Twisted Fate

by Hitchhiker1

One little slip can make everything go horribly wrong for Goku before he arrives on Yardrat VK YAOI

3. Reunions

Chapter 2

Warnings 4 this chappie-

well...pretty much the usual! Plus extra special added extras: Frieza bashing, extreme profanity as only saiyan royalty can manage, high-pitched Bulma, vague suggestion of attempted necrophilia, all out war, and two very confused and shaken up demi-saiyans.

Disclaimer: No, I still haven't gotten the rights to their souls. But damnit! I know i left them around here somewhere (stares forlornly at hideous mess bedroom has become)...

Sorry if the formatting's a little off, for some reason ffnet now won't let me do double " : " of those, so direct-thoughts-within-a-person's-head are now in this kinda format:

:thinkingthinkingthinking:

And my page-breaks/change of perspective thingies are now:

ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

cuz i can't do lotsa "#" (mutters something inaudible but obviously extremely rude about ffnet's formatting bugs)

It's a pity i didn't get this finished sooner, but i couldn't find a suitable break point for the two chapters so i just kept on writing!

heh. so a little (coughalotcough) late, but about twice the length it should be so there's an upside as well.

okay, everybody strapped in? Here we go!

oooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

:…well, use it or lose it I suppose, and I really don't think the big guy was using his head for the little stunt he just pulled…Kind of an improvement to be honest…:

Trunks's callous thoughts broke in on the white noise his brain was stuffed with. Kami, he'd been looking right at the two and he hadn't even seen Goku's hand move (let alone the split-second flash of panic that crossed the saiyan's face); just a flash of light and -Hey presto!- instant decap. hold the horn…

:…at least now I don't have to see his ugly mug leering at me anymore. Eurgh. That was one creepy bastard:

But all that was beside the point. What really had Trunks gaping was not the act itself, Kami knows he'd seen worse, but rather who had just committed it.

Trunks's stunned brain had now overcome the initial shock, churned over and kicked itself back to life, bringing him to the realisation of one very important fact: Son Goku, earth's almighty saviour and all-round nice guy, had just killed someone, violently, for no apparent reason.

The man his mother had always preached was a veritable saint, who wouldn't hurt a fly unless he absolutely had to, who always gave everyone, even the bad guys, even his violent prince of a father, a second chance; this man had just blown someone's head off with no more warning than a split-second rise in his ki.

He was beginning to doubt his mother's words. How could this be the man she so happily pointed to in dog-eared photos? The one Trunks had heard so many stories about that he felt he knew him as well as an older brother. There was obviously a resemblance, and it turns out his mother hadn't been exaggerating when she said her dead friend was powerful, but the subtle differences made the man below Trunk's feet seem like a complete stranger.

This was Son Goku. If only because the ki felt achingly similar to how Gohan's had, once you sifted through all the anger that masked it anyway. And yet….there were slight physical differences to the man he'd been expecting, and now that Trunks could see the saiyan's face clearly he noticed, even stranger than just the peculiar costume he had on, that Goku's face seemed thinner and paler than what he'd expected. There were strange short patches in hair he had only ever seen as thick and healthy. Dark bags weighed heavy under eyes used to dancing with joy. Eyes now framed by fiercely glaring brows. And he seemed to be somehow…gaunter? That wasn't quite the right word …, he couldn't quite place how there was something missing in his eyes…

Yet the man standing below him was still recognisably Son Goku, it was still basically the same familiar face of a hundred smiling photos, even if the expressions on it weren't. This was indeed the man Trunks had crossed the timestream to talk to and warn…

:Ok, so this was the guy I've come to see. Kinda. But how the hell did he get here? Goku is supposed to be at least 3 hours from Earth in deep space! Maybe gaping as he passes Jupiter or napping happily in his little pod and dreaming of returning to his wife's home-cooked riceballs or fishing or eating some more or...or something! Happy, air-headed non-worries I'm supposed to put a boot up so this Earth has a chance to survive:

This was not how things were supposed to be.

He shook his head slightly trying to deny what he knew was the only explanation.

Something had gone wrong, horribly wrong.

Either in his ship when he was crossing the time boundaries, possibly because of his crossing in the first place, or perhaps earlier in this world's timeline. He might've somehow found another reality instead of the past of his own. His mother had once said how whole universes are separated by no more than a butterfly's wing…that sometimes a single breath could alter destiny beyond belief.

His mind boggled trying to figure out just how he'd managed to fuck this up… he'd put all the co-ordinates in just as his mother had instructed him, he'd checked all his machinery just as she'd said, … he'd done everything his mother had told him, even taken the gum outta his mouth before he left… what had happened? He beat back the beginnings of a headache -time travel was a really confusing hobby- and looked back down to the battle-field-to-be.

The familiar stranger was now…smiling…at Frieza. Again, that wasn't quite the right word, but he couldn't seem to find a better alternative to the display of teeth on the man's face. Trunks felt himself shiver at the coldness in that look. The smile touched the man's black eyes with something Trunks was reluctant to name.

He had seen that same expression in his own time. More times than he'd have liked to. But it seemed odd that it appeared almost as at home on this normally cheerful-visage as it did on the bloodied face of a psychotic android.

:Kami… Trunks suppressed another shiver…

…What the fuck happened in this timeline:

oooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

oooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

Frieza was, to put it simply, not having a good time.

In fact, since his personal surgeons had carelessly let Goku die on the operating table; resulting in their immediate dismissal to the next dimension, things had been going downhill for the diminutive despot.

He'd ordered the operation to go ahead when waiting for his toy to become available had become just too tedious; the whole damn project had been taking too long! He'd wanted to have some more fun with his little saiyan. Of course Frieza knew the procedure was risky, knew the monkey was weakened when he'd ordered it, but it had never really crossed his mind that the man would actually die from it.

Heh, a super-saiyan dying, not gloriously at the hands of his enemies in battle, but because of a little needle. Frieza would have laughed at the irony when he was told, if he hadn't been so monumentally pissed.

Goku's inconsiderate death put a crimp in Frieza's recreational plans. He was no good to him DEAD now was he? Especially when the doctors took that moment to become proficient for once and had already disposed of the body. Baka surgeons.

After that Frieza had begun the boringly arduous task of re-instating his reputation; ruthlessly searching the galaxy for any beings that might have witnessed or heard of, of Namek, and what happened there and eliminating them. All he had left to do was come here on a nice little stress-free vacation and dispose of the earthlings who knew of his humiliating defeat. And, what the heck, the rest of their stinking planet as well.

But, noooooo.

He couldn't have things go his way now could he? First his father had to tag along and give, "advice" all the way here, annoying the hell out of his son and making Frieza take several little trips to the technology labs.Partly because his father would go nowhere near that strangely lit area of the laboratories, but mainly to try and have his hearing implants adjusted to tune out certain paternal vocal frequencies.

Then this little pastel punk turns up and decimates his standing forces, then the brat turns out to be some kind of hybrid super-saiyan. Why were all these saiyans suddenly jumping outta the woodwork? And why in the cosmos were they all after him? …Oh yeah. That planet destroying habit he had…

In all honesty, Frieza had almost had a heart-attack when the kid had transformed. Some important safety valve within his electronically supplemented brain jumped dangerously close to the breaking point. Only the quick re-assessment of the boy's features calmed him. This wasn't Goku. It couldn't possibly be Goku. Goku was dead.

But those eyes…the teal eyes reminded him too strongly of his last defeat. Of the waking nightmares he'd been having ever since he'd found himself on his father's ship with metal in place of his bones. He saw a dead man where this living boy stood and glared -in some oddly well-known way- and he couldn't stand it. Couldn't stand the mocking in those blazing blue eyes and couldn't stand the fact that even in death Goku was still finding some way to come back and humiliate him.

Which is why he might have lost control.

Just a little.

His momentary confusion of the boy's identity was quickly swept aside for all out rage. Which led to a lot of ki-blasts, cursing and not a lot of the now-golden-haired kid dying.

Stupid Monkey.

So it was about this time that Frieza decided he'd use his favourite planet-destroying attack on the little whelp. Maybe a bit like overkill, but fuck it, he was always up for the lightshow this thing gave him. And the sudden explosion of the entire planet might convince his father to stay home next time.

Anyone who could stand being so nauseatingly close to Frieza at this point in time would have heard a string of mumbled curses as he gathered energy for the imminent attack, mumblings that went somewhere along the lines of, "…uck's sake…not a hatchling… baka saiyans…can take care…m'self… baka father…baka monkeys…", the sort of mumbling that would make such a strong-stomached person doubt the efficiency of Frieza's patched-up brain…

Frieza's brain was, as has been mentioned: patched up. Quite badly really. The entire right side of Frieza's head had been lost to Namek's explosion. Almost 40 of his brain tissue, one eye, one ear, and a whole chunk of the ice-jinn's all-ready debateable sanity. The technicians that had reconstructed Frieza from the wreckage of a body they'd found floating through space had done a commendable job, but they were only mortals.

When for the second time in 10 minutes Frieza saw his most dreaded nightmare before his eyes he had one tiny moment of delusion where he was convinced the golden-monkey-brat had spawned a twin. Then the same second-glance that had confirmed the brat's identity as decidedly NOT Goku broke the bad news that, well, actually, this one decidedly WAS.

This allowed one fundamental flaw in Frieza's patched-up body to jump to the fore; the fact his brain could not handle large surges of emotional energy between the two halves of his head. The sort of emotional shock that almost pushed his brain into meltdown when the kid had transformed now doubled, tripled at the sight of his assumed-dead nemesis coalescing out of thin air in front of him.

Fuses blew, subtle circuitry shorted out, the unequivocal wave of electrical emotional signals crashing through both parts of Frieza's brain were simply too much and with a momentary "fzzz" sound, Frieza's brain locked up like a cheap laptop in wailing protest.

Son Goku, the real one this time, right in front of him, alive, glowering and without a ki-restraint in sight…

: OH SHIIIIiiiii…. Please press F1 to continue…:

Time passed; hours, minutes, it didn't matter as Frieza wasn't aware of it. He wasn't aware of much really, incapable of even simple defense, his body locked into it's standing position, the only flicker of movement a slight twitch in his left eye.

Frieza's brain unfortunately managed to reboot itself in the short time it took for the spectre to kill his father.

He saw in painful detail the near-comical flop of his sire's body before the saiyan's feet.

Could've sworn he saw a moment of shock, or…repulsion?...on his ex-pet's face, before the once expressionate eyes became opaque and unreadable as marble. He saw how his face stayed hard as rock; before cracking so forcedly into a humourless smile. And how his previously deadlit eyes showed a blaze of cold emotion to match that bitter grin.

Of course, the fact his brain had decided to come back online at such an inopportune moment meant he would feel everything that followed in clear technologically-enhanced spikes of pain.

Baka computers.

