Percussion

Chapter 5

In Reserve

Left. Down. Up.

Trunks swung the blade in a perfect circle above his head, his feet firmly planted to the floor.

Down again.

He had been training with his sword since he was fifteen. By then, his mother had come to accept the fact that her son would not give up fighting and training, and that Trunks was determined to face the androids head-on. She eventually reasoned that she would just have to give him whatever edge she could.

Still too slow. Up.

It had not taken her long to design and make the sword. A few quick calculations, and she had determined precisely the proper weight and dimensions for the weapon. The design was not especially intricate, but it didn't need to be. The handle, though plain, was as comfortable as possible. She had replaced the sword immediately upon learning of its destruction at the hands of Android 18. Trunks' new sword was a perfect replica, indistinguishable from the original.

Thrust. Withdraw.

Despite all his prior experience with the blade, this was proving to be more challenging than Trunks had expected. He had been in the present time period for a week, and had decided that—in the absence of much to do besides reading through the pile of research data that he had brought with him—he would take the opportunity to focus on his training. Using the sword at 150 times the Earth's normal gravity added another dimension of complexity to his training exercises.

Without missing a beat, Trunks took flight. He was now floating at the center of the room, giving him maximum mobility.

Right. Around. Down—nngh!

Trunks let out an irritated noise, halfway between a grunt and a yelp, as his head hit the ceiling. The sword clattered to the floor. He barely had time to stop himself before he barreled through the room entirely. It took him a moment to realize that the enhanced gravity had turned off. He looked up to find that he had managed to dent the top of the metal dome.

So much for concentration. He turned around as he landed, rubbing the sore top of his head with his left hand. There stood his father, leaning back nonchalantly against the frame of the door. Trunks knew it was a safety mechanism; if the door opened, the gravity generator would automatically turn off. Bulma had explained that there had once been an incident involving his younger self, Goten, and a very irate baby dinosaur. She hadn't revealed much more, only saying the near-destruction of the house had been more than enough reason to install the safety valve.

The Saiyan Prince was trying—and failing—not to look amused at his son's sudden displeasure. That wasn't surprising. What little sense of humor the man had tended to be fairly sadistic. Trunks frowned as he picked up his discarded weapon. He could have sworn he'd locked the door to the gravity room. His eagerness to practice, he supposed, must have distracted him.

Vegeta stood up straight, moving into the room and shutting the door behind him. Trunks did not move, instead allowing his father to approach him. Even when he wasn't being actively hostile, Vegeta could be oddly intimidating.

Vegeta did not look at his son, instead focusing on the blade that sat limply in the young man's hand. "Wasn't your sword destroyed?"

Trunks nodded. "Mother made me another one in her lab."

Vegeta quirked an eyebrow. "That daft woman made the original?" His voice sounded uninterested, but his face displayed a hint of genuine curiosity.

"It's apparently pretty easy compared to building space capsules and time machines."

The man's tone shifted from boredom to something resembling derision as he finally made eye contact with the teenager. "You can't possibly need such a thing."

Trunks swallowed as he met the steely obsidian gaze. After all this time, his father's judgmental stare still affected him far more than he would have liked to admit.

"I guess I just like the feel of a sword in my hands." The teen did his best not to sound defensive.

Vegeta backed up a few feet and held his hand out expectantly. As per usual, an impatient frown graced the man's features. After a moment's hesitation, Trunks tossed his sword over. What could his father possibly want with it?

Vegeta caught it by the handle. He shifted his right hand under the flat of the blade, removing his left from the handle and balancing the sword on two fingers. He quickly flipped it up, catching it just above his head with his right hand and slicing into the air with a few quick strokes.

Trunks was more than surprised. In all the months he spent in the past, he had never seen his father use any sort of weapon. Yet there was no mistaking Vegeta's experience; his technique was near flawless. He appeared to get a feel for the weapon, for its weight and point of balance, almost immediately, and was wielding the sword with impressive ease.

