Hey guys, Liz here. My exams went so well that I'm actually able to update this week! Woo! I'm hoping to get to at least chapter 45 before the year is out, but we'll have to see about this.

Also, we're close to a hundred followers for this story. That's wild! I'm excited to hit that milestone soon and can't believe the story has made it this far. It's seriously been an awesome ride, guys. Thank you so much for your continual support.

Anyway, on with the show!

Son Squad Ch.41

Once they were in the air, Trunks, Daichi, Chibi, and Krillin gave everyone else the low-down with the androids and the next course of action that needed to be taken because of all of it. The twins and Chinku couldn't believe what they were hearing had happened after they left. This day had been completely flipped on its head. How could things have gone so wrong? Was all their training for nothing? It indeed sounded like it, especially if these androids were as strong as they were being led to believe. Chi-Chi listened in as well as she finished strapping in a sleeping little Daichi and baby Chibiko.

"They're really that strong?" Chiyo asked after everything was said.

"Let's just put it this way; multiply Trunks' warning by ten," Krillin replied.

The present Son kids all looked over at the three teens from the future to how they'd react. All three looked defeated. It was like the weight of the world was on their shoulders, and they couldn't do anything about it. Just reading their faces could give everyone the impression that the warriors blamed themselves for everything that went wrong.

"…..So then, you guys are really Trunks, Daichi, and Chibi from the future?" Chinku questioned. "And that woman from before…..she was me?"

"… That's right," Trunks answered with a small nod. For him and his friends, it was odd seeing this little version of Chinku. The one back home was a grown woman hell-bent on whipping the three teens into shape to fight the androids. She did try to lighten things up every now and again, but she was a hardened warrior for sure. Now here was this little girl no older than six who had no real idea of the trouble they were in.

Chi-Chi, meanwhile, was trying to take in everything. Seeing her two youngest children before her as young adults were, to put simply, baffling. She noticed the scars and bruises the two of them sported, and her heart sunk that this could be the possible future for her children. She had so many questions she wanted to ask them about their time, but she also, at the same time, didn't want to know what they had been through. Chi-Chi worried that hearing more about this awful future would only serve to break her heart even more.

As a deadly silence filled the plan, a sudden thought struck Chi-Chi, and she yelped, catching everyone's attention as she ran to the back to pull things out from a knapsack. "I can't believe I almost forgot!" Chi-Chi said.

"What, mom?" Gohan asked.

He, Chiyo, and Chinku all gasped when their mother dropped a stack of books in front of the three sitting children that measured up to almost Gohan's height. All three gulped when they realized what this meant. "You three should do some studying while we make our way to Master Roshi's," Chi-Chi instructed the three.

"But mom-" all three whined.

"No, buts," Chi-Chi interrupted. "Your education should not be negated. Besides, you three have been very lax on your studies these past three years. You're going to have to get back into a routine sooner or later."

Daichi and Chibi silently chuckled to themselves a bit. They both remembered how their mother had always pushed for them to get a proper education, but they didn't remember her being this ambitious about the issue.

Chi-Chi noticed the two teens chuckled to themselves and took action. She went back to the knapsack and then walked up to the both of them, handing them each a workbook filled with advanced college algebra problems. "Don't think you two are being left out, now," Chi-Chi said. "I'm sure you both are brilliant, but there's nothing wrong with doing some extra work. It'll help stimulate your brains, you know."

"Y-You gotta be kidding me!" Chibi stuttered as she looked between the past version of her mother and the workbook.

"How is this fair?!" Daichi bellowed. "Why aren't you forcing Trunks to do this, too?!"

"Hey, leave me out of this!" Trunks quickly remarked.

"A mother knows best for her children," Chi-Chi stated, her hands on her hips to let the two Son kids of the future know that her word on the matter was final.

Krillin couldn't help but laugh and shake his head a bit. "Wow, Chi-Chi, you sure are something else," Krillin commented as he slid to sit down from his standing position.

"So, what's our next move?" Yamcha asked from the pilot seat since he was the only one who actually had a piloting license.

"Well, apparently, it's understanding these 106 pages of algebra," Daichi joked, squinting at the problems on the page. "What even is this garbage?! These numbers don't make a lick of sense!"

"You take the sum of the square root and divide it by two and then add seven," Chibi remarked, earning looks of shock from everyone else on the plan as she seemed to be flying through the problems. She looked up from her nearly two completed pages of work. "What? When I wasn't training, I hung out with Bulma and picked up a few things." (I completely made that crap up. If this is an actual thing, then I'm a monkey's uncle).

