A Shift in Time
Chapter 3: The Promise
"Hey Gohan this pile too!" A man in a hard said gesturing to a large pile of rubble, which was most likely an apartment building.
"You got it boss!" The young hybrid said as he held out his right hand and concentrated hard, sending a ki blast just strong enough to destroy the rubble without hurting the ground it was on.
"Nice shot kid, how about we call it a day? I have to get home to the wife." Gohans new friend said while wiping some sweat off of his brow from the hot summer sun.
"Sounds good to me Jackson." Gohan agreed also wiping some sweet off.
"You have done a lot of good work here kid, thanks. And not just for helping clean this city up but for destroying the androids, I know it was you." Jackson while grabbing Gohan's hand and giving him a firm hand shack.
"Ha…ha…well…" Gohan said scratching the back of his head doing the classic Son grin.
"Don't worry, your secret is safe with me. What do you say same time tomorrow, and we will have this city cleaned up, and the crews can start rebuilding." Jackson said
"You bet, I'll see ya tomorrow." Gohan said as he took off flying high into the sky.
Instead of flying back to the capsule corps underground base he headed to the city outskirts, at a fairly slow pace for himself. He was lost in thought, over how much had happened in the few weeks that he had been in this timeline. Bulma was slowly deteriorating, but it was noticeable. Gohan feared she would not have much time left. Trunks was spending every minute of the day with his mother, which drove Bulma crazy. She was busy working on her final project which wasn't an invention at all, but simply compiling all of her data and inventions into one hard drive for Gohan, and hopefully Trunks to give to the Bulma from the past. Trunks going into the past permanently was something that they argued about constantly. Trunks insisted he had to stay in the future to defend everyone. Bulma argued that the Goku from the past was right to an extent, but it wasn't just about him. If Earth had no strong fighters and no dragon balls then there would be no reason for bad guys from space to come to the mudball known as earth. It was something they argued about constantly, which is why Gohan spent his days helping clean, and rebuild the city.
Trunks and Bulma's argument worried Gohan, he believed her which meant that as long as the Saiyans, and the dragon balls resided on Earth then stronger and stronger fighters would be coming. Gohan knew of no place else he could reside, so that meant he would have to keep his training up to defend the people of earth. Which meant he would have to have an argument with his mother when he got home.
Gohan finally landed in a little clearing a few miles outside of the city, his work day was done, so it was time to train for a few hours before heading back to Capsule Corp for the night.
'Nothing to hard today, I'll just work on my transformation.' Gohan thought to himself. "AAAAAHHHHHHHH!" Gohan yelled as he started to transform into a Super Saiyan 2. "AAAAHHHHHH!" He continued to yell as he finally completed the transformation. His hair now standing strait up, with one lock hanging over his face, and lightening bolts cracked around him.
Gohan suppressed his power a bit to try and preserve the transformation as long as he could. He then sat in a meditative pose that he learned from his Master Mr. Piccolo. Gohan figured staying in this form as long as he could should help him maximize his power like he did with Goku in the hyperbolic time chamber. Unfortunately electronic devices tended to blow up or go on the fritz with long term exposure to a Super Saiyan 2, so he meditated in the form instead of living his everyday life as a Super Saiyan 2.
Gohan had been meditating for about an hour when he felt a strong power approaching from a distance, he smiled as he immediately recognized it as Trunks. Gohan stood up, and reverted back to his base form. It didn't take long for Trunks to arrive and he looked very frustrated.
"I need to spar!" Was all Trunks said before he rushed Gohan and hit him across the face.
Gohan was taken by surprise, he figured Trunks would give him a bit more of a warm up then that, but either way Gohan was here for his friend. He crouched down as the punch hit him in the face and kicked Trunks in the legs to sweep him off his feet, he then fired an energy blast right into Trunks midsection sending him flying back.
"I take it you had another argument with Bulma?" Gohan asked as their exchange ended.
"She doesn't get it!" Trunks yelled as his power level skyrocketed as he transformed into a Super Saiyan. "I can't leave these people defenseless, my mentor would be disappointed in me." Trunks continued as he launched himself at Gohan.
Gohan effortlessly transformed into the first level of his Super Saiyan transformation, and started to block Trunks wild attacks. He was fighting as reckless as Vegeta when he got angry, and that made this spar all too easy.