: Goku's alive. The saiyan is back. NOnonononono, he can't be! He died…I've got to be imagining this. I'll wake up soon with half a dozen quacks crowding round me trying to fix whatever it is that's short-circuited in my brain. I'll blast them all to hell and everything will be fine. It'll all be fine. Just fine. He's d..dead. He died….died on the operating table during the extrac…. wait

Wait…:

Connections were made tentatively amongst the mess in Frieza's head: had he ever seen the body? No. He'd never seen the body. He'd never seen the body…

HE'D NEVER SEEN THE BODY

….he'd just believed the surgeons -had wanted to believe the surgeons- when they'd told him. Goku had steadily been resisting the ki-inhibitors before the operation had gone ahead; it'd been obvious he was becoming a threat again. He'd been pissed, yes, but had almost wanted to believe that threat had been neutralised so efficiently…

But the fact remains: He never saw the body.

Oh those little fucks. If he ever got out of here those fucking doctors were in for a lesson in the meaning of pain! No, wait…damn, he'd already blasted them to Hell for letting the saiyan die in the first place. Shit. Shit shit shit shit…..and this particular, "ghost" looked very solid and slightly unhinged. How the hell had he survived anyway? How had the saiyan gotten here? But more importantly, how the hell was he gonna get away from him?

Frieza saw Goku's cold gaze sharpen and a tremor moved unbidden through his body.

He'd seen such looks many times in his life. You can't go around blowing up people's villages and cities and planets without gaining a few mortal enemies; but this was the first time he'd ever seen his death in the eyes of someone with the power to actually carry it out.

He was in deep shit.

At one point the man before him would have forgiven anyone of anything, Frieza's continued existence was testament to the fact. But Frieza had seen that compassionate belief gutter and die in the short year he'd had keeping of the saiyan. Had finally beaten the notion out of him. Shredded the conviction that there was some good in everybody to an unidentifiable mess. Torn compassion viciously from his heart and left the remains bleeding on the floor.

But, something was…different.

Off.

There was definitely something off about the saiyan in front of him. Yes, he saw murder in those black eyes. Yes, he remembered just what he had done to deserve that very look, but…he didn't remember ever seeing that look of defeat in the man's eyes, didn't remember ever putting that look there. Goku had remained defiant right up to the last time he had sent the man unconscious to his hard cell floor…

Yes, Goku had definitely changed since the last time Frieza had seen him. He scanned the saiyan, pushing aside any rising emotions to actually look. He was paler in some way that had nothing to do with his naturally porcelain skin. His eyes held shadows darker than the very blackness of a saiyan's inherently pitch eyes.

He was…. broken.

Something had snapped…something, something Frieza had never been able to touch had been…broken. Something had finally beaten the saiyan before him.

Frieza had the barest inkling he knew what might have caused such a monumental shift, he had rudimentary knowledge of the nature of saiyan bonding, enough to guess at the vulnerability present in the saiyan before him. And a plan began forming at the back of his brain on how exactly he could exploit this new weakness.

Yep, you guessed it folks, he still hasn't learnt. Still the same Frieza, he's gonna try and get outta this.

Frieza may have been a sneak, a horrific mass-murderer on the sort of scale that isn't even possible to comprehend on Earth, a freak and one of the kinkiest bastards even the sex-crazed moons of Pa'orn had ever seen; but he was stubborn as the proverbial ass. This sleazy little changeling was the essence of ice-jin traits in many ways; one being he abhorred not getting his own way; two being that if he had a target locked into his brain he would not give up on that idea until hell froze over and Beelzebub personally handed him a pair of ice-skates.

No amount of mechanical implants could change it. He was pig-headed.

No set back or obvious mistake would ever alter it. He was ice-jin from the top of his repaired head to the end of his mechanical tail.

No amount of pain or beating could dislodge the fact he still considered himself this glowering monkey's better (and the rest of the universe's while we're on the subject).

And no matter how powerful the saiyan before him became, Frieza knew he had one over on him. One thing that was a true ace up his sleeve. Because Frieza was now sure that this great agony that had so changed the saiyan before him was the same thing that had led him to believe the man had died months before. One little thing…

Or rather, one little person.

ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

Why was there never ever a camera around when you needed one?

Goku knew a Kodak moment when he saw one, and the look Frieza's face seemed to have become stuck on was something he wished he could capture and cherish for all of time.

Although fully appreciating the look of petrified confusion Frieza's face seemed to have become stuck on, Goku was starting to feel the beginnings of nausea he always got when in close proximity to the slimy maggot, something that had developed within his first week of being stuck in the vile creature's presence. Gods he hated this feeling. Like a nest of snakes had recently hatched in his gut and weren't exactly happy about it. He was just gonna get this over with… was going to get what he came here for; revenge.

Sweet, sweet revenge.

And then he was gonna get back to Yardrat. No-assing around. No hanging about. No more unnecessarily expended energy.

Well…

…maybe he should make the lizard squirm a little. Just a little. There was no doubt he deserved a taste of what Goku had been put through…

Frieza's first tentative movements jerked him back from his half-thoughts on which body parts to remove first,

:y'know I really should finish the job I started on Namek…maybe I should start with that one remaining arm, 'be rude to leave him all lopsided like that and all…:

Some say that the best sense for recall is scent. Our olfactory senses, arguable the most primal, are linked near- directly to certain memories in our brains.

The smell of suntan lotion is lodged in the minds of a million earth children as the essence of summer.

Scent was the first key identifier amongst saiyan blood, no babe could ever forget their birth-parents' scent.

And for reasons he could never adequately explain, anything pine-needle fresh would recall perfectly the quadratic formula in Gohan's confused mind no matter the situation.

But in this case hearing was a powerful enough sense to send Goku hurtling back to a time he couldn't breathe for thinking about. Before Goku could begin the systematic vengeance he'd spent hours of his rarely coherent thoughts on, Frieza opened his disgusting painted mouth. Maybe to yell some insult at him one last time, maybe to vainly plead for his pathetic life, he didn't know; he wasn't, couldn't, listen. The sound of this mechanical monster's voice, his slimey, deceitful, feminine voice, was like a bulldozer to every mental barrier Goku had managed to patch together other the past year. The thin walls within his mind tore like so much wet paper at the mere sound of his tormentor's voice, a voice he hadn't heard for months anywhere but his nightmares.

Goku's eyes widened unseeingly as he was dragged back into the mess his mind had become. The walls in his mind collapsed, and without them, the chaos threatened to drown him once more.

Memories raised themselves out of the dark hiding places he'd banished them to. Memories he'd only just been able to force back down when he dealt with the whole King-Cold's-two-feet-shorter-all-of-a-sudden-oops slip-up, but now they slinked eagerly out of the darkness of his subconscious, moving to the epicentre of his mind's eye with blinding speed at the prospect of biting, shredding, tearing at those tender parts of his sanity that had scarcely been rebuilt…

Oh Gods it hurt. Hurt right down deep. It undermined and attacked some important pillar of his consciousness he hadn't even known was so vulnerable before this whole ordeal. Goku barely kept his knees from buckling while the memories danced mockingly to the forefront of his attention, shaking loose their chains as his suppressed demons threatened to wreak havoc across his psyche once more. His hands clenched tightly of their own accord, he could feel himself losing it, slipping, crumbling.

He helplessly replayed the blood, the pain, the tears, every slash, every bruise, every moment of humiliation and torn flesh… but none of it hurt as much, nothing even compared, to that one instant he awoke on Yardrat to find himself so horribly excruciatingly alone.

He screamed.

Images and feelings that had been firmly strapped down and contained now ripped freely through his tattered defences. Gouging new scars over the old in the core of his mind. He felt his control slipping over his body and his power, felt the frozen smile on his face wither away until he just threw his head back and howled.

He screamed for all the things this monster had stolen; his innocence, his sanity, horror free nights, the tiny little… no, don't think about that, don't, don't… no no NO…WHY DOES IT STILL HURT SO MUCH?... Power rushed to his call, trying to fill a void that had been so recently torn in his body and mind, trying to replace what had been stolen. Blazing gold usurped the butchered raven locks, eyes bleaching to a colder blue than the universe had yet seen. The planet itself began to shake in sympathy of the super-saiyans desperate struggle.

But Goku was hardly aware of it.

His eyes remained wide and blank to the world.

He couldn't see anything but his memories.

Couldn't feel the hot tears streaming down his face.

Couldn't feel the warning heat building in his muscles and the air around him as his ki grew steadily beyond that which he could control. Couldn't feel anything but the pain.

But still he heard Frieza's voice - not the desperate words the ice-jin now seemed so intent on saying, not the gasp of surprise as the changeling was thrown back by Goku's igniting power, but the haunting laughter that had been the last thing he'd heard before he'd awoken on Yardrat.

It all swirled through his mind, tearing into his psyche, confusing his sense of where he was, of why it all mattered anymore. Even as he screamed he was vaguely aware that a part of his mind was truly buckling under the pressure, knew it and couldn't stop it. Knew he couldn't care enough to stop it anymore. Why bother? He couldn't do it; there simply wasn't enough power to fill this awful howling emptiness. Before this started he'd never realised just how huge the part of his soul that he shared was, couldn't have realised how vulnerable he was when it was so unnaturally violated. How could this one loss have disrupted everything else within his mind? How could he be so, so weak as to be brought down by this damage he couldn't even see? He'd wanted to fight it, had needed to fix it at some point, but how the fuck was he supposed to do anything, to even think straight with this aching bareness within him?

He almost forgot what he was here to do in the terrible despair that swept through him at that thought -nothing would make the ache go away. He'd lost something irreplaceable.

Nothing could undo what that freak had done to him. Nothing would heal the unnatural black rips that had been shredded through his mind. And nothing would ever return what he had taken away. What HE had taken away. What FRIEZA had forced upon him and then ruthlessly torn away. It was all FRIEZA'S FAULT! This pain, this gods-awful pain…

:HE DID THIS TO ME:

Gods, if he could make him feel even a fraction of the pain he was feeling right now….

The thought hadn't even finished forming and he was right before the lizard lord, a knee buried deep in the white fleshed gut. He didn't bother to hold back a smile at the choked scream this caused. The senseless sensation of motion as he backhanded the freak to the ground momentarily drowning out the torture confined within his mind. Quieting the demons and soothing the ragged holes in his consciousness like a fine opiate. The raging power that had been building without his conscious thought spiked with his movements, barely contained within his skin now he had a target and direction. With such a satisfying punchbag as the outlet of all that terrible pain the freak had caused him his very bones felt alight.

He'd have Frieza screaming for mercy before he was finished. Screw ending it quickly and getting back to Yardrat. He was gonna pay him back tenfold for everything he'd done…

:fuck mercy. Fuck compassion. Frieza is gonna scream all the way to the lowest levels of hell…:

oooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

Vegeta took one look at the saiyan/ice-jin stand-off below him, scrunched his eyes firmly closed, turned his face to the unsuspecting blue sky and swore for almost 7 minutes straight before he'd repeated even a single curse.

There are very few people left in the galaxy that can still manage such a skill -especially at the speed the last saiyan prince was managing to spit them out- and was a true testament to a childhood wasted blowing up those weaker and with a larger vocabulary than himself. The fact that 98 of the expletives leaving his mouth were in languages these humans couldn't bend their weak throats around, let alone understand, was the only thing that kept the blue harpy from screeching at him; seeing as roughly 100 of the offensive words pouring so fluently out of Vegeta were aimed at her friend the $£& bakayarou who had just &$#$& well appeared out of nowhere onto the battle field and was now giving that &#$£?& Frieza the &$£$&-kicking he had wanted to for the past two &#€$-£$£# decades.

