Disclaimer: Don't own it, never will.
A/N: Yay! Enough of the jungle growing up scenes! I promise, things are going to heat up now!
****
In the pitch-black night, all is silent as the creatures of the jungle roam around in the high loping trees. The forest bed is barely lit with specks of moonlight shining through the thick canopy of leaves. Predators lurk in the hot jungle, getting ready to hunt down their next meal. A small rustle breezes through the canopy tops. To the untrained eye it is merely from a light wind passing through. But to the hunted, they would know an unnatural predator is stalking through the trees. A shadowy figure stops above a clearing, waiting in silent readiness. Then he spots his prey.
A jaguar, also prowling in the bush. Only it doesn't know it's about to become the hunted. The shadowy figure swiftly pounces on the jaguar and then wrestles it down to the ground. But the mighty cat won't give up easy. It fights back its attacker with a loud roar, also wrestling with the creature. They roll all across the ground, until the attacker relents and lets the jaguar pin him to the ground.
A merry laugh rings out in the dense jungle, "Okay! Okay! You win!"
The large cat jumps off of its assailant, puffing out its chest and looking very proud of itself. In truth it's only about two years old, just barely out its cub years and raring to be out on its own. Goku had found the little cub when it was just four months old, its mother lost in a forest fire. So since then he'd been taking care of the jaguar, feeding it meat on an irregular basis and playing wrestling games with it would with its mother. Now it's starting to go off hunting on its own, so Goku doesn't bother bringing meat any more. But he continues to visit whenever he can.
The young saiyajin jumps up from the ground, only to show that he's not so young either.
Under the ouji's ever-watchful eye, Goku had grown from a little boy into a young man. Now he is aged fourteen. Five years had passed since that day that the hospital blew up and Vegeta had taken him into Mute Point.
Somehow he still hasn't recovered his memory, provided Vegeta didn't exactly 'encourage' it, and he had learned all the rites of being a saiyajin no ouji and more. But to the real ouji's delight, the young saiyajin is becoming more and more like him everyday, and he is indeed succeeding at molding the young impressionable Goku into his image.
Except now Goku is starting to become a rebellious teenager.
A VERY rebellious teenager, and the ouji starts cursing the day nearly everyday that he decided to call himself the boy's father.
Goku checks the time by the moon and winces, "Aw jeez! I need to get back before Dad sees I'm gone." He cups the young jaguar's face in his hands and smiles, "I'll see you later, okay?" The cat gives a little 'rar' in comprehension. Then Goku rushes off, quick as lightning, picking up the staff that he dropped during the wrestling match.
He jumps from tree to tree, scurrying across the forest until finally he comes back to the tree house. The ever faithful tree house that Vegeta built with his own hands. Only it had two stories to it now and is actually very comfortable to live in. Goku jumps to the roof of the tree house and opens up a panel that he made there himself; he ducks his head inside to check around and then jumps in. He smirks to himself, "Ha! Another success!"
A voice suddenly says behind him, "I don't think so, brat."
Goku gives a small shriek and turns around, holding a hammering chest in his hand. He can just barely see an outline of the ouji in the dim moonlight.
Good ol' Vegeta. He hasn't changed a bit in five years. However, Goku was growing more and more into his former stature. In fact he's just about an inch taller than the ouji now, which he likes to point out every minute of every day, until Vegeta gets so annoyed he would go chase the teenager around the forest, cursing at him with very colorful words; some that Goku thinks he might have made up.
Vegeta demands in a flat voice, though his eyes burn in fury, "Where were you?" Despite the disguised voice, Goku can tell the ouji is absolutely livid.
The teenage saiyajin says nervously, trying to think a way out of this mess. "Uh..... I was just out in the front yard, not doing anything."
That's when the ouji steps out into the moonlight and he hisses, "And I suppose that JAGUARS WANDER INTO OUR CAMP?! Which is all the way across the forest from the JUNGLE!!"
Goku winces, {Jeez, busted!}
Vegeta screams, "YOU'RE DAMN RIGHT YOU'RE BUSTED!" He grabs Goku's shirt and demands, "HOW MANY TIMES HAVE I TOLD YOU NOT TO WANDER AROUND ON YOUR OWN AT NIGHT?! YOU NEVER LISTEN TO ME ANYMORE YOU LITTLE-" and then he goes off into a string of English curses. The teenager mentally groans. His father only ever speaks English if he's furious.
Goku protests, as if that would help the situation at all, "But Dad, I was just checking on Lara. I haven't seen her for nearly two months. And you know that jaguars only come out at night."
"I DON'T GIVE A DAMN! If you really wanted to see her you should've asked me to go with you! BUT YOUR FRICKIN' LIFE IS IN DANGER!! WHAT IF BLADE FOUND YOU AND I WASN'T THERE?!!"
At this, the younger saiyajin turns angry and starts yelling back in an equally powerful voice, "BLADE! BLADE! BLADE! THAT'S ALL I EVER HEAR COMING OUT OF YOUR MOUTH!! YOU TALK ABOUT HIM SO MUCH, AND YET I NEVER SEE HIM_ONCE_!!"
"YOU SHOULD CONSIDER YOURSELF LUCKY!"
Goku growls in frustration and hisses accusingly, "I bet you just made him up! Just so that you can keep me under lock and key! I wouldn't be surprised if you just told me he doesn't exist! In fact I'm completely sure that he doesn't!"
The ouji stares at him in silence, his expression turning lethal. He marches right up to Goku's nose, seeming to tower over the young teenager and he says in a quiet, clear voice, "Don't you ever say that again."
Goku's eyes widen in astonishment, "Dad, I-"
"Never again! Do you understand me?! NEVER AGAIN!"
All the teenager can do is nod, in silent shock. Vegeta visibly slumps and gives Goku a very tired, haggard look and then quietly heads downstairs down the wooden ladder into the living area. Goku suddenly realizes that he got away without being punished. But far from being elated, his father's behavior had disturbed him terribly. He peeks down to the first floor and sees the ouji sitting in a chair, holding up his bent head with a hand, just staring at the floor. He had never seen his father look so.....damaged.....
Unsure of how to act, Goku quietly gets ready for bed instead.
A while later, Vegeta comes back upstairs to check on him. Goku has his back towards the ladder, his face turned towards the window. The ouji sits on the side of the bed, tilting it with his added weight. Leaning his head on the backboard of the bed, he sighs, "I know you're frustrated by all these rules I put on you. If it was me, I'd have run away a long time ago." Putting a strong hand on Goku's shoulder, he continues, "I just wish you wouldn't do such stupid things."
Thinking that the teenager is asleep, he starts to get up, but suddenly Goku grabs his hand and in a shaky voice says, "I didn't mean to say that. I didn't think it would hurt you that badly. I'm sorry."
Vegeta gives him a small smirk and pulls him up to look at him, "Prince Goku, that doesn't really matter. What matters is that you're safe, and well, relatively content with your life. The thing I'm most afraid of is that I'm going to lose you just like I did the others. You're all that I have left in this Godforsaken world."
Goku smiles and then hugs his father and says, "I love you, Dad."
This is only the second chance that Vegeta gets to reply right in the last four years and he's not going to waste it. He leans Goku's head onto his chest and says, "I love you too, son."
