Scars – Chapter 29
Vegeta woke to the sound of heavy breathing, but it was not his own. He grunted softly, feeling a tight pinch in his lung when he inhaled, and he realized that his ribs were broken and firmly wrapped. He also noted that he was clean and dry, dressed in his normal spandex, good as new. He sat up gingerly, and directed his gaze to where he could hear Goku gasping for breath as he furiously beat the air with his fists. He was Super Saiyajin, his chest heaving as he fought an invisible enemy with perfect speed, grace, and form.
Glancing over the doorway to the training chamber, Vegeta saw that the gravity was set at 850 times Earth's normal gravity, and that it had been running this way for three hours. Vegeta raised a brow. It was unusual for Kakarot to train in the gravity chamber. In fact, this hadn't happened before. Vegeta had been knocked out before a few times by Goku, and each time the idiot would patch him up and leave him fresh and somewhere safe. But Goku always left afterwards, he'd never hung around. Vegeta supposed that Goku was upset. He'd seen the younger saiyajin try this sort of thing before....try to befriend the prince of saiyajins with softness and stupid kindness in order to keep himself from being alone. Vegeta wrinkled his nose and stood up, his hand wrapping around his ribs. He moved to the doorway and stayed on the normal gravity side, hitting the deactivation button. Kakarot looked over to him in surprise.
"Hey, what was that for...? I was in the middle of blowing off some steam Vegeta." Goku said nothing about Vegeta's wounds, he never did. The prince leaned in the doorframe with his arms crossed. "Kakarot, get the hell out of my gravity chamber and find someone else to keep you company. I don't care if your brat doesn't like you. Neither do I!"
Goku sighed, his teal eyes charged with aggression. A vein throbbed on Goku's temple, but he forced himself to power down to normal and keep control over himself. It was part of the way he maintained his own pride in himself. Never lose control over an awful saiyajin temper. It was just a bit more difficult now. Goku threw up his arms, his voice not very like his normal cheery self.
"Vegeta just... stop bothering me." He said shortly, pitting a hand on his hip and making a fist of the other.
"Stop bothering you? You're the one who's still here. This is ridiculous, Kakarot. Just go confront your brat and beat some sense into him since you're so angry. Teach him not to disrespect you. If he has a problem, the tell him how it is and don't give him room to argue with you. That is what I would do. If that isn't your style, then figure out something else. But get a hold over your temper, Kakarot. You're embarrassing yourself."
Vegeta turned to walk out of the Gravity Chamber, and Goku stared after him with a stunned expression on his sweat slicked face. He folded his arms and glared at the prince's back, his mind churning over Gohan's words, and applying Vegeta's method in a hypothetical manner. (never knew Goku could think that straight...) He shook his head, dismissing that kind of treatment of his family as most definitely not his style. He raised two fingers to his forehead and disappeared from the Gravity Chamber altogether.
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Trunks and Gohan returned to CC shortly after taking off from the mall. Trunks ran his fingers through his short hair and seemed to relax when he entered the large dome-shaped house. He removed his boots at the door and Gohan did the same thing, shifting the bags of clothing on his arms as he did. His eyes wandered over the seemingly calm entranceway to the home. Trunks quickly led him up the stairs that branched off the 'parlor' and curled along the inside of the dome, door and some other halls extending further into the building. It was completely bizarre, but Gohan had seen it many times before. He followed Trunks up the stairs and along the hall, branching off down another hall, which curled along the outside of the building, and was set on one side with the large windows that made up the outside of the dome. Trunks opened the door as Gohan slowed to a halt, looking out of the windows through the thin sheer curtains that hung from ceiling to floor. He felt for Videl's energy, and found it to be perfectly safe. Relieved, he turned his focus to the touch of fingers on his arm. He looked up and saw Trunks tugging him towards his room, to put down his bags of purchases so he could find places for everything. Gohan grinned and twisted out of Trunks' grip with a bit of a nervous blush, scratching the back of his head and walking past Trunks into the bedroom. The scarred man came in behind Gohan and close the door over thoughtlessly as he strode towards the bed to start putting things away.
Gohan sat on the bed, taking things out of the bags ad picking the tags off of the various clothes so Trunks could fold them ad put them into the dresser, as he seemed intent on doing. Gohan had never imagined that Trunks was so...boring. He frowned, not really liking the sound of that in his mind. But it seemed kind of obvious that Trunks wasn't willing to do much, talk much, or even smile most of the time. Gohan wasn't used to a person with a ki that seemed to...close tightly around his body and hide there, instead of spreading to touch and sense the world around him. Gohan didn't say anything at all, not knowing where to begin. He imagined himself saying something to hurt Trunks more than he obviously already had been. He frowned and looked at the items on the bed, his eyes darkening.
