note: I'm such a ditz I completely forgot to point out ages! Gah, I'm so dumb. ^^; Well, Usa is 18 (I know I pointed that one out), Trunks is 18, Goten 17, and Gohan is 21. Yes, there is an age difference between Usa and Gohan (not that big), but think Usagi/Mamoru with those two. I don't know if that's really his age and I know it doesn't fit into any timeline of Dragon Ball, but oh well. I'm taking a little license here. Let us all just pretend and come into my little world of make-believe. ^_^

extra note: Thanks to the following for reading and reviewing, I do appreciate it very much! Anthony, Of the Endless, Renity, Black Angel Juuhachigou and cjchan, thanks!

Chapter 9

"Usa? Usa, daijobu?" Trunks was kneeling beside Usa, who was staring blankly at his face. There were no tears on her face, but her eyes were glassy and watery. She shook her head back and forth. She couldn't believe what Trunks had told her. But, how could she not believe him? With what she had seen last night, it had to be true. Gohan was in love with Videl, he had been for a long time since before she had shown up. Gohan had led her on, or had he? She couldn't even decipher the feelings she was having, how could she have deciphered Gohan's? Usa came back to her senses and looked at Trunks, who looked very worried.

"Daijobu?" Trunks asked, while gently shaking Usa. She blinked a couple times, fighting back the tears that she was sure were going to pour out at any second.

"I'll be fine," she said, standing up and crossing her arms, "I just need to be alone for awhile, and think about this. Ja, Trunks." and she quickly ran back to the Son house.

'What was that all about?' Trunks thought, scratching his head. He knew he had asked Usa to come talk with him, but why? And what had he said? He started to walk off, back towards where Usa had gone, but his watch beeped.

"Oh, shit!" Trunks exclaimed, "Okaasan is gonna kill me!" He flew off back to Capsule Corp, in a hurry, knowing his mother would go ballistic if he wasn't there when his father was done training.

As Usa cleared the hill leading back to the house she saw two people standing outside the door. She knew who it was, although she wished it wasn't. As she got closer she wiped at her face and calmed her nerves, and hoped they wouldn't notice she had been crying. She walked up to the two brothers as if nothing had happened.

"Gohan, Goten," she nodded at the two, "Good morning." she directed the comment towards Gohan. Gohan gave a look to Goten, meaning 'go away', but Goten didn't move, but looked around wonderingly.

"Where'd Trunks go?" he asked. Gohan blinked and looked at his brother and then back at Usa, he wondered why Trunks had been with Usa.

"Oh, well... he had to leave." Usa stated, shrugging her shoulders. Goten got a nudge in the side by his brother, and he took the hint and went back into the house. The two were left alone and an unbearable silence stood in between them. Usa made sure not to look him in the eyes, instead she adverted her attention to the trees behind him. Gohan didn't know exactly what to say, he shifted his weight on his feet and looked at Usa who was intentionally not looking him in the face.

"Usa... I'm... I don't know what to say," Gohan was going to go on, but Usa held up her hand.

"Look Gohan, there's nothing to explain." she said, looking him directly in the eyes, with no fear, "Let's just train, all right?" She began to walk off, and turned around, "Are you coming or not?"

"Um, yah." Gohan said and ran to catch up with her. As they were walking he looked at her. He wondered what to do. He didn't know what was going on. He didn't know how he felt about her, or how she felt about him. He felt as if he should apologize. But it sounded like she didn't want to talk about it. But the whole situation and what had happened last night kept nagging at him.

Usa pushed whatever she was feeling away and into the back of her mind. She needed to be able to do this if she was going to survive a day of training with Gohan. They both stopped in the place where they normally spent most of the mornings doing physical training. Usa knew they'd start out the morning with a run, like they usually did.

"Well, let's go already." she said, getting ready to run on ahead of him if he didn't start. But Gohan shook his head. "No run today." he stated and Usa looked shocked.

"You've had enough physical training. You actually came along faster than I anticipated. You did in three weeks what most normal people would have to do in three months. You're in your top physical condition, although you may not look it. I think there must be something in your genetics that keeps your body slim, even though you should have muscles bulging everywhere." Gohan explained and Usa looked at her arms, and they were like he said, she could see her body was taught, firm, but not bulging with muscles. When she flexed her arm she could see the muscles appear there and her legs were the same.

