A/N: Sorry for the wait guys, being a senior is like the most terrible thing ever! I'm in three dual credit classes, one being a year class squished into one semester. I'm pretty much full throttle all the time, and find little time to write anymore. It makes me sad. So I hope this makes up for it.

Disclaimer: I do not own any of the DBZ or DBGT characters, if I did, I would be filthy stinkin' rich and wouldn't have to be looking for a summer job, but alas, I am up for employment.

A special thanks to: Sakura Lisel, Blood's moon, supersaiyanx, SSJ-Pan-chan, Vampire Queen Kassandra, niara01, Black Onyx83, Benny-JPanimeluver, Fhulhi the Crazy, gossipgirl101, AnimeFreak-TrunksPan-Lover4evr, Tri17, and Happy-Spirit. Thanks so much for reviewing, you are all very lovely people. Hope you like the newest chapter. Oh yeah, did I reply to you guys, its been long enough I honestly can't remember. Hehe, sorry!

Category: Anime: Dragonball Z

Genre: Romance/Drama/Action/Adventure

Rating: PG-13

Summary: The Z-fighters are fading, their legacy dying. The last of their kind giving up on their blood. Pan, the youngest generation, has been forbidden to fight, yet she refused to lose her heritage. They want her to marry, settle down, start a family, but she refuses to mate any who are weaker than she. She must find the last fighter. MTP

Last Fighters
by: Dark Huntress
Chapter Three: Culinary Expertise

"Ok, now you put two eggs in, very gently please," Bulma coached the rather frazzled brunette, who had found she lacked a lot of kitchen skills. "No, you must make sure all of the shell is out!"

Groaning, said brunette angrily beat the batter together, her temper getting the best of her as said wood spoon splintered in her grasp. Shards embedded in her hand and she quickly jerked it back, not allowing the blood to get in the food or on the counter top. She had never found something so frustrating or annoying, how could anyone have the patience for this stuff? She would much rather just order it out or throw it in the microwave, who needed this home cooked thing?

"Shut up," she growled, glaring spitefully at the lavender haired youth who had fallen from his perch on a chair and onto the floor, holding his sides.

"Oh really, that was my favorite too," Bulma complained, sighing as she eyed the concoction before dutifully throwing it out the back window, there really was no hope for it.

"Oh, gee, thanks for your concern," Pan snidely replied, shaking her hand about as the small wounds and the splinters fell to the floor, thank goodness for the Saiyan healing.

"Oh come on, Pan, you have to admit, that was funny," Trunks said, shaking his head as the young woman turned her heated gaze to him again.

"I don't see the humor," she replied, slumping back into one of the kitchen seats, playing with the end of her ponytail, not happy at all by her failure.

It had been a week since she woke up in the middle of nowhere and found a dead city, thus leading to her rather rude capture. Smirking, she remembered all too well the way he had manhandled, and for the rest of the week had been trying to make it up to her, it was quite amusing. In fact, just by the look on his face, he seemed to feel remorseful for his earlier laughter. As nice as it was, it was slightly annoying, and she'd definitely have to confront him soon.

"Hey, man," Satoya called, letting himself in the backdoor, over the past few days she had come to realize that this was almost like the Goten of this world.

Satoya was completely human, and had lost his family to the androids several years ago after his entire city had been destroyed. He had lived in Tokyo his entire life, and only had escaped the droids' destruction by his older brother, who had distracted them long enough for the small child to hide in a crevice. It had been the same day that her father, Gohan, had died. Trunks had been there, and together they had left, Satoya watching over the Saiyan after he had descended and passed out. Ever since then the two had been inseparable, according to Bulma. If had been up to those two, she would have never known.

Of course she had Sakura, Satoya's fiancé, but by the way Bulma acted around the woman, it was easy to tell the two didn't get along. Sakura was an alright sort, Pan supposed, but the girl was completely hopeless. She had had little formal teaching, which wasn't unheard of in this time, being that the educational standards had been obsolete since most were just trying to survive. And besides that, common sense had been not part of her genetic make up, she couldn't remember how many mishaps the poor girl had been in since just she had come. She really did feel for the scientist, since said girl seemed to follow her around like a lost puppy.

Speaking of which...

"Bulma!" a small redhead yelled, skipping merrily into the kitchen and the embracing the irritated woman. "Guess what Satoya and I did last night!"

Said girl went on to tell about their adventures the other night in the bed, bringing a blush to poor Satoya's face. Snickering behind a hand, Pan tried desperately to keep from guffawing all over the place, the short redhead did amuse her. She was quite pretty, with sparkling green eyes and a set of rose red, full, lips. Pan wasn't exactly sure how she had those red lips, being that makeup didn't exist here either, but decided she really didn't want the girl to jump into a long explanation.