**** (The end of the drama.....hopefully.....)
The next morning, Goku bounds out of bed at the crack of dawn with a refreshed smile on his face. What a great way to start a day! Training from dawn! He's quick to change into his training clothes and makes sure that there's no bugs that crawled into them in the middle of the night.
He grabs a leather band, tying his hair into a ponytail to keep it out of his face while training, letting three bangs fall to the right side of his face. Then he picks up his mahogany staff propped up against the window and hops down to the dining area, where a whole pot of wild rice porridge is waiting for him. Gulping it down like a famished man, he finishes quickly and then jumps down from the tree house, nearly landing on Vegeta who's training outside. Goku says quickly, "Sorry, Dad! Bye Dad!" bounding off into the woods.
The ouji just glares at him, then rolls his eyes and goes on with his one- hand stand push-ups.
Goku runs the full length of the forest along the underbrush and back again, going back again past the tree house to the other side of the forest. Then he does this for 100 more laps, continually running past Vegeta, training by the tree house, until finally the ouji gets fed up and grabs the back of Goku's shirt as he runs past, yelling in his face, "WILL YOU QUIT THAT! YOU'RE MAKING ME DIZZY! GO TRAIN SOMEWHERE ELSE!"
The teenager gives him a sheepish grin and escapes the ouji's grip, running off towards the bamboo thicket. Again Vegeta gives him a venomous glare.
In the infamous bamboo thicket, where Goku first discovered his strength, the teenager whips out his mahogany staff and practices with it. He has two different staffs now actually. One bamboo, and his favorite mahogany one. The bamboo one is light and flexible, while the mahogany is its complete opposite, requiring Goku to learn different styles for each of them. Not that he has anything better to do.
Suddenly something swooshing up above the treetops catches his attention. He blinks, looking up with a frown, but he ignores it and continues training. About five minutes later he hears a sound resembling an explosion coming from the direction of the Quicksand Pits. Goku's eyes widen, "What the heck?"
Curiosity starts getting the better of the teenager. He knows he's not allowed to go over into that area..... And he really doesn't want to get into the same conversation he had with his father last night. He bites his bottom lip, when billows of smoke starts to fume from the site. He mutters to himself, "I'll just take a quick peek. I'll fly just over the ground a little bit. He'll never know I'm gone."
With that he hovers off the ground by an inch and then zooms over to the Quicksand Pits.
****
Goku looks around the decaying marshlands warily, careful not even to let one inch of him touch the ground. Most of the trees seem rotten and dying, releasing a pungent smell, not so safe to try and swing around in. The area is denser than most parts of the forest that Goku's seen, covering the area in darkness as if it's night. Nervous, the teenager almost decides to turn back.
Then an odd scent comes to this nose. The smell of fire, along with.....something else..... As he gets closer to the site, he can see light shining through the trees. He hides behind one, readying his staff in his hands, and then peeks around the tree trunks.
That's when he see the oddest contraption he's ever seen, after the coma, in his life. It looks almost like a mini house thingy, only full of windows and the color of it is the same as the burning tongues of fire. Half of it is stuck up in a tree and the other is slowly sinking into a quicksand pit, burning up and choking out black smoke. It also has two wide boards coming out of it and barrels at what looks like the back of it. And then there's someone standing in front of it. Goku freezes and hides behind the tree once more, starting to panic. What if this is the guy that his father is always trying to warn him about?! What if it's Blade?!
Suddenly the teenager frowns, {Wait a second, doesn't Blade have a sword?} He peeks around the trunk once again, but then the figure starts to turn around, and Goku hides again. He curses inwardly and thinks, {Dammit! I can't remember what a sword is! Hmmm..... I'll probably remember once I see it. I want to take a closer look.} He hops up into the branches and crawls along the largest one above the guy's head, completely silent.
Goku sits there and watches the stranger in wonder. For some reason the guy starts jumping up and down, right in the same spot. He has the oddest clothes that he's ever seen in his life, again after the coma. But it's the HAIR that catches his attention the most. He's never even SEEN that color before. Goku starts leaning over the side of the branch even more, completely mesmerized by the color, until he realizes too late that he's slipping from the branch.
He gives a loud yelp as he falls out from the tree. Suddenly, something catches him and he looks up and sees a vine tangled up around his ankle. He looks up/down and shrieks, realizing that the stranger is looking right at him. He tries scrambling back up to the branch using the vine, but as he struggles it only ends up unraveling and he falls to the ground with a loud thud.
Instantly, Goku clambers to his feet and points his staff at the stranger, ready to attack.
The stranger just stares at him as if he was crazy. Then he tries communicating to the boy with the staff, who seems to be a forest native, "Uh hi, there. I come in peace?"
The native just narrows his eyes, keeping the same stance.
The stranger mutters nervously, "Um. Ookay." He clears his throat and says slowly, "Do you know English? You know, EN-GA-LISH."
Still no reply.
The stranger frowns, "Huh, I guess not." He heads back towards the ship, only to have the native yell at him angrily in a foreign language. The stranger smiles good naturedly, "Hey, calm down! I'm just getting my stuff!" pointing to the section of the ship up in the tree.
The dark haired native gives him a very deep frown, but doesn't object anymore.
The stranger climbs up the tree and grabs something out of the cockpit muttering to himself, "How did I ever manage to get stuck in a place like this?" He hops back down to the ground and turns back to the native, "Um, would you happen to know a way out of here?"
The native stares at him blankly, so the stranger attempts to pantomime it, getting absolutely nothing except a confused look. Sighing, the stranger hoists his bag over his shoulder and points to himself, "Can I-" then to the native, "go with you?"
This time the native seems to understand. He gives a smile and nods, turning the other way out of the marshlands. Finally thinking he's getting somewhere and the teenage stranger starts following the native out of the gloomy bog. While they're walking, the stranger takes a closer look at the native, noting that they're about the same age. But the odd thing is he's positive that he's seen this native before. And his heart wrenches at the expression on the native's face. It looks like one that his father always wore.
Laughing out loud, the teenage stranger says, "You wouldn't believe it, but you look exactly like a combination of two people I knew." The native gives him an odd look, and hops over a log in their path. The stranger frowns and hops as well, only not quite as far as the native.
The native boy gives a loud yelp, and only then does the stranger realize that he's stuck in a black quicksand pit, and is already sinking to his knees. He starts struggling, only increasing the native's distress. The dark haired teenager thinks quickly and climbs up a tree only to hop right back down with a vine. Then he wraps one end around a tree and flings the other end to the stranger, who's now up to his chest in black sand.
Understanding at once, the strange teenager starts pulling himself out of the quicksand pit, the native pulling him out as well. In about three seconds flat, the stranger pops out of the quicksand back onto stable land. Both of them breathe a huge sigh of relief and smile at each other. The stranger looks up at the native and smiles, "Hey, thanks a lot. You saved my life there."
To his complete shock, the dark haired native replies, "No problem."
The stranger blinks, "You can talk?!"
"Yeah! I got you pretty good, didn't I?" the native laughs, but his English has a very odd accent to it.
The teenage stranger sweatdrops, "I guess you did." He smiles and holds out his hand, "Hi, my name's Trunks."
The native takes it and also grins, "And I'm Goku."
At once they both stare at each other blankly, before yelling out simultaneously, "I know that name!"
Goku frowns, "Wait a sec! That isn't right! The Trunks I know is dead!"
