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title: Reconstruction
series: Dragonball GT
characters: ToraTora (Trunks/Future Trunks)
count: 956
notes: (03/20/08) This drabble was based out of a personal ficverse, wherein these these two had it out over an identity crisis. Light hints of shounen ai, if you're so inclined.

He really shouldn't have been surprised. Nothing should've surprised him anymore, really. Thirty years in a world where Dragon Balls were a fact of life did that to people--made them expect the unexpected. Except that there weren't any Dragon Balls, anymore. So he blinked, momentarily at a loss, when his own face peered down at him from across his desk. "What are you doing here?"

"Our mother invited me here, then I think your secretary got the wrong idea when she saw me--"

"I meant," Torankusu interrupted, frowning, "What are you doing in this dimension, Tora?"

Tora. "Future Torankusu." Goten had given him that nickname, over ten years ago. He was thankful that it'd stuck. It made this encounter a whole lot less weird, greeting the man as a separate person.

"The world isn't ending," Tora admitted sheepishly. "I just wanted to visit, Chibi."

His eye twitched at the use of that old nickname. He hadn't minded so much when they were teenagers--Tora was always a couple years older than him. But he was an adult now. And it'd been years since anyone had referred to him as a kid.

"As you might have noticed, this is kind of a bad time," Torankusu turned back to his paperwork grumpily. He was rewarded with a sigh and the soft shuffle of footsteps, leading over to one of the windows. He could almost see the expression on his double's face as he surveyed Metro West. Months after the apocalypse, it stil looked like the site of a missile drop.

"They're saying it was earthquakes. Storms. Is that true?"

"Partially," Torankusu allowed, suddenly caught on the irony. "Mostly, it was Gokuu-san."

"Gokuu-san?" the other man spun around and bore down on him so fast, they nearly cracked skulls. "What do you mean? Gokuu-san would never do this sort of thing to the Earth! This is global disruption! Why haven't you summoned the Dragon to help?"

"Woah woah woah," Torankusu protested, shoving the older man away. He never could get used to his excitability. "All that destruction was caused in the battle between our fathers and Yi Xing Long."

"Yi Xing Long?" Tora echoed, confused, "What? I don't... do you mean, literally, one-star dragon? Like, as in... Yi Xing Qiu?"

"The one and only."

"What? Do you mean to tell me that each Dragon Ball has its own dragon?"

"Had," Torankusu corrected. "...but not anymore. They're all defeated. And gone." He looked on with some pity as Tora seemed to catch up, clearly wanting details, but he was really not in the mood. His older self opened his mouth again, but he already knew the question and beat him to the punch. "There are no more Dragon Balls. They've disappeared--Gokuu-san, too. He left with Shenlong."

"So this mess...?"

"Was left to us to handle, on our own."

The room became quiet, except for the faint scribbling sounds of his pen. Across from him, Tora fidgeted. "Hey, Chibi... you will tell me about it later, right?" he asked quietly, "I'll... be here for a while."

Torankusu stilled, then looked up at him with careful consideration. That face, so much like his own, was pained, tired... And yet still so earnest. Somehow, that didn't bother him. And everything about Tora used to bother him. And Tora knew that. Hell, he knew that if he looked closely enough, he'd still be able to see the scars from their last fight. But there he was, asking him instead of their parents.

He was either still as ignorant as ever, or much wiser. But his own resentment for this person, whose shadow he'd lived in, was difficult to summon. Maybe that was a sign that he'd grown up, but maybe he was really just too tired to care anymore. Tora was a fighter, not a businessman. And what the world needed, right now, was to rebuild itself; for that, Capsule Corp had become indispensable. Which meant the wisdom of its president was in high demand. Which meant Tora was no longer a threat to his personal achievements.

It was just a damned shame that he was too overloaded to really appreciate that, or his position.

He rubbed his temples. There had to be a better way. Too much more of this would be the death of him. No rest, no end in sight... His desk was more like a terrace in a paper mountain. "I'd love to, honestly, but I really don't have the time."

He really shouldn't have been surprised. Nothing should have surprised him anymore, really. But when Tora came around his desk with a chair and sat next to him, he couldn't be anything but floored. "Then let me help you for a while."

"But..."

"Come on, don't tell me you've already forgotten? I've already done this. Mother and I already rebuilt my world, and there was only two of us in the company, to start," he grinned at Torankusu's flabbergasted expression. "I mean, if you want... I'll understand, but I can already tell you which of those proposals are going to work and which ones are going to fall through and--"

He decided then that it was fate. No matter how he fought, it would always come to this. Only this time, he didn't care. If the last year had taught him anything, it was that anything at all was better than being miserable. And as long as they were their own people now, it might not be so bad.

"Please," Torankusu interjected, taking Tora's hands and holding them tightly--hopeful that it would convey his gratitude, "Stay a while... maybe we can catch up on things."

Tora just smiled. "I'd like that."