Well, that answered that. So much for the stereotype that girls weren't good at math.

Getting back on track, though, Trunks got the ball rolling by proposing the next course of action; "This might sound like a stretch, but I have an idea: since we know where Dr. Gero's lab is, why don't Chibi, Daichi and I go back and time before the androids were activated? We could destroy them before Gero even gets the chance to turn them on."

"That sounds like it'll work," Yamcha said with a smile. It seemed solid enough to him.

"Okay, but didn't you say that your time machine wasn't all that precise, though?" Krillin brought up. "You and Chinku also told Goku that messing with the timeline could have even more consequences. Besides, what about fuel to get back to your timeline? Surely going back again will make it difficult to get you all back home, right?" Krillin didn't want to be pessimistic about the idea, but he also wanted the next course of action to be judged carefully before it was made.

Trunks thought about the issue. Yes, they'd run the risk of running out of fuel, but if it could guarantee that the androids were never activated, it was worth it, right?

"But then, if you could go back, what would happen to the androids here?" Gohan asked, turning to join the conversation. "Would they just disappear, or would it be like they never existed at all?"

"How exactly does that kind of time-travel work?" Chiyo added in. "By doing that, wouldn't that cause even more unforeseen ramifications to the timeline? And what would that do to you guys' future?"

"Wait, it wouldn't do us any good!" Daichi suddenly chimed in, throwing down his workbook down in realization. "Remember, Bulma said that wouldn't work!"

"That's right!" Trunks gasped in realization as he recalled what his mother had told them before going to the past. "Going back to destroy the androids would just change the timeline for those of the past, but it'd do us no good."

"Hold up, what?" Krillin questioned, losing what Trunks and Daichi were trying to say. "Could you guys be a little clearer, here?"

"Here, let me try to explain," Chibi said, closing her workbook. She grabbed a scrap piece of paper from a notebook that Gohan had and her pencil. She sketched out what looked like a flowing river twisting back and forth like a drawn river would be portrayed. "Let's say this is the flow of time." She then drew a small stream branching off from the river towards the middle. "Our timeline diverged here at this point when Dad died." She then drew one parallel to it on the opposite side of the river. "And here's where things diverged for you guys when Trunks and Chinku brought back the medicine and warned everyone about the androids. By giving him the medicine, Dad survived to live here, but that doesn't mean he's alive in our timeline since he already died." She then added a smaller stream right beneath the one representing the current timeline. "If we went back in time to stop the androids, it wouldn't change a thing here since the timeline has already diverged. All it would do is create another timeline where Dad survived, and the androids were stopped before they were activated. On top of that, we'd be in a timeline with double versions of time travelers."

"But if that's the case, then that means the androids in your timeline won't be gone, even if we defeat them here?" Krillin questioned, still trying to wrap his head around things.

"That about sums it up, yep," Daichi answered with a nod.

"But then, why go through the trouble of traveling back in time if it won't change anything for you guys?" Yamcha asked. "It's not gonna change anything, so why come back here?"

The three didn't speak for a moment. Then, Trunks stood up and walked towards the front window and stared at his reflection. He asked himself the same question to his mother when he told her all this. Why would they go through all the trouble of doing all this if their world didn't benefit? "….My mom said that she was done," Trunks stated. "Done living in a world without any hope. She told us that any world without the androids in it was better than anything. She insisted that we go back, even if we couldn't change anything for ourselves. We thought that by watching Goku fight the androids that we'd figure out some way to beat them in our timeline! And if that didn't work, we'd bring Goku to our time to face the androids there!" He abruptly stopped and just stared out the window. Everyone could tell this was a sore subject for Trunks, and who could blame him? He, Chibi, and Daichi had been through so much, so who could blame him for getting upset?

"I apologize," Trunks said as he turned back to others, not wanting to get so caught up in everything that he'd get worked up. "The thing is, everything is so skewed with Goku's heart virus that it throws a wrench in everything. On top of that, there are now three androids we have to deal with. And they're way stronger than the ones from our time."

Silence fell once again as everyone took it all in. Trunks summed it pretty well; they were screwed. They were stuck with this mess, and even going back in time wouldn't change a thing, least of all for Trunks, Daichi, and Chibi.

"But, why is everything all messed up?" Chinku asked, looking up from her work. "How could go so bad?"

"I don't know," Trunks sighed, leaning back against the wall of the plane. "Maybe it's my fault for meddling with time like I did."

"Come on, don't blame yourself," Daichi insisted, sitting next to Trunks. "If anything, it's me and Chibi's fault. If we had just stayed back with Chinku like you said, maybe things wouldn't have turned so screwy."