Trunks gathered up the four T-shirts he'd bought, all different colours – Gohan had suggested he try them all to see which ones ended up suiting him best – and methodically folded them and put them into the middle drawer of his dresser. Gohan didn't make a sound behind him. The silence was thick. It clung to Trunks so that he rubbed his arms after closing the dresser, frowning at the scars that laced his flesh as a constant reminder of the suffering in his time. He came to the bed and sat beside Goten. He didn't understand why intensity had to creep into every situation he faced that was focussed on this man. This strange man who was the same as his teacher, and also a completely different man. And he did appear to be a man, he gave off the energy of one who thinks about himself as a part in the machine of his life, He seemed wrapped tightly in silence. Trunks stared at him, these thoughts circling his mind. Why did it have to be so intense when it was Gohan!? Trunks couldn't relax. He had started to at the mall, before they left, when Gohan had not seemed like his master. Father figure, teacher, friend... that is what Trunks expected from Gohan. This man sitting on the bed... life had only just come up to snap at his heels. He was just beginning to realize what it was like to care entirely for oneself... to share that ability to care with those close to oneself, in order to do the greatest amount of good, and keep up the spirit of living. Very important that nobody thinks about ending it all. Positive attitude is integral.
"Trunks, are you listening?" Gohan said, waving a hand in Trunks' face. The short-haired boy started and looked at him with a wide stare, his eyes hardening and clearing as he realized where he was. He picked up a pair of pants and started to fold them, looking out the window at the afternoon sunlight.
"I was saying, I'm gonna get going.... I think my mom wanted me to come home and tell her how the eye exam went. I'll want to start looking for apartments, too."
Trunks blinked at the next pair of pants he picked up to fold, his voice soft. His eyes drifted towards the window again. "Its going to rain."
"Its sunny out."
"Go home Gohan, Thank you for coming with me to the mall."
Gohan got up and inclined his head in a slight bow, backing out of the room with a confused smile. A shiver ran up his spine as he headed back down the glass hallway and out the back door of CC. He saw Vegeta coming out of the gravity room, closing the door behind him. Gohan smiled brightly.
"Hey Vegeta, have you seen Goten around? He's hiding his ki, and Trunks too. I should see if he's ready to come home yet. Have they tried any pranks around here yet today?"
"Are you implying that those stupid children are wasting their days trying to make trouble!? They should be training... when you find them, send Trunks to me immediately, and take your father's spawn away from here quickly. Buzz off, brat."
Gohan watched the clearly pissy Vegeta walk off as he pushed past him and stomped into the house. There was a flash of lavender accompanied by a flash of orange which darted quickly in the corner of Gohan's eye, but when he turned his head, there was nobody there. Gohan frowned. "Goten, Trunks, I know you can hear me, and I am not in a really great mood. You guys come out, Goten its time for us to go home. And Trunks, your dad wants to see you."
Silence answered Gohan's words. There were many places for two boys to hide on the CC back lawn. Gohan listened carefully, knowing the two well enough to know that they were their own biggest giveaway. He soon heard whispered bickering, and Goten was pushed out of a nearby tree. He hit the ground with an 'oof' and looked up into the tree. "Ttrruunks! You're being such a meanie today! That hurt! And now I'm caught! We didn't finish our missionnn....Truunkkks!"
Gohan rolled his eyes and crossed his arms, waiting for them to resolve their tiff. Trunks' head popped out of the leaves a little higher up from where Goten had been hiding.
"Goten I don't feel like putting up with your whiny babyness today, just....go back to your house. I don't want to play, I want some time by myself. I'll call you in a week. Just....leave me alone for awhile."
Goten butt his lip, feeling his chest hurting a lot, but this was his own hurt, not Trunks'. Trunks wasn't feeling hurt, he was glaring at Goten like he'd done something wrong, like he was punishing him for being annoying or something. Goten bit his lower lip, tears threatening. He swallowed them before they showed as more than a glaze in his eyes, and nodded.
"Ok Trunks, I understand."
Trunks' lip curled slightly and he jumped down from the tree, landing beside Goten lithely. "Chibi, only babies cry. Relax... I just need some time by myself, cause...of what we talked about."
Goten's eyes were big and dark, absorbing Trunks' words as he slowed his breathing and nodded slowly. "Well, Trunks... ok..." Goten got up and dusted himself off and wanted to give Trunks a hug, but he didn't because Gohan was standing right there and Trunks would yell at him. He smiled at his best friend and turned on his heel, walking towards his big brother, who was waiting for him, his arms at his sides. Gohan wrapped his hand around his little brother's hand and looked up at Trunks. "Hey Trunks, your dad wants you to go see him, I think he wants to do some training with you in the gravity room or something. Bye!" Trunks watched them jump into the sky and fly away.
He watched them go, and turned himself to walk into the house and find something else to do.