((a/n, I'd like to take this moment to explain that I'm not shy about swear words. They serve a very useful purpose and I'm pretty sure that Vegeta's head would explode if he didn't let off steam this way every now and then, that or there'd be many many more cases of genocide in his close proximity. The only reason these words have been put into weird symbolly-thingies is that I haven't found the English equivalent of the sounds coming outta his mouth. O.O; ))

This was not the first time the baka had evoked this reaction in him, but certainly the first time he had allowed himself to give in to the unadulterated feelings of rage and just, unfairness, the £$& baka seemed to carry with him everywhere; as palpable as the man's scent and in the same way almost a physical presence to saiyan senses.

"FUCKIT!"

–there, he felt a little better now. His power level had been steadily rising during his rant, he squashed it back down; they were supposed to be incognito till an opportunity presented itself to jump the snarling saiyan down there and knock his fucking head off. At least, that was his plan, the weaklings around him were probably thinking more along the lines of coming out when it looked like Kakkarot had stopped going nuclear.

The bad thing about devoting one's entire attention to cursing a person into the next dimension was it hardly ever worked, usually turning out to be a waste of breath.

(( a/n, sorry to butt in again, but it should be noted that it is possible to kill someone this way: though personally, Vegeta has only managed the impressive feat a handful of times, and has recommended just blasting the bakas as it's much more effective. Sorry, no more interruptions, back to the show…))

That; and you might miss some important developments whilst you were so absorbed- very dangerous on the battlefield, but in this case a fucking shame as he would've loved to see King Cold's head blown from his shoulders.

A small smile crept onto his face as he caught sight of the golden death below him, watching the almost poetic dance of pain the blazing saiyan weaved around his new punching bag

:….heh, at least I'm not missing the main show…:

… even if it wasn't himself doing the hitting, it was still gratifying on so many levels to see his former master in such a state of panic that he was launching energy attacks every which way and not a single one landed on target. Heh… the bastard was sorely outclassed, Kakarotto was beating him to a nice bloody pulp…

Hn. Excellent technique really. Kakkarot was causing huge damage each time he touched the slimy little bastard, yet Frieza was still recognisably conscious and obviously feeling every single hit, if the screams drifting vaguely to his sensitive ears were anything to go by. Nice. It usually took years to perfect the art of getting that kind of pain out of an opponent without killing them. Wonder were the baka picked it up? From the astonished looks he noticed from the assembled, "Z Senshi" they had never seen their dear Goku behave in such a way.

Interesting…

: fuck this. I'm a Saiyan Prince, I will not hide behind a pile of rocks while there is a battle going on. Besides…if I don't move soon, Kakkarot will have finished off Frieza, and then I'll never be able to show the planet-destroying bastard just what I think of him:

Vegeta was just gathering the energy to take off when he noticed the whelp -the super saiyan whelp who'd been giving Frieza a run for his money- land clumsily on a rock pillar near their little group as he dodged a stray ki-blast. His heart constricted slightly…the kid was no where near old enough to have been born on Vejita-sei; could more of his people have survived the explosion?

:Goddamn…Must have been desperate though. To mate with something with that kinda colour scheme would require dire need or a lot of pan-galactic-gargle-blasters (1)…:

His hopeful wonderings were partly shoved to the back of his mind by anger. This boy was yet another blow to his pride. First Kakkarot, a third class peasant had beaten him to becoming a super-saiyan, and now this- this child had surpassed him as well! Some little mongrel punk! There were two, count'em, TWO legendary super-saiyans in the same millennia, AND NEITHER OF THEM WAS HIM!

UNACCEPTABLE! These konoyaros didn't seem to realise he was their prince, that they should all get down on their knees and offer him their lives for being so audacious as to better his own level!

He was beside the brat before he could think of what he was doing, gripping him by the throat and lifting him a good foot off the ground in front of him. The brat may be a super-saiyan, but his battle instincts were appalling when not powered up. The kid hadn't even turned at Vegeta's rapid approach, preferring to stare avidly as Kakkarot turned Frieza into a purple smear on the desert floor. If Vegeta'd been intending to kill, the boy would've been a bloody heap on the ground right now.

The thought had crossed his mind actually, it was very attractive idea…but no; business before pleasure. Info now, whelp-beating later.

Eyes he might have found familiar if they hadn't been such an odd colour stared down at his angry face as he addressed the boy dangling in his hand.

"Who are you, what are you doing here, and how the fuck are you a super-saiyan? Explain. Now. Or I will snap your neck like a twig." Vegeta's voice was low and dangerous, deceptive of the conflict he found surging in his gut. With the boy actually here, in his hand, he realised he'd been distracted. He didn't have time for this! He wanted to go fight Frieza! But he also wanted to beat this little shit into the ground! But most of all, he wanted to pound Kakarotto into the turf until his hair stopped that annoying gold shiny thing that showed everyone just how far he'd been surpassed by the third-class. He also really, really wanted to continue his rant about the baka…there were so many wonderful comments forming in his mind about certain people and their shininess. But first he had to know how…

"VEGETA! Put the poor kid down! He's just been fighting Frieza he doesn't need you on his case as well you asshole!"

Oh Great.

Just what he needed.

The Onna.

One of only two people on the planet with vocal chords capable of making saiyan ears bleed. And then be able to keep the aural torture up for minutes at a time without any apparent need for breath. This delicate flower was skidding gracefully down the mesa slope on her butt, yelling all the way, aimed straight for them. Oh happy joy fucking joy.

"….can't you leave anyone alone for one minute? You are the most conceited, annoying bastard I have ever had the misfortune to have to meet and if you think for one minute mister that you're coming back to Capsule Corp after this you can just…." Ok, that would probably be physically impossible even if he did still have his tail.

Or could find that many sheep…

The kid blushed so hard at that particular titbit that he turned red from where Vegeta had his hand wrapped round his throat right up to the roots of his disgustingly purple hair.

Impeccable self control kept the Prince from doing two things that would have showed embarrassing weakness: rolling his eyes at his luck, and wincing at the terrible assault on his sensitive hearing. Instead he tightened his grip on the purple kid, who seemed to have become transfixed by the atrocity the onna had somehow tricked him into wearing, and: interrupting an interesting and varied tirade on why his existence was an insult to sentient life the universe over, barked straight back at the annoying woman.

"Onna, if you don't close your trap I'll do it for you, then I will return to your precious CapCorp whenever I damn well feel like it, and incinerate every article of footwear you own. This brat is somehow one of my subjects. Therefore this is none of your concern. Go home and cook something, the battlefield is no place for a pathetic, helpless woman." The Onna, amazingly to the rest of the baka brigade following her down the slope; shut up.

Vegeta let a small smirk creep onto his face, he had discovered during his first week's stay at the CC that physical threats had little to no effect on the shrill chikyuu-jin. However, so much as mention the words, "ki-fry" and, "your wardrobe" in the same sentence and she was quite easy to manage.

His attention remained fixed on the purple haired brat half-choking before him, even though he then slid his eyes sideways to fix the perma-smirk at a certain grimacing Greenbean.

"Besides onna, your damn screeching is upsetting the poor Namek" It was an unfortunate moment for ol'Pointy Ears to arrive at their impromptu gathering, he knew the Beanpole had much more sensitive hearing than himself and was silently impressed Greenboy was still standing after the onna's shrieking. The child in his hand had flinched slightly as well…so definitely saiyan ears, though the kid was still clearly a halfling. A full blood would have suffered quite a bit more. Though he'd never admit such a thing out loud.

"…well runt? I don't have all day y'know." He gave the kid a shake for emphasis and returned to glaring into those hideously blue eyes.

ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

Trunks was slightly surprised when he felt a strong hand settle resolutely around his throat. He'd been kinda distracted watching Goku beat on Frieza, trying to catch whatever it was he was yelling at the white-maggot over the ice-jin's screams of pain, and dodging the wild attacks Frieza was launching at the super saiyan in a vain attempt to keep him at bay.

It was after one of the Frieza's less well aimed shots that he found he had drifted over to the area his mother said she and her friends had been hiding in. It had never occurred to him that he should watch out for attacks from their direction as well. Heck, weren't they supposed to be the good guys?

Then he felt a steel grip closing over his windpipe. What else could go wrong today? He looked down and caught sight of a face he had pored over for hours at a time in sparse photos…. had to ask hadn't he?

This is my father?….pink? PINK? and where's the rest of him? He's almost as short as mom!..:

Was no-one in this dimension what he had expected them to be?

And why was nothing on this trip going how it was supposed to?

:oh jeez…Mom's gonna kill me when I get home! Not only have I revealed myself to her past friends, when I clearly didn't need to if the beating Goku's giving Frieza is anything to go by, but my father, my father, is now glaring at me like he wants to remove my spleen with a spatula. How could this day get any worse? Okay, gotta stay calm and deal with dad before that vein in his forehead ruptures or he actually DOES break my neck…:

Trunks's overly confused thoughts were scattered by a particularly vicious shake from the man holding him. His dad may not be a super-saiyan but he was a lot stronger than Trunks had thought he'd be. It was kinda backwards, but the son felt a sharp flash of pride for his father. He wished he could stick around and get to know this man… Gohan had told him how Goku would take him fishing in the summers and tobogganing in the winters, he smiled at the idea of himself and his dad having a quiet day fishing by a cool river somewhere…

"WHAT are you grinning about brat! Answer me!

-WHO"

(shake)

"-ARE"

(shake)

"-YOU?"

(Double shake for emphasis) Trunks's stomach, already queasy from the rollercoaster of time travelling, was beginning to suffer a bit with all the back and forth motions going on, he was starting to think seriously about powering up and breaking free, no matter how mad this was sure to make his explosive father. He was suddenly hit with the feeling that Vegeta wasn't the sort of guy who'd be patient enough for fishing…

Luckily a calm deep voice intervened before his dad decided to choke him properly or Trunks embarrassed his father by blowing chunks on him: Piccolo.

"Vegeta, how do you expect him to answer your questions if he can't breathe? Put him down, I'm sure we're all curious about how exactly he managed to fight Frieza as a super-saiyan. I thought you and, heh, Kakkarot were supposed to be the last of your kind?"

Despite the mocking he'd layered into his pronunciation of Goku's saiyan name, the composed words of the Namek seemed to have some effect on the prince, as the choke-hold he had on Trunks's neck loosened and was abruptly gone, leaving the purple haired demi to fall hard onto the unforgiving desert ground.

"Talk brat. Do not continue to try my patience." Vegeta raised his voice slightly over a particularly large explosion from the direction of the Ice-jin's space ship. His gaze grew momentarily preoccupied before snapping back to attention with an even more furious glare for the boy in the dust at his feet.

Trunks didn't take his eyes from the short-tempered royal's face, despite the occasionally shaking ground and distractingly high energy he now knew as Goku's. Partly because he didn't dare to, partly because he wouldn't back down from the man's challenging gaze; but mainly because he was fascinated by this man who would one day be his father.