A few more strokes and Vegeta stopped. "I have to admit," the prince said casually, "it's expertly crafted. Your mother did well."

Trunks forced himself to stop gaping. His father was, as usual, full of surprises. "Since when do you know how to use a sword?" Trunks asked, doing his best to contain the utter bewilderment in his voice.

Vegeta rolled his eyes. "Don't be an idiot. I am the prince of a warrior race." He ran his finger along the sharp edge. "I had mastered the basics by the time I was five." The man's tone softened slightly as he examined the sword's tip. "It has been a long time, but some skills you never forget." The back of his hand brushed against the narrow end with uncharacteristic delicacy. It was as if he was trying to memorize the blade's every facet through touch alone.

Without warning, Vegeta tossed the sword back to Trunks. Though startled, the teenager managed to catch it by the handle. "Royal blood, boy," Vegeta continued, raising his voice as his tone abruptly returned to its signature terseness. "It makes sense that you would be drawn to the blade."

Trunks pursed his lips, trying to hide a smile as he returned the sword to its sheath. His father had actually volunteered information, albeit limited, about his heritage. Not only that, but Vegeta had pointed out a rare piece of common ground between the two of them. This was by a wide margin the closest the prince had ever come to reaching out to his teenaged son.

The man's gruff voice broke into Trunks' thoughts. "I don't have all day, brat. Do you want to spar or not?"

Trunks didn't bother to conceal his grin this time. He removed the sword and sheath from his back, setting it down next to the control panel. His father was keeping his end of their bargain after all.

"Two hundred G's?" he asked, gesturing to the panel.

Vegeta snorted. "Don't waste my time, boy. Three hundred."

Trunks nodded, plugging in the appropriate figures. A hand reached out and roughly grabbed his wrist before he could press the button to activate the gravity.

"Unless, of course, you don't think you can keep up." Trunks twisted his head to find his father staring him down, daring him to back away from the challenge.

Trunks wrested his wrist from the man's grip. The teen's sly smile stood in direct contrast to his father's scowl.

"Try me."

Bulma glowered at her computer screen, tossing a pen at the hapless piece of equipment. It bounced off the glass of the monitor, landing with surprising force on her own forehead. The blue haired woman winced and let out a loud string of swear words, cursing both her monitor and her pen to eternal damnation as she rubbed the sore spot upon which the writing utensil had landed.

She was not having a good day.

It had been a full week since her future son's arrival, and she had gone through every bit of data he had presented to her. She had learned a lot, and had gotten a sense for the kind of troubles that were plaguing the alternate timeline, but had experienced no flashes of insight as to their possible causes. The frustrated woman selected the icon on her computer's display to shut down her hard drive. As the whirring of her processors hummed to still, she internally berated herself. It was foolish, thinking she could find the answers that had eluded her own future counterpart, all by looking through the very data her doppelganger had herself compiled.

Of course, she still had another option open to her. It was one she'd hoped to avoid using if possible, but Bulma truly could not think of any other course of action to take.

"I need to talk to Trunks," she mumbled to herself wearily, rubbing the back of her neck in small circles and drinking the last of her coffee. She stood from her desk, now covered in empty coffee mugs and two full ashtrays, and made her way to her dimly lit stairwell. She quickly dashed up the stairs and up into the main floor of the compound. After a few moments of contemplating the most likely place her teenaged son would be, she picked up her gait and started moving toward the gravity room.

Her suspicions were confirmed as she heard the whirr of the gravity generators grind to a halt, then saw the large metal door open from down the corridor. She was unsurprised to see her son step out of the chamber. Trunks was carrying his sword with one hand and definitely looking the worse for wear, but appeared oddly cheerful despite his apparent fatigue and the obvious beating his body had taken. What was slightly more unexpected was seeing her husband exit the same room mere seconds later, also looking slightly drained, but bearing nowhere near the number of bruises and scrapes that were apparent on the teenager's skin.

