Disclaimer:
All DBZ characters belong to Akira Toriyama.
The other ones belong to me :p
YELL
" Someone has taken the idea of revenge a little bit too far "
Chapitre NINE : Lost Trace
That night Trunks got a nightmare. He woke up almost
in tears, as a young kid surprised by a thunder.
He was with Mirai-Trunks in that nightmare, and Mirai-Trunks was almost all
the time standing and talking behind him, as if he was just his shadow.
They were both driving in a black Honda Prelude. Mirai-Trunks has his hair mid-long and gathered in a pony-tail; he was also wearing his classical gray jeans, black tanktop and blue jacket. He had his hands calmly put on the wheel and was whistling happily, following the tunes of a music that seemed familiar to Trunks, but that, for an unknown reason, he couldn't place. From the passenger's seat, Trunks looked over his shoulder, and saw Gohan, sitting behind Mirai-Trunks and smiling to him.
"It has been a long time, heh Trunks?", Gohan said with a happy grin on his face. The three of them were looking like three old comrades, going to some afternoon party. "I thought you were dead...", Trunks said flatly, in this weird out-of-place situation.
"Yes, I know", was the only answer Gohan gave.
*Yes you know I thought you were dead? or Yes you are dead?*, Trunks wondered, but before he could ask that to Gohan, Mirai-Trunks started "There's a place I'd like to show you". His tone was suddenly serious. Trunks forgot about his question to Gohan.
After a few minutes - or what seemed to Trunks as a few minutes, but in dreams the time can behave really strangely - Mirai-Trunks parked the car in the main alley of the Capsule Corporation. Trunks came out the car and turned a calm gaze to his future counterpart, "I know this place, this is my house", he said with an almost condescending tone.
"You're all wrong", Mirai-Trunks replied in an amused tone. "No one has been living here for years", he went on, "the son of the former proprietor went nuts a few years ago and killed everybody before committing suicide".
After the surprise and the disgust towards Mirai-Trunks' bad humor, Trunks wondered *by the way, which year are we?*
Mirai-Trunks leant on the car, his elbow on the roof and stared right into Trunks' eyes. "Some rumors said the guy had been helped by his father. It's perhaps just an urban legend", he added, raising an eyebrow, "but both had that killing tendency deep inside of them. A little observation of the Saiya-jins genes could have foretell this and prevent all this blood bath. Don't you think, brother?", Mirai-Trunks asked with a wicked smile.
Trunks frowned to him. "Am I supposed to find that funny?". It seemed somehow important to show to Mirai-Trunks that he was not afraid of him. Very important, because he had reached a degree of terror he couldn't remember of.
Mirai-Trunks simply showed the house with a movement of his chin while closing the door of the car. Trunks started walking like in a trance towards the main door, as if he was not controlling his own decision. The daylight seemed painfully blinding, and he had the feeling that everything was in slow motion. He turned a moment and realized that Gohan was staying in the car.
Gohan's gaze was strange, he thought. His face was expressionless and the look in his eyes was empty. He was also strangely surrounded by shadows, though the inside of the car couldn't be as dark, especially around Gohan only... He turned back to the house, and as he was reaching the door, Mirai-Trunks' hand passed from behind him, over his shoulder, and moved a magnetic card in front of his face.
No, not simply "moved", otherwise Trunks could have replied or refused the card, or even push it away, to show his future counterpart that he was not afraid of him. No, here, it was as if the hand had initially planned to smash the card into his face, and all Trunks could do was to grab it in order to save his nose.
Trunks passed the card into the device on the side of the door, and after a few seconds, the unpleasant buzz was heard, meaning that the magnetic lock was removed for a few seconds. Trunks put his hand on the glass to open the door, but as soon as he touched it, the glass seemed to deform as if it was melting, then the door shattered in tiny pieces of metal and glass that fell on the ground in slow motion.
Trunks was staring at this process with wide eyes. Mirai-Trunks came really close to him. Trunks could almost feel his breath in his ear as he was talking softly, "Man, you keep destroying everything you touch, heh?".
Trunks entered the corridor.
He didn't want to enter, actually. He wanted to stay outside and talk with Mirai-Trunks. No, he rather wanted to ask him why he was leading him through all this; why he was trying to terrorize him; what he had against him...
... because entering the house was even more frightening than having Mirai-Trunks standing in his back. But it was just a bad dream, and in bad dreams, you could not control the events... Not even your own reactions...
The familiar corridor seemed now strange, almost hostile. Trunks didn't like the echoes his steps were making on the floor; not only because that type of sound was confirming what his future counterpart had said, that no one had been living here for awhile, but also because of the dark, horrible, deadly message that was flying with that sound.
He wanted to turn back and run away, but couldn't. Because Mirai-Trunks was behind him and Trunks knew (but didn't know how) that Mirai-Trunks was now holding his sword.