He stood slowly, picking himself up very carefully...
-When faced with a wild animal you make no sudden moves.
The same is true of pissed off royalty.

He felt the group's eyes on him as he dusted off his slightly shaking hands on dustier black jeans and straightened his favourite jacket. He was being stupid. He shouldn't feel so nervous about talking to these guys, but all the stories his mother had told him of the, "Earth's Special Forces" came back to him as he allowed his attention to wander around the assembled warriors.

There was Tien, looking at him with suspicion in all three slanted eyes.

He spotted Chaotzou floating behind the triclops like the small freaky shadow his mom had always said he was.

Yamcha, the scar-faced bandit who could easily have been his father.

The short guy must be Krillin, the little ex-monk Bulma always counted in her top 3 friends and life-long annoyances.

There was no mistaking the great green Piccolo, the once-demon his mother had never really trusted since he'd so gleefully killed her best friend.

And staring curiously at him from the namekian's side: Gohan. Still a small boy, but who he knew would grow to be a great man someday. His eyes rested on the oddly-dressed kid for a second, wondering if Vegeta had forced him to wear such a saiyan-looking battle-outfit or if Gohan had inherited Goku's, um… "interesting" dress sense, before redirecting his attention to his parents.

His mother stood with her arms crossed, glaring with all her considerable might at the saiyan warrior before her. She was wearing a striped dress so short it almost made him blush again. Weird to think his mom was young once… but the ferocious scowl she was directing at his future father was one of many that would leave tiny wrinkles around her undiminished blue eyes in years to come. He almost smiled. She always said she'd hated his royal pain-in-the-tush's guts. Both for his attitude and the premature aging she placed squarely on his shoulders. His gaze returned to the rump-pain.

The pink shirted rump-pain; the pink shirted rump-pain who seemed to have been quietly seething to himself whilst Trunks had taken in their assembling company. He was waiting for an answer wasn't he? Oh well, here goes….

"I…I can't tell you"

Luckily, "Pastel Boy", as he was already thought of in Vegeta's head, had figured his Father wouldn't appreciate this answer and caught the fist that flew at his face.

But only just.

"Vegeta!"

It seems even the threat of charred shoes couldn't keep Bulma's tongue under wraps for long. Trunks watched with a fear born of long experience as his mother stomped, hands clenched into fists by her sides, over to his father. All the while breathing steadily and deeply through flared nostrils. Not, as the casual observer might suspect, to calm herself and get her infamous temper under control: but to make sure she had enough oxygen for when she started screaming.

His father actually disengaged his fist from Trunks's grip and turned around stiffly to glare straight back at the approaching woman. Probably recognising a real threat when he saw it.

Trunks wanted to warn Vegeta that facing Bulma when she was like this was really not a good idea. One thing Trunks had learned over the years of living with his temperamental mother was that when she had that look in her eyes, and was hyperventilating like that, he was in a shitload of trouble. There was nothing left to do but take cover and hope nothing important got broke.

That, and the fact she was unholy loud when she was pissed. Trunks managed to cover his ears just as his would-be-Mother let loose.

"YOU UNGRATEFUL KAMI-DAMNED LITTLE TROLL! WHAT THE FUCKING HELL IS YOUR PROBLEM? I HAVE HALF A MIND TO SLAP YOU YOU LITTL-"

"WHO'RE YOU CALLING LITTLE YOU DEMENTED SCREECHING HARPY! ONE MORE WORD OUT OF THE SHRIEKING CAKEHOLE YOU CALL A MOUTH AND I BLOW THIS ENTIRE FUCKING PLANET TO THE NEXT DIMENSION!"

"YEAH GO AHEAD AND TRY IT BRAINIAC! YOU'D GO WITH US SO WHY DON'T YOU JUST SHOVE IT UP YOUR-"

Trunks was starting to feel, well, kinda glad he didn't have much experience with "family" life.

His parents were now less than 3 feet apart screaming insults and threats right in each other's faces. How the hell had he been the result of this kinda relationship? His mom had her eyes screwed shut and was screaming words at his father that would make a sailor blush crimson. Vegeta was slowly losing control over his carefully suppressed ki and was starting to glow slightly around the edges … This was so not good.

Trunks took a few steps back and cast his eyes over the rest of the Z fighters again. Apart from Piccolo who was clutching his ears and groaning in agony, they were all staring with rapt attention at the scene made by the Dignified Saiyan Prince and the Dainty Mechanical Genius. It had quickly lowered to simple name calling….

"NAUSEATING SHRIEKING HARRIDAN!"

"PSYCHOPATHIC LITTLE MONKEY!"

"NARCISSISTIC KONOYARRO!"

"ANAL-RETENTIVE PIG!"

"REPULSIVE WENCH!"

"EGOTISTIC DICK!"

"BRAIN-DEAD!"

"HALF-PINT!"

"FAT-ASS!"

"FREAK!"

"BITCH!"

"JERK!"

"SLUT!"

"ASS!"

This was getting dangerous, (he knew it was only a matter of time before his mother started throwing things) and giving him a headache, though it was interesting to note Bulma was freely using words and phrases she'd expressly forbidden him to even think. Kami, they were getting even louder! How was that even possible? Definitely time to retreat and regroup.

The purple haired teen kept his hands clamped firmly over his ears -for all the good that did- as he performed an overlooked departure behind a nearby rock outcropping. He was relieved to find the noise level slightly lowered behind the basalt shield and cautiously released his ears.

Thank Kami, now he could at least think.

:I am so dead. If my father doesn't get me for insurrection against the high throne of Vejitasei, Mom'll decapitate me the moment she finds out just how badly I messed up the timeline… that is, assuming, my head doesn't implode from the nuclear temper-tantrums my parental units are throwing, and the planet doesn't shake itself apart from Goku's energy. Y'know now that I can actually think about it…Perhaps being able to think about it isn't such a great thing after all…:

Trunks sighed and looked down at the calloused hands resting on his crossed legs. He realised now that some of the acoustic pressure had been lifted that not all of his budding headache was being caused by his thunderous parents; the throbbing ache he felt right at the base of his skull had a lot more to do with Goku's shrieking power level.

Kami… he'd never felt anything quite as huge.

But it wasn't just the quantity of the energy causing his brain to feel like it was being pressure-cooked; it was the quality. How it felt in his head. The anger Trunks had first sensed at Goku's appearance was nothing, nothing compared to the jagged emotion he felt sawing across the man's ki now. The energy the saiyan was putting out was harsh and ragged and sharp around the boundaries of it, giving the terrifying impression that Goku was barely holding onto the brittle edges of the forces coursing through him. Just sensing that much energy was like having a screwdriver slowly embedded between cerebral lobes, Kami knows what it must be like to have that amount of -almost wild- power burning through your veins, but he couldn't imagine it was a very comfortable experience.

Taking a few deep breaths, Trunks tried to close off that part of him that could pick up other's life-forces. He felt a momentary twinge of gloom as he realised he wouldn't be able to sense the millions of bustling humans anymore.

: ah well, I can't feel them anyways.:

It was true. At the moment trying to pick out the tiny human kis was like trying to spot a faint star whilst the sun was going super-nova. He went completely still for a few minutes whilst he clamped down on that element of his mind, until Goku's blazing ki level was nothing more than a mild itch, a thrumming toothache of the mind, something he could easily ignore.

Ah, blessed quiet. Now that he had that under control and his parents were far enough away not to be puncturing his eardrums he could figure out how to sort this out logically and with the minimum amount of fuss and with no-one else finding out about him and somehow fixing this screwy reality while he was at it and still making it so Goku doesn't get dead from some stupid heart virus andthat he himself still existed and making sure the androids don't take over this world as well and making sure Goku didn't actually go super nova and pop before he could catch any stupid heart viruses… and, and…. Okay breathe. Now, how the hell was he gonna do all that?

Kami, why did he have to do this on his own? He couldn't handle all this. He wished his mother was here to guide him. He wished even more that Gohan was here. Gohan would've sorted all this out in an instant, he wouldn't've bolloxed the mission up this bad this early on…He'd have known what to do…

His recovering ears picked up the movement of small feet stumbling over to his position. He looked over to see the subject of his ponderings, well kinda, rubbing his ears after the vicious assault they had just endured. He couldn't believe how kawaii Gohan had been as a chibi! The mane of hair reaching half-way down his back was obviously a saiyan trait, whilst the impeccable manners the kid was displaying was definitely a Chichi thing. On catching sight of the weird purple-haired guy sitting amongst the rocks the mini Gohan had immediately dropped a waist-bow and was currently stammering an apology for walking in on his aural retreat.

:Kawaii!:

"s…sorry for disturbing you. I didn't realise there was anyone round here! Honest! I j-just wanted to get away from the noise! I'll just go.. don't you mind m-"

"They're pretty loud aren't they?"

"h'uh?"

Trunks was chuckling madly to himself on the inside, amazed his sensei had ever been this clueless. The kid had bowed at a supposed enemy instead of adopting a defensive pose! How trusting could ya get? And the look on the kid's face at the moment! He only let a small smile escape and surface on his face though, he didn't want to freak the lil chibi out by giggling at him…

"Bulma, Vegeta. Loud. Very, very loud, I never realised two people could make quite that much noise. They should brand it a new attack or something, it's certainly got Piccolo floored."

"hehe, yeah. They're, um…deadly." Gohan was still nervously backing up the way he'd come, one hand behind his head in a pose Trunks recognised from a half-dozen photos as the "Classic Nervous Son". But just before he made it back around the rock outcropping was abruptly stopped by a chunk of local stone flying dangerously close to his head.

"….STAY STILL YOU FUCKING BASTARD! I'M GONNA NAIL YOU T'THE FLOOR!"

"HAHAHAHahahaha! WHAT'S THE MATTER ONNA? HASN'T THE BANDIT BEEN AROUND TO GIVE YOU ANY TARGET PRACTISE? GUESS SCARFACE FOUND SOMEONE BETTER TO ROLL! AGAIN! AHAHAHAH–oof!"

ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

Gohan sweatdropped.

"I think she got him" he said, voice deadpan as he leaned back to look round the last of his stone shield at the belligerent pair.

He turned his gaze slowly back to the purple haired stranger sitting quietly under the rock overhang, looking back at him with big curious blue eyes; then once more at the chaos that had erupted around his gathered friends; and seriously considered just which situation would really be worse for his health. Sitting with an unknown, possibly hostile, incredibly powerful super-saiyan; or going back into the Briefs/Ouji war zone.

Shrugging, he walked over to the young supersaiyan and plopped himself down beside him. Relieved to find the rock overhang added further shielding to the yells of the entire z-senshi as they tried to keep Vegeta pinned and convince him it would be a very bad idea for him to Big Bang Bulma. Judging by the shouts and muffled swearing he could still make out they weren't doing a very good job of it.

"Are they always like that?"

Gohan looked over at the stranger as he abruptly broke the complete and utter lack of silence. He didn't seem all that bad, his ki didn't feel evil either…and he seemed genuinely interested in the two atrociously loud warring beings in the background.

"um, well, actually… I, I don't really know. My mom won't let me around Bulma too often- she doesn't really approve, and when Vegeta was at capsule corp. she barely let me go round there at all."

