Chapter Two: Life Moves On
A/n: I know it's past due for an update, and I apologize for it! I've had a major dose of writers block for a while, that and the computer was being a brat. Also, because this computer I'm using is weird, it doesn't notify me of any ,misspellings, so you'll have to forgive me for any that you happen to come across in my sotry.
Gist of this timeline: Goku died when he was supposed to, because future Trunks never appeared. Also, instead of Vegeta dying, I altered it to where he lives. In essence, this story is like the alternate timeline that appears in the series, but because of a single change (Vegeta living), it is completely different in several aspects.
Disclaimer: I don't own DBZ!
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Age 774
It was late in the year when her daughter was born. Thankfully, she'd been able to find a nice older woman who had been a nurse before the androids had attacked that was willing to help her. Though, she nearly died of a heart attack when her daughter had been born with a tail.
"Sorry to scare you dearie. It's just I've never seen a baby born with a tail before." The middle-aged blond said, blushing because she had fainted.
"No, no. It's fine." Videl waved it off, knowing she was almost as shocked as she. Almost.
"I don't know what could have caused such a deformity..." Videl gulped nervously. She knew exactly what had given her daughter her tail. The father. And she didn't even know the guys name! After they slept together, she woke up to him gone. And it felt like a dream. She nearly questioned her memory, wondering if she could had made him up in her mind but she knew she hadn't. After all, she was a virgin before she found him. Afterwards... not so much. The blood staining her thighs and sheets evidence enough. "Would you like me to cut it off? I'll burn the stub to keep it from bleeding her out. It'll be painful, but she'll be normal."
"What? No!" The woman blinked at Videl. "I mean, She looks pretty normal, and I don't want to cause her any pain like that."
"Whatever you say dearie." The woman chuckled at Videl's reaction, cleaning her hands of the blood from the birth in the sink.
The baby in question was sound asleep in Videls arms, though she seemed to be stirring awake from the volume of their voices.
"Well, I've left some diapers and things in the other room for you and the baby. You know where to find me if you need anything?" Videl nodded, and watched the nurse leave the kitchen in the tiny apartment, walking away without a backwards glance to Videl and her baby. When she finally glanced at the tiny bundle in her arms, she noticed her daughter was awake, her dark eyes staring eerily knowing-like into Videl's own violets.
She hadn't even thought of names the entire time of her pregnancy because of the threat the androids posed, but she knew instinctively what she wanted to call her.
Pan.
Pan Satan.
It was a beautiful name. Simple.
"My beautiful baby Pan." The baby cooed at her mother, somehow knowing that she was being referred to. Videl smiled. While her time with the mysterious man who had given her this bundle of joy had been short, he had left a wonderful reminder of their time together. One that would be cherished for all time.
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Age 776
It had been two years. Two whole years since the Onna had died. She had died and taken one of the androids with her. How could she, a mere human, defeat something that even the planets strongest men had all perished from trying to defeat. All but one that is.
Vegeta snarled at the thought, him calling this mud ball of a planet his home. His home planet had been destroyed so long ago that it no longer hurt to think of the red planet that had been destroyed by Frieza. No longer did he want to howl from agony that his race had all but been diminished. It was only a matter of time. His son might have been half Saiya-jin but he had more of his mothers blood racing through his veins.
When he was born, he was ashamed to think that the saiyan blood that coursed through his sons veins had been so diluted by the Onnas weak human blood that he didn't even have the customary black hair.
His hair was purple!
What kind of Saiya-jin had purple hair?
His son was no Saiyan.
No.
He didn't even lust for battle. Something every single Saiyan was born with. The call for blood sung to every Saiyan, and it was not present in the boy who came from his loins. Not with that blue haired woman's blood in his veins.
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Videl had a very hard time containing the scream that was tearing at her throat.
Her daughter was flying!
Flying! It was unthinkable. Sure, she could deal with the tail. And she knew she would be a bit... strange because of her father not being normal. But this? She was only two years old for heavens sake! She could barely even form sentences, so why was she able to soar about the living room without a care for the world?
"Pan?" Maybe her daughter was kidnapped, and someone was left in her place, but the giggles coming from the little girl were all Pan.
"Mommy!" The little girl cried out in delight. She was loving the flying, not knowing she was terrifying her mother.
"Pan, come down from there!"
"No!" She didn't want to stop. She felt like she could do it all day.
"Please baby girl? For mommy?" Videl whimpered, scared shitless. She'd never thought her daughter would be able to fly like the man who was her father, like the androids...
"Alright." She moved to hoover in front of Videl, a silly grin eating up her face. Videl took her into her arms as soon as she was in reach, semi-crushing the little girl in a hug.
"Sweetie, don't scare mommy again please." She was so scared, and clinging to her daughter was the only way to calm her nerves.
"Okay mommy."
Sure, she could fly... she'd obviously inherited the ability from her father. But no normal human could. Not even her father, and he had been the strongest human alive. She was scared of what others would think of this. What would they do to her.
Sure, people could handle talking animals, and her daughter having a tail would be strange, but it would be accepted. Flying would not. Not when most couldn't do it. And those damned androids had done so while terrorizing the earth...
Thankfully those damned machines weren't a problem anymore. They seemed to just... disappear not too long ago, but even now many were paranoid, wondering when they would be back. After Seventeen and Eighteen, no one felt safe. After all, for as long as they had been terrorizing the earth, nothing could sway the strength of the fear gripping onto the hearts of all survivors.
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Age 784
She was ten years old today and according to her mother, that meant she was going to get a present to celebrate. For as long as she could remember, Pan and her mother Videl lived simply. They were very nomadic, never settling down for too long, and she knew that material things were nothing of value really. Her mother was very adament that anything they owned had to be something they could not function without. Like Pan's watch. It let her know the time it was, so she was able to be home before dark. And her picket knife, something to keep on hand in case someone tried anything funny with her. She rarely came across others while scavenging, but in the few instances that she had, she'd gotten into carrying it around.
