Disclaimer: Ah shit...who let Jack out of his cage? *goes chasing after the little devil waving a sign that reads "Panabelle owns all! Sue her! Sue her!"* Jack! Drop that this instant before you get me in trouble!
A/N: Are you reviewing? You should be. Anywho, one with the new chapter!
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Petrified Tears
chapter 61
Gohan settled down into the little wisp of cloud with a heavy heart.
He had run out of tears a while ago, and now was just left with empty questions.
Questions that drove him and that he needed answers to, but that he had no more emotion left to put into.
"Take me to Dende's Lookout, old friend," he told the cloud, gently gripping handfuls of yellow fluff in his fists. The little cloud complied, speeding off in the desired direction of its passenger, its pace slightly slower than it had usually been, the misery of its passenger being contagious.
Gohan sighed and leaned his elbow on his knee, cupping his chin in his palm.
He felt bad about leaving Videl like he had, with no warning and no explanation, and with no reassurance other than this ramrod-straight back as he walked past the kitchen and out the front door, but he knew she wouldn't understand. He knew nobody would understand; Piccolo had completely misinterpreted the situation between Trunks and his daughter. Vegeta more than likely understood, but Gohan would prefer not to deal with the Prince's cryptic explanations in his current state of mind, and Bulma was just so determined to get Trunks married, that the entire "Pan situation" was being overlooked. Goten understood well enough, but he was Goten…too much their father's son to be of any real help other than a laugh and a smile.
Gohan sighed again. Pan had made him promise not to tell anyone about what she'd told him…but he wasn't going to tell anyone; he was going to talk to someone who had watched it happen.
Dende.
It'd been a long time since Gohan had flown to the lookout and sat down to talk with the little green Namekian that he'd (in a sense) grown up with, and now not only did he feel the need to reminisce about the past, but he needed to talk to someone about his daughter.
He didn't expect Dende to understand. Dende just had this way about him though, where he understood enough to give comfort, and to put things into perspective. But the nice thing about Dende was that he didn't pretend to understand. He just listened and did what he could to help; he didn't tell you what you wanted to hear, or that everything would be alright shortly. He just reminded you that you'd been through worse times, and that there would continue to be bad times, that it was just a part of life, but those down times only made the good times better.
That's what Gohan needed right now.
The air was cool around him as they flew, Nimbus taking his lazy time, the air gently tossing locks of Gohan's hair around his face in an almost playful way that had thrilled him as a child. If he closed his eyes, he could feel his father's arm holding him on his shoulder, or feel his own little arms wrapped around his father's leg, Goku determined to make his son smile and laugh and shriek with delight. He could remember clinging to his hat as they flew, or sitting in his father's lap, laughing only like a four year, a five year, a child could. It'd made Goten laugh the same way when he was little, when Gohan had held his seven year old little brother on the cross-section of his ankles, tickling his sides as they flew home from the Briefs', or to the Briefs'.
It'd once made Panny laugh, too.
Gohan felt his eyes try to well up, but it was impossible; there were no more tears left in him, none that could be reached without a dizzying amount of sobbing and retching and soul-baring; nothing that Gohan wanted to do. He'd done it too often in his life, and he wasn't going to continue to do it.
He flopped back into the little cloud, stuffing his glasses into his pocket, hooking a leg so that it hung out against his own leg.
He had always known that Pan had kept a lot of skeletons in her closet, and that some of those skeletons had even been there since before he'd started teaching her how to fight. But she'd always been a happy kid, happy-go-lucky even. It was hard for a Son not to have a happy life. Sure, life was hell, and life was as confusing as learning how to ride a bike for the first time, but that was the beauty of it. Once you've learned how to ride, you never forget. Sure, going from slow and steady on a level street, to huffing and puffing up a steep hill, to zipping down an even steeper hill with brakes that didn't want to work were all challenges that you had to learn to overcome, so the bike ride was rarely as easy and serene as it would seem at first. But over time, the hills wouldn't seem so big, nor so impossible, they just took a little more work or a little more commitment than the last; you just don't realize how big they really are until you stop on the crest of one of them and look back over the ground you've covered.
Gohan sighed. None of the actual bike rides he ever been on had ever actually been easy or serene. Most involved Goten, Trunks, Pan, and a lot of pain. Oh, how he missed those rides, he and Goten and Pan and occasionally Trunks riding down the wooded trails, racing each other as Goten and Pan held a competition as to who could be the more endangered or daring, Trunks popping wheelies and being the pompous bastard his father had given him the right to be, Gohan just racing to keep up with them, usually playing Ben-Hur with his little brother, each trying to shove each other from their bikes.
How he missed his daughter sneaking into a room just to jump him from behind with a hug; how much would he give to be able to hold her in his lap and play with her hair as she told him about her day, to help her with her homework, to take her flying or to teach her to keep her guard up in a spar.
