Chapter 5: "Training"
The next morning the Scoobies were already gathered at the Magic Box pretty early. They all wanted to hear how Pan's first night of slaying had been and they wanted to hear from Faith how good she was. After the two Slayers told the rest of the gang everything, it was Trunks' turn to tell his news and his plans.
"… and that's why I think that I should train you. What do you think about it?" Trunks asked, when he finished his little speech.
"Sounds good or what do you say, Pan?" Faith leaned back in her chair and looked at her partner.
"As long as we get stronger it can't be wrong. Count me in," Pan said grinning from ear to ear.
Trunks smiled at them and turned to Dawn, who had a thoughtful expression on her face. "And what about you?"
"When does the training start?" she asked him eventually with a huge smile on her face. Finally someone, who took her for serious and wanted her to take part in this fight against evil.
Pan nodded eagerly. "That's a good question."
"Hey, hey! Not that fast," Trunks said laughing.
"Trunks, listen to me," Faith told him. "We don't know how long it will take Giles to find a way to get you back to your home. That means we have to use the time we have. What do we need to train?"
"Fine," he agreed, glad that the girls were so eager to learn from him. "We start now, if you want. I think for today you won't need any training clothing, because we won't spar. I will show you how to control ki, but I explain that later. Now let's go to the training room."
In the training room Trunks explained the most important facts about ki and the girls listened to him. When he was finished about fifteen minutes later, Pan asked the most important question. "Okay, you've explained now what ki is, and how we could learn to control it. But, what do we need that for?"
"That's easy. With ki blasts you can easily kill vampires. Faith already saw how I vaporized one of them. And you might be able to fly, when you can control your ki," he told her.
"Fly? You're kidding," Pan asked disbelievingly. At that comment Trunks suddenly started to float a few feet over the ground, which caused the three girls to look at him with a shocked expression on their faces. "Okay, no kidding."
"And you think we're really able to learn how to fly?" Dawn wanted to know. She was really excited about the whole stuff with training and now even flying. This was getting better and better!
"Yes, I think that won't be a problem. Your power levels are all very high. Do you have any more questions?" When the girls shook their heads, Trunks continued, "Okay, now relax and concentrate. You have to clear your mind and find the energy that is flowing through your body. When you think you got it, try to lead it to your palms and create a small ki-ball."
The girls obeyed and closed their eyes. Trunks guessed that it would take a while till the girls made improvements, so he put his Capsule Corporation jacket aside and sat down, cross-legged. He closed his eyes and concentrated and slowly a blue aura surrounded him and he was floating in the air, meditating.
Unnoticed by everyone in the room, even by herself, a small ki-ball was being formed between Pan's palms. While Pan was meditating, her breath became more and more regular and deeper. She thought of nothing but ki and flying and suddenly a picture of her and Trunks with shorter hair flying through the air, found its way to her mind. 'Hey, where did that come from? I think I have a way too big fantasy. Okay, now back to the concentration.' When she continued, a red aura was built around her and she began floating as well – again unnoticed by everyone. She was about the same height as Trunks when she opened her eyes, wanting to look if this 'ki-thing' worked, and saw Trunks sitting directly in front of her, in a deep trance. While she was watching him, she noticed how well built the half-Saiyajin was and couldn't help but admire his body. 'He's gorgeous.' She eyed him up and down. That was when she noticed that he was floating about two meters in the air. 'Wait a minute. When he's that high in the air, how comes that I'm on eye-level with him.' She looked down at her own body and saw that she was floating as well. "AAAAAAHHHHHH!" she screamed and hit the floor with a loud thump. This scream woke the others from their concentration and they saw Pan sitting on the floor, rubbing her behind. "Ouch… That hurts…"
"Pan!" Trunks shouted worried as he descended. "Are you okay? What happened?"
Faith stretched down her hand and pulled the other Slayer on the feet. "Thanks… I think I know now how the air's up there," Pan said and pointed with one hand to the roof and rubbed with the other her still hurting behind.
"Huh? How do you mean that?" Dawn asked confused.
"Well, I was floating, I guess. Or else I don't know why this hurts so much. Ouch… I think I still have to learn how to land properly," Pan joked, while the others just stared at her.
~*~
"I wonder what they're doing in there…" Willow asked herself, when she looked up from one book. It had been quiet the whole time, except of the one scream, but they didn't worry, since Buffy often screamed when she hit something … or someone.
"I don't know what two Slayers, a teenage key and a young half-alien would do alone in a training room," Xander told her, but earned scowls from the other Scoobies. "What?" He thought for a moment. "Hey! That was you with the dirty thoughts! Not me!"
They mumbled apologies and got back to their work, just Anya sat down next to Xander and began cuddling. "Hey Xander… Can't we go somewhere else to…"
"Sorry An, but no. We have here some work to do. We still don't have a clue how we could send Trunks back to his own dimension," Xander told her.
"So what? I don't think that he really wants to leave, now that Pan's here. If you haven't noticed, I think he's fallen for her and she for him," Anya said shrugging.
~*~
"Wow, I can't believe you already managed to fly. I mean, I didn't even find this energy in my body. How did you do it?" Faith asked Pan, when the training was over. Even though they hadn't done any 'real' training like sparring or something like that, they were still completely exhausted and sweating like there was no tomorrow. At the beginning this whole ki-stuff really seemed to be quite difficult – at least for Faith and Dawn.
"I don't know. It was somehow easy. I just concentrated on it and when I opened my eyes I was floating. It simply happened. But if you excuse me now, this whole flying stuff made me hungry. I go and eat something. Is someone else in this room hungry?" Dawn and Faith shook their heads, but Trunks nodded.
