CHAPTER 67
Mystic Saiyan

Pan became aware of the air, the land, the energy of the planet. She felt a cool rush to her head as her mind cleared. In a breath of a moment, time stood still for Pan as she closed and opened her eyes slowly, and all she saw was black and purple lightning.

Black plasma bolts cracked in a wild purple dance around her. She felt the energy course through her veins. She felt the connection of all beings, all matter, all mass. She was united with the planet, the sun, the stars, and all celestial bodies. She could feel their potential energies and their kinetic power. All was one. And she was All.

All Time was still as she lay there. She felt All energies flow into her veins, and flood her with All the enlightenment of All immortal power. She felt the energy of All the universe course through her like waves of bliss. It was the power of All connection. It was pure love of All things living. It was the energy of All creation. It was the Commandment of Death, for All to be Reborn.

The black lightning grew in its intensity, bursting and sizzling with pops of nuclear static energy. A thousand rifts of star-filled space and purple voids blinked in and out of existence, crackling with thunderclaps that echoed on the landscape.

She felt the electric course within her blood - the healing energy of life. It buzzed through her bones and cooly tingled like snowflakes along her burnt skin. She was one with the energy. She was All.

And she had All the time.

Within the course of her inhalation, she felt the wound on her head heal. Her mental fog lifted, and her foggy vision became clear and crisp, and enhanced. She became aware of her surroundings.

She was lying face-down on the rocks, with her head turned to her right. Lightning bolts painted her aura, and it was bright and hot, with two Kamehameha waves bursting down, but for some reason, she was not in any pain.

Beside her, so close to her vision, she could see long light lavender wisps blowing in a turbulent wind that was beyond her hearing. In blindingly bright light, she saw his lilac eyelashes, a pained, unconscious face. The one who shielded her. Her savior. Trunks.

Pan reached out with her right hand and touched his chest, so close. Upon her touch, Trunks' pained face softened, and he relaxed in whatever struggle he was in.

Pan took her hand away and pressed it against the ground, to sit up against the immense ki waves. As she propped herself up, she became even more aware of her surroundings. Pan saw that the black lightning also radiated from Trunks. The reason why they were alive is because the bolts had drawn together to create a dark spiraling lightning umbrella-like shield above them. It spiraled and fizzed and popped with plasma void energy. Pan was entranced.

There were sounds beyond the shield, which muffled the sounds of all the world outside her protective bubble. She watched as Gohan stopped his energy wave, blue lightning coursing around him as he seemed to shout angrily to Goten to coordinate a more powerful wave. He and Goten then blasted another set of ki streams at Pan and Trunks on the ground with a collective chest-rattling "HAAAA!"

The more power that was thrown at them, the stronger the lightning shield became. The sounds of the blasts seemed muffled, as if they were behind a wall. The lightning wall absorbed All energy. Pan felt herself breathe the life-giving air of the planet. She felt the energy resonate within her and her ring as her eyes lingered on Trunks.

That's right. She loved him. She forgave him. He saved her. And she needed to protect him with All she had.

Pan propped up her second elbow, starting to sit up. She felt all as one. She was haunted. She was possessed… but free. The black and purple lightning was like something she had seen before. It felt… like an old talent that ran in her blood, in either some dream or some past life. It was the knowledge of All.

Winds from the ki waves whipped her short hair as she got to her knees. She looked up to the source of the light, seeing through the light. She cooly watched the blonde Tuffles emit their enormously powerful energy waves. All of the power converted into her dark lightning. Their energy coursed into her, and radiated within All of her - her physical, and her mental potentials. She felt stronger each moment, as if ki fed off their energy. She felt her muscles twitch with excitement as they grew healthy and strong, and her emaciated body filled with health and stamina.

As she stood slowly, her tattered purple gi flapped in the strong wind, and the rags fell free. The purple fabric flew away and vaporized in the bright Kamehameha light as it reached the border of her shield.

She rose, hauntingly collected and calm. She was emotionless and naked. The black and purple lightning raged around her, partially concealing her form. Her ring was glowing a shade of intense red.