The world was dangerous for a little girl and her mother!
Never before had Pan ever been allowed to scavenge alone, but her mother sent her out because she wanted to make the anticipation for the "celebration" all the more significant.
Because it had been almost a decade since the last sighting of the androids, people were more... in the open. Meaning, they didn't cower as much and actually were out in the daylight, some even trying to reinstate a sore of government. Some Corp or other... Pan didn't pay much attention to things of the like. Her mother did, but not Pan. After all, Pan was only ten today, she had no interest in such things.
Because it was nearing noon, and Pan had only just left the house, she picked up her pace. Normally, she took her time, because she had all day, but she had until sundown, and the city that lay in ruin in which she and her mother scavenged was an hours walk away. Knowing she didn't really have the time to take in the scenery, she decided to take to the sky. She seldom flew, especially out in the open, because her mother had instilled fear within her about scaring people with the ability, after all, the adroids had been able to fly and they terrorized the planet!
Making sure her tail was securely wrapped around her waist, Pan began to fly. Really, it wasn't hard at all, but her mother never seemed able to pick up the ability. Meaning that it came from her oh so mysterious father. Speaking of, she seemed to inherit a lot from the man. She had a tail when others didn't. She could fly! She was strong too. And fast! Pan didn't know anyone who could run faster than her. She could run for miles and not even feel the burn that kept regular people from achievments.
Pan often wondered who the man was who sired her, but she didn't ask her mother such questions. She knew well enough to keep to herself the numerous questions that plagued her, she heard her mother cry herself to sleep too often through the walls of plaster that separated the rooms.
Upon reaching city limits, Pan stopped flying, and began walking once more.
She set about the routine she had gotten into from scavenging so often for her mother and her own livelyhoods. The buildings closet to the forest were nothign new to her, so she continued a bit further into the concrete jungle, hoping she could find things for her mother to use for bartering. They were well stocked on many things but food was not one of them. Food was severely limited, and though that Corps place handed out food, the amount was never enough for Pan. She never told her mother either. After all, she would feel terrible that Pan still felt unsatisfied with her half of the food, but it didn't fill her up! So, Pan had taken to hunting.
It took her a bit, but she eventually learned how to catch fish and other animals. Even longer for her to start a fire, but she got by.
That reminded Pan that she needed to hunt on the way home, so she wouldn't go to bed hungry.
After a few hours, Pan found a few salvageable things that her mother could use to trade for food and such, and decided to head back, leaving herself an hour or so to hunt before the sun was set.
She carried the various sized objects carefully as she soon took back to the sky, flying would save her even more time, and when she was only a mile or so away from their lodgings, she placed the materials down, and stripped down to her undergarments. It wouldn't do to come home covered in mud and such. It would take forever for her clothes to be cleaned, time she didn't have today.
Slowly, because she still had a hard time with it, she allowed her instincts to take over, and the thrill of hunting to envelope her. Part of her reveled in hunting her own food, but another side of her was petrified of loosing herself to the instincts.
It didn't take long for her to sniff out a rabbit, and snap its neck, though she did have to run through several bushes to capture the frightened creature.
Her stomach growled in protest while she slowly roasted it over a fire she made not long after killing the creature, but she knew it would be bad for her to eat raw food. Her mother drilled that into her ever since Videl herself had gotten sick from trying to hunt their food, and not cooking it right. Pan had been fine, but her mother was up all night, throwing up.
After it was cooked through, she took greedy bites into the carcas, growling in content as the chuncks of meat slid down her throat and landed in her stomach where it would probably be digested by the time she reached home, but it was better than nothing and she didn't have time to kill and cook anything bigger, though a bear would have been nice.
Once she was done with her meal, Pan began getting dressed, only before she could even finish pulling the fabric over her head, something, she knew not what, was telling her something was wrong. She immediately took to the air, forgetting the things she had brought all the way from the city with her, and flew home, taking care to wrap her tail around her leg to keep the wind from pulling at it while she flew. Never before had she ever flown so fast, but she knew deep down, she needed to be home, and now.
While Pan might have been impervious to many things, her mother was not. She was just as fragile as anyone else, and while it had not really bothered Pan before, she was not deathly frightened of the fact that was slapping her in the fact right in that moment. Her mother was all she had in this world and while they might not have gotten along in many things, she was her mother and she needed her.
It was deathly silent when she came to the home in which the Satan women resided, and Pan still levitated in the sky above the porch, tail twitching in anxiety.
"Mom?"
There was no answer.
"Mom!"
She flew into the house, bursting through the doors. Immediately she was greeted by the smell of smoke, which burned her nose, and she had to stop flying to cover her very sensitive nose. she coughed and stumbled through the lodgings, looking for her mother in her bedroom, and not seeing her, went into the kitchen, her eyes falling onto the sight of her broken body, blood pooling on the ground around her. Her clothing was torn, and she was beat up, like she had just gone a match or two with a grizzly.
"Mom!" She fell to her knees beside the woman who gave birth to her, tears stinging her eyes.
"Mommy?" She shook Videls shoulders.
Once.
Twice.
Nothing.
"Mommy? Please, are you ok?" She recieved no reply, and placing her ear to her chest, heard no heartbeat. Her cheast wasn't moving up and down in the tale tale sign of someone breathing. Pan bit her lip, sobs shaking her body violently. "Mommy!"
Unable to stop her primal insticts from taking over, she threw back her head and cried out her pain. "MOMMA!"
The world around Pan went bright, then she knew nothing.
So what do you think? I the next chapter, I'll be introducing the guys into the story.