a golden shimmering glow, as if returning to nothing but a natural form of ki. Beerus didn’t draw it out or let Vegeta have enough time to ask why or explain it to him, he didn’t have enough time to suffer. But the physical form of him was gone in a glowing mist and Goku stood still, breath caught. He was unwilling to take it in, for the sound he was going to make if he did.
Beerus erased Vegeta.
Erased him.
He’s…
The breath still didn’t come and his lungs burned. He stood, hands reaching for nothing, but there as if he was stuck in a position of horror. He was. All he could really see was the empty space where a body just was and the distorted haze of ki that left an impression behind. He felt like he was being blasted harder than he’d ever really been blasted. He felt winded and yet wasn’t even breathing. He was frozen in a moment where his mistake caught him and broadsided him with so much intensity that his vision was blurry and he wanted to scream.
“You did this. He did his very best to avoid being erased by me. And as it would be, you were the one who caused it. How will Bulma respond? His children? How will they react to know you are the cause?” Beerus spoke, as if he hadn’t just destroyed someone so uncomfortably important to him—more important than he’d realized until that very moment, where seeing him destroyed was burning him alive.
He was simply gone. The shocking reminder of Beerus’s ability to do that so easily, flexed for him to witness, and he nearly lost feeling in his limbs in direct response to it. Goku had hardly begun to think about anything beyond the immediate event. Bulma and the rest of them, hadn’t even begun to sink in. He hadn’t even considered what that would mean. The burning in his chest overtook every other feeling, until he it left him finally gasping for air as moments passed.
“This is what your trouble making causes, and you will do well to keep this reminder in the back of your head for the next time you decide you want to try and cause a stir,” Beerus tilted so close to him that he could feel his presence radiating his seriousness in the moment, before he moved away with all the confidence of a god who didn’t care that he’d destroyed something important to someone—someone Goku thought Beerus was at least a little fond of… But Beerus whipped around and raised his voice, “Whis, turn it back now.”
Goku sucked a breath in, acutely aware of time distorting around him, but not being part of it. Whis was omitting him from the rewinding of time. The events of the last few minutes rewound in front of him and he watched the golden haze reform into the physical form of Vegeta and solidify in an instant. Purposefully, they wanted him to see it happen again, to remind him and Goku nearly barked Vegeta’s name just seeing him in front of him again. But he was struck silent for a moment, again, eyes trained on Beerus.
“Remember what I said, Goku.” Beerus delivered a hard look, and he turned away from him, stalking away without a word. He was done with his lesson. His very effective, very horrifying lesson that left him more shaken than he wanted to admit.
“Kakarot, what the hell is going on, why am I here?”
Goku turned his attention from the departing form of Beerus, to the irritated and completely unaware fellow saiyan. He said nothing, immediately. Anything he said would come out in a failure. He left the silent moment to hang in the appreciation that Vegeta was there at all.