"What's your mom got against Bulma? I think she's pretty cool to be honest." Why was it that Trunks sounded slightly…insulted? Almost, Gohan couldn't quite put his finger on it…protective?

The little chibi chuckled nervously, "I know! I don't get it either, mom just said," Gohan forced his voice higher and made it go as nasal as he could manage, "…'she's a bad influence Gohaaan! I don't approve of somehow who walks around in skirts that short at her age! Now go study your statistics and geometry!'…

Trunks seemed to almost raise a single purple eyebrow at the impromptu impression of Mrs Son Chichi. Gohan couldn't tell if he was impressed or simply embarrassed at the fact he'd just made himself sound like a rabid chipmunk for no apparent reason. Only someone who actually knew his mother would realise just how accurate his impression was.

Gohan forced himself not to let out the embarrassed chuckles building in his throat, coughed slightly in awkwardness, and continued talking. Heh… maybe the super-saiyan hadn't noticed anyways…..

ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

Trunks almost raised a single eyebrow at the impromptu impersonation of Mrs. Son Chichi. Gohan sounded almost exactly like a rabid chipmunk. The boy was pretty damn good.

:not bad, at least, that was a pretty accurate impression of the Chichi in my time! I suppose she isn't any more chilled in her youth then.:

"er…hehe, yeah, anyways, I've never seen them fighting for this long before. They usually get sick of each other, or get bored of thinking up original insults, or their throats get sore... I don't really know. They just end up going their separate ways in really, really bad moods. Bulma's not so bad after, she'll go and take her frustrations out on whatever it is she inventing, just don't bug her and ya gotta watch out for explosions. But Vegeta, well, Vegeta goes to find a "sparring partner", heh, I think that's Veggie-speak for punching bag. After the first time he did this with me I came home with so many bruises my mom refused to let me go there anymore. Kinda sad. Even after Vegeta left to find my Dad she wouldn't let me go over. I haven't been round and seen everyone for at least six months. I, err, guess my mom can get a little over-protective at times…"

:Gods, "over-protective"? That's a bit of an understatement….:

Gohan continued his nervous rambling while Trunks spared a thought for the enigma that was the boy's mother.

Son Chichi was, quite simply, one of the most confusing people he'd ever met.

At one moment a warm and loving person you could go to about almost anything, perhaps the most ideal mother-figure you could find. At others, almost fanatical in the conviction that her way -was the only way-, that Gohan should give up this fighting nonsense and settle down with a nice girl and give her some grandchildren, that this whole "android problem" would sort itself out. Seemed delusional at times actually….

"…so I guess that's why I never noticed you around there. You're just arrived here, right? I'm pretty sure I would have noticed if another saiyan had been living at CapCorp whilst I'd been going over there!"

"H'uh, wha..waddya mean? I don't live in the CC!" How on earth had Gohan linked him so quickly to his mother's company? What was he talking about while he'd zoned out? WHY did he always manage to zone out on the important bits?

" But then why have you got one of their work jackets? They only issue those to their mechanics and tech people, and people Bulma particularly likes. And how did you know Vegeta and Bulma's names if not from Capsule Corp? I thought you must have known Vegeta, or that he'd found you when he was space and dragged you back here; I mean, he usually only gets that mad at people he knows and personally hates…strangers he'll just blast. And you knew to get out the way when Bulma started with her ranting! You have to know them!"

Gohan was giving him a calculating look. It was a direct Piccolo hand-me-down, the "I'm assessing a new enemy" look that His Gohan would give whatever new and interesting training bot his grandfather could come up with. It hurt Trunks's heart a little to see that look from someone he still considered -despite being dead and not really the same person in the first place- to be his best friend.

"I, uh, saw them in the papers once! Yeah, Bulma invented the…err, thing a few months ago and I just recognised her from the press release!"

Damnit. That was appalling.

Trunks winced. That was really appalling.

But then, he'd always been crap at lying to his sensei. Figures it would hold true in this dimension as well. And he hadn't even given his old jacket a thought, the logo on the side had virtually worn away over the years, as the CapsuleCorporation itself had. Damn his sensei for always noticing those little details!

"Bulma never lets her picture into the papers. She says she's so brilliantly beautiful that it would attract crazies who'd come after her in the street. And that doesn't explain how you could possibly know Vegeta, he's only just gotten back from deep space! Or, how you know Piccolo for that matter. You're….you're lying." Gohan said softly, almost as though he was afraid he'd angered the strange man with his accusation.

Trunks was disappointed to see his future sensei had moved about half a foot further away from him and had turned his body to look at Trunks, a disapproving little frown on his face. He looked slightly confused that Trunks hadn't told him the truth. Ah, to be young and innocent again.

The time-traveller sighed another weary breath and looked at his hands, still lying lax on the knees of his crossed legs. Still looking innocent, as though they didn't have the power to blow up the entire planet with one wrong move. He owed a lot to his Gohan, and he couldn't bring himself to lie to this Gohan. He could lie easily. He was usually quite good at it, very believable when he wanted to be (a lifetime of convincing his mother of his, "innocence" gave him good opportunity for practise). But, he didn't like lying to Gohan. It was just wrong. Without Gohan he'd never have started training. Never have been able to generate, let alone control, the powers he had today. Never have gained a fighting chance against even one android. He owed Gohan, any Gohan, the right to the truth. He sighed again and looked up into the near-blackness of the child's eyes.

"Okay Gohan. Here's the truth. I know their names because I know them from the future. I'm a time traveller. My name's Trunks and I've come back almost two decades to warn everyone about a terrible danger that's gonna come to earth in about three years. I didn't really want to tell anyone this because I haven't been born yet. And the more people who know who I am the more likely it is I never will be born."

Trunks almost let his eyes return to staring at his suddenly interesting hands. He really didn't want to see just what his future sensei made of that. WHY had he told him? It was too harsh, too brief, he'd never believe it, he'd think he was crazy! But Trunks made himself stare straight into the boy's face and gauge how he reacted…

Gohan looked…troubled.

Once the words "time traveller" and "future" had fallen out of his mouth with greater ease than he'd expected, Gohan's expression became slightly withdrawn. The look was one he knew his Gohan to wear only at times of extreme puzzlement… sometimes when he'd been working out some kink in the very time machine that had brought him here, but more often when looking at the result of Bulma's cooking and trying to decide just what poor animal it might once have been. Even geniuses got stumped sometimes y'know.

:Gods that's a relief…he hasn't run away screaming and I've yet to see the, "Great, I'm sitting next to a crazy-person" look. Maybe I can actually convince him! It'd be brilliant if I could, maybe he can help me talk to Goku, maybe a second person in on the secret isn't so bad… he can make sure Goku remembers when the androids are gonna show up,remind him to lookafter the medicine…and maybe Goku would calm down abit if it's his own son talking to him…:

"...is, is that how you knew Frieza was gonna be here? Cuz you're from the future and it's already happened in your time?"

:YES! Questions! If he's questioning he's open to the idea! Now I've just gotta play this right and I could have another ally in this dimension…:

"yeah. I knew that both Frieza and your Dad would show up in this desert today. I never planned on fighting Frieza though, I thought Goku would get here a lot quicker, deal with Frieza and then I could a have a chat with him alone about the future and stuff."

: and of course I never expected the saviour of the planet to go fucking schizo on me and become so bloody unapproachable…: Trunks muttered within the confines of his own head. He had the sense not to insult the chibi's dad in the middle of gaining his trust though.

Gohan lifted his eyes to stare at Trunks through his fringe of heavy black bangs. Trunks couldn't help but be hit with how young Gohan looked here. Like he needed protecting from the world.

"what's so bad that you had to come back through time to tell my Dad about? Frieza's no match for him, obviously, and there's no-one out there who could possibly rival a super-saiyan, I may not have believed much of Vegeta's usual ranting but I think he's right about that."

There was quiet for a moment, a heart-beat. Trunks finally let his head hang between his shoulders, clasping his hands together as he debated with himself what to tell the boy.

:Gods, he is still just a boy isn't he...:

All the shit Gohan had been through in his short time made him act older than any 7 year-old had a right to. Did he really need to know that he had only three years left of his peculiar childhood? To not worry? To play and laugh and not wonder if there was some crazed robot hiding behind every ruined building waiting to take his head off? But if things turned out for the worst as they had in Trunk's time, then Gohan deserved more than anyone the chance to try and change his twisted fate. But what if the kid told Bulma or Veg…

:No, I know I can trust Gohan. He's not my Gohan, but the core is the same person. Someone I can trust. And if anything, He deserves a warning. I might as well start at the beginning. This boy has a right to know what brand of hell's in store for him…:

ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

The supersaiyan, Trunks, the… time traveller?... was silent for just long enough for Gohan to realise it might be something he shouldn't have asked. Maybe he wasn't supposed to know? He said he'd wanted to talk to his Dad alone. What if it was private? Gods he didn't wanna embarrass Trunks! He'd only just met him he didn't want to get things off badly alrea…

"It'll start in a little less than two years."

"H'uh?" Gohan was surprised out of his thoughts by Trunks's voice. Perfectly audible despite the fact he wasn't looking at Gohan and seemed intent on talking to his own knees.

"What will?"

"The rumours. Listen to the news over the next few months and you might hear little pieces about some fuss with the military, I think it's some guy called General Oreoco, trying to force through an act for bio-weapon funding. It's pretty far-out stuff, the usual eco-warriors kick up a helluva fuss over it. In any case, they get the act. They do their little experiments, they develop a new virus and begin testing it. The rumours are gonna start in about two years about how the disease has escaped into the general population."

Gohan knew the man Trunks was talking about. He'd seen the squat, irritable Secretary General on TV a few days ago when rallyists had lobbied his headquarters. He was what brought someone back across TIME so they could be warned? Not some crazy megalomaniac? Not some unfathomably strong enemy? A Bad-tempered soldier with a height complex?

"You mean after all the monsters we've battled and all the…the, the shit we've been through trying to protect the earth, everyone's gonna die because of some stupid general and a bad case of FLU? You're kidding me!"

Gohan saw Trunks continue to look down at his crossed legs. He could just make out he was wearing a sad little smile. Like he was half wishing that was it.

It made Gohan nervous… he knew what that kind of smile meant. His mother often wore that same expression when he presented her with his "finished" homework….it meant the worst was yet to come.

"No Gohan, not everyone dies of this virus. The illness is a particularly nasty one -nothing like the Flu by the way, it's more of a heart virus- but it gets way more publicity than it truly deserved as it was nearly impossible to successfully contract. When it does get free into the population I think less than 500 people on the entire planet actually die of it- and I'm pretty sure that's an over-estimate…" He trailed off, as though reluctant to continue.

"But then why? I don't think it counts as a world-wide emergency if only a few hundred people die from it. Moredie everydayfrom malaria! Why did you really come back in time?" Gohan knew he sounded perplexed. He really felt it. He knew there was more that Trunks had yet to tell him. He desperately wanted to hear it, what was the catch? What was really gonna happen? He had to know!

Why wouldn't he just say it? What could make Trunks so reluctant to tell him?

"It's not the only thing I came back to warn you about. The virus's escape simply marks the beginning of the end.Because, because one of those few people who caught it, and died of it, was your father."

