Disclaimer: *prays* please don't let the power go out, please don't let the power go out, please don't let the power go out...

A/N: Told you I'd have another chapter up by tonight...figured "do it now while I have the chance". Last time the power was out for over 12 hours. It sucked. But, as promised, here's 99. Oh, and everybody check out my a/n after the chapter. I've revived my contest/challenge one last time.

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Petrified Tears
chapter 99



Pan stared down at the half of the picture in her hands; Jack's winking, squinting face smiled up at her, hand reaching off the picture to where she should have been.

With a sigh, she dropped down into the window seat, propping up her knees and pushing the picture against her khakis. The card in her back pocket burned through to her skin.

"Look, Pan…I'm sorry! But if you'd just been willing to let me look at the damned photo-"

"I just don't want to see him added to your list of endangered species."

"What?!"

Pan ignored her, looking out into the sunshine. Behind her, Bra harrumphed and stormed around the room. They'd reached the Briefs's over an hour ago, after Pan gathered her junk into an angry armload and stormed out her window while Bra tried to change the subject to all the broken glass and the pile of Trunks's clothes sitting in a corner of her bedroom. Things had been tense since they'd arrived.

"Knock knock," came a quiet voice at the open door, fingers tapping the wood. Pan didn't seem to register the presence of the intruder until a body blocked her sight of Bra's tantrum. Blinking, she looked up to find Trunks leaning against the wall with his arms crossed over his chest, slightly behind her. Baggy black slacks, tattered, torn, dusty, bloody. A tank top that had probably once been white, but now was more dirty and black with blood and dirt to tell for sure.

"Hey," he said quietly. His eyes seemed odd this morning-afternoon. Not so much tormented as they'd been before, but not playful. Contemplative, as if he didn't understand anything he'd ever thought he'd known.

"Hey," she mumbled back, gripping the ripped photo lightly, looking back out the window.

"That's the picture that was on your mirror last night, right?" She nodded. "What happened to it? Aren't you supposed to be somewhere in here?" he added, uncrossing his arms to wave his finger over the missing area of the picture.

"Ask your sister about it."

"Don't even go there!"

Pan whipped her head around, more pissed just to be pissed now than pissed for any real reason.

"Who ripped one of whose most precious pictures?!"

In the middle of the room, Bra bristled, hair standing on end. "Fine! I'll give you another picture!" With that remark, she stormed across the room and into her closet.

"Just a photo, Panno," Trunks said gently, moving to sit beside her. She shifted and he leaned back against her legs. "The guy's still alive. Or at least he was last night when the limo dropped me off."

She sighed, smiling tightly and looking up at him, studying him. It was so odd to see him in the natural light of day with eyes that weren't blurry from lack of sleep. He'd bathed since she'd last seen him, but obviously hadn't changed. She started, stiffening a little, her spine straightening. Indigo blue eyes narrowed and she scrutinized him: the dark bruises on his arms and chest, the black mark on his forehead that his hair failed to hide. The dirt and dust on his clothing. The fact that the slacks were what remained of his tux pants, that the tank had probably been his undershirt the night before.

The pile of jacket, shirt, socks, and shoes that had been sitting on her dresser when she'd woken up that morning.

"Get into any fights lately?" she demanded flatly. He blinked, flinching as shoes and clothing and accessories came flying out of the closet followed by rants from his sister about how she'd give Pan a picture to cherish.

"Goten and I had it out last night," he admitted lamely, blushing and looking down at his bare feet, rubbing the back of his head.

She blinked and relaxed back against the wall, a corner of her mouth quirking up into a smile as she shifted and pushed the photo of Jack into her back pocket with the card. "What brought that on? Why last night?"

He shrugged. "We were both there and we were both awake…and it had to be done. No time like the present."

He wasn't sounding like himself, nor was he acting like it. This was a Trunks that existed outside of the box, society, and all known time and space. Pan wasn't sure if she was worried, intrigued, or suspicious.