"Yeah, Daichi's got a point for once," Chibi agreed, leaning back to join Trunks on his other side. "We were the ones who insisted on coming back to help. Besides, we also really wanted to meet Dad, too." She looked over to the sleeping Goku, and the small smile she once had turned into a frown. "Maybe us being selfish screwed everything up."

"It could've been just all of us coming back," Trunks concluded, leaning back once more. "Either way, we messed everything up so bad, who knows how we'll fix this."

"Hey, you three don't need to overthink it," Chi-Chi spoke up, earning their attention. The wife of Goku and mother of five sat down at Goku's side and smiled at the three warriors of the future. "However bad it seems, I know we're better off than if you hadn't come at all." She then looked down at her husband and caressed his cheek. "My Goku is alive because of you coming to help. That has to mean something, right?"

That definitely turned things around for the three, and they couldn't help but smile too. Sure, things seemed dark, but Goku was there. Daichi and Chibi still had a chance to know the man that Bulma, Chinku, Chiyo, and Gohan talked so much about. There was still a chance to make things right. There was still hope, just like Bulma said there was.

Speaking of Bulma, Yamcha suggested they call to catch her up on everything. He put Krillin in charge of doing it since he knew more about the situation. Krillin tried to protest against it and suggested Yamcha do it, but Yamcha pointed out that he was the only one with a pilot license and needed to get the plane to Roshi's safely. (The real reason was more or less that he and Bulma were still on rough terms after the breakup, and Yamcha wasn't looking to talk to his ex at the moment).

Begrudgingly, Krillin made the call to Capsule Corp and, after being patched through to Bulma…well, "KRILLIN! WHAT'S WRONG?!" She shouted on the other end, startling everyone on board and waking little Chibi from her nap and causing her to cry. As Chi-Chi rushed to get to her youngest, Bulma continued, "Don't leave me in the dark! Start talking! You wouldn't call unless something happened! Where are you calling from?! I tried calling Goku's place to see if the twins got home okay, and no one answered! Are they okay?! What about my future son?!"

"Y-Yeah, they're all here, Bulma," Krillin stuttered. He's was starting to see how Bulma and Vegeta could be a thing. "Long story short, we had to get Goku and his family out of there since the androids are on their way to his place. We're going to Master Roshi's to hide out for a bit."

"Oh, thank goodness," Bulma sighed in relief. "Now that that's out of the way, I need to talk to my future son and his friends."

"You're on speaker, so go ahead," Krillin informed Bulma.

With the go-ahead, Bulma explained the situation she was in: some land surveyors came across a weird vehicle a few days ago and looked to Capsule Corp to figure out how to start it. However, there was no way to identify the model since there was no model number on it. Despite this, they insisted that it was from Capsule Corp since it had the logo and everything ton it. Bulma asked them for a picture of the thing hand she explained that was she found looked like the time machine that Trunks, Chibi, and Daichi had used. However, it looked old and like it hadn't been used in years.

This immediately shocked everyone, especially the future warriors. There was no way that it could be the time machine. Bulma only made one, after all. And besides, Trunks had it with him, so whatever it was that was found couldn't have been the time machine, right? Bulma insisted that it was, though, and sent a picture for all of them to see. When it came through, Trunks picked it up right away and froze at what he saw: it looked exactly like the time machine his mother made, but it was old and abandoned by the looks of it.

Daichi took the photo from Trunks' shaking hands and gasped when he came to the same conclusion as Trunks.

Chibi also took a look and felt a cold shiver run down her spine as she looked at the messed up machine.

"Okay, but how can that be the time machine?" Gohan asked. "This doesn't make any sense."

"I-I wish I knew," Trunks said as he took the picture back from Daichi. "….But, it's definitely it."

"…So, we're going to check it out, right?" Daichi questioned. "I mean, what else can we do?"

"It's worth looking into," Chibi stated. "Otherwise, we're just gonna sit here, twiddling our thumbs. Let's check this thing out."

"Can we go too?" Chiyo chimed in, leaning in along with Gohan and Chinku to look at the machine.

"We wanna see it, too!" Chinku proudly proclaimed.

"Now, hold on a second," Chi-Chi said.

"Mom, we'll be okay," Gohan insisted before his mother could fight them on it. "We'll be with Trunks, Chibi, and Daichi if there's any danger. Besides, it doesn't like there will be any trouble anyway."