"Oh, do you need help Bulma?" Sakura squealed grabbing the bowl that Bulma had been working with, stirring furiously at the batter inside. Pan gnashed the inside of her cheek, trying to keep from snarling at the fact that the idiot of a girl could outdo her in the kitchen, it just wasn't fair!

"Mom, me and Satoya will be back," Trunks announced, chuckling slightly as he and his friend left the door, out for another patrol she supposed.

Trunks and Satoya left every morning about the same time to go in search for the two androids, seemingly not at all concerned about it. She was always slightly worried, and felt for Bulma, who always watched the two leave with tears in her eyes. She knew, as well as Pan did, that that could be the last time they would ever see them again. Everyday they risked their lives, and Pan knew if it made her worried, then it would be devastating to Bulma. Pan had only known them for a short amount of time, but to the blue haired woman, they were the only family she had left.

"Bye," Bulma whispered, the two having already gone outside, and Pan was sure, already flying their way to the city itself.

"Oh, I must go and do the laundry," Sakura giggled, seemingly unaffected by the tense air as she quickly went through the back door, abandoning her earlier food project.

She and Satoya lived in a house a few yards away from the main house which Bulma and Trunks occupied. Satoya had at one time lived in the large home as well, but after meeting Sakura, he and she had moved into the Briefs' cottage house in the backyard. It was small, but cozy, and seemed to suit the two just fine.

Bulma turned back to her cake batter, sniffling slightly, but otherwise remaining impassive, Pan was sure she was reliving her last time with her mate. She hadn't heard the story from anyone here, but if it was anything like the other future Trunks's story, then she knew it was bad. That Trunks had said his father had walked out the door one day, a grunt signaling as a farewell, to never return again. It had been just a normal farewell, a normal day, with the sun shining and all that, but had ended in tragedy. Pan didn't want to think along those lines.

"Bulma?" Pan whispered, willing to let the woman lead the direction of their conversation, she didn't want to force her into anything, but wanted to be there if the need arose.

"I'm alright, Pan, its just hard to see the ones you love risk their lives everyday. I still miss Vegeta so much," at that a choke broke her statement, and Pan stood.

Walking over to her the young woman embraced the older one, not saying a word but rocking her back and forth, letting her cry. She wasn't blubbering or crying out, which the Saiyan was happy about, but rather delicately sniffling as tears streamed down her face. The only other women she had seen cry had made a big show about it, most likely for attention, which most men fell for, but she found altogether annoying.

"Goodness, its getting late, I need to go to the lab," Bulma said, brushing away from the other girl and wiping her hands on her apron. "Take the cake out of the oven in twenty minutes, Pan."

"'kay," Pan replied, watching silently as the woman left, she hated emotions like that, she wasn't used to them.

Ever since her preteen days, Pan had been the one comforting others and making sure that tears were never seen in her eyes. She hadn't cried in front of someone in over seven years, and today, had almost broke that. Every time someone else had an emotional situation, one she would help them through, it only made the old lingering feelings in herself shoot forwards. Each time it was stronger, and she hated it, hated knowing that she was weak.

"Damn it," she murmured, hurriedly rubbing her nose, Pan walked out the backdoor, intent on working off some of her nerves.

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"Oh shit, oh shit," Pan cursed, hopping around like a maniac as she burned her hands on the hot glass baking pan the cake was in. "Oh, how could I be so stupid?"

Dropping the hot glass on the stove, she quickly retreated to the sink to run cold water of her stinging palms, happy to note that there wouldn't be any lasting effect. She had grabbed two dishtowels, being that she didn't know where the potholders were, and had found out, that they weren't quite thick enough.

Turning the faucet off, she went back to inspect the cake, fearing the worst. Smiling widely, she noted that only the outsides were slightly burnt, not overly so, and thus was edible. She had been outside training, completely forgetting the baking sweet, but luckily, had only left it in for five minutes over what Bulma had said.

"Nice vocabulary," a voice taunted, and she groaned, wishing she could bash her head on the cabinets, though she was sure Bulma wouldn't approve.

"Do you have to witness all of my humiliating accidents?" she mumbled, noticing a pattern, every time she screwed up, he just happened to be there.

"I do enjoy them," he replied, shaking his head at her pointed glare, instead he walked forward and grabbed her wrist, flipping her hand over. "Doesn't look too bad."

"I'm fine," she said, blushing, he was attractive, he was in her time and he was now, even if there wasn't any romance between them, it was still not good on her system to have an attractive male so close.

Laughing, he left her, she still contemplating his demise for the furious way her cheeks had reddened and pulse quickened, therefore, furthering her embarrassment. Sulking slightly, the brunette went back to her work, deciding that Bulma hadn't appeared to make lunch, so she would. Happy to note that there was lunch meat in the fridge, she didn't need anymore laughing at her predicaments.