Trunks counters, "Well the Goku I know is dead!"
Both teenagers frown at each other, but then shrug, "Oh well."
Trunks sits back down and sighs, looking at his nearly ruined bag, "Oh great. This thing's all mucked up with sand. Do you mind if I stop and check it?"
Goku merely shrugs, "Sure go ahead. The way we're going it's going to take forever to get back to the house."
"You have a house? You mean like a capsule model?" Trunks starts wagging his tail excitedly, hoping that maybe there's civilized people here.
"No, my dad built it."
"Huh, I don't see a lot of people doing that anymore," Trunks mutters a bit disappointed. Then he takes a look around the forest, "Then again, I don't get stuck in a lot of forests like these." He snaps open his bag and pulls out several objects from inside it, some soggy with sand and others surviving the ordeal.
Goku stops himself from staring at Trunks' hair again and tries to make conversation, "You know what's weird?"
Trunks says absentmindedly, "What?" still searching his bag.
"You're the only other person I've met in my life besides my dad."
The strange teenager raises an eyebrow at Goku and then goes back to work, "You must be pretty lonely then."
Goku protests, "Oh, I'm not! My dad's great! Well..... Actually he's kind of violent, curses a lot, he's only told me he loves me ONCE, but he's still good."
A deep sadness wells up in Trunks' heart and he mumbles, "I had a dad like that."
The young saiyajin notes the past tense in that sentence and says quietly, "Sorry."
Trunks smiles, "Don't worry. I'm fine." Finally he pulls out the object that he's looking for. A long object wrapped up in brown packaging, untouched by sand. The teenager sighs a breath of relief, "Whew, I'm glad this one's okay. My brother would've killed me if this got wrecked!"
Goku leans over the package and asks curiously, "What is it?"
"Here, I'll show you." Then Trunks pulls off the brown paper, revealing an ancient Japanese Nodachi. He grins up at Goku, "My brother ordered this from Kyoto, but they couldn't deliver it so I ended up going to pick it up."
The dark haired teenager's eyes widen as a flashback comes to his mind.
//Flashback//
Vegeta looks sternly down at Goku and says, "Now remember, Blade is a shape shifter. I'm not sure if he just takes the forms of people he absorbed or if he can change into anyone or anything. But one thing is for sure. When he's hunting you down, he's going to have his sword with him. So if anyone you see has a sword you run from them."
A nine-year-old Goku blinks innocently up at his father, "Father, what's a sword?"
The ouji stares at him and smacks himself in the forehead, muttering to himself, "Kami help me." He looks around the room for some visual reference and picks up a knife off the dining room table showing it to Goku, "Okay, think of this as a sword."
".....But it's a knife....."
"I KNOW IT'S A KNIFE! WILL YOU JUST LISTEN TO ME?!" Vegeta takes a deep breath, trying to calm himself down, and says shakily, as if he's suppressing his anger, which he probably is, "Now a sword is almost like a knife. It's long and it's metallic. But swords come in all sorts of shapes and sizes, so don't trust anyone with one!"
"Well then how do you tell the difference between a knife and a sword?"
Vegeta sighs, "If it's bigger than two feet," he holds out his arms, showing the length to the young saiyajin, "then run."
//End Flashback//
And that's what Goku does. Once he recognizes the description, he bolts for the trees hurrying back to the tree house. Trunks yells in surprise, "HEY! WHERE ARE YOU GOING?!" But then he sees something unraveling at the dark haired teenager's waist, extending to full length at the back of Goku's pants.
A tail. A saiyajin tail.
At once, Trunks whispers to himself, "Holy crap," then cups his hands around his mouth and screams up at the trees, "GOKU! GOKU!! COME BACK!!!" Hastily he scans the objects on the ground and says, "Aw man," picking up the sword and jumping up into the trees, trying to chase after the runaway saiyajin. "GOKU!!! PLEASE! COME BACK!!"
****
"DADDY!!! DAADEEEE!!! HELP!!!"
Vegeta blinks lazily out of his nap and rolls up out of the couch in the cabin, "What the hell does that kid want now?" Then his expression turns blank, "He hasn't called me Daddy for nearly two years." He jumps down the stairs and down to campsite below the tree house.
Goku comes running out of the forest, screaming and once he sees the ouji, goes running for him, "DADDY!" He says in hysterics once he gets closer, "Daddy! I didn't mean to! But I went- and there was a fire! There was this big thing, I don't know what the hell it was- And there was a kid! The same age as me! But he was chasing me! And he still is!"
The ouji grabs Goku's shoulder and says in alarm, "Prince Goku! Was it Blade?!"
The teenager just shakes his head, "I don't know! But he has a huge-"
He's suddenly interrupted by a loud, "GOKU!!! WAIT UP!!!" Goku yelps and hides behind Vegeta, trying to make himself smaller than him.
Meanwhile, his father just stares at the pathway. He knows that voice. Then a lavender haired teenager comes running up the pathway, looking like a ningen that just sprinted five miles straight. Vegeta takes a step towards the teenager and whispers, "Trunks?"
Goku yells, "Dad! The sword!"
The ouji just ignores him. Trunks also stares up at Vegeta in complete disbelief and chokes out, "F-Father?"
They stare at each other in complete silence, while Goku watches his father in astonishment and waves a hand in front of his face, trying to get some sort of reaction. Nothing. Goku's expression turns livid and he points his staff at Trunks, "What the hell did you do to him?!"
Trunks ignores him as well and drops the sword, running up to his father and tightly wrapping his arms around the saiyajin no ouji's torso. Vegeta makes no move to stop him. The lavender haired demi-saiyajin cries, "Dad! Oh god, Dad. I thought you were dead! Where the hell were you the whole time?! Kami, who cares! You're alive!"
Vegeta says shakily, "I could say the same thing to you."
Goku stares at them, his jaw dropped in disbelief. {Kami, it's his Trunks! It must be!} Then he sees the way that they're holding each other, just like the way Vegeta would always do with him if he's hurt or has some sort of emotional dilemma. He never actually imagined that his father would do that with anyone else.....
Then he starts to feel threatened by this new kid, the bitter bite of jealousy taking a hold of him all too quickly. His tail puffs out and his eyes grow as narrow as slits. Growling possessively, he pushes Trunks onto the ground, away from Vegeta. {MINE!}
Both the ouji and his son stare at Goku incredulously, "WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING?!"
Goku looks at Vegeta hopelessly, "But Dad....."
Trunks looks like he's just been slapped, "DAD?!"
Vegeta hisses urgently, "He's your half-brother."
Blinking, Trunks gets up and suddenly pulls off the band Goku is using to keep his hair in a ponytail. It poofs up back to its original form, the one that Trunks would have recognized instantly. The lavender haired teenager gapes at Goku before managing to point at him and yell, "Half-brother my ass! That's Goku!"
Goku gives his father a confused look, "Dad? What's he talking about?"
The ouji turns to Trunks and screams, "WILL YOU SHUT UP?!"
****
Trunks looks around the tree house in wonder, "Wow, Dad, you did this without any tools at all?" All three of them are inside now, sitting around in the living area, which is just made up of two plush meditation pillows and a blue couch. Goku takes up a pillow, sitting indian style on the ground, while the other two take the couch.