Chi-Chi bit her lip as she thought it all over. It didn't seem like there would be any trouble, but she wasn't a hundred percent okay with her children going off. She finally caved in, though, and agreed to let the three go check out the time machine.

The six warriors took off to meet up with Bulma at the second time machine with that settled.


The flight there didn't take long, and soon the group of six made it to the spot Bulma would meet them at. It was just as remote as Bulma pointed out, with hills and trees in every direction. They had passed a small town on their way there, but other than that, this place was a wasteland.

"Why would someone land the time machine here?" Chinku remarked as she looked around for the machine in question. "It's so quiet and remote."

"Well, it's not too accurate with choosing a location," Daichi explained. "Bulma barely had enough parts to get the thing working, let alone be super precise. We're lucky it got us back here at all."

"We should split up and look for it," Trunks suggested. "Since we don't know the place too well, let's go looking around in teams of two."

"I'll go with you, Trunks," Gohan volunteered.

"And I'll go with Chibi," Chiyo suggested.

"Then, I'll go with Daichi!" Chinku declared.

"Sounds like a plan," Trunks said. "Let's go!"

Splitting off, the teams of three began surveying the area looking for the vehicle. Gohan and Trunks took the north, Daichi and Chinku took the east, and Chibi and Chiyo took the west. It shouldn't have been hard to find the machine, but it was a bit of a wide area to search. The three duos went out on the hunt for a few minutes, and it ended up being Trunks and Gohan who found it. The six soon met up at the machine and looked it over. It was just as decrepit as it was in the picture. Moss covered most of the device, and it looked like it had been weathered out by the natural elements. The most striking thing about it was the massive hole in the glass cover. No one could quite figure out what caused that, at least not yet.

"Holy cow," Chiyo remarked upon seeing the machine up close.

"You can say that again," Chibi stated, staring at the machine as well.

"Holy cow," Chinku repeated, earning a side-look from Chibi. The little girl smiled, though, and gave a small peace sign to her little sister's older version.

Not long after that, Bulma arrived on the scene, and the investigation regarding this second time machine began. To start things off, Trunks pulled out the time machine he and his friends had come in, proving definitively that this old-looking time machine couldn't be the one they used to travel back in time with. It looked too new and polished compared to the one that had been found.

"Well, guess that settles it," Bulma said upon seeing the newer time machine. "This broken-down thing can't be yours, then."

"But if that's the case, then why does this thing look exactly like the one you built?" Daichi seriously questioned, going up to it. He walked around the back and scratched at a patch of moss on the bottom half of the machine. Under the green substance was the word, Hope! painted in all black letters. "This is the exact word you painted on it before Trunks and Chinku came back to the past. Same style and everything."

"Hold on a second. I have to think about this," Bulma stated, trying to figure this out for herself. She scratched at her chin a bit as she tried to piece together what this could all mean. How could there be two time machines if her future self barely had enough parts to make one? And how could they be identical to each other? There had to be an explanation.

Investigating some more, Trunks, Gohan, and Chibi floated towards the cockpit and started looking at the glass. Chibi touched the rim where the hole in the glass was and noted how it was curled outwards. "Hey, whatever did this didn't do it from the outside," Chibi said, looking over to Gohan and Trunks.

"You think the pilot did this?" Gohan asked, looking up from his side of the rim.

"It's possible," Trunks guessed, unsure if that was the case or not. Why would the pilot do that? They had to have some form of strength to be able to create something this big. "Let's open it up more and see inside." He pressed a button on the ship's outer rim, and the glass slowly propped itself open to allow for Trunks to get in on the inside. Chibi soon joined him in there, and both teens found two halves of, well, something inside. "What the heck is that?"

"Not sure," Chibi admitted as she handed her half to Trunks.

"It kinda looks like an alien coconut," Gohan commented as Trunks put the two halves together. It did kinda have the coconut-like vibe about it. However, the small spikes and purple shading didn't convince everyone that it was some fruit. Trunks then gave the thing to give to Bulma, who also gave it a good look.

"If you ask me, it looks more like an egg," Bulma believed, putting the two halves together to be sure.

"If that's an egg, then what was inside it?" Chinku questioned, looking up at the blue-haired genius.

"I wish I could tell ya, kid," Bulma told Chinku. "But it doesn't look like any eggs I've seen before."

"So then, whatever was in that egg, is what was in the time machine?" Chiyo wondered, looking back up at the old thing.

"Trunks, can you get that thing running up?" Daichi questioned. "Maybe it has some fuel left we can siphon."

