Survival

***

Prologue

***

Off to the side during a small gathering, a group of women huddle together.

"How long have they been like this?"

"A couple of days. No one's really sure when it started, though."

"What started?"

"The way they've been acting. As if neither of them exists to the other..." She trailed off, hushing her voice. "It's as if they're strangers-strangers who loathe each other."

"But-why? They're best friends! I've never seen them act so...cold to another."

"No one knows why. A couple of days ago they went off together. The day after that they started to act this way..."

"It tears your heart out, to see them like this. Such good friends...and now everything seems lost..."

"We've been trying to figure out what happened, but the only ones who know what happened are them, and they're certainly not talking."

"So you've tried, then?"

"Of course. Repeatedly. But all she says is that nothing was lost that wasn't there before and all he says-well, he won't say a thing."

"And-that's it? That's all we know?"

"Correct. That's all we know. Or more likely that's all we don't know."

"I'd give anything to have been there...you said it happened the night they went out together?"

"Right. And the next day they were like this."

"Well, anyone know where they might have went, might have done? Perhaps then we can reconstruct what happened?"

"You're a genius! Why didn't I think of that! Wait...that won't matter, now I think of it. Because no one knows anything. They were going to meet and then discuss what they wanted to do."

"Just a normal meeting as friends?"

"Right, like they've always done. Nothing remarkable-"

"Except that something went horribly wrong..."

"Yes...and now it seems that their entire relationship is over with..."

"How do they suspect to survive without one another?"

***

She stared out the window into the pouring rain, watching the drops that hit the window slide down and plop onto the sil. She watched as the wind blew the trees this way and that. She watched the fog rise, hindering visibility.

How the weather fit her mood.

She sighed, tracing the path of one of the drops with her finger, starting at the top and winding its way down the glass, joining with other drops, until the reached the sill and plopped. She kept a watch on their paths. They all started out differently, she noticed, all in different spots, but at the end, they all came down joined together. As if one could not exist without the other.

She turned away.

Everything she thought about-every little distraction-they all pulled her thoughts back to the forbidden place. To him. To the one person she couldn't, wouldn't think about. To the one person who had started it all...to the one person who had ended it all.

To her saviour.

To her demon.

To her heart.

She crumbled the sheet of paper and fried it with her ki, watching it incinerate. What she wouldn't give to be able to do the same to him. What she wouldn't do to have him out of her life.

Forever.

Except that forever was a very long time and she truthfully didn't know if she'd last that long.

So she wished only that he was going through the same things she was.

It would be her only consolation.

***

It was a dreary day, but he didn't care. It fit him. It was what he needed at the moment-finally some understanding. Some understanding that he was not alone in his melancholy, that there was at least some other being who understood what he felt.

And then it hurt suddenly.

A sharp pain in his chest, a pain that left him gasping. And then he remembered. There was someone who felt as he did. There was someone who was going through the same feelings he was.

Except-she wasn't. He had long decided that she could not possibly be going through what he was at the moment. There was no way.

He closed his eyes, and instantly opened them again. He could not think of her now. Not now-not ever. It-everything was too risky.

So he did what only he could-he closed his mind to her.

To his friend.

To his demons.

To his saviour.

To his heart.

And as soon as he did this-as soon as he closed his heart-he felt it immediately.

There was no escaping it-the feeling that surrounded him. There was no hiding it, no ignoring it. It was there. They were connected together, no matter how he tried to fight it.

It was his only consolation.

***

Hi...this is my first T/P. I don't have that much experience with DBZ anymore- except for the last few weeks, it's been over a year since I had any contact with DBZ, due to my lack of interest. Now I've decided to re-write the DBZ fic I started almost two years ago and decided to start a new fic, with two characters I've never written before.

Let me warn you-I have not seen GT. I know the basics, sort of. If any of you know where I can find episodes on the internet, it would be greatly appreciated. GT was supposed to be aired in Dec. 2002 here in Germany, and instead they totally cut out Dragon Ball Z, only to begin replaying it this November, starting with the Saiyaman Saga. Therefore I have no idea when to expect GT and have decided to try to find it on the internet-which is harder than it looks, as no German DBZ sites seem to have full episodes of any Dragon Ball series.

As for the fic itself-well, I have no idea where this is going to go. The first couple of lines just hit me and I went on from there. I am at the moment trying to formulate a plot-I have a small inkling of where I want to go-so as soon as I manage to develop my plot, I shall post more.

Again-I don't know Pan's personality at all really-only what I got from the last few episodes of DBZ and what I've read in fan fiction. Same with Trunks... and I'm tempted to throw GT out the window, since that wasn't real 'canon' either, if you think about it. So be warned-I am making no promises.

With these things said, I shall leave you, request for any help you can give and ask nicely for a review or two-so I know if I have actually managed to pull this off. Thanks for reading.

-Jennie, 26/02/04