If he turned now, he'd know what Freezer had been through when Mirai-Trunks made his first travel from the future, a few years before his own birth.
The house was perhaps unoccupied by people, but all the familiar furniture was still there. Trunks reached the end of the corridor and turned on the right, towards the kitchen, where you could usually find someone at almost every hours of the day. His mind was not yet accepting what Mirai-Trunks had told him about the people living here.
Passed the kitchen door, on the right against the wall, was a little table with a white and blue vase on it. Strangely, the red roses in the vase seemed fresh, as if someone had just changed them. Strange, for a place supposed to be unoccupied for years... Without really thinking, Trunks reached out to touch the vase. As soon as he got physical contact with it, the vase exploded in hundreds of blue and white particles. The water flew down the table to the floor. The roses that had seemed so fresh a second ago, shrinked and turned to a dark gray before falling in the now greenish stinking water that was remaining on the table.
Trunks moved back in horror and hit another table in his movement. The wood of that table cracked in a sinister way and the table split into two neat parts that fell on the floor.
"What did you do to my house?!", he yelled at Mirai-Trunks, without facing him. He didn't need to turn to check the presence of the sword.
"Nothing", Mirai-Trunks answered, and Trunks didn't need to turn to see the smile that had been with that word. "*You* did all this", Mirai-Trunks went on.
Trunks wanted to move away from the table and his foot got caught in an object laying on the ground, he recognized a soft toy belonging to his sister Bra, but he lost his balance and put a hand on the fridge to keep from falling. The door of the fridge fell on the floor while all the electric devices inside the fridge were exploding in sparkles. The food inside rotted at high speed and started spitting outside; the milk turned greenish and flew down the several floors of the fridge that was now collapsing. An awful smell was coming from the whole and Trunks saw the meat and vegetables darkening at high speed, then covered by a white moss before turning into a gray stinking poodle. Trunks felt nauseous and turned away to vomit, but nothing came.
"Stop that now!", he yelled at Mirai-Trunks, "I want to wake up, and I want to wake up NOW! I hate breaking things!"
"You've always been the most clumsy of us", Mirai-Trunks said in a calm tone, as if they had been raised together since their birth.
"I'm not always breaking things!", Trunks growled. "I pay attention to keep a close control on my strength in order NOT to break things!"
"Hmm... Too bad you stopped that close control on yourself", Mirai-Trunks raised his eyebrows and smiled in a I-am-just-constating voice .
They were now standing at the entrance of the living room. Trunks saw Bra, sitting against the sofa, facing the blank TV-screen. She was wearing a dark blue jeans and a pink shirt. Her head was leaning forward as if she was sleeping and her green hair was covering her eyes. The same way Trunks previously didn't need to turn to know that Mirai-Trunks was holding his sword, now he didn't need either to see Bra's face to know that she wasn't sleeping, but that she was dead...
"You'll see better if you switch on the light", Mirai-Trunks went on in a I'm-just-spending-my-free-time-with-you-bro voice. Trunks moved his hand like in a trance towards the switcher a few meters away from him. A blue thunder beam came out his fingers and hit the device.
The plastic button blackened under the heat and jumped free from the wall, flying through the living room and bursting through one of the windows, disappearing in a sky that had turned in a strange blinding yellow-green. Thin blue thunders were moving along the electrical wires in the wall and reaching the spotlights and TV, which exploded under the effect of the surtension. Trunks reacted automatically and jumped towards his sister to protect her from the sharp pieces of TV screen exploding in her direction. No matter that she was already dead and that it didn't matter to her any longer.
The moment Trunks passed his arms under her own arms to raise her from the floor, her head came off her body and fell on her lap. Blood spilled from her neck on Trunks face. He closed his eyes by reflex. When he opened them again, he saw that Bra's empty eyes were staring in his direction, as in an accusing gaze.
Trunks started screaming - in the dream and not in reality, thanks God, otherwise he would have scared the hell out of the whole house.
Mirai-Trunks pressed the tip of his sword against Trunks' back under his right shoulder - or was it the left one?
"I am not finished with you", Mirai-Trunks' voice was
lacking of the previous smile. His tone was as cold as the iceberg that hit
the Titanic. "Remember well, Trunks, there's no hope, and..."
Trunks woke up suddenly, his face wet, his breath short.
"... nowhere to hide", he ended Mirai-Trunks' sentence...
He felt a scream, raising from deep inside of him. He
just got the time to put his fist in his mouth to prevent it from becoming free.
******************************************************
Trunks came out of the shower and started to dry himself with the warm towels he had previously put on the heater.
He stared at his reflection in the mirror. The same face. Of course, some shadows under his eyes as a proof of a slight lack of sleep, but almost his usual face. Not the face of the movie star, but his face anyway. He smiled to himself.