She folded her arms, staring down father and son. "There has got to be a better way for the two of you to bond." Trunks chuckled at his mother's comment, while Vegeta merely waved one hand dismissively and brushed past her, presumably to change out of his training clothes.

Trunks watched after his father as the older man strode down the hallways and toward the stairway. He was smiling when he turned back to Bulma. "What's going on? Have you found anything else out?"

Bulma placed her right hand upon her hip, running her left through her short teal hair. "I've gone through three terabytes of data, and I have come to an important conclusion."

Trunks raised an eyebrow, looking equal parts concerned and hopeful. "What's that?"

"That I am utterly stumped." Trunks' face fell at her reply.

"So what do we do now?" the teenager asked, foisting his sword and sheath onto his back.

"I didn't want it to come to this, and I'm not sure it's going to work, but I think we're out of options." The woman reached up, placing her hand upon Trunks' shoulder. "I know we've gotten more than our fair share of use out of the Dragonballs, but if ever there was a time to use them, this is it. Let's gather them, and see if Shenlong can't do something to fix the time stream."

"Do you think it will work?"

"I don't know," Bulma replied honestly. "It could very well be beyond the dragon's power. But it's definitely worth checking out."

"Of course." Trunks nodded, his face once again set in that familiar, determined expression. "Let me go shower and change, and we can get going." Bulma nodded in assent before briskly turning around to retrieve the dragon radar.

Bulma felt a twinge of nostalgia as she glanced into the back of her plane, taking in the sight of the glossy orange balls that sit there. There was a time when the hunt for the Dragonballs had seemed to her the ultimate adventure, the single greatest undertaking upon which a young traveler could embark. It was strange how what had been such a grand task decades before now felt almost routine. The ease with which she had gathered the first five Dragonballs left her almost wistful for days gone by. In a matter of hours, she had, thanks to the marked improvements she had made to the dragon radar over the years and the weight of her experience, been able to gather the majority of the orbs without incident. Mother and son had spent the better part of the day flying west, so they still had a few hours of daylight ahead of them.

There were only two balls left, and they were approaching the sixth Dragonball with great speed. They had already gathered the one-, three-, four-, five-, and six-star balls; the one they were coming upon had to be either the two-star or seven-star Dragonball. Bulma took a closer look at the dragon radar and directed Trunks to land the plane on the small, uninhabited island over which they were flying.

Trunks hummed his understanding and circled around the coast of the unpopulated isle as he brought down to sea-level, touching down with a smooth three-point landing. The vegetation on the island was scarce, consisting primarily of short grass and unimpressive shrubbery near the coast. The main feature of the island was what appeared to be an active volcano, still smoking at the center of the small landmass.

The smell of sulfur was heavy in the air. Bulma covered her nose with the sleeve of her shirt, and saw Trunks do the same with the right arm of his jacket. She examined the bleeping image on the radar as she approached the volcano, looking from the compact device to the smoking mountain and back again with a frown upon her delicate features.

"Well," she said, her voice somewhat muffled by her arm. "That's not good."

"What's not good?" Trunks asked, momentarily removing the cloth of his jacket sleeve from his mouth.

"Looks like the Dragonball is in the volcano."

Trunks let out a soft groan. "There's always something." He shook his head, taking his arm down from his face entirely. "I've got this covered." He clenched both fists, now low at his sides, and pursed his lips in concentration.

Though Bulma had never learned to sense energy, she could recognize the visual signed of her half-Saiyan son powering up. The ground beneath him appeared to shake slightly, as grains of dust and volcanic ash rose around his ankles and up to his knees. A strange light seemed to emanate from his body, even though it was apparent that the boy was not undergoing a Super Saiyan transformation. Bulma would swear that his muscles seemed to bulge slightly with their enhanced power, but it was entirely possible that she was simply imagining that. Soon, Trunks' tense posture and facial features relaxed, his power-up apparently complete.

"Trunks," Bulma said in a concerned tone, "I'm not sure powering up is going to keep you from being burned to a crisp."