Vegeta glances at the two boys and asks, "How did you two meet up?"
Goku answers sheepishly, "I found him over at the Quicksand Pits."
"Oh, alright." Then the ouji blinks and suddenly turns furious, "YOU WERE WHERE?!"
Trunks laughs nervously, "Dad, calm down! If he hadn't gone I wouldn't be here right now."
At this, the teenage saiyajin frowns and then goes to kneel in front of Vegeta, "Moushi wake arimasen, otousan! I swear I'll never disobey you ever again!"
Both the ouji and Trunks sweatdrop at this.
Vegeta just sighs, "Stop being ridiculous." He looks back at Trunks, feeling elated but also nervous at his long lost son's presence. Especially with all the suspicious looks Goku keeps throwing at the demi-saiyajin. He demands, "Trunks, what the hell happened at the hospital? I was convinced that you were dead. Dammit, even your ki's were all gone too! I even went to check with Dende and he couldn't find your ki at all either!"
His son bites his lip, "Well, we weren't on the planet actually. Well Goku had taught Gohan how to use Instant Transmission, while he was still in your body. Once we saw Blade in the hospital, Gohan instantly teleported us over to New Namek."
The ouji says flatly, "Leaving the two of us behind."
Trunks says guiltily, "Well.....yeah, but it wasn't exactly my choice at the time. We ended staying on New Namek for the day, and then Gohan brought us back over to the Lookout that same night to see Dende."
"But that Namek knew where we were, dammit!"
Suddenly Goku says something to Vegeta in a language that Trunks can't understand, the same language that he heard the saiyajin speaking in earlier at the quicksand pits.
[Dad? What does he mean, I was inside your body? He makes it sound like you were pregnant with me.]
[I was not pregnant with you! I can't even get pregnant! Just don't listen to any of this! I'll talk you later about it!]
Trunks frowns, "Um.....what?"
The ouji answers, "I've been teaching Prince Goku how to speak saiyago."
His son blinks, but then snorts and bursts into laughter, "Kami! I forgot all about that whole Prince Goku thing! Man, that's priceless!"
Vegeta says flatly, "I'm glad you find it so amusing, seeing as you're the one who did it to me."
Trunks smiles, "Well yeah, but it was Goku's idea," pointing to the young saiyajin.
Shocked, when Goku sees the ouji's glare on him he says defensively, "Dad! I have no idea what he's talking about! I only just met him!"
The demi-saiyajin demands, "Dad? What's the matter with him?"
Vegeta sighs, "He has amnesia."
"Again?!"
A sigh. "Yes."
Trunks looks up in thought, "I get it now. That's why he couldn't recognize me." He turns to Goku, "So Goku-"
Goku says in a very nasty tone, "That's Prince Goku to you, half blood."
The demi-saiyajin stares at him, "Excuse me?!" He looks back at Vegeta, who sweatdrops. Trunks stares at him in disbelief, {He didn't even try to correct him!} His mild disapproval of the young saiyajin bursts into full- fledged jealous contempt.
His father asks, "You were saying about the Namek?"
Trunks grits his teeth, still very annoyed with the other teenager, "He told us to find you using a red ball thing that he gave us. Ah well, I think that's where we got mixed up. The ball kept pointing towards the North Pole."
Vegeta stares at him, silently for a long time, "..............What?"
The demi-saiyajin frowns, "Yeah, all we found up there was a map. I guess you guys were supposed to be connected to it."
The ouji's eyes widened and he thinks, {Kami! I always assumed it got sucked into the quicksand! But how the hell did it get all the way to the North Pole?!}
Trunks continues, "Anyway, we went back to Dende and told him that the ball was busted and asked him to locate you guys with his powers. He told us he couldn't. We thought that meant that you guys were, well..... Dead. So then we tried using the Dragonballs. But then that stupid Shenlong said that it couldn't sense you either, either on Earth or in Otherworld!" He quiets down a bit, "We all thought that you died and decided to be reincarnated....."
He grins, "Well anyway, I can see why neither Dende nor Shenlong could sense you. This has to be the weirdest place I've ever been in! Does it take away your ki, or what?"
Goku frowns, "You just can't sense it here. Or at least that's what Dad said."
Trunks gives him an odd look, "Maybe you should get your memory back..... Dad? Why didn't you come home?"
Vegeta sighs, "Two reasons, first, we're supposed to be hiding out here from Blade. Second..... I can't find my out of here." Both Goku and Trunks sweatdrop.
"Well Dad, you don't need to be hiding from Blade anymore."
The ouji says in disbelief, "You defeated him?!"
"No, we just never saw him again after the hospital."
"HOW CAN YOU POSSIBLY ASSUME THAT HE'S DEAD?!"
Trunks sweatdrops, "Well, he could have died in the explosion."
Vegeta screams, "I REFUSE TO BELIEVE THAT CRAP! I DIDN'T WASTE FOUR YEARS OF MY LIFE OUT HERE BECAUSE OF A DEAD MAN! WHY THE HELL WOULD HE DIE IN HIS OWN EXPLOSION ANYWAY?!"
His son gives him an odd look, the word DENIAL ringing in his mind, "Well, besides that, Dad, why don't you just come back? What about Mom? And Mirai?"
Silent for a while, the ouji suddenly says, "Prince Goku, go outside."
Goku frowns, "Why do_I_have to go?"
"Because I said so. Now go."
The teenage saiyajin groans and heads to the door, hopping out onto the ground below the tree house. Vegeta closes the door and looks back at Trunks, a serious expression on his face, "Now is not a good time to leave."
His son protests, "Why not?!"
"Blade is still alive. I know he is. And Prince Goku..... If that vile creature ever gets his hands on him it'll be the doom of us all! Prince Goku's safe here! And he actually likes it here, too!"
Trunks' eyes narrow, "You're still here because of him?"
"It's always been about him."
"Well, well, what about us?! You have a responsibility to your real family, too! You can't just abandon us, for a- a kid, who's not even your actual son!"
Vegeta hisses, "He is too my son!"
"Oh my God!" Trunks laughs in vicious criticism. "You've been deluding yourself and him for the past four years! He has family, too! One that's ALIVE! Or did you actually forget this isn't his real age?!"
The ouji growls angrily, "I WON'T have you talking that way to me! No matter how much you think you've grown!"
His son turns back to him and demands, "Fine, just answer me this. Do you want to spend the rest of your life in this forest?"
"Of course not."
"Then PLEASE, get out of here while you still can! You've been away from everyone else for so long! It scares me how much you two have changed! You were only gone for four years and I couldn't recognize Goku at all when I saw him! And he called me a half-blood! A half-blood for crying out loud! Even you didn't call me that!"
"....."
Trunks groans, "Fine! Do what you want to! I don't care! I'm going to try and get out of here in the morning anyway! But listen to me, if I can find you out in the middle of nowhere then what's stopping Blade?"
Determined not to contribute another word in the discussion, Vegeta says, "You can take my bed tonight. I won't be needing it." Then he goes outside to fetch Goku.
His son sighs, "How could I have forgotten how stubborn you are?" He looks around the cabin, "Now I wonder where's Dad's bed?"
About half an hour later, Goku tips his bed over onto its side, screaming at its current occupant, "GET OUT OF MY BED, YOU LOUSY BUM!!"
****
A/N: .....Yeah, they definitely don't like each other that much.