He didn't know how he had managed to go back to sleep after last night's dream. When he had woken up with as last vision his sister's head in her lap, staring at him with empty eyes, he had thought he'd never be able to go back to sleep for the rest of his life. But five minutes afterwards, his breathing had been regular again, and he was in a deep - dreamless - sleep.
As he was coming out of the bathroom, the dream was still very precise in his memory, but not as horrible as the first time. Oddly, the sound of his steps echoing in the corridor was the only event still keeping the affective meaning. Nevertheless, that dream became one of the rare dreams of which he always kept the vivid memory almost as if it had happening in reality.
He put a blue tee-shirt and a light gray sport trouser and started climbing down the stairs, barefoot, when the doorbell rang again. After a few seconds, he heard his mother warning loudly: "He is back!".
Trunks froze in his movement, his foot suspended above a stairstep. A wind of cold terror was blowing on and inside of him. And the terror had a name: Mirai-Trunks. During a second, that's what he thought she had meant. That Mirai-Trunks was back from his post-apocalyptic future.
He raised his hands before his face and looked at them. They were trembling slightly, and he was feeling as if all the blood had left his face.
*Stop that!*, he ordered himself. *You're not going to freak out because of a nightmare, heh?! You never did dreams showing the future, and there's no reason you'll start now! The type of dream you did is what happens usually under a lot of pressure and stress...*
His internal discourse could sound great, it didn't prevent Trunks from getting a feeling of 'presque-vu', which, to the contrary of the deja-vu feeling, referring to something that already happened in the past, the presque-vu feeling was referring to something imminent to happen.
Trunks then heard the voice of the inspector Hayden and
understood that his fear had been pointless. He took some deep breathings to
calm down and look at his hands. When their trembling disappeared, he decided
he could appear in public without grabbing everybody's attention.
******************************************************
"The call was made from a phone-box in an underground metro station", Hayden started with the expression of someone who expected that. "And of course, nobody saw anything... So, we lost his trace..."
Trunks was now completely awaken, and his last night's dream was starting to disappear as the fog in morning wind. He remembered about what one of technicians had told when they were installing the recording system on their phone-line. That all those expensive systems were usually installed to learn most of the time that your guy was calling from a public phone-box in a commercial center.
"You are surprised?", Trunks asked Hayden coldly. Hayden looked at him clinically for a few seconds before answering in the same cold tone: "Not really, I was just hoping he would make a mistake. Those guys always end by making a mistake soon or later."
Hayden looked around him for a brief moment, "I'd like to talk to Trunks' father, if he came back home since last time of course", he added with an ironic tone that went on Trunks' nerves.
"Still not home", Bulma replied coldly. That fact was usual from Vegeta, but Hayden was looking at her as if Vegeta was seeing someone else. Bulma knew it wasn't the case at all - Vegeta was the type of men who could stay without a woman for a long period of time without even bothering - but she didn't like to be seen as the "poor and cheated wife" by anyone.
"Too bad", Hayden started, "I wanted to compare his voice and Trunks' ..."
Trunks and Bulma blinked at the same time, surprised. This was a subject they didn't expect from Hayden. They looked at each other with puzzled look, each of them hoping the other knew what Hayden was talking about.
"Actually", Hayden started after observing their reaction, "I don't think it would change a lot unless your father had exactly the same voice as you, Trunks."
Trunks frowned to him, waiting for the explanation to come.
"I was hoping to get Vegeta's vocal prints to compare them to the one who called because...", Hayden marked a pause than raised his eyes to Trunks, "the killer and you have almost the same vocal print, with just a few differences...".
Trunks blinked, he wasn't sure to understand. Hayden noted his reaction and took a folder from the suitcase he had brought with him.
"A vocal print", Hayden started, "is a computer-graph representing the voice quality of a person. The voice is in fact analyzed according to different parameters as the harmonics, the tone, the resonance, ... What the specialists call the Head voice and the Chest voice. It's a way even better than the fingerprints to identify someone".
He let them the time to digest the information he had given them. Bulma reacted the first, "so you wanted to compare Trunks' voice and the voice of the killer?".
"Indeed", Hayden replied.
"Bullshit!", Trunks snapped. "His voice and I aren't the same!"
"They might seem different at first", Hayden retorted calmly in a patient tone, "I heard the recording.... But it doesn't mean anything... Remember Trunks... Head voice and Chest voice..."
He paused, as if he was thinking of something else, then went on "Do Berlioz in 'Aristocats' and Mickey Randhall in 'Parker Lewis Never Loses' have the same voice in your opinion? "
Trunks needed a few seconds to try to remember of the voices of those two characters. Coincidence, he had seen the Parker Lewis show a few days ago with Katrina, same for Bra who had watched the Aristocats anime after Goten had given her the tape. The voices were still resounding in his head. He turned to Hayden "Well... it's difficult to say... But I don't think so...