Trunks raised his head at long last and pinned Gohan with his pure-blue eyes. Gohan saw the silent regret in them before Trunks's words had fully registered. As though Trunks could apologise for something he had no control over, or for simply telling him his Dad was gonna die. Of a Virus. His Dad was gonna die. Of a heart virus. His invincible Dad was gonna die in less than three years. Of a heart virus….

"WHAT! NO WAY! My Dad's way too strong to die of some stupid disease! He's a super-saiyan! He's the strongest guy in the whole world, he's not gonna die, he couldn't die of some stupid lil cold! You're wrong! You're lying! You're craz-"

"Gohan calm down and look at me! I'm not lying and I'm not crazy! Yes you're Dad is strong! I can feel that! It's hard to miss when his life force feels like someone's trying to give me a fucking lobotomy with a blunt toothpick! But even he has weaknesses. And in my time, he catches the disease, he fights its active form for far longer than anyone thought was possible, but in the end…" Trunks sighed, sounding defeated, the forced calm in his voice disappearing as he finished in almost a whisper , "…in the end it's just too much. It couldn't be stopped. We couldn't save him. The virus killed him. It was natural. He couldn't be brought back."

:Why's he telling me this? Oh gods, Dad can't die again I only just got him back. He just can't, it hurt so much when he died fighting Radditz, he just can't die. He can't leave me again…:

Gohan shivered slightly in memory of the odd empty feeling he had felt when his daddy had died fighting Radditz. It was so wrong. Gods it was hard to explain the strangely appalling ache his father's death had caused…

He'd always thought of his mind as a vast sprawling house. (2) There were different levels to it, floors with many different winding and confusing passages between them, there were parts he couldn't go in, some parts that were still dark and unused, some rooms of his mind he had filled meticulously with the academic knowledge his mother had helped him accumulate through out his life. There were some so filled with random crap it was impossible to sort through it. There was one place though where, sometimes, he could feel his father. Vaguely. It was as if he could feel his father in the next room, not quite make him out, but sometimes hear soft murmurings he recognised might be his Dad's voice.

When his father had…had died fighting he'd been unconscious. When he'd woken it was as though that room in the rambling house of his mind had suddenly been locked up. Badly. And the jammed door had splintered and sharded at the strength it had been forced shut with, leaving sharp aches across the expanse of his conscious. And shadows. Shadows that throbbed gently and crept outwards from were his father had been shut out of his mind, cracking and undermining the surrounding walls of his psyche.

He'd known the moment his father had been revived when he'd felt that door suddenly open again. Felt his father's, not quite presence, but the idea of him, his core become clear again in his mind. Instantly chasing away the terrible shadows and fixing the cracks throughout his sprawling mind-mansion.

It's why he'd never lost hope of his Dad coming home. He'd known his father couldn't have died on Namek when he felt the door remain resolutely open.

But for the last few months he'd felt… something.

Not the same as having that part of his mind he had labelled "Daddy's place" closed off from him, but as though someone had pulled the blinds and shattered the lights there. He knew, knew, his Dad was still there, but he couldn't hear him at all anymore.

The…shadows, had been creeping back again.

It felt so dark in there now.

Wrong.

So very wrong.

He was starting to think it was almost as bad as when Goku actually had died…

If Gohan hadn't been so absorbed in his morbid thoughts he might have noticed that the time traveller looked slightly panicked. Trunks had obviously seen the distraught look that had invaded the chibi's face, steadily worsening till it looked as thought the boy was about to either burst into tears or punch him.

"Gohan, Gohan listen, please don't be upset. I shouldn't have told you like that, that was way too blunt. Yes your Dad dies in MY time, but that's why I came back! To save him! A few years after he died, we managed to synthesise a cure to the disease! Please don't be upset! All he's gotta do is take a few of these when the active form is on him and he'll be absolutely fine!"

Trunks scrabbled in his jeans, awkward in the sitting position to get to his pockets, and held up a small vial of dark purple pills. They were so few of them, barely enough to fill his seven year old palm. Gohan felt his mood cautiously lift, his attention instantly caught and turned from his internal contemplation.

"Really? These'll save him? You're sure?" Oh gods he needed Trunks to be telling the truth about this antidote, almost as much as he wished the older boy was lying about the virus itself.

"Can I see it?" Trunks looked at him guardedly, "…Please?"

He just, wanted to make sure they were real. Ok, a little childish. But he just…needed to feel them in his fingers. He was unduly pleased when Trunks carefully handed him the tiny labelled container.

Gohan held the small vial in his hand. It just, it just seemed so small…but it could save his Dad. WOULD save his Dad from the horrible fate Trunks had predicted him. His small hand closed resolutely around the precious capsule, feeling the grooves of the lid dig into his palm as he looked straight up at the time traveller. Any lingering doubts of the purple haired boy's origins resolutely dispelled.

"Tell me what to do. How do I help him fight this? What did you mean by "active form?". When does he actually catch it?"

ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

This wasn't really what he'd been expecting.

Flat out rejection? Most likely.

Reluctant acceptance? A possibility he'd tentatively considered.

This eager reception? This desperation to hear his near unbelievable story? Hadn't even crossed his mind. He wasn't entirely sure how to continue.

"Well, okay. If you think it'll help. Um, just...well, give me a second. I wasn't gonna tell your Dad too much about this as I was pretty sure he wouldn't want to know…are you sure you do? Some of its pretty bad."

"I don't care. I want to know everything you know about what's going to happen. I want to be able to help if something goes wrong." A stubborn light burnt behind the boy's black eyes. His small mouth was set resolutely in a near-pouting line. He was dead serious about this.

Trunks puffed out his cheeks and blew an exasperated breath, rolling his eyes at his luck. Gohan didn't realise it, but this was his, "determined" look. One you could see Trunks was both gratified and mortified to see in such a situation on his young sensei's face. It was the sort of look that ended in blood running freely from stones and Donkeys walking around without any legs on.(3) He might as well just tell him.

"I guess you're right, I hadn't thought of something going wrong, but it seems more and more likely it could, I think even my coming here has skewed your timeline already." Trunks thought briefly of Goku's oddly dark eyes and continued in a slightly quieter voice.

"Who knows how much things will change?"

ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

Gohan saw Trunks shift slightly in his sitting position, frown a little as though thinking hard and begin telling him what he wanted to know. Gohanseemed determined to commit every word to memory, and so leaned back and let Trunks's pleasant voice carrying such unpleasant information wash over him.

"well… err, ok. The virus was developed by the military not only to kill an enemy but to, um, 'discourage' enemy activity in the first place. To do this they…they had to make its effects as awful as they could manage. I think they did pretty well.

Like I said, it's a strain of heart virus, so the virus's main target is, well, y'know, the heart. But it affects the rest of the body as well. It damages and eats away at major blood vessels throughout the body, leaving them fragile and easily ruptured when the virus goes through some of its last active stages. The main target of the virus is the natural pacemaker of a person's heart, the "SAN"- Sino-atrium-node, which is a small lump on the right side of the heart that controls the electrical signals that make the heart tissue contract and beat, ok?"

He saw Gohan nod for him to continue.

When the virus goes active the natural rhythm of the person's heart goes haywire, speeds up as though they're having a heart attack or have just decided they're hummingbirds. The highest heart-rate induced was well over 350bpm. We're not entirely sure what the real number is as the machine used to measure the victim's pulse couldn't keep up. Anyway. The virus would already have dug into and begun to weaken the muscle and tissue of the heart before the virus goes active, but with the sudden jump in heart rate the pace of tissue destruction increases exponentially. Weakened blood vessels throughout the body burst from the pressure. Then the heart itself ruptures.

The virus has run it's course when the victim's heart has literally burst in his chest."

Trunks had been keeping a careful eye on his tiny master as he continued to spell out exactly what the heart virus entailed with every scrap of medical knowledge he'd picked up from his mother. Not a lot, granted. But hopefully enough that his young friend would be cushioned by the professional delivery and not be truly thinking about his father's possible fate.

:Oh crap I don't think it's working. He looks way too pale, even for a Son.:

Gohan had grimaced once before he managed to school his features into an inert mask. Still too damn pale though…

"How could anyone want to do something like that to someone? What kind of sicko thought this thing up?" Gohan's voice was little more than a whisper, carrying with it a badly concealed strain of distress. Gods, he KNEW he shouldn't of told the boy this much!

"Look Gohan, you really don't need to kn…"

"NO! Tell me! WHY did they let it escape if it's so bloody awful? What do you mean 'when it goes active'? Trunks I've got to know! Please. I can't let my Dad die again. I just can't! and I need all the help I can get if I'm gonna be of any use to fight this."

Trunks looked at the desperation on Gohan's face. He really thought this would help? There was nothing he could tell the boy that would save his father if he caught the virus, the only hope was the antidote… but the timeline was already so different already…

"…okay Gohan. If you really think it'll help I'll tell you the rest of what I know just to put your mind at ease. I guess you've gathered that the disease is horrible, so horrible you'd think it should have been kept in some high security lockdown, right? It was. For the first year it was treated with all the reverence of an unexploded hydrogen bomb…but the researchers thought they had created a non-pathogenic strain, a virus that didn't affect living organisms. They didn't even know of its effects as they thought they hadn't been able to infect any specimens at all. They thought it was harmless. They got careless. Three of those working on the virus were infected with it. But they didn't know about it because of the virus's deadly peculiarity.

It was harmless. For a time. Utterly and completely harmless. Until the virus goes active it's an almost completely benign presence in the host's body. The viral spores work their ways into a huge number of it's victim's cells over time, they focus on the heart and blood system obviously, but can get into muscle tissue, vital organs, even the brain -But they don't do anything. They don't interfere with any of these cells' functions. Their presence is hardly detectable, by the bodies' defence system of medical science. And they multiply in such a way that the carrier shows almost no symptoms unless the active form is upon them. This is what was known as the passive stage of the infection. Sometimes thevirus will sit in a person's system and never come out of this stage, meaning that they infect others but never go through the devastating active part of the virus's attack. This is, as far as we can tell, what happens in most cases; a person will catch the disease, incubate it for maybe a few years, passing it on to perhaps a dozen people in that time, and then the virus just self-destructs. It can't sustain itself and it dies off, with the carrier none the wiser.

There is only a very slim chance of detecting the virus at this stage and no way whatsoever of combating it, the virus is too integral to each cell it's invaded to be isolated and destroyed. It's hard to tell when a person actually becomes infected, but we've estimated the passive stage lasts somewhere around one and a half to three years. My mother once worked out that thousands of people were carriers of the virus in its passive stage and never even realised.

We've never figured out just what it is that will make the virus go active, there were different circumstances and factors involved in each case we came across. Sometimes the trigger for the active stage was linked to stress, sometimes exertion, but most of the time there's no noticeable sign and the virus just erupts into its devastating active state. But we know it happens in only a tiny, tiny percentage of those we estimated were infected. It had something to do with whether the infected person had a particular genetic marker…I dunno we never really pinned it down, but I know that Goku's saiyan blood-type held something similar to the marker and makes him particularly vulnerable to it.