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"Where's Bulma?" Satoya asked, he had showed up a good twenty minutes after Trunks' departure, his hair wet and smelling of soap.

"Downstairs in the lab working on the time machine," Pan replied, seemingly happy with her arrange of junk foods, she was a master chef.

"So you made lunch?" he said, already knowing the answer by the lack of cooked items, all but the cake, which he was now very fearful of trying.

"Yes," Pan quipped, not noticing his glance at the baked item as she was mentally checking off her list to make sure all food stuffs were present.

"Be warned my friend, the young one hath prepared our food," Satoya teased, fully gaining the brunette's attention as Trunks entered.

"Very funny," she ground out, flipping him off once before stepping out the backdoor to yell at Sakura once, not really caring whether she showed or not, she was in a terrible mood.

Bulma walked into the room, smiling as she saw both men standing there, none the worse for wear. She didn't say anything, but the female Saiyan could definitely tell that the relief in her eyes was making her speechless. This was the first time she had ever really saw her this worried, had she just not noticed before? Was today special for some reason? She wasn't sure, and wasn't sure if she should pry. If this was her Bulma, she would have, without hesitance. But she wasn't, and she couldn't.

"Well, dig in!" Pan chirped, dispersing the tense atmosphere, well until Sakura pranced in and sat on Satoya's lap.

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Ok, maybe there was one other thing Pan hated more than cooking, and that was cleaning up after it. There were no dishwashers, so she had to rely on a sink, a prehistoric sink that pruned her hands. She hated it, detested it, and had been contemplating bashing a skillet over the human girl's head for the past hour. But she supposed Bulma would be displeased with that too.

"So he was like all tied up and I had put on my super cute...," Pan gulped, wishing that her hands weren't full of suds so she could cover her poor virginal ears.

As far as she was concerned, those two rabbits were perverted, twisted, whatever anyone wanted to call it. She had heard many exploits of the two, and she would never look at Satoya in the same way again. Never. She was surprised that the man hadn't locked the girl up, just to keep her mouth shut. If he knew all the things that she told the women, Pan was sure she wouldn't be seeing the redhead.

"Pan," the young Saiyan turned, smiling at Bulma, and leaving Sakura to her own devices, happy to be rid of the stupid chore.

Following the woman down the stairs, she felt the chill of all the machinery close around her, she had always hated Bulma's lab. Even if this one had slightly less equipment, the same whirring of machines, cold and unfeeling, enveloped her every sense. She could only assume it was her Saiyan heritage that made her so acutely aware of it, her instincts screaming at her to get out of there at any cost. All the humans seemed just fine with it, but the ones mixed with Saiyan heritage, that embraced it, always flinched.

"I'm sorry for this, but I need some DNA," Bulma explained, leading me to a sterile bed, with a far too thin mattress and smelled of chemicals.

"Um, ok, why?" Pan asked, used to this from the previous Bulma, but not understanding in the least how this would solve any current problem.

"Well, I've got a theory that everyone has a little bit different DNA, from time to time," she explained, placing a needle in my arm, I looked away. "Well, as you know, each Saiyan or human have different DNA's, but then again, they have similar ones too, which is what makes them human or Saiyan. But that factor, I believe, will be slightly different for those that do not belong to the same dimensions."

Pan nodded her head, trying to recall her old Biology class with much difficulty. She had never particularly liked science, but had found it necessary with being involved with the Briefs' family. She hoped that Bulma was right, she missed her family.

"Alright Pan, I'll study this, you don't have to stay down here if you don't want to," Bulma said, smiling at the clearly bored girl.

"But I really don't want to go back up with Sakura," Pan replied, scrunching up her nose, a shiver of disgust traveled up her spine.

"Then go outside, you bother me," Bulma laughed, turning back to her microscope, Pan eagerly jumped off and ran up the stairs, glad to be rid of the machinery.

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Finishing her pushups, Pan sat up, wiping a strand of hair from her eyes, enjoying the crisp breeze that blew through the otherwise deserted yard. The day was cool and peaceful, yet oddly strange and out of place. Despite the sun shining, the sky was forever gray and filled with dust that tickled her nose in an unpleasant way. The grass, though still green, was sickly and limp, holding no strength to reach towards the nurturing sun. No birds sang in the trees, and the trees held no leaves, but were bare and white as bone. Though cool and pleasant to the feel, the day was hallow and lacking of joy, she was glad she knew a time when this was not so.

Scanning the area, she noted no raised ki, happy for it. She feared for those two, unsure of the adversaries that the two androids presented. They must have been strong, extremely so, for this Trunks was much stronger in this time than the one in her's, and yet he couldn't hold against them. She had never seen him at full power, but even in his relaxed state, he radiated energy and strength, she wasn't sure that he wouldn't have surpassed her father.