"Well, actually, it's the same guy, Marc Lesser, who makes the two voices", Hayden said in an flat tone that reminded Trunks of the Agent Smith in the Matrix movie he had recently seen with Goten and Katrina. "But you'll understand better when you'll have seen this", he added, opening the folder, taking a sheet of paper and putting it on the table. Trunks and Bulma examined it. There was a single line of the sheet, with sometimes some strong and straight parts like pikes, always by group of two or three, but most of the time, the line looked like a perfect sinus. "This is Trunks' voice", he said and took another sheet from the folder, "and this is the killer's voice", he added by placing the second sheet next to the first one.
"They look almost alike", Bulma whispered.
Hayden put the second sheet over the first one and put the whole on a window. By transparency, you could see as if the two lines were on the same sheet. Actually, you could also be looking at only one sheet, for the lines were corresponding almost perfectly... Bulma gasped, "they *are* alike! But... how...", her voice sounded strangled.
"They're not exactly alike", Hayden said, showing three pikes from Trunks' line which didn't appear on the killer's line. "The differences come from Trunks' graph, but only occurred when Trunks was shouting.", Hayden pointed at them one by one: "What you want, son of a bitch, Huh. What do you want, at the end.", "You tell me bullshit, yes. ", and "It's a damn lie. I know it".
"I can tell you that at this very moment, all the specialists are getting very excited about those three differences", Hayden went on, "because even twins are not supposed to have identical Vocal prints. But of course, we know that Trunks yelled on the phone, while the killer remained calm the whole time."
"No kidding", Trunks growled.
"Do you have a twin brother, Trunks?", Hayden asked suddenly.
"Oh no, I just have a sister and that's really enough like that--", Trunks started on an humorous tone before turning pale as the memory of Mirai-Trunks driving the Honda flashed in his mind...
Hopefully Hayden was watching in Bulma's direction when Trunks' face became as white as the sheets of paper, but Bulma did see it.
"That's why I was trying to check Vegeta's vocal voice...", Hayden went on, "... just in case a close relative to Trunks would have the same vocal prints. It never arrived before, but as we say: there must be a first time..."
Trunks was not listening any longer... His dream was coming back... He fell like he couldn't breath... What if he had actually dreamt what was going to happen? Of course, he never had fore-dreams in the past, but what if he could fore-see what was going to happen because...
Because he had a kind of psychic link with the killer...? Because the killer was himself from another time...?
Trunks' eyes grew wider. That would explain the vocal prints...
But where the hell was his father?
Meanwhile Hayden was going on, "we thought of course that Trunks could have recorded his voice on a tape, letting silence for the moments he was supposed to answer, the whole dialog between Trunks and the killer would then just be a prepared screenplay similar to those Trunks is used as an actor--"
"But he'd need an accomplice to make the phone call from the phone-booth, wouldn't he?", Bulma was trying to remain calm. She had an idea of who Trunks was actually thinking about.
Hayden nodded, "Yes, of course; but... ", he breathed, "we examined the recording from the killer. We amplified the sound but we couldn't find the usual sound coming from a recorder. Besides...", he added, "you can hear on the background the announcements for the upcoming trains and their schedules, which corresponds to the time at which the phone-call was made".
Trunks turned to Hayden, trying to keep a face as expressionless as possible: "And that's why you got the Twin idea? This would make things a lot simpler, than simply thinking of two people having the same vocal prints, heh? "
Hayden nodded. Trunks went on, "This would put all your secure little identification system to the trash-can, heh?"
Hayden tightened his jaws. Trunks didn't know actually why he was keeping Hayden as an enemy while he was perhaps going to need his help if the killer was his future counterpart. But he felt like he had to take a revenge on Hayden's previous behavior towards him.
*must be my saiya-jin genes*, he thought bitterly.
Then, some words came in his mind... Some words pronounced
by a voice so similar to his...
"A little observation of the Saiya-jin genes could
have foretell this and prevent all this blood-bath. Don't you think, brother?"
******************************************************
"Where is he?", Goku asked as soon as he arrived at the Capsule Corporation.
"He entered the gravitation room as soon as Hayden left and doesn't answer to anybody", Bulma said her voice showing distress. Goku walked rapidly towards the training room. He saw Katrina, sit near the door, and the back against the wall.
"Katrina arrived a few minutes before you, Goku", Bulma notified.
Katrina raised, "but I didn't get any success...", she sounded pissed.
Goku passed before her and asked Bulma to type the code to enter the training room. "Once it is opened, Katrina, don't follow me in, you'd get squashed". He didn't warn Bulma, 'cause she was already aware of the danger of entering a room where the gravitation force could be several hundred times higher than what could be found on Earth.