Taking a quick look, Trunks tried starting up the machine but was met with no luck. "No, this thing's almost empty," Trunks reported from inside. "But, I think I can get the scanners running to get some of its log data." He pushed a few buttons here and there, and the machine slightly beeped to life, displaying a batch of numbers and stats that would be indecipherable to the average person. However, Trunks was able to figure it out and reported his findings to the others; "This time machine came back from the time 788, three years after Chinku and I made our first trip to the past. And the log also shows that it came here four years ago, a whole year before we came to deal with Frieza and his father! This might be why the timeline is so messed up!"

"Hold up, let me get this straight," Daichi said from the side of the machine. "This thing came from the future, but three years in the future of our timeline, and then came here a whole year before you and Chinku kicked Frieza's butt?"

"That pretty much summarizes it, yes, Daichi," Chibi flatly stated.

"Wait, hold on, what?" Chinku questioned, scratching her head as she tried to figure this all out. "Oh, time travel is so confusing!"

"Tell me about it," Daichi agreed. "I'm still trying to figure it out."

"Well, not to toot my own horn or anything, but I really am a genius, huh?" Bulma suddenly complimented herself out of nowhere. She had a small grin on her face as she proudly looked at her work. She was going to build a time machine, for goodness sake! "I can't believe I'm going to build a time machine someday!"

"Uh, Bulma," Chibi said from inside the second time machine's cockpit. "Not to burst your bubble or anything, but we kinda don't have time for you to celebrate. We need to shrink this one down and get it out of here before someone else finds it and starts asking questions."

"Good point, Chibi," Trunks stated and jumped out from the cockpit. "Let's shrink this one and ours down for now."

While that was going on, Chinku felt something run down her back and make her shiver. The others began telling Bulma about their plans to stay at the Kame house until Goku was better and didn't notice the little girl wandering off. She just walked behind a small rock formation and froze at what she saw. Then she let out a small scream: "Ahhhh!" She screamed, falling back on her butt and freaking the others out.

"Chinku!" Gohan and Chiyo both shouted before going over to check on their little sister.

Trunks, Daichi, Chibi, and Bulma quickly followed behind the twins, who soon stopped at what their little sister found.

"Holy-" Chiyo squeaked out.

"What the-?" Gohan quietly questioned.

"Guys, what is it?" Trunks shouted as he and the others came over to the scene.

"Y-You just gotta see it for yourself," Gohan told Trunks.

Just as they all came around the corner, the four gasped at what they found; it looked to be the shell of one of the biggest bugs in history.

"W-What is that thing?!" Bulma gasped, hiding behind Trunks and Daichi for protection. Chinku joined her in hiding.

"Whatever it is, it stinks worse than Daichi's laundry," Chibi remarked, plugging her nose.

"It smells like cheese that's been in the sun too long," Trunks followed up, wafting the smell away from his face.

Bulma slightly poked her head out from behind her future and looked ready to bolt at any second. "I-Is it dead?" She stuttered out. She didn't actively fear bugs, but she'd make an exception for this thing.

Gulping down some nerves, Gohan approached what he assumed was a shell and poked at it, finding that it was indeed a shell. "Don't worry, Bulma. It's just a shell," Gohan assured her.

"Well, if it is a shell, what made it? Some kind of cicada?" Chiyo questioned, checking out the shell a bit more, too.

"If that's a cicada, then I'm a monkey's uncle," Daichi remarked.

"This has gotta be the thing that was in the time machine, right?" Chibi guessed, circling around to look at the front of the shell. "I mean, what else could it be?"

"Whatever it is, it's disgusting," Trunks stated. He looked inside the shell and thought he saw something. Reaching inside, he quickly pulled out his hand to reveal a weird pink-like substance dripping from it. "This is still fresh. That more than likely means it's still around here."

"What?!" Bulma and Chinku shouted and frantically looked around. Some rustling in the bushes sent Bulma fleeing towards her ship and leaving behind the others. All six of them quickly got into fighting positions and prepared for whatever it was to come out.

Well, we all know who's about to show up onto the scene, but I plan on there being a twist to him. After all, we do have additional time travelers with Trunks. There's bound to be more messed up with the timeline. I know some of you have wanted things to get mixed up with more kids on the battlefield, and you're about to see some of that in action. What will it be exactly? Well, you'll just have to come back next time to find out, won't you? ;)

So what do you guys think? Are you enjoying the banter of the Son kids, both present and future? What do you think awaits them with the coming battle? Find out next time on the Son Squad!

Have a good day, guys, and remember to wash your hands! (Also, for some reason, someone yelled at me for saying this, but you know what? Good hygiene is important to promote!)