Vegeta woke to the sound of heavy breathing, but it was not his own. He grunted softly, feeling a tight pinch in his lung when he inhaled, and he realized that his ribs were broken and firmly wrapped. He also noted that he was clean and dry, dressed in his normal spandex, good as new. He sat up gingerly, and directed his gaze to where he could hear Goku gasping for breath as he furiously beat the air with his fists. He was Super Saiyajin, his chest heaving as he fought an invisible enemy with perfect speed, grace, and form.
Glancing over the doorway to the training chamber, Vegeta saw that the gravity was set at 850 times Earth's normal gravity, and that it had been running this way for three hours. Vegeta raised a brow. It was unusual for Kakarot to train in the gravity chamber. In fact, this hadn't happened before. Vegeta had been knocked out before a few times by Goku, and each time the idiot would patch him up and leave him fresh and somewhere safe. But Goku always left afterwards, he'd never hung around. Vegeta supposed that Goku was upset. He'd seen the younger saiyajin try this sort of thing before....try to befriend the prince of saiyajins with softness and stupid kindness in order to keep himself from being alone. Vegeta wrinkled his nose and stood up, his hand wrapping around his ribs. He moved to the doorway and stayed on the normal gravity side, hitting the deactivation button. Kakarot looked over to him in surprise.
"Hey, what was that for...? I was in the middle of blowing off some steam Vegeta." Goku said nothing about Vegeta's wounds, he never did. The prince leaned in the doorframe with his arms crossed. "Kakarot, get the hell out of my gravity chamber and find someone else to keep you company. I don't care if your brat doesn't like you. Neither do I!"
Goku sighed, his teal eyes charged with aggression. A vein throbbed on Goku's temple, but he forced himself to power down to normal and keep control over himself. It was part of the way he maintained his own pride in himself. Never lose control over an awful saiyajin temper. It was just a bit more difficult now. Goku threw up his arms, his voice not very like his normal cheery self.
"Vegeta just... stop bothering me." He said shortly, pitting a hand on his hip and making a fist of the other.
"Stop bothering you? You're the one who's still here. This is ridiculous, Kakarot. Just go confront your brat and beat some sense into him since you're so angry. Teach him not to disrespect you. If he has a problem, the tell him how it is and don't give him room to argue with you. That is what I would do. If that isn't your style, then figure out something else. But get a hold over your temper, Kakarot. You're embarrassing yourself."
Vegeta turned to walk out of the Gravity Chamber, and Goku stared after him with a stunned expression on his sweat slicked face. He folded his arms and glared at the prince's back, his mind churning over Gohan's words, and applying Vegeta's method in a hypothetical manner. (never knew Goku could think that straight...) He shook his head, dismissing that kind of treatment of his family as most definitely not his style. He raised two fingers to his forehead and disappeared from the Gravity Chamber altogether.
+++++++++++++
Trunks and Gohan returned to CC shortly after taking off from the mall. Trunks ran his fingers through his short hair and seemed to relax when he entered the large dome-shaped house. He removed his boots at the door and Gohan did the same thing, shifting the bags of clothing on his arms as he did. His eyes wandered over the seemingly calm entranceway to the home. Trunks quickly led him up the stairs that branched off the 'parlor' and curled along the inside of the dome, door and some other halls extending further into the building. It was completely bizarre, but Gohan had seen it many times before. He followed Trunks up the stairs and along the hall, branching off down another hall, which curled along the outside of the building, and was set on one side with the large windows that made up the outside of the dome. Trunks opened the door as Gohan slowed to a halt, looking out of the windows through the thin sheer curtains that hung from ceiling to floor. He felt for Videl's energy, and found it to be perfectly safe. Relieved, he turned his focus to the touch of fingers on his arm. He looked up and saw Trunks tugging him towards his room, to put down his bags of purchases so he could find places for everything. Gohan grinned and twisted out of Trunks' grip with a bit of a nervous blush, scratching the back of his head and walking past Trunks into the bedroom. The scarred man came in behind Gohan and close the door over thoughtlessly as he strode towards the bed to start putting things away.
Gohan sat on the bed, taking things out of the bags ad picking the tags off of the various clothes so Trunks could fold them ad put them into the dresser, as he seemed intent on doing. Gohan had never imagined that Trunks was so...boring. He frowned, not really liking the sound of that in his mind. But it seemed kind of obvious that Trunks wasn't willing to do much, talk much, or even smile most of the time. Gohan wasn't used to a person with a ki that seemed to...close tightly around his body and hide there, instead of spreading to touch and sense the world around him. Gohan didn't say anything at all, not knowing where to begin. He imagined himself saying something to hurt Trunks more than he obviously already had been. He frowned and looked at the items on the bed, his eyes darkening.