Katrina cross-looked him but said nothing.
As soon as the door opened, Goku felt the heat of the inside as well as Trunks' ki which was much higher than the day before. He stepped in and closed the door almost instantly. The gravitation was high. Extremely high. He didn't know Trunks could train at such gravity. He looked where Trunks was, kneeling and breathing hard. He was covered of sweat and was still in Super Saiya-jin form. Goku noted that the air was too hot for Trunks be able to recover fast. But the youth's ki was still full of anger... or more, hatred... and was still ready for a battle. Goku considered the training cyborgs, destroyed ("exploded" was more correct) on various parts of the Gravitation Room.
"Seems you lack of training partners, no?", he said in his usual happy tone. Trunks turned to him an annoyed gaze, still breathing hard, but saying nothing. "What do you think of it, Trunks?", Goku added , "Wanna spar a little? You'll explain me afterwards what's wrong..."
Trunks remained silent for a moment, then raised slowly to his feet, glancing briefly to the training cyborgs, then back to Goku.
"Right...", he said with a low voice. "Nothing better than a fight-session when you think too much, heh?". Goku blinked, he had once heard that sentence from Vegeta. As father as son...
Trunks gathered his ki and took a fighting stance. "No worries, I'll try not to kill you", he added as a joke.
But Goku wasn't laughing at all any longer.
******************************************************
"Chief Traxler!!!" Sharon shouted.
Traxler froze. He had hoped reaching the bathroom safe from reporters by using a side corridor, but apparently Sharon Silver knew perfectly the place. Go figure... He turned to her a frozen smile while she was running to him along with her cameraman, "Miss Silver..."
Sharon gave him a brilliant smile while other reporters, who had followed her example, were now running behind her. Traxler hoped his bladder wouldn't explode before he could escape from these pitbulls.
"Chief Traxler", Sharon started, "where are you in the investigation to find who killed Gohan Son in this horrible way on the Satan University campus this friday?"
Traxler leant to the microphone she was directing to him. "No comment, this is part of the investigation. Now, will you excuse me...". But Sharon didn't let go. "Tell us about those vocal prints. I heard that the killer and Trunks Connor had a lot of similarities..."
Traxler almost jumped and turned to Sharon some bewildered face, while all the reporters' attention had raised, if we could judge on all the flashes that appeared. "How do you know that? That's part of the investigation--", Traxler was almost chocking.
Sharon, apparently proud to be the center of the attention, started playing the innocent, using Traxler same previous tone. "Oh, no comment, this is part of my job to find out. I'm not going to reveal my sources..."
At that moment, Perry Richards, a slightly retarded cop came out of the bathroom. Sharon froze slightly.
"Oh, hi Sharon", Richards said. Sharon got an unease
smile. Traxler turned firing eyes towards Richards while all the microphones
of the other reporters were aiming the newcomer. Richards went on, "Sharon,
she swallows". All the reporters turned amused eyes in Sharon's direction who
was whistling, suddenly absorbed in the contemplation of the mosquitos' corpses
on the ceiling.
******************************************************
Trunks was leaning on the pavement of the Gravitation Room, trying to recover, his hair wet with sweat and laying on the floor under and around his head like a purple crown. He was feeling better now that he had this fight with Goku. Fighting training cyborgs was one thing, but once you had a huge anger to release, you needed better. Fighting the most powerful man in the universe was of a great help.
He had been beaten, but he was sure Goku had held back so that he'd have the occasion to release all his energy. Trunks realized that was true: you could better think after a huge intense exercise. He sat again and glanced at Goku. For a moment, seeing Goku in almost perfect shape, he knew that Goku had barely shown what he had inside of him.
For a moment, he could breath a peace of mind he had forgotten about since the moment he had met Gohan's gaze as the latter was tied on a chair in the Alpha Point Fraternity house's garden.
This state of peace was broken when Goku talked: "so, tell me what was wrong, Trunks...". Trunks frowned as he was brought back to here-and-now with all the recent troubles.
"Do you know where my father is?", Trunks asked for a start. It was not exactly what he wanted to say, but he had to start with something.
Goku shook his head. "No, I can't even locate his ki. He's probably maintaining it in a very low level, but..."
Trunks turned to him. Goku went on, "even if so, I could use the Instant Movement to locate him. I can't even do that." His gaze looked lost in some distance. "I think I would probably have to travel all over the world. He can perhaps hide his ki, but if I pass very close to him, I could feel his presence. Though..."
He paused, then turned to Trunks. "... if he hides, it's probably for reasons that are his, and I don't think he would appreciate me to interfere with his business."