"Gaw, too much thinking!" she sighed, laying down to start her sit-ups, she missed her sparring sessions with Vegeta and her grandfather, here it seemed like she was being put into a safe little box. She hated it.

Smirking, she chuckled, finding the circumstances humorous. At home she was sheltered, and here it was no different. She had gained strength over the years, never quite turning, much to the disappointment of herself. Bulma figured it was to do with her diluted blood, that it was impossible for a quarter-Saiyan to change to the next level. But her grandfather had another theory, Pan had never seen the tragedy that her friends and family had, and so never had the true drive to change. She didn't know which it was, she wanted to ascend so badly, yet the thought of Bulma's prediction being true broke her heart.

"So annoying," already she could feel the anger building in her, and she moved more furiously, racing through her warmups much quicker than normal.

Flipping on her feet, she quickly powered up, thinking of all those she loved, hated, and the frustration that grew with each passing day. Energy built within her, pouring from her body in giant blue waves that moved the otherwise dying foliage and disturbed the lazing bugs from their cover. She paid no heed, focusing only on the quickly approaching limit, she was close, having gone only a step further once before, she planned to make it passed that today.

Screeching as a hard body vaulted her to the ground, she sputtered, coughing before glaring up at the demi-Saiyan that had so rudely disturbed her training. If she couldn't train with anyone, she was going to improve on what skills she could, Vegeta would kill her if he found out she had been procrastinating on her workouts. She had already gone a whole week without flexing her muscles, it was about time for a good pounding.

"What are you thinking?" Trunks growled, staying atop her, Pan wasn't too pleased with that and seethed silently, trying every once in awhile to dislodge him.

"I was thinking I was sick and tired of being stuck in that house like some housewife," she hissed, growing more annoyed before quickly flaring her aura and flipping him over in his surprise.

"That was stupid, do you know what kind of beacon that was? Even a mortal could feel that!" Trunks retorted, knocking her off with little effort, which further annoyed the girl.

"Well, you're crazy if you think I'm going to leave my training behind, Vegeta would have my head," Pan snapped, pulling at the end of her ponytail, knowing he was right but hating to admit it. "But you're right, I'll go far off next time before I train."

"Oh no you won't," Trunks returned, his face never moving from its fierce scowl, if she wasn't so upset she would have been nervous.

"Like hell I won't, you can't keep my locked up Trunks, I'm not some puny little human who can't take care of herself," Pan angrily replied, ignoring the giant sigh from Satoya.

"Would you two stop slamming us humans?" he said, laughing out loud as the two part Saiyans turned their heated gazes upon him.

"You'll do as I say Pan," Trunks threatened, returning his intense blue eyes towards her, she felt her stomach flip, whether it was a good one or bad one, she wasn't sure.

"No, I won't, I'll do what I please, I'm training Trunks, and I don't give a rat's ass what you think about it," she snapped, jumping to her feet and brushing off her backside.

"Do you know how foolish and dangerous that is?" he grated out, he too came to his feet, not bothering however to rid himself of the gray dust.

"Dangerous, probably, but I don't care, its more dangerous to pretend that the androids won't show up at this place without anyone to protect it. What do you suppose would happen if they showed and you two were far off?" she asked, swiveling to gaze unblinkingly into his eyes. She received no answer.

"Exactly, it'd be a slaughter, I must keep in shape. You've handled this situation foolishly, its only a matter of time before those droids show and destroy this place. Someone has to hold them off until reinforcements arrive," she replied cooly, the anger slowly cooling. "As far as it being foolish, it probably is, but I have never been known for anything but that. I am a Son."

Trunks shook his head, exasperated, but smiling all the while. Gohan had been strict and stern, though still loving, he had been hardened into a true warrior. He did not remember Goku, but from what his mother had told him, he would have been similar to Pan, minus the temper. Full of love and life, both seemed to disregard all safety measures towards themselves, focusing only on growing in power to protect those they loved the most.

"Fine, but I'll train you, I don't want you out there alone," he conceded, not at all annoyed with losing the argument, but rather amused with the whole situation. "I would hate for my father to murder you."

Laughing, Pan clapped her hands excitedly, placated. She looked forward to the thought of a challenge, and though she doubted Trunks would be as powerful as Vegeta, or as merciless, she respected his own strength. She nowhere doubted his abilities, and was ready to see what it would be like train with another demi without it being relative or an old babysitter.

This could be interesting.

A/N: So if you guys don't completely hate me, R&R, I would appreciate it. Again sorry for the wait and for the length, its rather short, but I liked where I ended it. Thanks for all the past reviews! Ja!

Dark Huntress