"Okay, then, you two can try more to control your ki and Pan and I will go and eat something," Trunks told them and he and Pan left the training room.
~*~
After they told Giles and the others, where they were going and that Faith and Dawn still wanted to train, the two Saiyajins were on the way to the only All-You-Can-Eat restaurant of Sunnydale. When they arrived there, they sat down at a table for two and after both got their first plate with pasta and pizza, they began to talk about the training.
"Pan, I must say, I was really surprised that you were able to fly after such a short time. I knew all of you had the potential to learn it in a day or two, but not in half an hour. Do you somehow remember that you already learned to fly when you were younger?"
"Nope, everything's blank in there," Pan said and pointed to her head. She didn't tell him about this 'fantasy' she had, because she thought it was too embarrassing. She and him flying together through the air. 'Maybe that was a vision or something like that. Giles told me that Slayers sometimes have those prophetic dreams. Maybe it was one of them. But I have to do something if Trunks decides to cut of his hair. He looks way more handsome with the long hair tied back into the ponytail.'
"Hello! Earth to Pan, earth to Pan!" Trunks joked, when he saw the far-away look in her eyes.
"Huh? Oh sorry…" She laughed, "I think I was daydreaming."
Trunks couldn't help but admit to himself that he loved her smile. "And what dreamland did you visit?"
"I won't tell ya!" she answered smirking and turned her full attention back to her plate. Trunks just shook his had, but followed her example.
~*~
In the course of the rest of the day, Faith and Dawn also learned slowly how to lead the ki to their palms, but none of them managed to fly on the first day. Since Pan already floated, she and Trunks trained to control when she wanted to fly and when not. The very same evening Pan moved officially into Buffy's room and as she was laying in the bed that night she sighed of happiness, that even though she's lost her memory, she found people who cared about her and who were trying to help her with everything. But even though she felt that way, she couldn't sleep. She tried to lie still, and to toss from one side to another, but it didn't help. Groaning she got up and walked to the window and opened the blinds and the window. The air was pleasantly fresh and clear and there were no clouds in the sky, so that she could see many stars and the full moon. 'That's why I couldn't sleep. The full moon,' she thought grinning and looked at the stars. Then suddenly she turned around, grabbed the blanket from her bed and climbed out of the window. Pan stretched her muscles and sat down, snuggling into the blanket and leaning against the wall, just watching the stars. 'They're so beautiful. But why do I have this feeling as if I know how it is out there. I just wished that Trunks was here…' Pan thought yawning and snuggled deeper into her blanket and eventually fell asleep after a short time.
~*~
The next morning, shortly before dawn, Spike and Trunks came back from patrolling. That night was quite busy. Vampires, werewolves and even a few demons… They really had much to do, and since the night was almost over, they decided to go home and to bed, to rest from their exhausting night of killing. When they crossed the frontyard of the Summers' house, Spike suddenly noticed a figure on the roof.
"Hey, look there," he said and pointed to the figure.
"Is that Pan?"
"Yeah, I guess. But she looks pretty much asleep. Someone should get her into her bed."
"I will do that. You should go inside. The sun begins to rise." Spike nodded and Trunks looked around, careful that no one was watching him.
"Uhm, I think we have to go inside to get her…" Spike suddenly stopped, when Trunks started to levitate. "Okay, do it your way…" He shook his head and walked inside.
Trunks landed on the roof silently, carefully not to wake the beautiful girl up that was lying in front of him. He gently picked her up, noticing that she was as light as a feather and carried her through the window into her room and laid her on the bed, covering her with the blanket. While he was watching her she turning onto her right side and sighing contently, he leaned down and kissed her on the forehead. "Sweet dreams little Panny," Trunks whispered and left the room, carefully closing the door behind him.
~*~
The next few days everyone was busy. The three girls were training to control their ki and trained to fly, because Trunks promised them to begin with the sparring once they all managed to do that. The Scoobies were still trying to find a way to resurrect Buffy and a way to open a portal or something like that to Trunks' dimension. But they were slowly losing their courage, even though it had just been 16 days since Buffy's death and the appearance of the half-Saiyajin, because they already looked through almost every single book Giles had in his library and the Council didn't let them look into their books for unknown reasons.
~*~
Quentin Travers, Stevenson and Yasuo were standing behind a large window, looking down into a dark gym. In the background you could hear sounds of training and fighting, which were obviously coming from the gym. "Yasuo, I'm really pleased with you. You taught her really much in the last days that I'm surprised by her improvements," Travers praised the monk.
"I'm pleased to hear that from you sir, but I didn't even do half the work of her improvements. She's simply incredible. With each day she is growing stronger and gets more knowledge. From one moment to another she surprises me with something new. Not just physically, but also mentally. She already learned how to control her ki, and she is even able to float a bit. She is able to recognize vampires at the ki signature and can feel what they are planning to do in completely darkness. But once she has reached her old age again, I will start to train her harder than before. I'm proud to say that she's one of a handful people on the whole planet, who possesses the strength and skill to do that."
"That is good, because I don't want her to fail her mission. The Key must be eliminated, no matter what happens. And this is also a good chance to get rid of Faith and the other troublemakers like the witches."
"Hey Quentin!" the three men suddenly heard a female voice shouting. They looked again down into the gym and saw a bit dust flowing through the air to the spot where a small window in the roof sent a bit light into the dark gym. "I'm bored."
"Don't worry. In four days your training will get better!" Travers shouted back.
"Really? Cool." The owner of the voice stepped into the light. It was a sixteen years old girl with shoulder-length blond hair and lively hazel eyes, holding a stake in her right hand.