Trunks looked downwards, thinking. Then he started talking with a low, flat voice: "Can you feel Mirai-Trunks' ki?"
Goku opened wide eyes, "Mirai-Trunks is HERE?!!". His face was betraying his surprise, and also his joy. Trunks clenched his teeth. Goku felt hatred coming up again in his aura.
"Of course, I should have doubted. He's the hero... Everybody likes him...", Trunks said in a bitter voice. Goku could feel the youth's hatred building like a wall around him for a brief instant.
Trunks calmed down a little, and talked in a voice where all anger had - apparently - disappeared. "Goku, you can usually say when someone is good, or has a good side in him even if he first looks purely evil... as you did with my father when you first faced him so long ago.."
Goku nodded, waiting for the following. Trunks paused a little, then went on: "could you also see a bad side in someone who looks purely good at first side?". Goku frowned, guessing what Trunks would say next.
Trunks raised his eyes towards Goku: "Did you see any evil side in Mirai-Trunks? I need to know..." His voice was almost pleading. Trunks looked like he was about to burst into tears, "otherwise, I think I'll turn crazy...". Goku got a first thought: nervous breakdown. "Why do you think about Mirai-Trunks as the murderer?", he asked calmly.
Trunks hesitated a moment, then took a deep breath, and started.
He explained everything about the dream he had, about the vocal prints which were almost identical, about the constant reference to a HOPE that was lost. He hadn't planned to say so much at the beginning, but he had been caught in the flow and couldn't stop. Goku was saying nothing, letting Trunks getting it off his chest. He understood his reaction: Trunks needed someone to talk to, but Vegeta was always away and was not anyway the type of man to talk, and Bulma would never accept to hear anything against Mirai-Trunks. Of course, Trunks seemed to ignore that she loved her "two" sons the same way: She'd never accept to hear anything against "chibi" either...
When Trunks stopped, he was out of breath. Goku asked calmly: "how long have you been hating Mirai-Trunks that much?"
Trunks turned a bewildered gaze to Goku: "It's not that...". His anger was flashing again, "oh... I should have guessed... everybody is on his side...", he clenched his teeth, "I have been stupid..." he hit the floor violently with his fist. "I explain you why I think Mirai-Trunks *might* be the killer, and all you see is an immature obsession-jealousy against him, DAMNIT!!", he hit again the floor again, this time letting a visible hole. His hair had briefly flashed in Super Saiya-jin mode.
He raised on his feet. "Yes, I HATE him!", he shouted. "I hate him because he managed to get a bond with my father that I'll never have! I hate him because I know how my father values him and that I'll probably never reach his level, even if I become stronger than him! I hate him because of what he did to our world, when people look at ME, they see HIM, and when they realize I'm not HIM they always have this disappointed look in their eyes! I HATE him because whatever I'll do, I'll never be HIM!!!", he went super saiya-jin, and Goku opened wide eyes when realizing that Trunks had reached for a few instant the second level without even realizing it.
Too much power... too much anger... Of course Goku could master him if he was loosing control, but other people could be hurt. He reacted faster than his mind: he leaped towards Trunks and hit him with all his weight, sending the boy flying against the wall. And before Trunks could recover or attack again, Goku used a technique he had once seen from Trunks' movie partner, Lynn. He fold his arm and pressed his forearm with his free hand against Trunks' throat, blocking him against the wall, and leant his side against Trunks' body to prevent any movement from him. For safetly, Goku reached the third level of Super Saiya-jin, hoping that the Gravitation Room would be able to hold. Each time Trunks tried to break free, he was just strangling himself more. Goku was maintaining this key : "Trunks, you're going to calm down and listen to me, otherwise I swear I put you unconscious!". He finished his sentence by pressing a little bit more on Trunks' throat. The nervous breakdown he had suspected before, was really there, now...
Trunks was in total rage, but was no fool, he nodded. Goku released a little bit the pressure on his throat so air could flow a little again into the youth's lungs. "There is something you need to know about Mirai-Trunks. He did perhaps saved the world once, people feel perhaps in debt towards him sometimes, but he NEVER used that to get any "celebrity" here! He stayed only 15 days among us during the war against the cyborgs, and besides killing Freezer, warning us about the upcoming war and giving me the medicine, he didn't do much...", Goku paused, "... except bringing some feelings into your father's heart! Those feelings made once your father told YOU publicly that he LOVED you before being killed by Buh! The only proof of love that Mirai-Trunks ever got from Vegeta was a brief sign of the hand before he returned in his future! You have nothing to envy him! He lives in a place where almost everybody's dead. He didn't grow old in a peaceful place but in the total chaos. His childhood has been so traumatizing that he'll probably never have a normal life, EVEN IF HE HAD TO LIVE IN THE PRESENT!!!"