Trunks gathered up the four T-shirts he'd bought, all different colours – Gohan had suggested he try them all to see which ones ended up suiting him best – and methodically folded them and put them into the middle drawer of his dresser. Gohan didn't make a sound behind him. The silence was thick. It clung to Trunks so that he rubbed his arms after closing the dresser, frowning at the scars that laced his flesh as a constant reminder of the suffering in his time. He came to the bed and sat beside Goten. He didn't understand why intensity had to creep into every situation he faced that was focussed on this man. This strange man who was the same as his teacher, and also a completely different man. And he did appear to be a man, he gave off the energy of one who thinks about himself as a part in the machine of his life, He seemed wrapped tightly in silence. Trunks stared at him, these thoughts circling his mind. Why did it have to be so intense when it was Gohan!? Trunks couldn't relax. He had started to at the mall, before they left, when Gohan had not seemed like his master. Father figure, teacher, friend... that is what Trunks expected from Gohan. This man sitting on the bed... life had only just come up to snap at his heels. He was just beginning to realize what it was like to care entirely for oneself... to share that ability to care with those close to oneself, in order to do the greatest amount of good, and keep up the spirit of living. Very important that nobody thinks about ending it all. Positive attitude is integral.
"Trunks, are you listening?" Gohan said, waving a hand in Trunks' face. The short-haired boy started and looked at him with a wide stare, his eyes hardening and clearing as he realized where he was. He picked up a pair of pants and started to fold them, looking out the window at the afternoon sunlight.
"I was saying, I'm gonna get going.... I think my mom wanted me to come home and tell her how the eye exam went. I'll want to start looking for apartments, too."
Trunks blinked at the next pair of pants he picked up to fold, his voice soft. His eyes drifted towards the window again. "Its going to rain."
"Its sunny out."
"Go home Gohan, Thank you for coming with me to the mall."
Gohan got up and inclined his head in a slight bow, backing out of the room with a confused smile. A shiver ran up his spine as he headed back down the glass hallway and out the back door of CC. He saw Vegeta coming out of the gravity room, closing the door behind him. Gohan smiled brightly.
"Hey Vegeta, have you seen Goten around? He's hiding his ki, and Trunks too. I should see if he's ready to come home yet. Have they tried any pranks around here yet today?"
"Are you implying that those stupid children are wasting their days trying to make trouble!? They should be training... when you find them, send Trunks to me immediately, and take your father's spawn away from here quickly. Buzz off, brat."
Gohan watched the clearly pissy Vegeta walk off as he pushed past him and stomped into the house. There was a flash of lavender accompanied by a flash of orange which darted quickly in the corner of Gohan's eye, but when he turned his head, there was nobody there. Gohan frowned. "Goten, Trunks, I know you can hear me, and I am not in a really great mood. You guys come out, Goten its time for us to go home. And Trunks, your dad wants to see you."
Silence answered Gohan's words. There were many places for two boys to hide on the CC back lawn. Gohan listened carefully, knowing the two well enough to know that they were their own biggest giveaway. He soon heard whispered bickering, and Goten was pushed out of a nearby tree. He hit the ground with an 'oof' and looked up into the tree. "Ttrruunks! You're being such a meanie today! That hurt! And now I'm caught! We didn't finish our missionnn....Truunkkks!"
Gohan rolled his eyes and crossed his arms, waiting for them to resolve their tiff. Trunks' head popped out of the leaves a little higher up from where Goten had been hiding.
"Goten I don't feel like putting up with your whiny babyness today, just....go back to your house. I don't want to play, I want some time by myself. I'll call you in a week. Just....leave me alone for awhile."
Goten butt his lip, feeling his chest hurting a lot, but this was his own hurt, not Trunks'. Trunks wasn't feeling hurt, he was glaring at Goten like he'd done something wrong, like he was punishing him for being annoying or something. Goten bit his lower lip, tears threatening. He swallowed them before they showed as more than a glaze in his eyes, and nodded.
"Ok Trunks, I understand."
Trunks' lip curled slightly and he jumped down from the tree, landing beside Goten lithely. "Chibi, only babies cry. Relax... I just need some time by myself, cause...of what we talked about."
Goten's eyes were big and dark, absorbing Trunks' words as he slowed his breathing and nodded slowly. "Well, Trunks... ok..." Goten got up and dusted himself off and wanted to give Trunks a hug, but he didn't because Gohan was standing right there and Trunks would yell at him. He smiled at his best friend and turned on his heel, walking towards his big brother, who was waiting for him, his arms at his sides. Gohan wrapped his hand around his little brother's hand and looked up at Trunks. "Hey Trunks, your dad wants you to go see him, I think he wants to do some training with you in the gravity room or something. Bye!" Trunks watched them jump into the sky and fly away.
He watched them go, and turned himself to walk into the house and find something else to do.