A/N: Yay! Enough of the jungle growing up scenes! I promise, things are going to heat up now!
****
In the pitch-black night, all is silent as the creatures of the jungle roam around in the high loping trees. The forest bed is barely lit with specks of moonlight shining through the thick canopy of leaves. Predators lurk in the hot jungle, getting ready to hunt down their next meal. A small rustle breezes through the canopy tops. To the untrained eye it is merely from a light wind passing through. But to the hunted, they would know an unnatural predator is stalking through the trees. A shadowy figure stops above a clearing, waiting in silent readiness. Then he spots his prey.
A jaguar, also prowling in the bush. Only it doesn't know it's about to become the hunted. The shadowy figure swiftly pounces on the jaguar and then wrestles it down to the ground. But the mighty cat won't give up easy. It fights back its attacker with a loud roar, also wrestling with the creature. They roll all across the ground, until the attacker relents and lets the jaguar pin him to the ground.
A merry laugh rings out in the dense jungle, "Okay! Okay! You win!"
The large cat jumps off of its assailant, puffing out its chest and looking very proud of itself. In truth it's only about two years old, just barely out its cub years and raring to be out on its own. Goku had found the little cub when it was just four months old, its mother lost in a forest fire. So since then he'd been taking care of the jaguar, feeding it meat on an irregular basis and playing wrestling games with it would with its mother. Now it's starting to go off hunting on its own, so Goku doesn't bother bringing meat any more. But he continues to visit whenever he can.
The young saiyajin jumps up from the ground, only to show that he's not so young either.
Under the ouji's ever-watchful eye, Goku had grown from a little boy into a young man. Now he is aged fourteen. Five years had passed since that day that the hospital blew up and Vegeta had taken him into Mute Point.
Somehow he still hasn't recovered his memory, provided Vegeta didn't exactly 'encourage' it, and he had learned all the rites of being a saiyajin no ouji and more. But to the real ouji's delight, the young saiyajin is becoming more and more like him everyday, and he is indeed succeeding at molding the young impressionable Goku into his image.
Except now Goku is starting to become a rebellious teenager.
A VERY rebellious teenager, and the ouji starts cursing the day nearly everyday that he decided to call himself the boy's father.
Goku checks the time by the moon and winces, "Aw jeez! I need to get back before Dad sees I'm gone." He cups the young jaguar's face in his hands and smiles, "I'll see you later, okay?" The cat gives a little 'rar' in comprehension. Then Goku rushes off, quick as lightning, picking up the staff that he dropped during the wrestling match.
He jumps from tree to tree, scurrying across the forest until finally he comes back to the tree house. The ever faithful tree house that Vegeta built with his own hands. Only it had two stories to it now and is actually very comfortable to live in. Goku jumps to the roof of the tree house and opens up a panel that he made there himself; he ducks his head inside to check around and then jumps in. He smirks to himself, "Ha! Another success!"
A voice suddenly says behind him, "I don't think so, brat."
Goku gives a small shriek and turns around, holding a hammering chest in his hand. He can just barely see an outline of the ouji in the dim moonlight.
Good ol' Vegeta. He hasn't changed a bit in five years. However, Goku was growing more and more into his former stature. In fact he's just about an inch taller than the ouji now, which he likes to point out every minute of every day, until Vegeta gets so annoyed he would go chase the teenager around the forest, cursing at him with very colorful words; some that Goku thinks he might have made up.
Vegeta demands in a flat voice, though his eyes burn in fury, "Where were you?" Despite the disguised voice, Goku can tell the ouji is absolutely livid.
The teenage saiyajin says nervously, trying to think a way out of this mess. "Uh..... I was just out in the front yard, not doing anything."
That's when the ouji steps out into the moonlight and he hisses, "And I suppose that JAGUARS WANDER INTO OUR CAMP?! Which is all the way across the forest from the JUNGLE!!"
Goku winces, {Jeez, busted!}
Vegeta screams, "YOU'RE DAMN RIGHT YOU'RE BUSTED!" He grabs Goku's shirt and demands, "HOW MANY TIMES HAVE I TOLD YOU NOT TO WANDER AROUND ON YOUR OWN AT NIGHT?! YOU NEVER LISTEN TO ME ANYMORE YOU LITTLE-" and then he goes off into a string of English curses. The teenager mentally groans. His father only ever speaks English if he's furious.
Goku protests, as if that would help the situation at all, "But Dad, I was just checking on Lara. I haven't seen her for nearly two months. And you know that jaguars only come out at night."
"I DON'T GIVE A DAMN! If you really wanted to see her you should've asked me to go with you! BUT YOUR FRICKIN' LIFE IS IN DANGER!! WHAT IF BLADE FOUND YOU AND I WASN'T THERE?!!"
At this, the younger saiyajin turns angry and starts yelling back in an equally powerful voice, "BLADE! BLADE! BLADE! THAT'S ALL I EVER HEAR COMING OUT OF YOUR MOUTH!! YOU TALK ABOUT HIM SO MUCH, AND YET I NEVER SEE HIM_ONCE_!!"
"YOU SHOULD CONSIDER YOURSELF LUCKY!"
Goku growls in frustration and hisses accusingly, "I bet you just made him up! Just so that you can keep me under lock and key! I wouldn't be surprised if you just told me he doesn't exist! In fact I'm completely sure that he doesn't!"
The ouji stares at him in silence, his expression turning lethal. He marches right up to Goku's nose, seeming to tower over the young teenager and he says in a quiet, clear voice, "Don't you ever say that again."
Goku's eyes widen in astonishment, "Dad, I-"
"Never again! Do you understand me?! NEVER AGAIN!"
All the teenager can do is nod, in silent shock. Vegeta visibly slumps and gives Goku a very tired, haggard look and then quietly heads downstairs down the wooden ladder into the living area. Goku suddenly realizes that he got away without being punished. But far from being elated, his father's behavior had disturbed him terribly. He peeks down to the first floor and sees the ouji sitting in a chair, holding up his bent head with a hand, just staring at the floor. He had never seen his father look so.....damaged.....
Unsure of how to act, Goku quietly gets ready for bed instead.
A while later, Vegeta comes back upstairs to check on him. Goku has his back towards the ladder, his face turned towards the window. The ouji sits on the side of the bed, tilting it with his added weight. Leaning his head on the backboard of the bed, he sighs, "I know you're frustrated by all these rules I put on you. If it was me, I'd have run away a long time ago." Putting a strong hand on Goku's shoulder, he continues, "I just wish you wouldn't do such stupid things."
Thinking that the teenager is asleep, he starts to get up, but suddenly Goku grabs his hand and in a shaky voice says, "I didn't mean to say that. I didn't think it would hurt you that badly. I'm sorry."
Vegeta gives him a small smirk and pulls him up to look at him, "Prince Goku, that doesn't really matter. What matters is that you're safe, and well, relatively content with your life. The thing I'm most afraid of is that I'm going to lose you just like I did the others. You're all that I have left in this Godforsaken world."
Goku smiles and then hugs his father and says, "I love you, Dad."
This is only the second chance that Vegeta gets to reply right in the last four years and he's not going to waste it. He leans Goku's head onto his chest and says, "I love you too, son."