The teen gave the small mountain an intense stare. "No, but I can basically compress a ki shield around my body. I should be able to keep that going for at least a couple of minutes." Bulma nodded; while the idea seemed odd to her, she had learned through decades of observation that the ability to control and manipulate large amounts of pure energy could lend a fighter a whole host of strange abilities. Suspending her sense of disbelief was something she had become exceedingly good at over the years. She watched as Trunks flew up to the mountain's summit, forced an odd translucent glow to condense around his body, and leapt in to the volcano's crater.

Bulma realized that it couldn't have been more than about two minutes, but it seemed that she was waiting at the edge of the volcano for an eternity. She glanced fretfully from the dragon radar to the obviously active volcano, waiting with bated breath. Though she was aware that Trunks knew what he was doing—and that the teenager had faced challenges far greater and more dangerous than a pit of hot lava—maternal instinct left her more than a little uncomfortable with the notion of her teenaged son going volcano-diving.

Her worry was soon allayed when Trunks reappeared from the crater and flew back down to ground level. Magma slid off his body like mercury, leaving him completely unscathed as he powered down. In his right hand sat the seven-star Dragonball, equally clean and undamaged.

Trunks let out the breath he had been holding; Bulma did the same. "See?" he said, tossing the orange ball into the air and catching it effortlessly in his palm. "Easy."

Bulma glowered at her son as she snatched the Dragonball from him. "Teenagers."

"Arise, Shenlong!"

Though Trunks had seen the Eternal Dragon once before, when he had been brought back from the dead at the conclusion of the Cell Games, he had never seen Shenlong being summoned. So it was with no small amount of amazement that he watched the seven small orbs glow with pure magical energy as his mother called out the simple incantation. Night may have already fallen, but Trunks would swear that the sky darkened even more as a dome of light began to radiate from the gathered Dragonballs.

Bulma and Trunks had found the two-star ball among the vines of a far-away rainforest, and though it had taken some time to locate the orb among the foliage, its retrieval hadn't been difficult. They had quickly loaded the last Dragonball onto their plane and retreated to a secluded mountain range several miles north of West City. Hopefully, local residents would not see the awesome and terrifying sight of a massive reptile seemingly materializing out of thin air.

Within seconds, a single stream of light burst straight upwards from the glowing dome. It blasted hundreds of feet into the air, winding and snaking around as it began to take shape. Long, thin sparks shot forth from the main beam, quickly dissipating into the night sky. Trunks stumbled back, shielding his eyes from the powerful glow as the beam wound about itself, growing and widening as what appeared to be the dragon's head continued to climb into the sky. Moments later, the bright glow abruptly disappeared, and the serpentine form took on its characteristic green and scaly appearance.

"Whoa," Trunks said, moving his hand away from his face. He gazed right past the dragon's sharp fangs and long, wriggling whiskers. He could feel his heart rate increase as he looked straight into its enormous, glowing red eyes. The demi-Saiyan was transfixed.

"You have awakened me from my slumber," came Shenlong's deep and booming voice. He spoke with a godlike authority; Trunks could not have looked away if he tried. "Speak. Name your first wish."

"Oh," Trunks said, startled back to awareness of his task by the dragon's command. He looked to his mother, who stood with her arms folded on her right. "How do we phrase this?"

Bulma bit her lip, frowning up at the large dragon. Trunks couldn't help but notice how much less impressed his mother seemed with the dragon's appearance than he was. He assumed that was largely due to the sheer number of times the woman had helped summon Shenlong over the course of her life.

"I'm not sure," she said, folding her arms and tapping her foot upon the grassy ground. "Probably should have worked that out before."

"Speak!" the dragon repeated, obvious irritation sliding into his intimidating voice as it reverberated throughout the mountain range. "I grow impatient!"

"So what's new," Bulma grumbled, crossing her arms across her chest. Trunks would have laughed at her unimpressed reaction to the dragon's threat, had he not been so awe-struck by Shenlong's very appearance. "Alright," she shouted up at Shenlong. "Here's the situation. Trunks came from this alternate future timeline, which we think has been destabilized. Is there anything you can do to stabilize the timestream?"