"You guys back on speaking terms?" was all she said.

He looked over at her with a smile and nodded. "Nothing like trying to kill each other to remember you're friends."

She laughed as he stood, reaching over to pat her shoulder. His hand veered away at the last second, gripping her fingers awkwardly before falling away.

"I'll see you later tonight, alright Panno?"

Confused, she nodded, her eyes shifting to Bra's emergence as he moved away.

"Here," the blue hair birthday girl crowed triumphantly, shoving a Polaroid into Pan's hands, planting her fists on her hips and smirking. "I don't care. Marron was in ecstasy when I gave her of the other ones."

Pan's eyes bugged out of her skull, growing wide, pupils mismatched sizes. Her face alternated between white and red, settling with a purplish-indigo hue with blood beneath.

"Don't ask what I'm doing with that," Bra added as the Son began to tremble, smirking as she sensed her brother pause and turn in the doorway, looking back in curiosity.

Pan squeaked, looking back and forth at her friend and the photo, pointing excitedly at the image, squirming her half of the "oh my Dende!" dance from earlier that morning.

More than curious now, Trunks came back into the room, noticing another Polaroid in his sister's fist. Cocking his head, his face filled with blood as he made out the image, yanking it from his sister's fist and staring at it in shock.

"BRA?!"

His sister grinned, looking back at him.

"Yes Brother?"

"What the hell is this!?" he demanded, his face the color of boiled lobster as he shoved the picture in her face. She smirked.

"That's you, Silly."

"But-but-"

The image of Trunks lying on his bedroom floor, hardly covered by a white terry cloth towel and barely decent, trembled as he shook.

"So I forgot to knock the other night. I figured it was a perfect blackmail opportunity; not to mention Marron and Panny here would kill me if I didn't."

Pan stared, shell-shocked and seemingly elated. Bra wouldn't have been able to say whose face was more hysterical if her life depended on it.

"But you're my sister!"

She shrugged.

Pan looked back down at the photo in her hand, then at the one in Trunks's.

"Hey! This one doesn't show anything! I want that one!"

Trunks squawked as Pan tackled him, trying his best to get the first away from her while keeping the second out of her reach. Bra laughed hysterically as they tumbled around on the floor, both of them begging-one hyperactively and the other pathetically.

When Pan shoved one down her shirt and into her bra before going after the other, leaving Trunks flabbergasted and white-faced, whimpering and desperate, Bra lost it completely and fell over onto the floor.

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A/N: Expect the next chapter before Friday; if you don't see it by then, check my site [www.angelfire.com/dbz/storytellers] to find out wtf is going on. I'm usually pretty good about leaving updates on my existence over there. Anyways, about the challenge thing I was talking about.

Tear Drops
That's what I'm calling this one. Why? To celebrate the fact that this damned thing is finally (going to be) done with, I'm putting on a little challenge thingie. Here's the jist of it:

Pick your favorite PT scene. It can be anywhere in the story, anything you want. And then draw it out. It can be a simple little picture, or it can be as complex as you want it. Just keep in mind that the closest thing this story has to hentai is...well, it's this chapter. Which means nothing gratuitous, keep it clean for the kiddies that find my site--I cater to all age groups and the last thing I want is an irate mother emailing me telling me I'm the devil and angelfire shutting me down.

There isn't a set deadline as of yet; I want to finish out the story before I tell you to turn in your pictures. As of right now, the deadline is Febuary 20th. Should I get behind schedule with my chapters, I'll extend the date. Prizes have yet to be determined; as of right now, the winner gets to have their picture as the title pic for PT on my site. I'll come up with something a little more substantial as things get nearer to February. (Can we tell Belle's coming up with this on the spur of the moment? ;P) If you're interested, email me or leave a note in your review. All questions should be directed to the forum on my site, to the "Tear Drops Challenge" thread. Leave them there and I'll answer them...I'm pretty good at checking that thing.

So that's the challenge. Anybody up for it?

-Panabelle ;P