He would give just about anything for those moments, just for one more shot at each of those moments. He'd sell his soul for that life, if it meant he could keep it, if it meant that Pan hadn't grown up and didn't have to, that she could stay his little Panny forever and smile at him with those blue eyes that could have been black sapphires or blue diamonds, and never, never, smile at anyone else with those eyes.
But those days were gone; she was older now, she had grown up. The bikes were rusted and bent and broken beyond repair from reckless races. She was never home anymore to surprise him with the only embrace a father ever wants from his daughter—the kind that just says "I love you Daddy!" all over it, with a smile and those eyes that twinkled just for him to make the hug all the more special. She was too big and too old to sit in his lap, and more often than not, the events of her day would terrify him for her well-being, or for Trunks's. She had graduated completely, no longer had homework. Flying was nothing compared to that damned bike Trunks had brought that morning, and she didn't fight like she used to; she knew what she was doing now, there was nothing more he could teach her that wouldn't attract a potential evil.
Besides, she only seemed to want to spar with Trunks now.
Gohan rubbed his eyes and sat up, the distant top-shaped silhouette that was the Lookout glistening in the distance.
As much as he didn't want to admit it, it had been a date. Trunks had picked her up, he'd taken her to and paid for dinner, and he'd kissed her. The basic outline of a date.
Exhaustion began to set in and he laid back down, rubbing his temples. It just felt wrong to him; Trunks had been nearly as much his son as Goten had been his son when they were seven—Trunks always just there, always underfoot, and he was the only father either boy had ever known. Goten until Goku had finally come home, Trunks to this day because Vegeta was too busy with himself. As they had grown older, when he and Videl had been talking of marriage, before Pan had been born and when the boys had finally discovered girls, Goku had been around, and Goten had turned his reverence towards their father, but still held his brother in high regard. Trunks hadn't been around so much, had been so convinced to prove himself to his real father, that Gohan hardly saw him, and simply began to think of him as a second brother, extended family.
And then Pan had been born. Trunks and Goten had already discovered babies with Bra's birth, but both had pretty much avoided her, the daughter of Bulma being too much of a screamer and crier to their ears. But with Pan, Bra's-up-and-coming best friend, they couldn't get enough of her, and would "kidnap" the young girl whenever Videl was sleeping or distracted. Often, Trunks had Bra with him, baby-sitting for his mother, and the 14 year old Briefs and the 13 year old Son would just sit and watch the two little babies interact, often wondering if they had acted the same way. They were over so often, that Gohan began to think of Bra as his own, just as much as Pan was.
Trunks and Bra just became a part of their family, Bra the "other daughter", and Trunks drifting in and out with Goten as the two entered high school and devoted their time to "homework" and females. As the girls had grown older, Trunks was still family, and was still seeking Gohan's approval at age 32 when Pan left for college.
He should have seen this coming; he should have known that his daughter's crush hadn't been just a crush, but what might turn out to be forever. How many evening of "shop talk" in the kitchen had been interrupted by Pan sneaking up on the purple-haired son of Vegeta, leaping up behind his chair and locking one arm across his head and face, the other over his shoulder and down towards his appendix, his struggles to keep from choking on coffee, laughter, and his own surprise knocking them both splaying across the kitchen linoleum, then turning into a tiny wrestling match that Trunks never tried at but always won? How many father-daughter afternoons had suddenly involved Trunks as they passed on the street? How many times had she gone to Trunks with her problems, before she went to her father?
Gohan didn't know. He didn't want to know.
All he knew is that he should have seen this coming. He should have known that Pan hadn't really just been hopelessly infatuated with the boy he'd once and still considered a brother. Should have known that Trunks would have known her to be older than her years, the perfect match to his refusal to grow up past the age his face displayed.
Maybe that was why he could never think of Trunks as anything more than "the boy". Trunks was just that, a big kid trapped in an adult's body; he was like Goku like that, only too bogged down with the realities of life and the corruptions of living 24-7 with Bulma and Vegeta.
Or maybe it was the fact that if he acknowledged the fact that Trunks was nearly forty, he himself was older than he wanted to be. Like age mattered to him…but it mattered to his wife and his mother. If Trunks was nearing 40, then he himself was nearly 50. And that only meant that his mother was almost 70, and that there were only so many years left before he lost Videl.
He wasn't stupid nor naïve. Age meant nothing to him; ever since he'd come out of puberty, he'd aged one year for every three. So, if he was forty-six, in reality, he might as well been only twenty-six or so. Videl, however, was susceptible to the years, as was his mother. His mother had already suffered one heart attack and it had left her catatonic for over a week. Videl was aging; in the tradition of aging women everywhere, she'd cut her hair short in attempt to look younger, or in Videl's case, in attempt to make her mornings less stressful. Even Pan was susceptible; she may look her age now, and may still look twenty-one for years to come, but she'd age faster than he had and still would.
