Between Friends—
Rated: M (for obvious reasons)
Disclaimer: I do not own DBZ or anything related to the DragonBall franchise.
Summary: Another adulthood-esque fic. Identity crises & long talks.
Pairings: Trunks/Pan. Goten/Marron. Bra/Uub.
Note: Hi, this is my first DBZ-related fic and I doubt I'll ever figure out the plot completely. Writing as we go! (08/2016 Updates: new formatting and rewrites on previous chapters. All replied reviews & author notes have been posted on my Tumblr page. I just wanted to focus on the writing, please.)
CHAPTER 1
Late April | 259 Days Before
Muzzled sounds of telephone calls, endless typing, brushes of paper, and other usual noises of a busy office floated around the chrome desk fixtures and spotless ten-foot windows. It was an hour past noon, and a perfectly cloudless blue sky day was going to waste as everyone worked in their cubicles. He only managed a short sigh, knowing a day like this came in a dime of a dozen. It was a very adult world at the Capsule Corp. Business Building.
Trunks nodded to a few familiar faces, pushing the faux-glasses his mother had given him on his first day as president up against the bridge of his nose. He was only a kid then.
You'll look more grown up! her encouragement echoed through his head. His initial plan had been to just entertain her. Much better! As glad as I am that you have my charm and your father's blood runs through your veins, looking young doesn't help you play the part of being a mature, serious business leader. She would've given him a gold star if she could.
He then remembered his father coughing and chuckling all at the same time. The old man had been carrying his three year old sister with his mere finger from the arm of the couch at the time.
Mature? SERIOUS?! The boy should be training while he actually does have his youth instead of writing his name on papers all day! He's an heir to a warrior race! A son of a prince! A prince HIMSELF, and you... you want him to sit in an office all day!
His mother only rolled her eyes as she sat the back of her hands on her hips in a huff. They had been arguing over him taking over the office long before he even graduated high school. His mother wanted him to be the president, and his father wanted him to be a warrior.
He's not just your son, Vegeta! He's half of ME. He's an heir to MY legacy too. Unless he has some intergalactic work that needs to be done for your planet, he's doing his duties for the planet we're on now. Got that?!
But the old man had already sunk into the couch, closing his eyes with his little sister laying on top of him. Since Bra had been born, his father slept better with loud noises. Before, he would've grunted and left back to the artificial Gravity Room, ignoring his mother—but then, he simply dozed off. Sometimes he thought he picked fights with her on purpose.
Trunks signaled his secretary to cancel the rest of his meetings for the day, getting a headache from the memory. In addition to the endless chatter of mergers and propositions from earlier, there was a stack of paperwork ready to greet him. His entire morning, along with his pitiful his lunch break, was spent sitting in front of a long table with board members, team leaders, bland never-ending PowerPoints, and people who were even less enthusiastic than he was on a Tuesday morning.
He was ready to take a nap.
As the Brief heir walked into his office, he thanked his long-time secretary who was always sympathetic to his in-need-of-sleep cause. Karolina Olive had been his mother's secretary for as long as he remembered—she even babysat him while his mother was enduring the same mornings. Nonetheless, she understood all too well.
When he had taken over Capsule Corp. at the ripe age of nineteen, it was Ms. Olive who helped him gain a routine for the paperwork. Like his mother when she was younger, he had taken a bigger bite than he could've possibly swallowed (even with his alien appetite).
Within the first week, he found himself suffocating under employees who undermined him and other execs who thought of him as naive. His wall looked like the line to the bathroom of a noisy club—tired, anxious, and possibly drunk people chattering amongst themselves whilst ambitiously glaring at the room door ahead of them. It was ridiculous.
Trunks had been going over some new contracts when he was about to scream. He didn't remember discussing any of the newly fine print with his mother and he felt like he was losing his mind. How could he forget projects that were being created before he arrived? Who was he kidding?
Confused at the mistake but too proud to admit it, Trunks spent two hours trying to understand half the gibberish he was reading. Then, he called in the graying fifty-year-old woman in, trying to play off his ignorance by asking her who exactly dropped the papers off on his desk.
She said she did.
He then asked her who handed her the papers.
She said the mail-room boy handed to her.
For a moment, he wondered if he needed actual prescription glasses, or maybe it was about time he let her go. She only looked at him with pity.
He had been sitting there with his eyebrows furrowed, biting his inner cheek—a habit he had when something frustrated him—trying to figure out the company that sent the papers. He didn't recognized the logo, didn't even know the name!