"You know, she may be right. What will be left for you after she passes?" Gohan asked as he continued to block or dodge all of Trunk's attacks.
"It doesn't matter about what is left for me. If I leave these people then that means I have failed, as this time lines defender!" Trunks roared as he continued his assualt. Punching wildly Trunks was unable to make contact on any significant part of Gohans body.
"How can you think you failed? You destroyed the Androids! There is nothing left to fight here." Gohan argued as he caught Trunks fist as he threw a wild punch. He then grabbed Trunks other arm leaving him defenseless. Gohan then drove his knee repeadiatly into Trunks stomach leaving him gasping for air.
As Trunks was bent over trying to catch his breath, Gohan punched him as hard as he could knocking him to the ground, and knocking him out of his Super Saiyan transformation.
"Don't come to me for a spar like this again, your mind isn't right." Gohan said as he blasted off back towards capsule corporation.
Trunks sat on the ground utterly surprised at how bad Gohan had just defeated him. 'It couldn't have all been my technique?' He thought to himself, then said outloud "I need to start training again." With that Trunks picked himself up off of the ground and blasted off after Gohan.
Meanwhile Gohan had just landed at Capsule Corps headquarters to find Bulma sitting outside quietly sobbing to herself. When she noticed Gohan land next to her she wiped a few tears off of her face and smiled at him. "Don't forget your promise" She said very determinedly, Gohan just nodded and allowed Bulma to continue. "All I want to is for him to be happy." She said as she started to cry some more.
Gohan looked up as he felt Trunks power directly above them as he landed next to Gohan. Trunks proceeded to sit next to Bulma to try and consol her.
"Mom, Gohan helped me open my eyes to a couple things. I'm going to give you some space to let you finish up your project. Not too much though…" He said with a slight smile before he continued "I will train for a couple hours a day, and maybe help Gohan clean up the city for a couple hours a day." Bulma squeezed Trunks hand in agreement as he continued. "And lastly I will follow your last wish and go back in time with Gohan, when… when you pass."
"Oh Trunks!" Bulma exclaimed as she pulled her son into a tight hug. "I am so glad you're agreeing to do this, I made Gohan promise to knock you out and drag you into the past with him if you refused." Bulma said laughing at this.
Trunks glared at Gohan, who just gave his classic Son grin and said "Well… I was hoping it wouldn't come to that" Gohan said also laughing.
The months went on, and just like Trunks promised he would train with Gohan for a couple hours a day and help clean up Earth's greatest cities. Because of this Capsule Corp was a happy household for some time. Bulma's cancer seemed to regress a little, as she was revived with new energy, she was happy, she now accepted her fate. Unfortunataly the cancer didn't actually regress, it was spreading, and now six months since the two hybrid Saiyans returned to the past Bulma was on her death bed.
Trunks was sitting beside his mothers bed, like he had been for the past 24 hours keeping his mother comfortable, administering medications as Bulma had instructed him too.
"Trunks… get Gohan I need to talk to him one last time…" She whispered to his son, in a rare moment of alertness.
Trunks jumped out of his chair and went to go fetch Gohan who was just in the other room. "She's asking for you…" Trunks said as Gohan got up to follow Trunks back into Bulma's bedroom.
"Gohan, you're like a second son to me, I love you so much." She said as she motioned for Gohan to give her a hug, which he did. "I want you to give this to your mother, she said handing Gohan a thick envelope. It contains the contents of what remains in my bank account, as well as a letter explaining why you were gone for six months."
"But Bulma, we can just return the day after we left, cant we? And the money what about Trunks?" Gohan asked confused.
"Because you have grown so much, and have spent so much time in the future, I would feel safer if you returned to your time line about the same number of months you spent here. Don't worry about the money, my counterpart in the past has much more then this for her family. I don't want your mom to have to worry about money for some time." She said with a smile, she knew her time was done.
"Trunks, you are my pride and joy, you're my hero… You made my life worth living, please have a long and happy life…" She said as she squeezed her son's hand affectionately, as her life force vanished.
Bulma Briefs was dead.
A/N: Ok I know this was rushed a bit, but I wanted to get everyone back to the correct timeline. Prepare for a jump ahead a couple years in the next chapter, I will give a brief summery of what went on in that time.