"Hey, Pan,"
Pan sighed and tried to ignore the boy she knew was going to try and ask her out yet again. He'd been asking her since shortly after her adventures in space a few years ago. It seems all that adventure was just the trigger she needed for Puberty, she'd grown two inches before that year had ended, and finally switched away from training bras, but if ever there was a reason to hate it, it was this boy, "What David," she snapped as she turned around to face him.
He put up his hands defensively, "Homeroom teacher wants you," he said with as much timidity as he could muster.
Pan moved pasted him toward Homeroom. When she opened the door to Homeroom there were two people in the room, the first was her Homeroom teacher who she'd expected, a grey haired old woman who'd taught since before her father Gohan had been here. But standing in front of her desk was a boy who had to be about the same age as her. He wasn't short, but he was just a touch below average height, which meant he was just a little taller than she was now. He had dark hair past his shoulders and a slightly familiar face.
"Hello Pan-chan," The teacher waved for her to come closer. As she did the teacher motioned toward the boy, "This is a new student, and I wanted you to show him around the campus. As I understand it, he lives almost as far away as you do," she chuckled. She turned to the boy next, "Jun, this is Son Pan, granddaughter of Mr. Satan. Pan-chan, this is Quartermaine Jun, he's just transferred to this school."
"Son?" the boy finally spoke, "Are you related to Son Goku?"
Something flickered in his eyes, they were dark with a sliver of blue around his pupils, but for a moment there was a shadow of red in them. But he blinked and it went away, making her wonder if she'd imagined it. "He was my grandfather."
Jun smiled, leaving Pan suddenly feeling self-conscious, though his smile came off as charming, it didn't seem aimed at her- or anyone in particular for that matter. "My father knew your grandfather, I'm sure he'd like to know how Son-San is doing."
"He moved on actually, a few years ago."
"He's dead?"
"Actually that's a long story, maybe I'll tell you, but not right now, come on," she turned toward the door and motioned for him to follow.
When they got out of the room Pan spoke again, "I never heard of a Quartermaine?"
Jun scoffed, "You wouldn't have, Dad made up that last name because he needed one for both of us when he started filling out forms- back when he took online college courses, and when he enrolled me here."
"Then who's your father?"
"Well- Seventeen."
Pan started, turning to face Jun in a fighting pose-
"Please, if I were gonna try to kill you I wouldn't have mentioned knowing Goku or being related to 17- not to mention I'd like to point out until Myu showed up, 17, his wife, and later myself, were perfectly content hiding in the middle of a forest, Dad got his kicks putting food on the table the old fashion way. And now he wants me to finish out in a real high school, get some social exposure and a real diploma."
Pan's fists were still clinched, trying to gauge his sincerity…
Jun stood there for a while just standing still with his arms crossed in silence, waiting for her to make a move. After a while he sighed and rolled his eyes, "Aren't you supposed to be showing me around."
Pan scrunched her face in annoyance. "Anyway," she said finally relaxing her posture, "Isn't your dad dead?"
"Technically, but he's around, I brought him back," Jun had a distant smile on his face. "I ripped my way through hell, and brought him back."
Pan paused, they were standing near the cafeteria, as it was morning it was closed, but there were windows through which you could see the staff preparing. "And you wonder why it's hard for me to believe you're not after me or my family…"
Jun scoffed, "Hey, my dad went nuts, but that was Myu's fault, Gero and Myu anyway, I didn't exactly find it pleasant to see my dad go all red eyed possessed and take off either, then when I finally figure out some of what happened, I find out my dad's dead, but hey- you guys only killed him cause Myu put him on a rampage, if it'd been me, I'd have had to find a way to put him down too."
"Like you could, you think you're strong enough." Pan put her nose in the air, but pointed out a couple more features of the school.
"Maybe," he said in that tone that implied a certain certainty.
"Well anyway, Grandpa's gone now; he left the Galaxy with Shenlong."
"With who?"
"The Eternal Dragon," she snapped and faced him again.
"Oh- The Dragonballs yeah I figured out those were gone too."
"You wanted to use them to bring back 17." She turned around, but kept her head facing him as she moved forward, using her senses she didn't need to look ahead to see if someone or thing was in front of her, but she wanted to keep an eye on Jun, she apparently still didn't know what to make of him.
"He's getting better you know, what Gero and Myu did, it really messed him up for a while, but he's getting better." That was the first ounce of vulnerability he'd shown yet. It was clear, whatever his motives, he obviously cared about his father, and that at least was something Pan decided she could sympathizes with.
"I have a training session 3 times weekly with Trunks, and sometimes Vegita- but he usually trains alone, would you like to join us?"
"Sure but I'll have to let Dad know I'll be home late." He scoffed, "Just you and Trunks huh?"
"Goten used to stop by every once and a while, but he was always late and never serious." She sighed, "And as I said, sometimes Vegita shows up but that's usually just to have us team up on him or to belittle Trunks' efforts," she frowned.
Meanwhile, in the outskirts of the Sol System, far out in the Ort cloud where the Earth-Vegita sub-system was still far enough away to be just a single dot reflecting Sol's light. A familiarly sized pod containing a single passenger speeds its way towards Earth.
Later on Earth, Pan shows Jun to a large chamber, Trunks looks over surprised to see someone other than Pan.