The dragon actually paused before answering. "No," he responded, his speech sounding even more like a growl than it had before. "Such a wish is far beyond my power to grant."

"Damn," Trunks said under his breath. He finally looked away from Shenlong, disappointment giving way to actual anger. He bit the inside of his cheek, refraining from letting out a torrent of curses. Even the near-omnipotence of the Eternal Dragon couldn't repair what had somehow come unglued in time. Once again, the time-traveling warrior found himself back at square one.

Bulma, on the other hand, seemed unperturbed. Trunks recalled how she had already considered the possibility that Shenlong would, for whatever reason, be unable to affect events from beyond this timeline. So it was without hesitation that she made her next request.

"In that case, is there something that can connect us to Trunks' timeline?" she asked loudly. "Something that I can use to monitor his reality?"

The dragon seemed to consider the possibility before responding. "It shall be done." Moments later, a cubed unit, barely larger than a music box, was sitting on the ground near Trunks' feet.

He approached the small, box-like object, kneeing before it and gazing at it. To describe the box as "dark" or "black" would have been a gross understatement. It wasn't simply dark in color—it actually seemed not to reflect light, period. Trunks got the sense that, if he were to reach out and try to touch it, he would feel nothing at all.

It was mesmerizing.

Bulma stepped over to her son and the small block. "Wow," she said, sounding as thoroughly impressed as Trunks felt. "Unless I'm mistaken, that's dark matter."

Trunks tore his stare away from the black box and looked up at his mother. "What?"

"Only about four percent the universe is made of observable matter," Bulma explained. "The rest of it is made of dark matter and something called dark energy. I'm guessing this is dark matter." She folded her arms, shaking her head in something between satisfaction and disbelief. "It emits no detectable radiation. The only reason we can observe it now is because of the fact that it's sitting against the backdrop of visible matter." She looked back at the dragon, shifting her attention to Shenlong once more. "Does this mean that our timelines share the same nexus of dark matter?"

"Yes," the dragon said. "This much is shared between your two timelines." The dragon let a few moments of silence pass between mother and son before speaking again. "I cannot manipulate the time stream further. Do you have a second wish?"

Just as Trunks was opening his mouth to respond, no, and thank the Eternal Dragon, Bulma interrupted. "Yes," she said. She turned to her teenaged son, an explanation already at her lips. "I have an idea, but I'm going to need a hell of a power source if this is going to work." She turned back to the floating dragon. "Can you give me some sort of electric power source? Something compact and really powerful?"

"That," Shenlong replied, his demeanor much calmer than it had been when he was first awakened, "is well within my abilities." Bulma smiled as a glowing white orb, smaller even then the Dragonballs, appeared by Trunks next to the dark matter that had been conjured.

"Your wish has been granted," the dragon said abruptly once the orb had settled on the grassy ground. "Farewell." Without another word, Shenlong disappeared, and the Dragonballs emitted a power glow before leaping into the air and scattering, presumably dissipating to the corners of the Earth.

"Man," Bulma said, watching one Dragonball fly due east before it disappeared from sight. "That never gets old."

"What are you planning to do with this stuff?" Trunks asked, looking from the dark matter on the ground to the glowing power source next to it.

"It's a shot in the dark, so to speak," Bulma responded. "But if I have some kind of conduit that will link us to your world, I might be able to at least monitor what's happening in your timeline."

"Do you think it will work?"

"Can't be sure until I try." Bulma bent down to pick up the power source. "But it's better than nothing."

Trunks raised an eyebrow at the glowing orb in his mother's palm. "Should you really be carrying that?"

"Probably not," she replied, smiling. "I have no idea how radioactive this actually is. So we'd better get it back to the plane and get home as soon as possible."