With her infamous tsk-tsk, Ms. Olive asked if she could see the papers and as soon as she read them it was just as she suspected! (For some reason. He honestly didn't know.)
So the lavender-haired boy looked at her curiously, and she returned a heartwarming smile, one that he remembered her having every time she snuck him a piece of candy from her desk, like a prize he won if he waited long enough to listen.o
"Oh, it's just your typical corporate leeches trying to get the Brief heir to fund their ridiculous ideas," her New Jersey accent thick as she explained. She began underlining some random words with her wrinkled finger, showing him as if it was oh-so-obvious. He was too tired to even read it. By that time, he waited until she went into detail as she normally did.
"They want to raise a sea-monkey aquarium! For 2 million zeni! How ridiculous is that? I say just get a glass bowl and grow the little suckers in there yourself. They're not as interesting as they seem!" He noticed she talked with a head bob, making circular motions when she emphasized a word. Ms. Olive began chuckling, and he naturally followed.
He didn't understand Ms. Olive half the time, but he remembered why he wouldn't let her go. Her thinking was refreshing, and even her laugh—the random song of pig snorts and high-pitched oh my goodness!'s never got old to him. She—in a building of overly-trained scientists, over-qualified lawyers, and even overly-skilled mail room personnel—was a breath of fresh air. Professional, obviously. But she was a real voice, one that cared more about things than just work.
In his seventeen years as the company's president, he always found comfort in her small jokes and understanding nature. It was different. The happy woman finished with a story about how his mother almost signed off to build a well in the middle of the ocean, howling in amusement.
"The ocean! Of all places! Like you can just step an inch out and touch water!" she waved her hand as if there was an actual ocean beside her. With the way she talked, he could feel the salty breeze against his face.
They laughed some more and she told him to not repeat an actual word of the story to his mother. He nodded; he never did. Like his father about his fighting capabilities, his mother was proud of her work and wanted to be remembered as the best.
She was, of course. Though, he figured some of the help was due to Ms. Olive in some ways. The secretary shuffled everyone out of his floor, telling them he would only take in appointments. She then called him on the phone, telling him to rest easy for the remainder of the day.
Trunks was now thirty-six. More vetted in the world of business acquisitions and company takeovers than he ever was, but still liking the fact that Ms. Olive called in to say, "Go ahead. Rest easy."
"Thanks," he told her before silencing his phone.
Trunks stretched his long arms and torso towards his desk, almost ready to call it a day. He was tired, but there was still things to be done. A small break wouldn't have hurt though.
His late-grandfather now replaced his mother's voice in his head. He could hear the humble scientist say, Take a breath of air and look out your window once in awhile! I didn't choose this place to just work.
He continued to tell the younger that this office had a private seat at one of the highest points of the city, and it would be a shame if he left it as simply as a backdrop to his paperwork. There were always be another stack waiting for him. He might as well appreciate it while he could.
On the last days he was able to spend with the beloved grandfather, Trunks promised. When he passed, he kept it. Every other day, he sat at his chair and looked at the horizon of West City to honor the old man. He admitted, it helped a lot. He felt more put together.
He turned back to his desk, and watched a sleek computer screen rose up from the slick desk after pressing a red button. He took out the keyboard tucked in the front compartment and placed it under his fingers. He wasn't planning on continuing his work. Not yet. He was catching up on his friends and family the only way that seemed possible nowadays: social media.
Trunks typed in the familiar domains and watched in strange awe as his timelines began to move with great pace. People were updating their statuses, making commentary on their lives. He found it fascinating.
Granted, his main use for the platforms—as advised from the PR department as a Hollywood starlet went from the D-list to the A-list once she upgraded her B-cups to C's—was for product promotions and researching popular trends. Nothing more, nothing less. He was a private person anyway, but something in him felt rebellious when they told him to be careful of liking crude 6 second videos of animals and curvaceous women doing something called twerking. He never clicked on a heart, but he was tempted.
Nonetheless, he was an honorable man. He respected their rules and trusted their judgement. That was what he paid for them to do, after all. Once scrolling down bored him after a minute or two, he sought out the customer feedback on of Capsule Corp. products in stores now—a television set that was a dual microwave, noise-cancelling earphones that were discreet, and other miscellaneous items he had faith in to take over the markets and they did. Some said different, but there was always that one loud voice on every platform, telling people they were supporting military warfare if they purchased something as simple as a pack of gum. He tried not to dwell on that voice.