Trunks wasn't struggling any longer, but looked Goku right in the eyes: "and what if he snapped? What if his world has been destroyed in the future and that made him turn psycho? You said he was traumatized. You never know with people like that..."
Goku got a bitter smile: "You want to know something, son-of-Vegeta? If such a thing was happening in the future, Mirai-Trunks would kill himself right away!"
He let go of the pressure at once. Trunks found himself free but didn't counter-attack. He was looking at Goku from aside, trying to fully understand his words. Goku turned his back to him. He didn't need to look at him to read his thoughts in his ki. He had guessed that there would be somehow a rivalry one day between the two Trunks, but he hadn't suspected *this*.
He had once seen these traces of breakdown in Mirai-Trunks, when he had explained about the death of all in the future, and when Goku had found Mirai-Trunks and Vegeta in the mountains; the son had spent 3 whole days, trying to get the attention of his father while Vegeta was trying his best to ignore him, too focused on his pride and his battles against the cyborgs.
Something had happened in the Room of Spirit and Time when those two had been sent there the first time. He had realized that when they had come out. Vegeta had let Mirai-Trunks come out first, even if it meant that the others would feel his strength before Vegeta's. And even, as far as he could remember, Vegeta had kept his ki rather low, compared to Mirai-Trunks'. Later on, there had been at least two occasions where Vegeta had defended his son from the future.
Yes, Vegeta was more human now, he'd be able to understand
more than before... Goku would have to talk to him about Trunks before it became
too serious.
******************************************************
"We found some similitude between Trunks' voice and the killer's voice but not enough to be able to call that a proof", Traxler was lying in his declaration to the media, but first, he had more or less been obliged to make a declaration due to the behavior of one of his colleague (Richards has been now assigned to the road signs), but didn't want to reveal all what they have yet.
"We are still trying to locate Trunks' father to make some vocal test, but we couldn't reach him yet...", he went on.
"Do you think of him as a suspect?", Sharon interrupted him. Traxler considered her for a moment. She had plenty of nerves to come back and to act this way. If he had been in her shoes, he would try to find a hole where to hide. But hey... her behavior was perhaps typical of women's. He would never understand them anyway, so... why bothering?
"He could as well as could not... We just try to reach him for a few voice tests... now will you excuse me...", Traxler managed to excape, saving his dignity, towards the bathroom again.
After all, he had given very few info to the journalists
and had perhaps found a way to reach Vegeta, admitting that the man was watching
the TV at that moment. But he could trust the media to display a picture of
Trunks' father and to make the researches for them. It was a good day after
all...
******************************************************
"He thinks it's Mirai-Trunks, right?", Bulma turned to Goku after she lightened up a cigarette. She had tried to stop, but in days like these, the call was too strong...
Goku could see in her way of smoking that she was trying to hide her nervousity. "And you? what do you think?"
Bulma pulled on her cigarette, then put it out in a plant pot. "I don't know what to think... Same voice... And it was obviously someone Gohan knew to get drugged so easily... Not to mention Vegeta's disappearance - he should have felt about Gohan - I really love Mirai-Trunks, but... you know the old adage, heh? it sounds like a duck, it swims like a duck, it gossips like a duck... well, it might be a duck..."
She lighted up a new cigarette. Goku blinked: "A duck?"
Bulma waved Goku's question away without even smiling: "if it's Mirai-Trunks - and I'll always think of ANY OTHER solution before accepting he might have turned into a psycho killer - I want to know WHY!". She paused. "That's the big problem actually. We all tried to know WHO without the WHY! Perhaps if we started from the WHY, we could find easier...".
Goku wait for a few seconds before talking: "Bulma, we have to find Vegeta as soon as possible. If you know where he is, whatever the reason keeping him away, warn him. He has to come back. His son, and I'm talking about Present Trunks here, is going to turn crazy if it goes on like that. "
"You know", Bulma pulled on her cigarette again before putting it out in the same plant pot, "I think that's perhaps the big deal... I mean... Everybody has been against him since the very beginning of this affair. Hayden is always after him, denying any other possibilities, the killer himself always calls him and puts a lot of stress on his shoulder. They wouldn't act differently if they really wanted him to snap."
Goku got a weak smile, "if he does.... well... I got a Taste Of Things To Come in the Gravitation Room..."
Bulma remained silent for a few seconds before lightening up a new cigarette. "I was thinking of something... We both know Mirai-Trunks could not do it. I can't imagining him coming from the future to kill everybody in a present he build with his own tears and blood. The last time I saw him was a year ago, and he seemed happy now. I think that Lynn did a lot in this change. She's not human, but she's a fighter, probably what he needed. I can't imagine him with a normal girl anyway..."
"... as Katrina", Goku finished her thought.