"Okay," Trunks agreed. He bent down to lift the dark matter. Contrary to his expectations, it felt solid enough in his hands. He gripped it tightly, and was stunned to find that he could not pick it up due to its sheer weight.

"Wow," Trunks strained, trying to lift it once again. "This is...really heavy."

"Of course it is, silly. It's hyper-condensed." Bulma nodded in encouragement. "Just power up. I don't think the plane can carry it, so do you think you can get it back to the house on your own?"

"Shouldn't be a problem." Trunks quickly transformed to his Super Saiyan form before attempting to lift the unit again. Carrying the small block was still not easy, but at least he could get it off the ground now.

"Just make sure no one sees you flying in," Bulma said, walking back to her plane.

Trunks considered the scenario of explaining to some confused West City denizen his appearance and his ability to fly, as well as the absurdly dark and heavy unit in his arms. He smiled at the ridiculous thought. "You don't have to tell me twice."

"Why on earth does a house need thirteen bathrooms?"

Trunks thought it was a legitimate question, but his younger self didn't seem to agree. "Why not?" the youngster replied, rolling his eyes upward. "Big house, lots of space between rooms. No one wants to run half a mile just to take a whiz, you know."

Trunks chuckled at the crassly phrased response. He and Bulma had returned to Capsule Corp rather late the night before, and the teenager had gotten some well-deserved rest upon his return. He had been foraging for breakfast in the large kitchen when his younger self had entered. The eleven-year-old Trunks had nearly choked on his cereal when he learned that, despite the fact that the older boy had been in this timeline for over a week, no one had thought to give him a tour of the facilities. Since there wasn't much he could do until Bulma had enacted whatever plan she had in mind for the dark matter and the small energy generator, the teenager had happily gone alone with the kid's insistence at showing him around every corner of the large compound.

They had been at it for over an hour when Bulma found them, poking their heads into Vegeta's thankfully unoccupied lab. She folded her arms, frowning at her two sons. "Trunks, I've been looking all over for you."

Both boys startled and turned around, their movements exactly in time with one another. "For me?" the boys asked in unison. As if they had rehearsed the exchange, the boys shared a look before letting out simultaneous chuckles. The older boy's laughter died down before the younger's, and the teenager coughed into his palm as he caught his breath. Bulma's scowl evaporated at the display, her expression shifting into an amused smile.

"The older one," she said, stepping over to the boys. "Mind if I steal him away?" Bulma asked, addressing her younger son.

The boy shrugged. "Knock yourself out," he said, bounding off quickly. The teenaged Trunks laughed again, remembering what Goten had said the first time they had met. The younger Son boy was right; as long as Trunks was stuck in this timeline, the name situation was going to be confusing.

The teen's chuckles quieted as he followed his mother through the basement corridor into her own lab. "So, did your plan work?" he asked, stepping into Bulma's dimly lit workstation. "Have you figured anything out?"

"You bet," she said, sitting down at her main computer. Trunks could see that, underneath her large desk, a series of wires and fiber optic tubes connected the dark matter and the power source to her computer and what appeared to be another processing unit.

"Like I explained," Bulma said, "the unit Shenlong gave us is dark matter. Specifically, it's baryonic dark matter."

Trunks pulled up a chair and sat next to his mother. "Translation, please?"

"The vast majority of dark matter is nonbaryonic—basically, it's not made of atoms. This," she said, pointing under her desk, "is the exception, rather than the rule. Baryonic dark matter is made of protons and electrons, meaning that it can interact directly with ordinary matter through electromagnetic forces."

"How is that useful?"

"It seems like each timeline has a different physical plane in terms of regular matter, but actually shares the same mass of dark matter. We might have two timelines, but we're ultimately only one universe." Bulma gave her son a self-satisfied grin as she pointed at an especially large monitor she had set up on a side table. "I refit some of the equipment I used to enter the coordinates for space travel to Namek. It's a lot quicker to cannibalize existing technology than to build it from scratch."

"Build what from scratch?" Trunks asked. His mother's explanation of her work had actually managed to leave him more confused than before.