When that was out the way, he checked small local businesses for possible investments. Those promoting restaurants usually caught his eye, so he would bookmark their physical addresses to try out with his friends later.
He checked for the occasional 'meme' that always made him laugh regardless if it was simple or absurd; checked for any major news from old friends in high school so he could send the casual 'Congratulations!' comment; checked for current news on the economy; checked the celebrities that interested him; checked the latest fashion trends for both men and women; and went so far to even check if there was any menial holiday he could wish to the fans that followed his accounts religiously. There was nothing, so he bid them all a good day.
After another five minutes of refreshing pages that didn't change, Trunks logged into his secret personal accounts, and checked on the social updates from his family and friends who were aware of the unoriginal grey silhouette being his icon. He began reading from where he left off the day before.
Today, his beloved best friends, Goten and Marron were hanging out in a zoo in Australia for no reason at all. He guessed being in a committed twenty-four year old relationship just called for the occasional, spontaneous trip.
His mother, as busy as she was in her lab at home, had the time to show everyone the cutesy selfie she took with his father, arms crossed in the background. He made the effort to press 'like' out of obligation.
His sister, Bra, was thinking of adopting of a puppy as she sat at the movies, in which Krillin commented that they already had an entire park of animals at their compound. She didn't reply but it lead to her own high school friends asking if she had a dinosaur. They had five, but Trunks wouldn't give them the satisfaction.
He scrolled down a little more and saw that Uub—along with Mr. Satan at his ripe age, Goku, and Gohan—were helping Pan move into her first apartment in the city. He paused, hovering his cursor over the highlighted names tagged in the post. He grumbled at himself.
Curiosity caught the best of the thirty-six year old man, and he had been click-baited into watching a video of the twenty-two year old Pan scaring her balding World Champion. He had been carrying her couch when she jumped up from behind a plant. The old man dropped the large furniture on his foot, whimpering in pain. Satan screamed as she tried to apologize between laughs, picking up the couch with just a single hand and placing it down beside him with ease.
The other men out of frame laughed. Trunks laughed along as if he was there too. He wish he had been. Lately, his hours at work felt longer than they were allowed to be.
Then almost as if on cue, he heard a pat, pat, pat on his window. He quickly exited out of the browser and pushed the button to return the computer back to the secret slot it came from.
He turned around and was greeted by a flying quarter Saiyan in tight, black bicycle shorts, a matching black sports bra, sweatbands and a slightly worn-out hoodie with SATAN embroidered along its hood. Her dark, wild hair was somehow maintained in a ponytail, and she was sweating like she had risen from a pool of perspiration.
She had came from the obvious place he figured she always went to—the Gravity Room with his father. Dende knows why she was such a masochist to endure any type of training by the old man, but nonetheless, he wouldn't complain if it meant that it kept the grump busy. She floated with her hands on her hips, staring at him in the very usual Pan-like way. Annoyance usually was the Pan-like way.
"Hey! You going to invite me in or what?" she laughed, waiting for him to open his window. Trunks obliged and allowed her space to fly inside. He was hoping she would take a seat, but she was pumped up with adrenaline.
Pan paced around the room, emitting a small amount of ki to dry her skin. She told the Brief boy of how she was able to fool Vegeta into thinking he badly wounded her—in which, she seized the opportunity to deck him on the jaw. They trained at 450G, and she was ecstatic at the new pressure.
Trunks raised an eyebrow, disbelieving that they went up that high on the machine, and she assured—no, argued—that if he got out of his office, then he would see the beautiful block numbers shining brightly. The numbers 4-5-0 all brilliantly red.
She exclaimed proudly, "I kicked your dad's ass today and I feel great!"
Trunks snorted as he sat at the edge of his desk, watch her do a few light cartwheels before tearing off her jacket and placing it on the white suede chair opposite of him. Once she caught her breath and finally calmed herself, she politely asked him about his meetings, what he was up to, and everything that was considered as small talk.
Pan wasn't great at small talk, however. Once he said "Well, today," she already lost interest. Trunks only proceeded to challenge her with his extensive vocabulary. The fighter nodded, pretending she knew what the hell he was talking about.
He told her about his accidental puerile yet trite benightedness of strategizing to regale a domestic spread for his favorite chum despite the fact that said chum was nowhere near the immediate Northern Hemisphere! He had Ms. Olive rescind for he was to subjugate a more surreptitious yet rife congregating. Although, he wasn't sure to serve chicken or beef when they met again.