The infestation of the virus makes this final stage very, very brief. Before Goku's went active the record for surviving the virus in this stage was just over 8 hours. There were one or two cases where the victim died withina few minutesof showing active symptoms. People thought they'd just had heart attacks and it wasn't until autopsy that it was proved otherwise.

Before we developed the antidote, no-one who'd ever been recorded as suffering the active stage had survived it."

Gohan sat stunned for a moment. Taking in what Trunks had said. He'd regained some of his colour but still looked as though he'd been given the shock of a life. Well, he had, hadn't he?

Finally, he nodded again at the sword-wielding saiyan to continue. "This antidote plays on one of the virus's only weaknesses. Within a few minutes of going active each viral spore gives out a kind of communication chemical. This makes them identifiable, it makes them vulnerable. This antidote will eradicate every single active viral spore within your Dad's body. It…it takes a while to flush out all the spores, for all of them to go active and become identifiable, but the antidote, if taken at the right time, will work. If he takes this he will live and history will be drastically changed."

Gohan's expression had been completely swapped. He looked ecstatic, Trunks now guessed he was in more danger of being hugged than of being punched…

"I shouldn't be doing this Gohan. Time is not something you mess with lightly, I have no idea just how much my simply being here has screwed up what will happen in the next few years. History might already be changing." a hard look overcame the older boy's face, "But Some History should change."

"My Dad doesn't deserve to die like that Trunks. No-one does."

An amused smirk. "True. But if that were really so, I'd be going after the men who're gonna create this virus and stop it being released in the first place. But even I realise that would alter the timelines too much, even saving one life like this will change the future greatly. You see Gohan, I didn't come back simply to save Goku, by keeping Goku alive over the next 3 years, it should hopefully save the entire planet."

"H'uh?"

"We need your father's strength Gohan.Three years from now the real fun is gonna start.Three months after your dad dies of the heart virus in my time, the shit well and truly hits the fan. May 12th at 10am, on an island nine miles west of South City, two horrible monsters appear. They're unlike anything you've ever seen before Gohan. They're, they're horrible. Totally ruthless, unnatural and unfeeling killing machines.

Androids.

Artificial human life with the power to destroy all life on this planet. They are the creations of an old enemy of your dad's; Gero, Dr Gero. And their only purpose for being created was to kill Goku and act out Dr Gero's revenge upon him. But these androids are so despicable that their first actions after being activated were to kill Dr Gero and destroy his lab where they were created. With Goku still warm in his grave, no parameters left on their mission and no one to tell them what to do, they go on a killing spree that is probably going to last until every human on earth is dead. I've lived with it my whole life, always running and hiding, no-where's safe from them! Living on earth in my time is like living in a nightmare! I'm trying so hard… but it's two against one and, gods, I'm just no match for them both."

ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

Trunks bowed his head again. Some strong emotion…Shame?...Making him break eye-contact. No, that wasn't quite it, or at least not all of it. Loneliness. Gohan could feel the loneliness and despair seeping out of the boy before him. It must have been truly awful. Born to a world already slipping into utter chaos and being the only hope of its meagre population. But surely he wasn't… he wasn't fighting alone?...

"But, what about the others? Why aren't they helping you?" Gohan felt his voice shake slightly even as he said this. It wasn't right to fight on your own. Saiyan instinct insisted fighting in a pack made you stronger, Z-fighter experience reinforced the notion. The earth's defenders never left one of their own to fight solo. There could only be one possible reason the others weren't helping…

"They're, they're all gone aren't they? The androids... they must've…"

Gohan trailed off even as he pinned the time-traveller with a desperate look. Asking, begging him to correct him. Say that he was wrong. That they were all doing some kind of super-secret training and getting stronger…

"They're all gone Gohan. Everyone died the first day the androids appeared. First Piccolo, so we couldn't even wish anyone back with the dragonballs, then Vegeta, Krillen, Yamcha, Tien, Chaotzou…everyone. They all died in that first battle. Except you.

Everyone died, except you. You, my mother and I, were the only ones to face the androids who survived. I was still a baby when it happened, but as soon as I was old enough, you began to train me. You helped me get to where I am today, you taught me how to use the power I had to help people, you taught me how to go super-saiyan. You were the reason I became a super-saiyan in the first place."

:I'm a super-saiyan? I become a super-saiyan? I thought Dad was the only one capable of it? Wasn't that what Vegeta was ranting about for months? How Kakkarot had, "stolen his birthright" yadda yadda yadda? But if Trunks can be a super-saiyan, I can be a super-saiyan, …. :

"Then how come I'm, I mean the future-me, isn't here? How come you and me haven't destroyed the androids?"

There was a pause at this that worried Gohan. He was already getting to recognise some of Trunks's habits, and pausing to collect his thoughts and put off something particularly unpleasant was, unfortunately, one he recognised he was using right now. Trunks's voice was weak when he finally spoke. And he refused to even look up at him, preferring to once again pin his knees with his blue stare.

"Because, almost two years ago now, my time, the androids found you when you were weak, still recovering from an injury, and, and they killed you. I knew I could never defeat the androids on my own; you'd been way stronger than me and still been defeated. So my only choice was to wait until my mother finished the time machine, it took much longer than she'd expected without your help, and then to come back and try to change all of this before it happens. I can't let it happen again Gohan... I won't let it happen again."

That was it.

Right there.

There was the cherry on the top of the pile of shit Gohan's poor abused consciousness had had to process. Gohan's mind stalled momentarily from the huge intake of quite simply appalling prophecy.

His Dad was gonna die. The z-fighters would be incinerated in the course of a single battle. The earth was doomed. He was doomed. He was gonna die. He was gonna die fighting Androids.

For one as young as Gohan, he had an uncanny grasp of how fragile a mortal's hold on life was. Having been faced with the threat of his own death and those of his friends so many times, he knew how close life and death were, especially to a group like the z-fighters. But to actually hear it was so different.

He was gonna die.

He was gonna be killed in a battle.

With androids.

He'd never have a chance to live in peace, to spar and play with his Dad all day, to raise a family of his own, to try and get Mr. Piccolo to laugh out loud for once, to become the scholar his mom so desperately wanted him to become, or the scientist super-hero he secretly had always wanted to be, wait a sec…

"You mean I helped make a time machine? COOL! How on earth does it work? Wait, I work on it with your MOM? When do I get to meet you mother? Who is she? Is she some kinda cool galactic saiyan with purple hair? When does she crash land here? Do we have to fight her like we did with Vegeta and Nappa or is she really nice and wanna help us straight off?"

ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

Trunks felt his face flush again. Oh great, he'd gone red again. Hideously, vibrantly, clashingly red. It just wasn't fair! Anytime he got even a little bit embarrassed he turned the exact shade of rouge that clashed distractingly with his fair purple hair. You'd think life would cut him some slack with the shit he had to deal with normally, some things just weren't fair.

"Erm… actually, all full-Saiyans have naturally dark colourings, I got my hair and eye colours from my mom's human side. I get my saiyan blood from my dad."

Gohan slowly lifted one eyebrow. "You mean… we're brothers?"

"NO! no, heh, Goku's not my Dad! There's more than one saiyan left on earth you know…"

There was a split second where Trunks could actually see Gohan counting the full-saiyans apart from his father that he knew. Blanching. Counting them again and coming up with the same answer.

"VEGETA? Vegeta's your Dad! Oh wow, I can't believe it!...(snigger)…Vegeta's gonna be a daddy!"

At this point Gohan lost the plot a little.

Trunks was again struck by how young his master was in this time, couldn't really miss it in the childish way he'd fallen flat out on his back, kicking his legs and clutching his sides as he laughed so hard he could hardly catch his breath. Trunks sat and watched him, letting him have a moment of mirth at his expense. The chibi deserved to let out a little tension after the stuff they'd just been talking about anyways.

Still, he didn't have to laugh quite so hard did he? He'd heard his dad was a little antisocial, okay, okay, according to certain unnamed blue-haired sources he was, "straight up undiluted asshole with an attitude problem", but it couldn't be that funny…could it?

Suddenly, the chibi stopped laughing: his eyes widened and he hastily scrambled to sit back up. Staring avidly at Trunks's hair, then straight into his eyes. He squinted his black-chocolate eyes a little before opening them impossibly wide. Short whisperings under his breath only just managed to carry to Trunks's ears in the still desert air, "noooo…. No way. You're not…she wouldn't…they absolutely hate…. she's already got Yam… Oh. My. GOD." Trunks didn't manage to catch any more of the disbelieving mutters, as the chibi had collapsed into an even harder fit of giggles.

"BULMA AND VEGETA! That is priceless!"

Trunks quickly leant over the chortling chibi, worriedly trying to shut him up, "Gohan be quiet! Do you want everyone to hear? If my parents get wind of this it might not happen and then I won't be born! I don't wanna not be born! If I'm not born than I won't exist! I don't wanna not exist! I like existing!"

Despite Trunks's obvious desperation, and rising pitch, Gohan just couldn't stop. He brought both hands over his mouth to frantically try and muffle his continued laughter. The chibi would seem to be calming, catching his breath and stop shaking from his bottled-up mirth; then would catch sight of Trunks again and collapse even further into his childish amusement. It was starting to piss Trunks off. Letting out the tension was one thing, this was another entirely. The chibi was laughing at him.

"Gohan!"

"I'm sorry, heh, sorry." The small boy pushed himself back into a sitting position on the ground, small chuckles still escaping him every now and then, despite the annoyed glare he was receiving from his fellow demi. "It's just, I can't believe those two could ever be alone in the same room long enough to make a ba…well, a you, without one of them killing the other."

"Well… they don't stay together long that's for sure. And I'm not entirely sure how my dad felt about my mom, I never remember meeting him, but my mom was never really all that heart-broken when he left. She missed him, yeah, when he died she was the only one who was really upset, but she talks about the rest of you guys a lot more than she talked about him. I think it was more of a….a passion kinda thing."

They sat in silence for a moment after this final prediction, going over the many important life-altering prophesies Trunks had brought his young master from such a future. Trunks, trying to remember if he'd left anything important out -he had meant this little talk to be with someone else after all- and still fuming mildly at the boy. HE was the elder now! Didn't that mean he deserved some kinda respect outta his younger master?

Gohan appeared to be going over the more memorable aspects of Trunks's startling life-or-death revelations. Didn't seem at all repentant. Hm. He raised his eyes to catch Gohan looking at him with an odd mix of amusement and disgust written across his slightly-scrunched up features. He had his tongue hanging out.

" 'a passion kinda thing'? Euw Trunks. Just, eeeeeuw…"

Trunks fell over anime-style (quite impressive considering he was already sitting down) before he joined his fellow demi-human in laughing till he thought his sides were splitting. There was no hope for it, he just couldn't stay mad at Gohan. Any Gohan. When was the last time he'd laughed like this? Must've been back when his Gohan was still alive. Gods his stomach hurt; the perfect sky above him blurred to a smudged blue as he laughed so hard tears fell from his eyes. He'd really missed this…

Eventually, the laughter passed. Though Trunks found he couldn't look at his newly re-found friend without breaking out into short, breathless huffs once again. He'd always known Gohan had a carefully hidden hentai-side, he'd just never imagined he'd had it for so long.

