Disclaimer: My tummy hurts. I going to go get some aspirin...I think we own some of that.

A/N: Two chapters in a day! After a 5 chapter update the day before? Either I've given up, or I've hit a streak! Anyways, this is the last chapter for today. I'm updating this on a whim, after sitting on it a few days (actually, I'm a few chapters ahead of what I've posted, but am editing them and seeing if they really work well in the story). Enjoy.

Smiles give you purpose, just like reviews. Reviews are really just written smiles, or smirks, depending on their nature. Unless the smile is one of the free ones from McDonalds.

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Petrified Tears
chapter 51



She shifted and shivered in his arms as he cradled her to his chest, her eyes still twinkling with laughter. She'd calmed significantly in the cool air outside; her laughter subsiding to giggles, the giggles subsiding to a genuine Son smile. Now the smile was secretive and reserved, but still sincere, as the chill evening wind whipped against them as they flew into it.

He tightened his hold on her, gripping her tightly to him as he felt the chill of the air ripple through him. If he was cold, she was freezing. He had long ago learned that cold touched her more then any of the rest of the semi-saiyans. Goten had jokingly mentioned once that it was because she had less saiyan blood then the rest of them. She had then proceeded to kick his ass.

Goten.

He winced at the memory of his childhood best friend as he cradled the only person who he really knew anymore against him.

He and Goten had fallen out completely, the lack of trust and the guilt they both harbored, still fresh and biting to this day whenever he thought of it, not to be dismissed until Pan was safe at home, with no need to ever go back to California again, except maybe to visit friends-times when they could go back with her.

I'm going back to California with summer's end… I have a guy friend out there who I'm close to…who understands enough to accept me…

He ground his teeth, wishing that whatever reasons she'd had for going over there hadn't existed. That she hadn't left at all.

She shivered again and he held her closer instinctively, his mind flipping back to the previous Friday night, back on the beach. He looked down at her as he flew, smiling sheepishly as she peeked up at him through his arms, her eyes twinkling but shaded over by their own private night.

"I know what you're thinking," she told him, shifting and wrapping an arm around the back of his neck as he started in midair and nearly dropped her.

Face blazing he looked down at her with a smile, not caring that the full moon-over head showed the entirety of his expression to her.

"This is how Friday night should have ended," he said quietly, looking back to the skies as clouds surrounded them.

"Friday night never happened," she mumbled, using her ki to steer them out of the path of a pair of falcons.

"I know it didn't," he laughed smoothly, not missing a beat. "That's why this is how it should have ended."

She laughed, the darkness lifting from her eyes. "Yeah. Had we listened to me and sparred, instead of going to the beach."

"We never went to the beach, remember?"

"Yes we-argh! Nevermind! Just shut up!" she cried, playfully slapping him as he laughed at her fumble. She moved her arm under his and across his back, setting the top of her cheek against his shoulder, her eyes peeking over it and up at the sky and stars.

They fell into a comfortable silence, the only sound that of the air whipping past them, before Pan sighed.

"Tired?"

"A little. More or less wishing I could be back up there again, actually."

He glanced back at her with his eyes, noting the pale blue hue of her skin, the streaks of indigo that highlighted her hair, a gift from midnight herself. Her eyes shone like black sapphires, blue diamonds, completely alive in the dead of night.

"Sometimes I can't help but feel the same way," he acknowledged, changing his hold on her.

"Dende, it's gorgeous," she purred quietly, her eyes twinkling with their own stars, her body relaxing and subsiding against his own.

"Yeah," he agreed, holding her closer out of habit. "Breath-taking."

"The stars, the moon…especially when it's full like this," she sighed, her voice quiet and melodic, entrapping him into a trance.

"That's because we're drawn to the moon, Panny. Especially when it's full like it was last night and is tonight-"

He froze, stopping, seeming to stand on the air in terror.

"Trunks?" she asked, levitating away from him. "What is it? You don't have a tail do you?"

He swallowed thickly, his pupils so tiny he didn't seem to have any at all.

"No, I don't…but your dad does," he choked out hoarsely.

Pan immediately understood and hooked an arm through his, pulling him after her as she steered them towards her house, which could be seen sparkling in the near distance.

"Don't worry about my father. I'll protect you from him. You haven't done anything other then what didn't happen, so therefore he doesn't need to know."

"Pan," he whimpered, clinging to her arm like he had once clung to his mother as a child, whenever his father had tormented him and was no longer around. "Pan, he'll kill me. It doesn't matter that Friday didn't happen, I still did it! He knows I did something, and whether or not you tell him, he'll kill me! Especially if Goten was able to cross hairs and pin the blame on me!"

Pan laughed, taking the opportunity to wrap her arms around him and hold his back to her chest, leaving him to dangle beneath her as they sped off to her house, where her father waited on the lawn, turning the tables of the past.

"I'm only going to tell you once. I won't let him kill you. Maim you, maybe. But only during daylight hours." He whimpered and she laughed, wondering what they looked like, she holding him like a teddy bear, him hanging in her arms. "I've dealt with my father before, under circumstances far worse then me staying not being home for a week. Trust me.

"Now, what you're going to do, is you're going to pull yourself together and drop below me to fly on your own. Then you're going to land with me in front my father, with that classic Vegeta face you inherited, showing no fear. What my father is going to do is either start in on you, or tell you to stay put and hear him out. I'm going to contradict him, and you're going to contradict us both and use some excuse to go home, alright?"