**** (The end of the drama.....hopefully.....)
The next morning, Goku bounds out of bed at the crack of dawn with a refreshed smile on his face. What a great way to start a day! Training from dawn! He's quick to change into his training clothes and makes sure that there's no bugs that crawled into them in the middle of the night.
He grabs a leather band, tying his hair into a ponytail to keep it out of his face while training, letting three bangs fall to the right side of his face. Then he picks up his mahogany staff propped up against the window and hops down to the dining area, where a whole pot of wild rice porridge is waiting for him. Gulping it down like a famished man, he finishes quickly and then jumps down from the tree house, nearly landing on Vegeta who's training outside. Goku says quickly, "Sorry, Dad! Bye Dad!" bounding off into the woods.
The ouji just glares at him, then rolls his eyes and goes on with his one- hand stand push-ups.
Goku runs the full length of the forest along the underbrush and back again, going back again past the tree house to the other side of the forest. Then he does this for 100 more laps, continually running past Vegeta, training by the tree house, until finally the ouji gets fed up and grabs the back of Goku's shirt as he runs past, yelling in his face, "WILL YOU QUIT THAT! YOU'RE MAKING ME DIZZY! GO TRAIN SOMEWHERE ELSE!"
The teenager gives him a sheepish grin and escapes the ouji's grip, running off towards the bamboo thicket. Again Vegeta gives him a venomous glare.
In the infamous bamboo thicket, where Goku first discovered his strength, the teenager whips out his mahogany staff and practices with it. He has two different staffs now actually. One bamboo, and his favorite mahogany one. The bamboo one is light and flexible, while the mahogany is its complete opposite, requiring Goku to learn different styles for each of them. Not that he has anything better to do.
Suddenly something swooshing up above the treetops catches his attention. He blinks, looking up with a frown, but he ignores it and continues training. About five minutes later he hears a sound resembling an explosion coming from the direction of the Quicksand Pits. Goku's eyes widen, "What the heck?"
Curiosity starts getting the better of the teenager. He knows he's not allowed to go over into that area..... And he really doesn't want to get into the same conversation he had with his father last night. He bites his bottom lip, when billows of smoke starts to fume from the site. He mutters to himself, "I'll just take a quick peek. I'll fly just over the ground a little bit. He'll never know I'm gone."
With that he hovers off the ground by an inch and then zooms over to the Quicksand Pits.
****
Goku looks around the decaying marshlands warily, careful not even to let one inch of him touch the ground. Most of the trees seem rotten and dying, releasing a pungent smell, not so safe to try and swing around in. The area is denser than most parts of the forest that Goku's seen, covering the area in darkness as if it's night. Nervous, the teenager almost decides to turn back.
Then an odd scent comes to this nose. The smell of fire, along with.....something else..... As he gets closer to the site, he can see light shining through the trees. He hides behind one, readying his staff in his hands, and then peeks around the tree trunks.
That's when he see the oddest contraption he's ever seen, after the coma, in his life. It looks almost like a mini house thingy, only full of windows and the color of it is the same as the burning tongues of fire. Half of it is stuck up in a tree and the other is slowly sinking into a quicksand pit, burning up and choking out black smoke. It also has two wide boards coming out of it and barrels at what looks like the back of it. And then there's someone standing in front of it. Goku freezes and hides behind the tree once more, starting to panic. What if this is the guy that his father is always trying to warn him about?! What if it's Blade?!
Suddenly the teenager frowns, {Wait a second, doesn't Blade have a sword?} He peeks around the trunk once again, but then the figure starts to turn around, and Goku hides again. He curses inwardly and thinks, {Dammit! I can't remember what a sword is! Hmmm..... I'll probably remember once I see it. I want to take a closer look.} He hops up into the branches and crawls along the largest one above the guy's head, completely silent.
Goku sits there and watches the stranger in wonder. For some reason the guy starts jumping up and down, right in the same spot. He has the oddest clothes that he's ever seen in his life, again after the coma. But it's the HAIR that catches his attention the most. He's never even SEEN that color before. Goku starts leaning over the side of the branch even more, completely mesmerized by the color, until he realizes too late that he's slipping from the branch.
He gives a loud yelp as he falls out from the tree. Suddenly, something catches him and he looks up and sees a vine tangled up around his ankle. He looks up/down and shrieks, realizing that the stranger is looking right at him. He tries scrambling back up to the branch using the vine, but as he struggles it only ends up unraveling and he falls to the ground with a loud thud.
Instantly, Goku clambers to his feet and points his staff at the stranger, ready to attack.
The stranger just stares at him as if he was crazy. Then he tries communicating to the boy with the staff, who seems to be a forest native, "Uh hi, there. I come in peace?"
The native just narrows his eyes, keeping the same stance.
The stranger mutters nervously, "Um. Ookay." He clears his throat and says slowly, "Do you know English? You know, EN-GA-LISH."
Still no reply.
The stranger frowns, "Huh, I guess not." He heads back towards the ship, only to have the native yell at him angrily in a foreign language. The stranger smiles good naturedly, "Hey, calm down! I'm just getting my stuff!" pointing to the section of the ship up in the tree.
The dark haired native gives him a very deep frown, but doesn't object anymore.
The stranger climbs up the tree and grabs something out of the cockpit muttering to himself, "How did I ever manage to get stuck in a place like this?" He hops back down to the ground and turns back to the native, "Um, would you happen to know a way out of here?"
The native stares at him blankly, so the stranger attempts to pantomime it, getting absolutely nothing except a confused look. Sighing, the stranger hoists his bag over his shoulder and points to himself, "Can I-" then to the native, "go with you?"
This time the native seems to understand. He gives a smile and nods, turning the other way out of the marshlands. Finally thinking he's getting somewhere and the teenage stranger starts following the native out of the gloomy bog. While they're walking, the stranger takes a closer look at the native, noting that they're about the same age. But the odd thing is he's positive that he's seen this native before. And his heart wrenches at the expression on the native's face. It looks like one that his father always wore.
Laughing out loud, the teenage stranger says, "You wouldn't believe it, but you look exactly like a combination of two people I knew." The native gives him an odd look, and hops over a log in their path. The stranger frowns and hops as well, only not quite as far as the native.
The native boy gives a loud yelp, and only then does the stranger realize that he's stuck in a black quicksand pit, and is already sinking to his knees. He starts struggling, only increasing the native's distress. The dark haired teenager thinks quickly and climbs up a tree only to hop right back down with a vine. Then he wraps one end around a tree and flings the other end to the stranger, who's now up to his chest in black sand.
Understanding at once, the strange teenager starts pulling himself out of the quicksand pit, the native pulling him out as well. In about three seconds flat, the stranger pops out of the quicksand back onto stable land. Both of them breathe a huge sigh of relief and smile at each other. The stranger looks up at the native and smiles, "Hey, thanks a lot. You saved my life there."
To his complete shock, the dark haired native replies, "No problem."
The stranger blinks, "You can talk?!"
"Yeah! I got you pretty good, didn't I?" the native laughs, but his English has a very odd accent to it.
The teenage stranger sweatdrops, "I guess you did." He smiles and holds out his hand, "Hi, my name's Trunks."
The native takes it and also grins, "And I'm Goku."
At once they both stare at each other blankly, before yelling out simultaneously, "I know that name!"
Goku frowns, "Wait a sec! That isn't right! The Trunks I know is dead!"