"It must be in my Lunarian genetics," Usa stated, "What keeps me so slim, I mean." Gohan nodded, trying to think of something to say. He couldn't help from looking at her and being amazed. She was just such an amazing, beautiful person. He could have stood there forever and just looked at her, admired her, but she cut his thoughts off.

"So, what do we do now?" Usa asked, being all business.

"Well, I think it's time you learned some basic fighting techniques." Gohan said. Usa's face brightened. So, it was finally time for her to learn how to really fight. She smiled and nodded enthusiastically. So, Gohan began teaching her, trying hard to keep his mind off of anything else but his task at hand.

The morning had worn by in what seemed like only an hour and it was mid-afternoon. Gohan and Usa had had a quick lunch and had gone straight back to training. Usa was doing so well, Gohan thought that he could have her spar with him a bit at the end of the day, but he'd go easy on her. After all, it had only been her first day of actual fighting.

The day quickly went by as the two trained without any conversation. The only actual spoken words came from Gohan telling Usa what to do, or how to perfect, or to tell her she was doing well. Usa merely nodded and added in a "all right" or a "okay" into the mix every now and again. They were beginning to loose light, so Gohan decided he had better call it a day.

"I think we're going to loose the sun pretty soon," Gohan said as he wiped a bit of sweat from his forehead. Usa stopped and realized the sun was getting ready to set and she also felt a rumble in her stomach telling her it was dinner time. Gohan gingerly stepped toward Usa, all day she hadn't really let him near her, and it was getting to him. Usa crossed her arms in response to Gohan's approach and was getting ready to go into her defensive mode again.

"So, I was thinking, since you do come along so fast, you might want to try a little sparring with me right now." Gohan said, kind of nervously, "That is, if you want to, I'm not trying to push you or anything, but just seeing as how well you've been doing in such a short amount of time, I just thought.." he rambled off quickly, but Usa's face had lightened a bit at the comment.

"Gohan! Usa!" they both turned towards the house. It was ChiChi calling them. She was waving her hands around like a maniac, and occasionally jumping up, yelling at them over and over again. "Do you two hear me?! Get over here right now!" Usa looked at Gohan and they both began running as fast as they could to the house.

"I guess, I'll have to take you up on that offer some other time Gohan." Usa said while running.

"Yah, I wouldn't want to keep Okaasan waiting." he agreed.

***

"Do I have to go?" Gohan asked, even though he was already sitting in the drivers seat of his mother's car.

"Yes! Your father isn't here (ie: Goku is up in the clouds) and I don't trust Goten to drive." ChiChi explained. Goten looked disgruntled in the back seat by the comment, he was a fine driver. He had only been in five minor incidents. Only five!

Usa sat in the backseat of the car with Goten. She had changed out of her training clothes and was now wearing a spaghetti-strap white sundress ChiChi had given to her. She was actually enjoying ChiChi giving Gohan a hard time, she thought he deserved it. Gohan sighed and started the car up and pulled out onto the road. They were going to Capsule Corp. for dinner because Bulma wanted to catch up and of course, wanted to see the girl who had mysteriously appeared. Usa watched out the window as little homes passed by and other cars passed by as well. She couldn't keep her attention fixed on the outside of the car however, because of what was happening inside.

"You took a wrong turn Gohan!" Goten yelled.

"I did not!"

"Did too!"

"Did not!"

"Did too!"

"NO I DIDN'T!"

"I go to Capsule Corp all the time! You never go there! And if you do, it's by flying! I'm telling you, you took a wrong turn!"

Usa could still hear the two arguing, but her attention had been turned somewhere else. Flying. Of course! She had completely forgotten that Saiya-jins knew how to fly! She wondered why Gohan had not taught her yet. She wanted to fly and she would make sure she learned tomorrow. But for now, she had other things on her mind, such as food. Just as she began to imagine herself eating a huge triple-double-decker-super-duper-sundae the car had stopped and they had arrived at Capsule Corp.

"I told you I didn't make a wrong turn."

"Hmph."

note- This chapter was completed on Tuesday, January 15, 2002. Sorry, this chapter was pretty short, I'm just not getting very good ideas lately and the words aren't coming out like I would like them to. I don't like to write crap, so I don't want to rush myself if my writing is just going to turn out bad. Look for the next chapter in the next couple days, that is if my writer's block goes away. ^_^