Gohan and Goten stopped their attacks and jumped back, wide-eyed and confused.

Goten roared, "What is she doing?!"

Gohan stood incredulous, his eyes widening in wonder. "Is that… Mystic power? How?"

"I don't know," Pan she looked up at him, her eyes almost quizzical, "But let's find out what it does."

Pan's eyes flared as the lightning spiked around her. She felt her body regenerate with divine energy as it coursed through her. The power warmed and tingled on her skin as her body healed. She felt her heart pump warm blood anew, which straightened her posture,powered her hands, and strengthened her resolve.

Pan grabbed the Nyoi-Bo from her back with her right hand, feeling the energy of her palm crackle through it. She instinctively knew what she could do.

Gohan seemed genuinely surprised to see the weapon, and then his eyes glimmered as he sneered and erupted in laughter. "Hehehehehahaha! Are you going to bat me now with the Nyoi-Bo?"

Pan pictured All the lightning channeling into the bo staff. "Extend."

With the Nyoi-Bo as its hilt, a giant ki wave of lightning exploded as a giant column of radiation light. It extended as a SHIIIIII sound between Gohan and Goten. They dodged backward in each direction, cursing as the ground underneath the beam smoked and melted into molten rock.

Pan swung the lightning bo toward Gohan.

ZAPPPP! The plasma laser zipped by Gohan as he did a backflip to narrowly avoid impact. The edge of the energy beam sliced off the ends of his blonde hair, which blew away as black strands.

Pan stopped to marvel at the weapon momentarily. Cogs turned in her head as she thought of All the things she could do with her power.

Goten threw a boulder that flew toward her and Trunks in a WOOOOSH, which he exploded mid-flight into a thousand smoldering rocks. Gohan flew immediately behind the attack to follow-up if Pan were to block it.

"Trampoline!" Pan instinctively thought, and brought the weapon up before the attack. The column of light became a flexible field of purple energy that stretched backward with every rock. Gohan stopped before he hit the field, but could not dodge in time before the rocks flung back at him and Goten, hitting them both hard with rock pellets like bullets. They made PTTA PTTA PTTA sounds as they shot at the ground and rocks behind them.

"What the fuck is going on!" Goten shouted in disbelief, "How is she doing this?" He staggered, his golden hair flickering.

Pan saw the opening with Goten. Eliminate the weakness.

"Lasso!" Pan cooly commanded, and the circular lightning hollowed out and stretched as it rotated counter-clockwise from the Nyoi-Bo hilt. Pan swung it toward Goten, the light zipping and crackling as it sought its target.

Goten tried to sprint out of the way, but stumbled, hair still flickering. "Shit!"

The lightning lasso lashed and caught him, pinning him in its hold as Pan swung Goten in the air in a deafening rage, and SMASHED him, his blonde head-down, into the rocks twenty meters away.

Pan's eyes teared ever slightly, as she commanded stoically. "Electrocute."

The shock hit Goten as fast as light with a KRAKKKK. Goten didn't have any time to process the pain as his entire body convulsed in an electric shock.

When the attack was over, and Pan retracted her lightning lasso, Goten's hair was black. He rolled over, unconscious and sizzling. Goten was down.

Gohan's eyes were wide as he hesitated, glancing to Goten, and then back to Pan. His eyes acknowledged her formidability.

Pan stood tall, unwavering, as she spun the lightning spear in her hand. "However fun our reunion has been," Pan drew in the dark power, and opened her mind to its growth within her, "I'm here for Baby. And you're in my way."

Pan held out her Nyoi-Bo to the sky, and all the lightning bolts within the atmosphere began to be drawn and coalesce around her. All the energy soared to her, spiraling around her to form a tight energy shield.

She levitated upward, ignoring Gohan's ki blasts that were absorbed by the shield. She closed her eyes, and opened her senses to the world around her. She made a mental map of the topography and the energy currents and waves that ran along the land. She focused on channeling her energy.