"Umhmm..." she said softly. He then went on about a poultry crisis, and, well, she wasn't paying attention. She wasn't trying to yawn, or be rude. She had a favor to ask, and she needed him to be in a good mood.
After another ten minutes, Trunks smirked to himself for half-remembering the sentence he taught himself last week. When he looked up to see Pan, her energy had finally left and her head was against the arm of the chair, peacefully resting.
Pan woke up to the sound of leather shoes being shuffled against marble floors, and she noticed her bright blue sky was now turning orange and yellow. She jumped, almost scaring the lavender-haired man with scalding beverages in his fingertips.
"What the heck, Trunks! Why didn't you wake me up?!" she questioned, and he sat back at his desk unfazed. Instead, Trunks stacked the contracts he had organized and finished in the past hour, waiting for her to do the exact same task she had requested.
"You kept saying, 'Five minutes!' but then—" he made a snore noise, making a joke of it. Pan frowned. She was a quiet sleeper, and she knew that. He only continued to mock her, "—'Five minutes! I'll be up in five minutes!'"
"How long has it been?" she quietly asked, refusing to behave like a fool.
"Three hours," he answered, nodding in the direction of the coffee in the to-go cup. She raised an eyebrow and he explained that he ordered food while she was napping.
Pan pouted, "Aw, Trunks! Really? I wanted to get take-out and show you my new place before everyone arri—" her eyes widen. Pan panicked as she checked her phone that had been tucked inside her sports bra. She yelped, "—Shit! Twenty minutes ago?! C'mon!" She grabbed his arm, and he admitted she was stronger than he remembered.
"PAN! I'm holding cof—AHHHHHHHHHH!" he cried as the hot drink burned his neck and traveled down his shirt. He began to whimper as the splashing liquid hit his pants, specifically in the crotch area.
The girl grunted, "I'll save the apologies for later. My place, first!"
"Can't I change first?! Or at least, know who's going to be there—at least!" Trunks was pleading more than asking. She only tugged at his sleeve.
Pan walked towards the front door of his office and then headed for the window instead. She lived downtown in West City, which was luckily near his office and other convenient walk-to places she had been planning on showing Trunks before she dozed off—ugh! She was so upset for herself for napping!
"PAN!" he yelled her name. She grimaced a look. Trunks paused and lowered the volume of his voice, regretting the tone and coughing. "Just let me call security to let him know I'm leaving by air, alright?"
She wordlessly huffed and let him go. The Brief heir sat back down, making the short call to the only guard taking a nighttime shift.
When Trunks got up, he felt a gust of wind by his shins and thought what strange air-conditioning it was. He then saw her legs running in mid-air, ready to set off. He simply nodded his head and she grabbed his arm, whisking him away. They were gone in a matter of seconds. He even forgot to hang up the phone.
Trunks knew he could fly a bit faster, but he thought it was wise to not question Pan in her panic. He wouldn't try to calm down a regular human girl at this state. Trying to calm down a superhuman that had the ability to incinerate his entire flesh? No, thanks. He let her drag him in the wind.
They landed in an alley a block away from Pan's apartment. The familiar scent of robust tomato sauce and buttered garlic caused Trunks to immediately recognize one of his favorite places to lunch. His mouth watered in excitement.
"No way! You live near here? I come here all the ti—"
She cut him off with another tug of his arm, indicating that the coast was clear. They ran across the street to a surprisingly lavish building completed with a doorman, chubby stone angel cupid statues, and a blood-red carpet that ran from the lobby to the street. He only took a glance, but Pan already knew the strangeness of her living in a place like this.
To be fair, she did prefer not to overuse her inheritance from her grandfather. Her parents raised her modestly, and she did indeed liked microwaving her own bowl of mac n' cheese instead of having some cook use truffle oil and heavy cream.
"However," she explained, "My Grandpa Satan bought a penthouse for some dirt cheap price last year and never realized he had it until he talked to his accountant last week. I was already apartment hunting, so he just came over and gave me the key. No questions asked. Lease and everythin—listen, I'm paying him back by working in his gym since my mom quit martial arts long ago," she justified, a little embarrassed. She crossed her arms, feeling much more vulnerable than she would've liked.