Trunks counters, "Well the Goku I know is dead!"
Both teenagers frown at each other, but then shrug, "Oh well."
Trunks sits back down and sighs, looking at his nearly ruined bag, "Oh great. This thing's all mucked up with sand. Do you mind if I stop and check it?"
Goku merely shrugs, "Sure go ahead. The way we're going it's going to take forever to get back to the house."
"You have a house? You mean like a capsule model?" Trunks starts wagging his tail excitedly, hoping that maybe there's civilized people here.
"No, my dad built it."
"Huh, I don't see a lot of people doing that anymore," Trunks mutters a bit disappointed. Then he takes a look around the forest, "Then again, I don't get stuck in a lot of forests like these." He snaps open his bag and pulls out several objects from inside it, some soggy with sand and others surviving the ordeal.
Goku stops himself from staring at Trunks' hair again and tries to make conversation, "You know what's weird?"
Trunks says absentmindedly, "What?" still searching his bag.
"You're the only other person I've met in my life besides my dad."
The strange teenager raises an eyebrow at Goku and then goes back to work, "You must be pretty lonely then."
Goku protests, "Oh, I'm not! My dad's great! Well..... Actually he's kind of violent, curses a lot, he's only told me he loves me ONCE, but he's still good."
A deep sadness wells up in Trunks' heart and he mumbles, "I had a dad like that."
The young saiyajin notes the past tense in that sentence and says quietly, "Sorry."
Trunks smiles, "Don't worry. I'm fine." Finally he pulls out the object that he's looking for. A long object wrapped up in brown packaging, untouched by sand. The teenager sighs a breath of relief, "Whew, I'm glad this one's okay. My brother would've killed me if this got wrecked!"
Goku leans over the package and asks curiously, "What is it?"
"Here, I'll show you." Then Trunks pulls off the brown paper, revealing an ancient Japanese Nodachi. He grins up at Goku, "My brother ordered this from Kyoto, but they couldn't deliver it so I ended up going to pick it up."
The dark haired teenager's eyes widen as a flashback comes to his mind.
//Flashback//
Vegeta looks sternly down at Goku and says, "Now remember, Blade is a shape shifter. I'm not sure if he just takes the forms of people he absorbed or if he can change into anyone or anything. But one thing is for sure. When he's hunting you down, he's going to have his sword with him. So if anyone you see has a sword you run from them."
A nine-year-old Goku blinks innocently up at his father, "Father, what's a sword?"
The ouji stares at him and smacks himself in the forehead, muttering to himself, "Kami help me." He looks around the room for some visual reference and picks up a knife off the dining room table showing it to Goku, "Okay, think of this as a sword."
".....But it's a knife....."
"I KNOW IT'S A KNIFE! WILL YOU JUST LISTEN TO ME?!" Vegeta takes a deep breath, trying to calm himself down, and says shakily, as if he's suppressing his anger, which he probably is, "Now a sword is almost like a knife. It's long and it's metallic. But swords come in all sorts of shapes and sizes, so don't trust anyone with one!"
"Well then how do you tell the difference between a knife and a sword?"
Vegeta sighs, "If it's bigger than two feet," he holds out his arms, showing the length to the young saiyajin, "then run."
//End Flashback//
And that's what Goku does. Once he recognizes the description, he bolts for the trees hurrying back to the tree house. Trunks yells in surprise, "HEY! WHERE ARE YOU GOING?!" But then he sees something unraveling at the dark haired teenager's waist, extending to full length at the back of Goku's pants.
A tail. A saiyajin tail.
At once, Trunks whispers to himself, "Holy crap," then cups his hands around his mouth and screams up at the trees, "GOKU! GOKU!! COME BACK!!!" Hastily he scans the objects on the ground and says, "Aw man," picking up the sword and jumping up into the trees, trying to chase after the runaway saiyajin. "GOKU!!! PLEASE! COME BACK!!"
****
"DADDY!!! DAADEEEE!!! HELP!!!"
Vegeta blinks lazily out of his nap and rolls up out of the couch in the cabin, "What the hell does that kid want now?" Then his expression turns blank, "He hasn't called me Daddy for nearly two years." He jumps down the stairs and down to campsite below the tree house.
Goku comes running out of the forest, screaming and once he sees the ouji, goes running for him, "DADDY!" He says in hysterics once he gets closer, "Daddy! I didn't mean to! But I went- and there was a fire! There was this big thing, I don't know what the hell it was- And there was a kid! The same age as me! But he was chasing me! And he still is!"
The ouji grabs Goku's shoulder and says in alarm, "Prince Goku! Was it Blade?!"
The teenager just shakes his head, "I don't know! But he has a huge-"
He's suddenly interrupted by a loud, "GOKU!!! WAIT UP!!!" Goku yelps and hides behind Vegeta, trying to make himself smaller than him.
Meanwhile, his father just stares at the pathway. He knows that voice. Then a lavender haired teenager comes running up the pathway, looking like a ningen that just sprinted five miles straight. Vegeta takes a step towards the teenager and whispers, "Trunks?"
Goku yells, "Dad! The sword!"
The ouji just ignores him. Trunks also stares up at Vegeta in complete disbelief and chokes out, "F-Father?"
They stare at each other in complete silence, while Goku watches his father in astonishment and waves a hand in front of his face, trying to get some sort of reaction. Nothing. Goku's expression turns livid and he points his staff at Trunks, "What the hell did you do to him?!"
Trunks ignores him as well and drops the sword, running up to his father and tightly wrapping his arms around the saiyajin no ouji's torso. Vegeta makes no move to stop him. The lavender haired demi-saiyajin cries, "Dad! Oh god, Dad. I thought you were dead! Where the hell were you the whole time?! Kami, who cares! You're alive!"
Vegeta says shakily, "I could say the same thing to you."
Goku stares at them, his jaw dropped in disbelief. {Kami, it's his Trunks! It must be!} Then he sees the way that they're holding each other, just like the way Vegeta would always do with him if he's hurt or has some sort of emotional dilemma. He never actually imagined that his father would do that with anyone else.....
Then he starts to feel threatened by this new kid, the bitter bite of jealousy taking a hold of him all too quickly. His tail puffs out and his eyes grow as narrow as slits. Growling possessively, he pushes Trunks onto the ground, away from Vegeta. {MINE!}
Both the ouji and his son stare at Goku incredulously, "WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING?!"
Goku looks at Vegeta hopelessly, "But Dad....."
Trunks looks like he's just been slapped, "DAD?!"
Vegeta hisses urgently, "He's your half-brother."
Blinking, Trunks gets up and suddenly pulls off the band Goku is using to keep his hair in a ponytail. It poofs up back to its original form, the one that Trunks would have recognized instantly. The lavender haired teenager gapes at Goku before managing to point at him and yell, "Half-brother my ass! That's Goku!"
Goku gives his father a confused look, "Dad? What's he talking about?"
The ouji turns to Trunks and screams, "WILL YOU SHUT UP?!"
****
Trunks looks around the tree house in wonder, "Wow, Dad, you did this without any tools at all?" All three of them are inside now, sitting around in the living area, which is just made up of two plush meditation pillows and a blue couch. Goku takes up a pillow, sitting indian style on the ground, while the other two take the couch.
Vegeta glances at the two boys and asks, "How did you two meet up?"