Dark lightning sparked on the shield around Pan and Trunks as Gohan tried to punch through the energy wall, but shouted as he was electrocuted and knocked backward.

As Gohan struggled to break through to them, Pan remembered Piccolo's training. As wind whipped at her hair, she levitated upward. As her feet left the ground, she crossed her legs, focusing on the environment around her. She closed her eyes and connected with the planet, with the air, and with All energy. The power gave her vision beyond her eyes. She sensed the warmth of the molecules and atoms around her, as they shimmered within existence. She focused her ki on the rocks throughout the entire landscape. Although she never grasped it before, Piccolo's telekinesis training seemed so easy now.

In the air, she slowly stretched, as if being born, her eyes still closed. As she extended her body, she raised her right hand with the Nyoi-Bo above her head. Her short black hair rolled like thunder as she hovered high, naked, proud, and powerful, eyes closed. From her hand, the Nyoi-Bo floated upward, slowly extending.

Gohan stopped attacking, and watched, incredulous, and readying himself to dodge.

When Pan opened her eyes, they were black voids with the dust of stars that swirled like galaxies. She was All the universe.

As she spoke, her voice came as a thousand in a chorale - a choir of gospel. She was the Mystic. She was the bringer of death. "This is for Piccolo."

Then she released it All.

SZZZZZZ! An electric storm burst forth from around Pan and Trunks, and came alive across the atmosphere, zig-zagging throughout the sky and saturating the air in every direction as it crawled every inch of space, and sizzling in between the space. It radiated and pierced every corner of the air as matter and energy exploded and became one.

The world became a cage - a barbed wire of energy that snagged Gohan through its strikes and paralyzed him in place. The world shocked its energy into Gohan, electrocuting him a thousand times over, burning his blue imperial jacket and khaki pants, searing off the hairs from his arms. He was frozen in place, a prisoner of Mystic punishment, as he screamed through the energy. He tried to raise his power level to try to power through and overcome the electrical paralysis, but his ki signature was too unstable. His blonde hair began to flicker.

Pan calmly and collectively started to walk toward Gohan as she formed her hands into a ball and recited, "Ka…"

Gohan gasped, trapped among the electrical current, locked in place as the lightning coursed through him and rendered him unable to channel his ki. "W-What is th-th-this!"

"...Me…" The light in Pan's hands grew in intensity and formed dark lightning shards around it. Pan slowly sank to the ground as the energy ball grew in her hands - blue, with black bolts along its edge.

"S-Stop it, Saiyan!" Gohan tried to power up, gathering energy in his hands, but the shocking power of the black lightning shorted out his ability to control his energy.

Gohan continued to struggle for power, but his reserves were empty from his struggle. His hair flickered back to black as he panted, still standing, unable to move his body as he was left vulnerable to her attack. "Stop iiiitttt!"

"Did you stop when you hunted me? Did you stop when you killed Piccolo?!" Pan cried out, anger flaring, her dark lightning dancing in a rage around her. She would take her time. Time was hers as she built her Kamehameha to its full potential. "Haaa… Meee…"

––––––––

Black electric buzzed through Trunks' murky, foggy head. As the energy hummed in his head, it absorbed the mist in small hot tingles that shocked him in and out of consciousness. His leaden eyes weighed heavily closed, but the heat of the bolts twitched his muscles awake. Every part of him felt like he was in a bog, or tar; his body felt slow and sluggish. It was so hard to move; so hard to breathe, but the tingle throughout his skin and body continued to restore his senses, and made it easier to draw each breath.

He felt his back against cold rock as his ribs snapped back into place with shocking POPs, and suddenly he could breathe freely again, panting deeply as the oxygen rushed through him.

Crackling clarity shot through his mind like a network of fireworks, bursting through his senses, and erupting through the darkness in hues and smells and feeling. A rush of air filled his lungs as he inhaled the millions of shifting colors that his eyes saw behind his lids, then bathed in them and healed in them.