Trunks understood her need to explained herself, remembering all the times Pan sat out of going on extravagant trips with his family and their friends because she didn't feel right not chipping in some way. She didn't even let him buy her a bottle of water when she was thirsty. Pan would rather suffer in a heat stroke than ask for help.
Bra never understood it, but he got it somewhat.
Like him, Videl was raised with an almost unlimited amount of money. Gohan, meanwhile, lived off the land of his mountain village. He, Goten, and Goku made it a game to catch the biggest fish almost every night for dinner. Videl spent more time wandering around her fifty-roomed house, talking to the temporary help, than she ever did with her father. The Sons practically lived in one of their small rooms with each other, never tiring of the company. Videl was always questioning the motives of her so-called friends. Meanwhile, Trunks watched as Goten and Gohan befriended some of the most dangerous threats without ever being bitten.
He used to think of it bizarre when he was younger—when Goten would effortlessly fly around and greeted random animals by first name. What was even weirder was that the animals responded to him, shared things in their own language that his best friend somehow understood.
All things aside, the Sons were freaks of nature—all bubbly, incredibly strong, and terribly even more innocent as they aged. He accepted that. They were their own species, those friends of his.
However, as he himself got older, Trunks began to appreciate the humbleness that were the Sons and their way of living. He even spent an entire summer camping out every night in their mountain village, despite the fact that he could've easily done the same thing in the arborium of his family's compound. It was hard to explain, but there was just something right about the way they lived.
The Son-Satan family mix only seemed relish in the strangeness. Eventually, all ended up growing really close to each other. Blood members, and unrelated aliens alike. They were like a humanized version of a holiday greeting card, constantly recruiting lost souls to join their cult. Trunks would've been happily brainwashed if he didn't have his pride.
In his teen years, he would pick up Goten from Gohan's place and stumbled upon three grown men pretending to fight to win the affection of the young girl—all while she cared less. She would be sitting with her adoptive Namekian grandfather, making funny faces to their once great foe, Majin Buu. The pink beast only re-arranged his puddy-like features to make her laugh. It was a ridiculous sight, but the genuineness and immense fondness Trunks felt stepping in, warmed up the house. Even he, an heir of both power and fortune, couldn't put a price or come close in having the magic of Gohan and Videl's home.
So, Trunks understood Pan.
He respected that she refused to take handouts without giving something in return. Even his father liked that she would rather earn everything she had then simply be on the receiving end (which usually after stated, Vegeta would throw a cheap look to the younger hybrid). She was raised with a pride of hard work and kindness, and he admired that about her.
But still—looking around the lobby, the place felt... expensive. It made him feel inadequate in his coffee-stained shirt.
For one, it was a lobby with a fountain that didn't even have water. It was simply just polished as a marble decoration. There was a seating area, which wasn't uncommon, but one with a constantly catered snack table was. Three chandeliers hung elegantly from the ceiling that made the Sistine Chapel look like it was colored with crayon. Live plants were kept so well that no leaves were less than green, and a bundle of complementary embroidered towels were placed in decorative ceramic bowls on matching marble tables. It was every bit of the word ritzy, and then some.
Completely unlike Pan, he thought to himself.
Trunks looked up at the elevator light that the dark-haired girl seemed irritated by. The light was stuck on 6 and the arrow was pointing upwards. She lived on the twenty-fifth floor, and it seemed that she left her patience there. She began to tap her foot, and the Pan-like face came on again.
The Brief heir looked around, saw a sign for the stairs, and asked if she would rather use them instead. She turned her head with a mischievous thought brewing in her mind. She smiled with a crooked smirk and said, "I got a better idea."
They walked back out into another alley. This time it was a slit where the trash took up most of the space and Trunks frowned at Pan.
"What are we doing here? Did you forget your lunch or something?" he pretended to whine, and that cracked a small, genuine grin on her determined face. No trouble in it whatsoever.
"Just—" she sighed, and grabbed his arms from behind, wrapping herself in them without so much of a syllable. Thankfully, she couldn't see him blush at the touch her bare stomach; fingers blazing at the contours of her abs.
"Hold on tight!" she cried and off they went.
They reached the ledge of the 25th floor. Trunks still held on as Pan floated in the air without his body weight affecting her. It seemed like today was just the day to forget that he, Trunks Brief, definitely had the power to hold himself in mid-air and soar as well.
Pan touched every window until she found the trick one that opened without a lock. She excitedly clapped for herself and retreated once she realized his head was over her shoulder, staring at the window.