Wiping the tears from his eyes and the tear-tracks from his face he looked over again at the spandex-covered child. He could see Gohan was only just keeping control of himself, could smell his unique scent tinged with an innocence he knew his Gohan's scent had lost long ago, and in the ensuing quiet after their outbursts could just hear the tiny clatterings of the pebbles around him as he sat himself up Indian-style and proceeded to wipe the tears from his dark eyes.

:Wait a minute… quiet:

ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

"Trunks? Trunks what's the matter?"

Gohan had only just managed to catch his breath when Trunks abruptly stood, alert for some reason.

"What is it Tr-"

"Sshhh! Do you hear that?"

He closed his eyes and concentrated on their surroundings, pushing aside the innate thud of his still-rapidly beating heart to hear the sound of the passing wind, and the other demi's breath as it panted near silently in and out of his slightly parted lips.

Gohan was, to say the least, confused. He couldn't hear a thing.

"Hear what? It's quiet…"

"Exactly! Bulma and Vegeta have stopped fighting! Shit! Oh shit shit shit! If she's killed him I am in such deep shit! Oh Kami I have so messed up this timeline! SHIT!"

With every "shit" he uttered Trunks became more and more distraught until he launched himself into the air to peer over the top of the rocks they had been sheltering behind. He perched cautiously at the top of the rock's edge. Visibly relaxing as he caught sight of the z-fighters below him. Gohan quickly picked himself up and launched after his fellow demi, already deciding time travel was much too stressful a pursuit to appeal to him if this was how his friend reacted to every little thing.

Hovering just behind his new purple-tressed friend, Gohan's attention was caught by the sword strapped to Trunks's back, he wondered idly what good a sword would do his friend with the sort of power he possessed. The pity of this was, that he missed quite a rare occurrence, both Vegeta and Bulma were at that precise point in time, calm and almost completely in control of themselves. By the time the youngest demi's eyes had been drawn to the flat plain below him it had reverted once again to a more common state of being for the two belligerent parents-to-be.

Chaos. Utter Chaos.

It all occurred with such speed that even the purple demi-saiyan's superior eyesight had trouble keeping up with it, and Gohan hadn't been looking and as such was completely caught off guard by the sudden wall of sound that threatened to wrench him out of the sky.

One moment Gohan's assembled friends were quiet, peaceful, in some cases still fuming and casting murderous glances at unwelcome alien royalty, but on the whole stable. The next moment, pandemonium had resumed its rightful place in the order of things, Yamcha was nursing a severely bleeding hand and Piccolo had lost his turban. Gohan was understandably confused.

It's unlikely we'd be able to get an answer from any of the z-fighters either, they were just as surprised at the sudden melee they were drawn into as the demis were at its appearance. So for the curious reader's benefit, events have had to be reconstructed from an impartial point of view:

The flat reddish expanse of rock on which the gathered fighters stood was none the worse for wear after round one of the epic battle.

Bulma's minidress, matching waistcoat and hairband had not fared quite so well. Small tears criss-crossed the skirt of the striped dress, her hair was not something that should be mentioned, and her blue waistcoat had a single jagged rip straight down the back, as though someone had tried to hold her back by grabbing the nape of it and the material hadn't been up to the strain.

The saiyan prince meanwhile, looked in a much better condition. Though he was currently only wearing the one borrowed black shoe and the centre of his luridly pink shirt was smudged with earth over his stomach. In the sort of shape you'd expect a rock to make if it hit a hard surface very quickly and broke apart on painful impact.

The two combatants stood some 20 yards apart on opposite sides of the outcropping.

Vegeta stood composed, arms-crossed, apparently staring off at the far distant mountains. In reality scanning the surrounding area for his missing footwear and muttering under his breath a few choice curses in saiya-go about weak baka onnas and his inability to blast weak baka onnas due to baka Honor codes.

Bulma had not been so easy to calm. She was currently still, arms restrained by Yamcha and one of his hands firmly clamped over her mouth muffling the obscenities she had been spouting at being dragged away from her quarry. Krillin stood in front of her, gesturing wildly and trying to get her to calm down and stop scowling. She was currently ignoring him and death-staring straight over his polished dome to the source of her anger. That Smug bastard.

Piccolo stood between the two, watching them both with equal levels of suspicion. He held his turban nonchalantly in one hand as the other rubbed at his tender ears.

The situation may well have resolved itself peacefully had Vegeta not chosen that particular moment to look over his shoulder, see the restrained genius, and smirk.

Bulma's eyes widened momentarily, then narrowed to thin slits.

The relaxing Yamcha didn't expect his dear darling girlfriend to renew her struggles and barely managed to hang on as she bucked wildly. Krillin was taken completely by surprise, lost his balance, and fell gracelessly into the struggling couple at the precise moment Bulma sank her teeth into Yamcha's hand.

The orally abused desert bandit jerked away from the sudden pain, was promptly hit around the mid-section by a small bald projectile and, flailing, crashed into Tien. All three managed to land on Chaotzou, who had been minding his own business, sitting on a boulder some feet behind them, completely ignorant that he was going to be squashed by three very heavy martial artists.

Bulma had extradited herself from the mess she had spawned with a greater speed than her power level would deem possible, luckily missing the sudden bedlam that had erupted behind her and shoved purposefully past a shell-shocked Namekian to the alien she really wanted to give a piece of her mind.

Said alien was more than ready for her, the entire well-practised process shown earlier repeated itself in the space of a few seconds, only a cursory moment of a glaring contest took place before the insults began to blister the air once more, petty bodily harm was exacted and all hell broke lose once again.

Gohan was suddenly struck by how lucky he was with his family. When HIS mom and dad argued there was only ever one screaming, spitting, cursing participant and his Dad had gotten amazingly good at placating her before she got truly into it and used, "The Voice". The Voice was of such a pitch and frequency that Gohan, two rooms away and with a book over his head, would still cringe in pain, and Goku would go to bed on the couch with blood trickling out his poor abused ears.

His poor Dad put up with a lot. And Gohan knew for a fact that Chichi had a thing or two to say to him when he got home. Now that he was finally back, Gohan was tempted to warn him to run…

:Hey wait a sec…where is Dad:

Gohan turned from the suddenly insignificant fighting pair and floated up further over the mesa pile they had been perching on. Flying just high enough that he got a clear view of Frieza's space ship. And more importantly, the flat expanse of desert right before it his father had been knocking the pathetic ice-jin around in….

Panic filled him as he desperately scanned the area. Eyes darting frantically to the surrounding rock formations.

His breath caught in his throat. This couldn't be happening…not again!

It was empty.

His Dad was gone.

ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

A/N:

(1)A note on Pan-Galactic-Gargle-Blasters as appears in the great book, "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" if you haven't read thisthing –shame on you!- go out and grab a copy as quickly as possible!

For those of you that need reminding, the Pan-galactic-gargle blaster is a drink invented by Zaphod Beeblebrox, president of the intergalactic alliance and all round miscreant, the effect of this drink on Carbon-based lifeforms is the equivalent of,

'having your brains smashed out by a slice of lemon wrapped around a large gold brick'

and can be made in the following way-

1.Take the juice of one bottle of that ol'Janx spirit

2.Pour into it one measure of water from the seas of Santriginous V3.

3.Allow three cubes of Acturian Mega-gin to melt into the mixture (it must be properly iced or the benzene is lost)

4.Allow 4 litres of Fallian Marsh gas to bubble through it

5.Over the back of a silver spoon float a measure if Quectin Hypermint extract

6.Drop in the tooth of an Algolian sun-tiger

7.Sprinkle Zamphor

8.add an olive

9.Drink, but…very carefully…

(last plug for it I promise) This book is an amazingly good read, especially if you like your humour dry as a bone. PLEASE don't go see the film they made on this recently as it is absolutely appalling and will put you off the book.

(2)the house/mind idea came from Hannibal. The good doctor Lecter has his mind arranged into a very organised house/mansion type thing, with rooms and objects linked to specific memories.

(3) In case anyone didn't get it, a persuasive/determined person could, "get blood from a stone" or "talk the hindlegs off a donkey" and a truly determined/persuasive person could then convince that legless donkey to go for a walk.

>

>

And now to the Reviewer replies! First of all, thankyou so much to everybody who took the time to review! It just gives me a case of the warm fuzzies to know you like my story! (wait a sec, did i just say, "warm-fuzzies"? I blame Son Goku entirely. I've heardoverexposure to Son-kun can result in a slight warping of the brain...)
So, ahem, a blanket "thx" to everyone who reviewed but also read and is keeping up with the story. I'm sorry it's taking so bloody long to write.

Shi Rurouni of the Aphrodesiac: wow. i think ya liked it! (grins). Sorry to say I am planning on fixing Goku in the near future, a pity as i love that twisted side of him as well.

harukatenohu, Moonlight-6056, SSJ Naomi: thx for reviewing and hope you liked how this is all going!

Pixelgoddess: thx for the great critique! I'm glad you picked up on Goku not having any precedents to dealing with this kind of stress, and yeah, i have to say I'd join you in the assumption that Vegeta would just tell Goku to get over it if he saw how he was acting now. He's gonna be an asshole for a while so don't hold your breathe over any war-story-swapping type bonding sesh occurring!
Little bit more saiyan torture came out this chap, but lotsandlotsa Frieza torture nxt one. (evil grin) I love my little corner of the universe, hehehe...

sq: This won't really be cleared up for a few chapters at least, but no, Goku didn't get his tail back on Namek, it grew back under Frieza's "keeping", during which time King Cold would have probably seen Goku about his space ship (e.g. in the tanks).

Hiss and You'll Be Fried : (btw, love the name) Nope, there's no way I'll let the little Ice-jin go now. He hurt poor lil Kaks, therefore, he will die a horrible flaming screaming death. (grins in a very disconcerting way)

x The Chichi Slaughter House x: You've really gotta love those tails. They're practically cute fuzzypets attached to a saiyan's back side! At least until Goku regains some control over his, till then theschizophrenic personalities are staying.

MiraiGee-Chan: hehe. thx for the review! (rummages in bomb-site of a room and comes up with a bag of Jelly-babies) Here ya go! Perfect for an evil-sugar-craver! You can bite the heads off before you eat them!

Sayain Queen, loreleithe1st: Yay! Glad you guys liked it! Thx for the reviews!

>

>

Anyways, that's my Second official chapter out (at last). Hope everyone liked my little bit o'science from Trunks, andI really hope it all made sense. As always, sorry it all took so long, I'm a naturally s-l-o-w writer, I write and re-write everything about three times and I'm STILL not completely happy with the finished product! (disgruntled huff). I am gonna try and post what I've got here on mmorg or affnet just because i can't take ffnet's formatting anymore! It is driving me insane.

So, see ya next time, support the yaoi-liciousness out there and above all, HAVE A MERRY CHRISTMAS! Hope Father Christams brings you exactly what you wanted! (btw, don't bother asking for Kaks or Veg, I already got dibs.:) but leave a review and i'll consider sharing...)

Ja ne!

xx

HH

p.s. Anybody hazard a guess at the song stuck in my head for Goku's lil break down in this chap?... there's a few lines from the chorus stuck in here and there...

---