Goku answers sheepishly, "I found him over at the Quicksand Pits."
"Oh, alright." Then the ouji blinks and suddenly turns furious, "YOU WERE WHERE?!"
Trunks laughs nervously, "Dad, calm down! If he hadn't gone I wouldn't be here right now."
At this, the teenage saiyajin frowns and then goes to kneel in front of Vegeta, "Moushi wake arimasen, otousan! I swear I'll never disobey you ever again!"
Both the ouji and Trunks sweatdrop at this.
Vegeta just sighs, "Stop being ridiculous." He looks back at Trunks, feeling elated but also nervous at his long lost son's presence. Especially with all the suspicious looks Goku keeps throwing at the demi-saiyajin. He demands, "Trunks, what the hell happened at the hospital? I was convinced that you were dead. Dammit, even your ki's were all gone too! I even went to check with Dende and he couldn't find your ki at all either!"
His son bites his lip, "Well, we weren't on the planet actually. Well Goku had taught Gohan how to use Instant Transmission, while he was still in your body. Once we saw Blade in the hospital, Gohan instantly teleported us over to New Namek."
The ouji says flatly, "Leaving the two of us behind."
Trunks says guiltily, "Well.....yeah, but it wasn't exactly my choice at the time. We ended staying on New Namek for the day, and then Gohan brought us back over to the Lookout that same night to see Dende."
"But that Namek knew where we were, dammit!"
Suddenly Goku says something to Vegeta in a language that Trunks can't understand, the same language that he heard the saiyajin speaking in earlier at the quicksand pits.
[Dad? What does he mean, I was inside your body? He makes it sound like you were pregnant with me.]
[I was not pregnant with you! I can't even get pregnant! Just don't listen to any of this! I'll talk you later about it!]
Trunks frowns, "Um.....what?"
The ouji answers, "I've been teaching Prince Goku how to speak saiyago."
His son blinks, but then snorts and bursts into laughter, "Kami! I forgot all about that whole Prince Goku thing! Man, that's priceless!"
Vegeta says flatly, "I'm glad you find it so amusing, seeing as you're the one who did it to me."
Trunks smiles, "Well yeah, but it was Goku's idea," pointing to the young saiyajin.
Shocked, when Goku sees the ouji's glare on him he says defensively, "Dad! I have no idea what he's talking about! I only just met him!"
The demi-saiyajin demands, "Dad? What's the matter with him?"
Vegeta sighs, "He has amnesia."
"Again?!"
A sigh. "Yes."
Trunks looks up in thought, "I get it now. That's why he couldn't recognize me." He turns to Goku, "So Goku-"
Goku says in a very nasty tone, "That's Prince Goku to you, half blood."
The demi-saiyajin stares at him, "Excuse me?!" He looks back at Vegeta, who sweatdrops. Trunks stares at him in disbelief, {He didn't even try to correct him!} His mild disapproval of the young saiyajin bursts into full- fledged jealous contempt.
His father asks, "You were saying about the Namek?"
Trunks grits his teeth, still very annoyed with the other teenager, "He told us to find you using a red ball thing that he gave us. Ah well, I think that's where we got mixed up. The ball kept pointing towards the North Pole."
Vegeta stares at him, silently for a long time, "..............What?"
The demi-saiyajin frowns, "Yeah, all we found up there was a map. I guess you guys were supposed to be connected to it."
The ouji's eyes widened and he thinks, {Kami! I always assumed it got sucked into the quicksand! But how the hell did it get all the way to the North Pole?!}
Trunks continues, "Anyway, we went back to Dende and told him that the ball was busted and asked him to locate you guys with his powers. He told us he couldn't. We thought that meant that you guys were, well..... Dead. So then we tried using the Dragonballs. But then that stupid Shenlong said that it couldn't sense you either, either on Earth or in Otherworld!" He quiets down a bit, "We all thought that you died and decided to be reincarnated....."
He grins, "Well anyway, I can see why neither Dende nor Shenlong could sense you. This has to be the weirdest place I've ever been in! Does it take away your ki, or what?"
Goku frowns, "You just can't sense it here. Or at least that's what Dad said."
Trunks gives him an odd look, "Maybe you should get your memory back..... Dad? Why didn't you come home?"
Vegeta sighs, "Two reasons, first, we're supposed to be hiding out here from Blade. Second..... I can't find my out of here." Both Goku and Trunks sweatdrop.
"Well Dad, you don't need to be hiding from Blade anymore."
The ouji says in disbelief, "You defeated him?!"
"No, we just never saw him again after the hospital."
"HOW CAN YOU POSSIBLY ASSUME THAT HE'S DEAD?!"
Trunks sweatdrops, "Well, he could have died in the explosion."
Vegeta screams, "I REFUSE TO BELIEVE THAT CRAP! I DIDN'T WASTE FOUR YEARS OF MY LIFE OUT HERE BECAUSE OF A DEAD MAN! WHY THE HELL WOULD HE DIE IN HIS OWN EXPLOSION ANYWAY?!"
His son gives him an odd look, the word DENIAL ringing in his mind, "Well, besides that, Dad, why don't you just come back? What about Mom? And Mirai?"
Silent for a while, the ouji suddenly says, "Prince Goku, go outside."
Goku frowns, "Why do_I_have to go?"
"Because I said so. Now go."
The teenage saiyajin groans and heads to the door, hopping out onto the ground below the tree house. Vegeta closes the door and looks back at Trunks, a serious expression on his face, "Now is not a good time to leave."
His son protests, "Why not?!"
"Blade is still alive. I know he is. And Prince Goku..... If that vile creature ever gets his hands on him it'll be the doom of us all! Prince Goku's safe here! And he actually likes it here, too!"
Trunks' eyes narrow, "You're still here because of him?"
"It's always been about him."
"Well, well, what about us?! You have a responsibility to your real family, too! You can't just abandon us, for a- a kid, who's not even your actual son!"
Vegeta hisses, "He is too my son!"
"Oh my God!" Trunks laughs in vicious criticism. "You've been deluding yourself and him for the past four years! He has family, too! One that's ALIVE! Or did you actually forget this isn't his real age?!"
The ouji growls angrily, "I WON'T have you talking that way to me! No matter how much you think you've grown!"
His son turns back to him and demands, "Fine, just answer me this. Do you want to spend the rest of your life in this forest?"
"Of course not."
"Then PLEASE, get out of here while you still can! You've been away from everyone else for so long! It scares me how much you two have changed! You were only gone for four years and I couldn't recognize Goku at all when I saw him! And he called me a half-blood! A half-blood for crying out loud! Even you didn't call me that!"
"....."
Trunks groans, "Fine! Do what you want to! I don't care! I'm going to try and get out of here in the morning anyway! But listen to me, if I can find you out in the middle of nowhere then what's stopping Blade?"
Determined not to contribute another word in the discussion, Vegeta says, "You can take my bed tonight. I won't be needing it." Then he goes outside to fetch Goku.
His son sighs, "How could I have forgotten how stubborn you are?" He looks around the cabin, "Now I wonder where's Dad's bed?"
About half an hour later, Goku tips his bed over onto its side, screaming at its current occupant, "GET OUT OF MY BED, YOU LOUSY BUM!!"
****
A/N: .....Yeah, they definitely don't like each other that much.