She then realized that he had been holding her the whole time with only tight spandex and a thin summer cotton suit between their... areas.
The fighter turned and looked at him, and he was already staring. Their noses touched. She could practically smell the coffee from his shirt and get a caffeine high by simple proximity. Then, a face came about on Pan. She was squinting, her mouth was frowning, and she was stabbing him with her eyes.
"Uh, P-Pan? Are you—ow! What the fuck!" Trunks cursed, letting go of her waist and losing his footing. He was falling now and he was sure he was going to die. In trash. What a cleverly ironic way to perish.
"You can fly, you doofus!" Pan yelled and he barely missed the pavement.
Remembering his own speed, he jolted up a second faster than she did, rubbing the back of his head modestly. It was the same naive 'oops' gesture she recalled her Grandpa Goku doing all the time before he apologized to her grandma.
Pan shook her head, opening the window and climbing in with Trunks following behind. The room was dark, but her tall windows brought in the moonlight. He looked around, unable to distinguish where walls began and ended. Everything was in the shadows.
She stumbled around the walls until she felt a switched and turned it on. Then Trunks understood why her room both felt endless and empty. She hadn't even unpacked her bed sheets yet and her labeled boxes were scattered in far away walls. Not to mention, her room was as big as the lobby's downstairs.
Pan noticed the look on his face, feeling the same meekness from earlier. To amaze even the richest guy in the world was a comment in itself on how excessive it all seemed. Her walk-in closet, though every girl's dream and even more spectacular, just reminded her that she hadn't really cared much or even owned enough to fill up a shelf.
Trunks fell onto her sheet-less bed. Just as he suspected—it was wonderfully soft and contouring to every muscle he had. He then looked up and saw the high ceiling. For once, despite that he grown considerably tall against the fact that his parents were short, he felt incredibly small in her room.
"Pays off to be a spawn of Satan, doesn't it?" he asked, inattentively. She couldn't decide if it was a joke and a genuine comment. She then slapped him in his gut, and suddenly memories of his father tormenting him flooded his brain.
"Get up! There are important things at hand, Trunks!"
"Five more minutes!" he mimicked her from earlier. She rolled her eyes and tugged on his leg, but he only held harder to the bedpost. His sleepiness had caught up with him finally. "Five more minutes! Please!" he squealed more genuinely.
"Trunks! You overgrown man-child!" spat Pan as she pulled. When he didn't let up, she remembered something that hadn't bothered her for some time now. She let go of the Brief boy and his face plastered onto the soft mattress, sighing in contentment. He then looked up to see Pan had been stripping off her clothes.
"Pan, what are you doing?! Go to the bathroom!" he yelled with an uneven voice. She rolled her eyes, taking off a sweatband and tossing it to him.
Trunks expected the small, black fabric to be like any other sweatband. Gentle when it touched his face, barely making any difference. Maybe it was sweet smelling like how Pan smelled.
Unfortunately, he learned that she had taken in the methods of her Grandpa Piccolo and Goku. He tried his best not to show fear as the piece of weighted clothing dented a crater in her headboard.
200 kilos.
She threw the one on her left hand, and remembering to protect himself this time, Trunks covered his face again. Her aim wasn't there though.
200 kilos, to his potential bank of children.
He stood up to dodge and block her attacks. 200 kilos was easy, even though the feeling down below was becoming a little numb. Pan smiled at his challenge, step out of her boots and got the sweatband from her ankles.
"Ready?" she smirked, daring him almost. He returned the look.
"Always," he said, giving her a Vegeta-esque prideful half-smile. Pan laughed at the resemblance.
"Cute," she told him. He was then off-guarded by the compliment as she flung the fabric at him. He had caught sweatband. Barely.
She threw another of her ankle sweatbands and he caught it impressively, chuckling and telling her that she would probably wanted to train with something heavier if she wanted real resistance.
"Oh?" she belted innocently.
"Yup! I mean, maybe these slowed you down today. 800 kilos is practically 1 ton! That's impressive," he said and she waited for him to say one of the things she hated the most. "... for a girl, I mean."
Pan got reached down for her left 3.5 ton boot and threw it at him. Then when he got up again, she threw the right. She held her nose up high and slapped the dust off her fingers. Trunks barely twitched as he laid helplessly on her bed, unable to make sense of what happened.