Gohan pushed himself back up until his legs were crossed at the ankle and folded back—nearly under him, looking ahead as the Lookout loomed over him and the tiny cloud. His mind was even more trouble now then it had been when he had left; he only prayed Dende could help him at lease make sense of all of this.
As if on cue, the green Namekian appeared as the little yellow cloud lifted Gohan to the level of the lookout, eyes wide with knowing surprise and face kind with welcome.
"Gohan!" he laughed, watching as the troubled half-saiyan stepped onto the floor of the floating palace and waved good-bye to the yellow cloud. "It's been a long time."
Gohan nodded, his troubles momentarily forgotten but still reeking havoc on his mind. "Yeah, it has been a long time, hasn't it Dende?"
The two stood awkwardly before Dende turned, his staff leading them to the steps of the palace, where they say just outside the Room of Spirit of Time. The silence became ominous as they were joined by the older Namek, who stood with his back against the wall, nothing but one shoulder and part of the side of his face visible to the younger and Gohan.
Piccolo cleared his throat, and Dende mentally steeled himself, throwing himself into conversation.
"So what brings you, old friend? You haven't been here since shortly after Goku left us."
Gohan's face flicked with anger, but that anger quickly died away into depressed defeat. "You know full well what brings me here, Dende. If you don't, you've been doing a terrible job as guardian of Earth."
Dende shook his head. Piccolo kept his ears locked on their feeble beginning to a conversation. Beyond hearing range, Mr. Popo was bustling about his garden, a bright smile on his face as he tended his flowers.
"Yes, Gohan, I do know," Dende started, his soft voice floating effortlessly on the gentle breeze that seemed to have taken residence at the Lookout since before Gohan could remember. "And sadly, there's nothing I can tell you that you don't already know," he cautioned, his eyes hidden behind a blatant lie that even the Son picked up on.
Rolling down onto his back, Gohan sighed, raking his hands through his hair. "You know something, Dende. In the past four years, my daughter has changed into someone I hardly know, my little brother has gotten smart, and I've lost track of Krillin and his family, not to mention the Briefs. And in the past seven days, Pan's been crushed by Trunks, Trunks has accepted my challenge, Bulma has kept both of them locked up at Capsule Corps Offices so I never see either of them, my brother has everything figured out while I'm still floundering for straws, and my mother has started going through menopause. And that's just off the top of my head!" he complained, eyes sad and puppy-like, face tight and distraught.
Dende glanced to Piccolo, who nodded discreetly. Gohan noticed, and laughed inwardly. Guardian for over 30 years and still looking to Piccolo for permission. Just as inwardly, he kicked himself. Who'm I kidding? I'm nearly 50 and I still can't figure anything out with Piccolo's help.
"Gohan, if you weren't Pan's father, this would all make perfect sense to you, too."
Gohan screamed and jumped up, standing in aggravated frustration before the guardian.
"That doesn't help me! I still don't know what's going on! Oh, for the love of Dende! Gen…uh…Kami! Argh…Dammit!" he swore, and collapsed back onto the steps, holding his head in his hands and laughing at the terrible irony of it all. Rubbing his temples, he fought for calm before allowing himself to speak again, ignoring the laughter of the Nameks. "Dende, I can't just not be her father, even if just for a few minutes. It doesn't work that way. I just…I want to know what's going on. I want to know what's going on…" he repeated, trailing off.
A warm hand settled on his head, and peace swept over him. His head fell into his hands and his neck seemed to disappear into his shoulders, his eyes falling closed. He felt like he was a child again, safe and sound when Piccolo would watch over him sleep, or when his father would cradle him in one arm after a long day. For a fleeting instant he thought it was Piccolo or his father, but the hand was too small, too delicate.
Mom?
"Dende? Piccolo?" he heard his wife's voice murmur. "Would you two mind leaving me along with my husband for a few minutes?"
The two Nameks nodded and moved away. Videl raised her voice slightly. "And no eavesdropping you two!"
Both stiffened, their faces turning that odd purplish-green of blushing Nameks, and hurried off to the edge of the Lookout to speak amongst themselves.
Gohan opened his eyes and lifted his head from his hands, looking at Videl as she sat down next to him and laced an arm through one of his, leaning up against his shoulder.
"What's wrong, Gohan?" she murmured.
Without warning, the half-saiyan burst into tears he didn't know he still had.
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A/N: *sniff* Poor Gohan, I can't stand doing this to him, but, c'est le vie *don't speak french*, all will work out for the better in the end.
-Panabelle ;P
Shrine of the Saiyan Squirt