He swallowed, and she felt his ki charge.

"Alright?" she repeated, letting go and pulling up beneath him, flying with her back to the ground. His face was stern, impassive, just like she always remembered it to be from her childhood.

"Trunks? Alright?"

He smirked down at her, swiping playfully at her. She dodged the blow and veered slightly right as they made their descent to the ground.

Gohan was waiting for them, fully dressed, and completely sane. Angry beyond all reason, but sane nonetheless.

They landed at the same time, touching down and slowly lowering themselves to the ground, both with the ingrained fighter's grace that they'd learned to use without a second thought over the spans of their lifetimes.

"Sorry Daddy," Pan laughed, her face bright, eyes twinkling with laughter.

"My mom 'surprised' us with more work she'd 'forgotten' about," Trunks added casually, shrugging and pushing his hands into his pockets, seemingly completely oblivious to the fact that the fingers of his right hand showed through a hole acquired during the previous night's sparring match. "If she didn't know better, I'd almost say she's attempting to lock us up in there until we go insane enough to make a break for one of the local chapels so that she can get those 'grandbabies' she wants so badly."

Gohan's slightly peevish face twitched, his expression conveying anger and hate as he unconsciously powered up. Pan and Trunks both threw their hands up in front of their faces to block the blast of power, leaning forward and digging their feet into the ground as they were shoved back towards the surrounding trees.

Gradually, the dust cleared, revealing one very pissed off Gohan.

"You stay away from my daughter!" he cried, his voice echoing in the stillness of the night, his tail whipping furiously, the moon overhead threatening to slide into his line of vision.

"Gohan, she's my best friend-practically a little sister! Please!" Trunks shot back, powering up as well, his eyes shadowed black by anger of accusation as he slowly pushed his power level up.

Gohan smirked evilly as his invitation was accepted, and dropped into a defensive stance. His power flickered maliciously about him like a tiny flame about to consume a house. "You really think you can take me, boy, with your power?" he chided, his voice barely above a whisper, yet eerily loud in the silence that had fallen with his transformation.

"Seeing as how I have no intention of sleeping with her," Trunks retorted, his voice even with anger and clearly stated, he paused to let his power rocket through him, snapping his hair gold and his eyes green. He dropped into a stance to meet his opponent. "Yes," he finished coolly, his voice displaying the arrogant attitude of his father that veiled the true power to back up his words beneath.

Gohan smiled, a light passing over his eyes from the inside.

"Then bring it on, kid."

Trunks smirked, then launched himself towards the older man, knowing full well that he wouldn't land the punch, but accepting the invitation just like he would have with Goten or Pan.

"Keep your ass outta this, Trunks!" Pan cried, breaking the stillness, meeting with Trunks millimeters before he would have met with her father, knocking him upside the head with a roundhouse kick, sending him into one of the surrounding trees. Still turning, she set one foot on the ground and completed the revolution to set the other on the ground, facing him with an stance that would allow her to turn and counterattack her father if he tried to jump her from behind for her interference.

Vision blurred to the left side of his head and black on the right, Trunks pulled himself out of the mess of trees his impact with them had created, shaking his head and gripping the back half of the right side, where her foot had made contact.

With a snarl that was pure Vegeta, he whipped around, glaring at her with vindictive hate, his cheek twitching, his eyes calm with rage and inner turmoil.

"If you really want to die," she hissed, mirroring his emotions, face calm and impassive, eyes tormented with anger, "try to retaliate against me, I'll dodge and let you deal with my father. This has nothing to do with you so stay out of it."

Trunks snarled again and turned his head, looking ahead of him at the trees that paralleled the front of her house. Grinding his teeth and clenching his hands by his side, he clenched his eyes shut, forcing himself to power down, his anger shooting up one last time. His power faded, his hair going with it, then falling back down in respective directions.

"Pan!" Gohan roared. She whipped around, her hair just as black as his, eyes met to match.

"Your beef is with me, old man. I'm the one you need to talk to. And that's exactly what you're going to do. You're going to power down and calm down," she sneered, holding his gaze.

"You power down first," he growled, standing tall and glaring down at her.

"You're going to power down," she commanded, her eyes biting fiercely into his, "and you and I are going to have a nice little talk while the Prince over there goes inside and waits his turn."

Trunks sneered at the sarcasm in her voice at his title.

"Like hell, little girl. You're going to power down, and that bastard is going to stay right were he is. We'll talk, but he's not going anywhere."

Trunks snorted, crossing his arms over his chest, silently demanding their attention as he addressed them.

"You two are insane if you think I'm going to wait around here."

"Go in the house," Pan ordered angrily, eyes raging, whipping her head around to glare at him.

"Stay right where you are," Gohan countered.

"Like hell."

Pan's ki skyrocketed gold again. Behind her, Gohan launched himself into a blur to attack, but she grabbed the front of his shirt and used his own momentum to swing him back around and into the ground where he had stood not even heartbeats before.

"Get your ass in the house," Pan shouted over her father's curses.

"Make me, kid," he snapped. As her anger registered in the furious flames of ki above her, he laughed. "I'm going home to sleep. We'll finish this in the morning."

And with that he left, leaving father and daughter to duke it out.

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A/N: o.O I have no idea where that chapter came from, but I'm glad it came!

Smiles are free at McDonald's, but Burgerking makes better french fries. What am I supposed to do!? Argh! If only reviews tasted as good as french fries.

-Panabelle ;P
Shrine of the Saiyan Squirt