"Trunks-kun, this is Jun, he's apparently 17's son, I asked him to train with us," she motioned towards Jun.
"Pleased to meet you Trunks-san, how is you father?"
"Otousan is on Vegita, will be most of this month. He's overseeing the construction of the headquarters of new branch of Capsule Corp.," Trunks smirked, "I think he's come to think of it as his new personal Palace." He turned to Pan, "So what made you invite Jun?"
Pan shrugged, "Kind of a spur of the moment thing, when I first heard him say he was 17's son I thought he was gonna attack me right there, but as we were talking, I decided I could at least sympathize with him supporting his father no matter what had happened to him, and what he'd done."
"You make it sound like he rampaged across the earth, he just got his head all bothered by Gero and Myu and tried to kill Goku," he scoffed, "Not like nobodies' family here hasn't tried the same," he finished with a smirk.
The moment however was broken as a flash of chrome flew into Pan-
"Giru, Giru, Pan-chan, Giru missed Pan-chan at school today."
Pan hugged onto Giru then pushed him out enough that he decided just to circle her head again. "Yeah but Giru, you know what happens whenever you try to follow me to school, you make a lot of racket and distract everyone until the teachers start asking me to turn you off like you're some toy."
Jun looked towards Trunks hoping for an explanation of some sort. "What's that," he asked at last when no one seemed to notice his silent inquiry.
"Giru was actually built by Myu before he died and met Gero, we met him in the same adventure that introduced us to Dr. Myu, he actually built Giru to betray us, but once that programming ran it's course he'd really become our friend and did everything he could to help us. Up to and including betraying Dr. Myu himself." Trunks explained as he got to his feet and walked over to a console in the center of the room, "So Jun, have you ever trained in high gravity?"
"No actually, in fact I've never even been to Planet Vegita with its 10 times Earth Gravity. Bebi's lucky he didn't kill all the earthlings when he brought them there."
"But Goku brought the rest of earth's people there before the Earth blew up so he could bring Earth back?"
"I was dead by then, I didn't manage to break out of hell until right before that mass breakout, but I went back for my father and got out again before everyone got brought back after Goku asked for help with that last Genki Dama," as he explained he made a ripping motion with his hands and seemed to have a slightly possessed look. Once again his eyes flickered red. But he blinked and looked up at Pan and Trunks again as if he'd forgotten what he was talking about.
"Oh," Trunks sounded slightly impressed, "How did you get out of hell, I heard it took two people, one outside and one in, to create a gateway between Hell and here."
"Hmm, didn't know about that way, I just learned to manipulate the energies of Hell itself and tore it open, basically blasting my way through the hard way." He sighed.
Trunks' fingers still hovered over the gravity controls, "Whoa sounds like when I was fused with Goten, we had so much power we managed to just blast our way back to earth from a training dimension we'd be sealed into with the hope of trapping a monster with us." He sighed, "I still marvel at the power Goten and I had fused, and cringe at the childish attacks we made up, only today am I even close to the kind of power I had then, and I still can't reach SSj3."
Pan patted Trunks on the back reassuringly. "Don't worry; I've still never gone Super Saiya-jin."
"Yeah but in your case I wonder, Gohan had his aura completely restructured by the Elder Supreme Kai, he had to unlock Super Saiya-jin all over again, I wonder if that didn't have an effect on your ability to reach Super Saiya-jin." Trunks finally moved away from the controls though he hadn't set any commands yet, "I noticed, Goten had a much easier time going Super Saiya-jin than either Gohan or myself did, though of course I managed well enough thanks to those torture sessions Otousan called training, as soon as I could stand he had me in the Gravity Rooms, as soon as I could walk he taught me to fly." He sighed, but there wasn't any bite to it. "Anyway, remember Goku hadn't gone Super Saiya-jin himself when he had Gohan, but he had by the time he had Goten, and Vegita was close when he had me. But Gohan hadn't gotten Super Saiya-jin back by the time he and Videl had you. Never mind that Bra hasn't gone Super Saiya-jin either; she doesn't count because she's never tried."
"You think I'll never go Super Saiya-jin," Pan asked with a bit of surprise.
"I think it's possible that you might not, I could be wrong, a lot of things about Saiya-jins tend to be easier to disprove than to prove," he chuckled. "But either way, I wouldn't worry," he turned back to the computer, "you already have more power in your base form than I have in Super Saiya-jin, give it some time, and you'll match me in Ascended Super Saiya-jin too." He started typing, "Since Jun here has never experienced high gravity will start at ten and work his way up until he can train with us."
Jun scoffed, "Oh don't worry about me, set your gravity as you will and I'll adjust soon enough," his look offered little doubt in his sincerity.
"Don't be too sure," Pan began, "It's harder than it sounds."
Jun sighed in annoyance, "I really didn't want to have to explain it this way, but when I got to Hell and found my Dad, he was still a little loose in the head, and still merged with that copy of him, in fact he's still merged with that copy, but that's neither here nor there, the point is, I fought my dad in his fused form more than long enough to talk him down. I think if I can take that kind of beating and walk away with only a minor limp, I can take whatever you guys can- no offense intended- which is why I didn't want to bring it up."
"How strong are you," Pan asked in mild bewilderment.
"I don't know actually, I try not to push myself to the limit, I black out when I do, then it's like someone else is in control."
Pan and Trunks exchanged glances, then turned back to Jun, "Someone else?"