"And those are just my sweatbands and boots," she said matter-of-factly. She unzipped the weight she had been carried on her chest and then unzipped the one she had also worn over her workout shorts. She threw them both at Trunks, who had been sinking along with the bed. She walked over and picked up her belongings, setting them down on the floor with ease.
Trunks couldn't even blink. He had been dazed by the weights and the fact that she had them on the entire time. He could only imagine what her actual strength and speed must have been. Along with mastering on how to mask her ki by her grandfather and training with his own father, he couldn't even assume what it was.
"And by the way, I told you I've been working out in the Gravity Room at 450G. That's fifty-three tons my actual weight, so these were actually light! I wore them in the GR and your dad made the same mistake of thinking I was helpless. Better wise up," she told him, rather than said. He sighed. She was right, but it was one 'for a girl' slip that he had in a very long time.
Pan then went to her walk-in closet and ripped open the box that had been labeled FIGHTING CLOTHES. She took off her shorts and slid into the sweats that had been pressed against the bottom. She picked up one of her crop tops and then decided to be fine in just her sports bra and sweats.
Speaking of which, a ding came out of bra and then she realized the ongoing plan tonight where she played a crucial part.
Ding, ding, ding ding ding ding ding.
Her phone had turned itself off again and restarted.
Ding, ding, ding ding ding ding.
All her texts were from Bra and Goten, asking if her place was ready by now. They had been stalling Marron for almost three hours, and her best friend wasn't going to lose it if they saw another documentary about ostriches. She slid her thumb across the screen, but as her phone unlocked, it died again. She knew she shouldn't have taken it inside the GR.
Trunks came into the closet; one hand covering his eyes, and another holding his phone and knocking on the door. Pan could hear Bra yelling and the setting wasn't even on speaker. She got up and grabbed the phone from him. He opened his eyes to the large storage space in front of him.
"Whoa," slipped off his tongue. He didn't even think his mother's closet was as spacious, but then again, maybe it was just empty. Pan had exactly one box inside her closet and all it read was FIGHT on one of the panels.
Of course, he thought.
He looked in the box casually, like it had been his own clothes inside and he had been moving in. Luckily, like Videl, Pan used to wear baggy clothes that were twice her actual size when she began training. Sweats had elastic waistbands—so technically, they could've been his clothes. He saw his coffee-stained shirt again and looked at the box. Then at Pan. Then box again.
She wasn't dressed up so maybe wearing a suit wasn't a necessary part of the evening. She made a big deal about it though. He wasn't sure.
Pan sighed, leaning against the closet door.
On the other side of the line, Goten had came out of the theater and Bra threatened him to go back to stall the blonde. He said he didn't know how!
"You're her boyfriend! Just go make out with her, geez!" Bra snapped before returning to her call. "So listen, Uub said he left the box by your couch. Got that? Please, please, please Panna! Just let yourself pretend you're me and indulge in decorating! It has to be pretty, okay? Pan?!"
Pan knew what to do but she caught the blue eyes of the person in the closet with her. Her eyebrows furrowed, mouthing a what? to him. He pointed to the box.
"Pan? Pan!" Bra yelled and her attention came back to her friend. Bra instructed her again. "You got tha—"
"Is this a dress up party kind of thing? Because technically you're just in a bra," Trunks said loudly and his sister's ears poked up like a curious puppy.
"Why are you just in your bra? Is that my brother?" Bra interrogated. "Are you guys having sex?!" The people in the movie theater looked at her as they grabbed their children. The blue-haired girl felt her inherited short-temper coming up.
"I am not having sex with your brother," Pan replied back to her, sighing coolly. Trunks squinted his eyes in her direction, and then changed his view to the ground when she darted them back. Pan knew he heard that; she said it loud enough.
She trailed back inside her bedroom as Trunks stood unsure in her closet. Was she going to change? Would it be okay if he got comfortable?
He gave a minute—well, a second, and he decided to strip down. He folded his suit on top of the island in her closet and then dig into the box. He grabbed a grey shirt about his size and black sweatpants. When he looked in the mirror, he saw a picture of Hercule Satan on the shirt and held in his laughter.
Pan flew in, realizing that for once, she had the freedom to do whatever she want in her home. She handed Trunks his phone and then stared at his shirt. She held in her giggle to tell him the state of emergency. They had thirty minutes to get her living room to look welcoming and romantic.
"Are you up for the challenge, Trunks?!" she asked enthusiastically, balling up her fists trying to contain herself. She loved challenges, and twenty minutes was enough.
He gulped.
End.