Bulma remained silent, then "well, at first sight, Trunks and Katrina aren't really made for each other... But... this situation will show how she'll react and adapt herself... If they both go through this, then they'll be perhaps a strong couple..."
Goku humphed, then went on: "but... you wanted to say...? "
Bulma put out her cigarette in the plant pot "Ah yeah...".
Goku stared a moment at the plant pot before Bulma went on: "if we consider that it's another Trunks who made the call, I think of the future version of *this one* rather than the one from the alternate future. Especially if people keep on driving him nuts like that."
Goku blinked, "you mean, Present Trunks would grow nuts in the future and come back in time to kill everybody?"
Bulma leant on her chair: "if Hayden hadn't come with those vocal prints, I'd never had thought of this... This is so crazy", she said, putting her head in her hands. Goku seized his old time friend's wrist and squeezed it in comfort.
"Goku... I feel bad...", Bulma whispered, "... what if
it's a version of my son that killed yours...."
******************************************************
Trunks woke up with the cold contact of a wet tissue on his forehead. He opened his eyes and saw Katrina who was sitting on his bed and smiling softly to him. He smiled back to her.
"How do you feel?", she asked with a gently voice.
Trunks took a deep breathing and savored the fresh air in his room, compared to the heat of the Gravitation Room. He got a nervous laugh. Katrina didn't move but stared at him with half-surprised half-amused face expression. "What's so funny? I have a spot on my nose or something?"
Trunks calmed down and started "if you knew though all the kind of weird scenarios I've been about the killer this morning...". He looked at her again. "I think Goku-san will think I'm crazy... But I feel more relax now... ", then he burst out laughing again. Katrina waited patiently, then "Perhaps if you tell me, I can laugh too, no? Unless you tell me you thought *I* was the killer."
Trunks stopped abruptly and started at her, "You...?!" and then he resumed his laugh harder than before, tears appearing in his eyes. Katrina stared at the ceiling with an offended look that made Trunks laugh even harder, holding his ribs.
She jumped suddenly and sat on him, "I could! Look how open guarded you are now...". Trunks' laugh almost died in his throat immediately, trying to figure out if she was serious or playing, forgetting for a brief second that she was just a mere human, and that still yesterday, she didn't know that most of her boyfriend's friends were coming from another planet, and that himself was just half-human; she leant on him, "... so open-guarded I could do *anything* I'd want with you."
Trunks relaxed, "oh... and I'm supposed to play the victim, now?". Katrina nodded dramatically, Trunks had to fight a LOT not to burst out laughing again, he went on, on a pleading voice, "I don't wanna die...! What do you have in mind about me...?"
Katrina leant really close to him, "I was thinking that ... I could perhaps stay here tonight, for a start,...".
Trunks blinked. "Oh no please, I don't wanna die!!!"
"You already said that line"
"Shit!"
"hey..."
"Okie, hmmm... what about this: 'what light through yonder window breaks?' "
"heh?"
"... never mind... "
Trunks brushed his hand on Katrina's cheek and started into her blue eyes while she was smiling to him.
*Something is wrong*, he thought, trying to keep an gentle face. *and I know what it is*, he went on, silently as Katrina was leaning towards him to kiss him gently. *Kirsten...*
[to be continued... ]
*****************************
Yep, a longer chapter, with more information (I know most of you want to know where Vegeta disappeard. But see? they *are* actually people in this story who wonder the same thing :D
Trunks hates Mirai-Trunks, now it is obvious. Sorry, I warned that this chapter was going to be gore. Hope you were not eating while reading the dream sequence :p
Little note about the voices:
Marc Lesser indeed makes the voices
of Berlioz in 'Aristocats' and Mickey Randhall in 'Parker
Lewis Never Loses'... but in the french version of those two shows ;-)
The funny thing, for those of you who saw DBZ in french, is that Marc makes also Mirai-Trunks' voice ;)
SUPER THANX to jdchs, Rose Angel, and Diane, for your reviews :)))))) These kind of comments always give me the will to continue ^___^ *makes a HUGE HUG :) *
Rose Angel, you seem to like Mirai-Trunks evil? I hope you liked what you read in that chapter for Trunks' dream sequence :p White Hell 2 should appear within this month, yet I'm focusing on YELL14 in french for the moment ;-) Thanx also for the correction of punctuation :) I'll correct them and update chapter 8 soon ^___^
Jdchs and Diane: all your questions are pretty pretty interesting :-) Unfortunately, if I answer to one of them, you'll discover right away who is/are the murderer(s). So I save them for later. After the final chapter, I'll post a chapter where all pertinent question like yours will be answered with details examination of sequences of the story (and you'll see, you'll want to read te whole thing again to check the answers :p )
THANK YOU A LOT for what you wrote ^_____________^
*gives a huge GLOMP to the three of you :D *