"When I hook up the unit from the spaceship to this screen, you get an image of our world. Then I use the energy source, hook it up to the electron beam generator, and—" Bulma pressed a button on her keyboard, and the screen split. There were two graphic images, each seemingly identical, save for the streams of green numbers running below each blue orb.

The teenager finished the thought. "There are two Earths." Trunks' eyes widened in wonder. "Can we zoom in and actually see what's happening on my world?"

"Oh, no," Bulma said, pointing at the number stream at the bottom of the screen. "The images are just for my benefit. They don't actually tell me anything. All the actual information is down here."

Trunks frowned at the numbers on the screen. "What do those figures mean?"

"They're basically energy signatures. I entered the spatial coordinates of the earth when I hooked up the dark matter to my computer. Any energy signatures emitted at those coordinates should be reflected on my screen." She grinned at her own innovation. "We just needed a conduit."

"Have you learned anything?"

"Kind of," she said, turning to face her son again. "See, the energy signatures being reflected here should be identical, but for some reason, the figures I'm getting are different." The rate of her speech seemed to accelerate with each sentence, as if she were trying to cram as much information into as little time as possible. "A steady stream of energy is emanating from both Earths, but they're not the same. I'm just not sure what that means."

"So what do we do now?" Trunks asked.

"That actually leads me to my next question," the woman said authoritatively. "Do you have a copy of the time machine's design?"

"Well," Trunks hesitated, "my mother gave me a separate disc with the design, in case the time machine was destroyed. But I'm afraid building another one would be risky." He shook his head. "Besides, it would take way too long."

"I'm not going to build another machine, Trunks," Bulma reassured her son. "I just want to study its design. I need to look for clues anywhere I can." She tapped her long-nailed index finger against her chin thoughtfully. "See, the energy signatures I'm picking up might be from your world circa 776, the same year it is here. Based on your story, the problems in your world didn't start until 783."

Trunks nodded in comprehension. "I've moved across time and space. That's why the time machine's design might be helpful."

"Exactly."

"I'll get you the disc then," he agreed with a smile, standing. "Is there anything else I can help you with?"

"Not for now, sweetie," Bulma said, turning back to her computer screen. "I'll let you know if I need anything."

"Are you sure there's nothing you want me to do?" As much as he appreciated all Bulma's help, Trunks was growing frustrated with his own inability to make himself useful.

Predictably, Bulma shook her head. "Not that I can think of." She gave her teenaged son a warm, reassuring smile. "But since you're here anyway, it might be worth it for you to take a trip to Kame House. Krillin and Master Roshi are still living out there."

Trunks nodded at the reminder. Though he had, in the past week, managed to reconnect with Piccolo and the other Saiyans he had fought with against Cell and the androids, he had yet to encounter Krillin, Tien or Yamcha.

"Sounds good," he said with a smile, moving toward the doorway of the lab. "I'll head out as soon as I get you the disc." Suiting his actions to his words, Trunks dashed up the stairs to his bedroom.

Though Trunks could not actually remember the flight path he had taken to Kame House in the past, it wasn't too difficult to seek out Krillin's distinctive ki signature. Human energy had a very different feel to it than either the Saiyan or Namekian variety, and Krillin was without question the most powerful full-blooded human on the planet. Trunks used one of Bulma's planes to travel to the edge of the West City metropolitan area, capsulizing the plane midair and switching to manual flight as soon as he was out of the range of the crowded suburbs. He idly wondered if the inhabitants of Kame House would be as stunned by his presence as the others had been, or if Krillin or Roshi would sense his energy before he arrived.

Soon enough, Trunks came upon the small island. He landed softly on the sand at the beach's edge, stepping into the shade of one of the palm trees that grew on the isle. He quickly walked up to the house, signaling his arrival with three sharp knocks on the wooden door. He smiled as he heard footsteps approaching. Before long, a slim, very attractive, strangely young-looking blonde woman opened the door.

And Trunks' world froze.