He took a deep breath of air that felt like a cool spring morning under a rising sun. A blinding light beside him radiated with warm waves that sent tingles up his spine and through his fingers and toes. He could feel the static swirling inside him, charging his energy, and making his hair lift with a subtle tingling tickle to his neck.

As the energy flooded through him, he tried to swallow and his throat felt stuck. He needed water so badly. He needed air. He let in a deep rasp, and started to gasp, panting, trying to remember how to control his breaths. His body felt so heavy.

He labored to lift his eyelids as his thoughts tentatively flowed in his head. What is this…? Where am I…?

Black lightning cleared his thoughts. Memories crashed back to him. Clarity. Thoughts! Trunks gasped aloud, coughing and wheezing, struggling to adjust to the weight of the world against his corporal body and his heavy eyelids that fluttered as he struggled to open them. Breaking into a sweat with his effort, he paused and huffed again, trying to collect himself. As he panted against the cold ground, he opened up his senses.

Although his hearing felt muted, he heard loud rumbles that sounded distant, and felt the ground boom and roll with sharp strikes nearby. His consciousness fought hard to connect what was happening around him, but it was still so hard. His body felt like it had been stiff, sleeping for far too long, and had forgotten how to respond to his will. He just focused on breathing, and the colors swirling in his head until the world stopped spinning for him, and he had a better idea of where gravity was.

Trunks' hands grabbed the dirt and rock under him, squeezing, feeling the resistance against his fingers. His eyes were still so heavy and he needed to see. With a sore grunt, he rolled over on the rock and pushed his weight against the ground with stiffened arms, trying to pry himself up.

His murky blue eyes opened to see red stone, dusty and cracked below him. As he sat up, the overall sore ache in his body staggered his breathing, but as he moved, his discomfort dissolved into the energy that flowed within him. He felt confused, and looked down to his left hand against the rock, which emanated black and purple lightning from under his brown glove.

He sat up fully, looking at his hands in a daze. And then he started to tremble, as it began to dawn on him that he could see. He could feel. Sharp stings of black radiation nipped at his cheeks. Realization flooded into him as his eyes widened. He was free. But how?!

The dark lightning triggered his emotions. He felt a rush of blood and excitement, the pure joy of being able to take his own breaths. To think what he wanted, and be able to be who he wanted. It was all so clear. His eyes filled with tears as he looked down at his hands. It was his tears. They were his hands.

And then he looked up, to see a dark radiance that shone so bright that the edges of his eyes danced with light and colors. And he saw her.

Black and purple lightning buzzed and crackled around her. Her hair was shorter, but he knew her. Her face was lit by a blue ball of energy she was gathering in her hands. Her stiff short hair whipped sharply in the winds around them. Her purple gi was shattered, leaving her with a nude silhouette backlit by dark energy. She was the most hauntingly beautiful sight he had ever seen.

"Pan…" Trunks' heart leapt as he looked up at her wide-eyed, gaping.

"... Meee… HAAAAAAAA!" and the blast went off.

It deafened him. A massive Kamehameha wave erupted from her hands, with black lightning spiraling like a double-helix corkscrew around the wave. The shock of the blast KRAKKKed the ground under Trunks' legs as Pan held her ground with the massive force she emitted. Trunks' world spun as he stumbled to his feet, tripped, fell, and then re-stumbled to stand again. Trunks' eyes darted to view the path of her sustained blue-and-black energy wave.

Trunks saw the brunt force of the immense blue and black wave hit Gohan squarely in the chest. Gohan shouted in shock, an extended "Ahhhh!" as the wave knocked him straight back into the rocky ridges, hammering him deeper and deeper into the stone with GDDKK, GDDKK, GDDKK, increasing the size of the crater in the side of the mountain.

"It's over, Gohan!" Pan's eyes were cold as she shouted over the blast. Rubble, rocks and dust clouds rained down around them from the impact. Her emotions were numb as the cratered rocks crumbled around Gohan. And Pan felt nothing for him as she hovered in the air, relishing in her newfound power as she focused and spiraled it into her Kamehameha blast. It felt like she was channeling through a well that led to All the oceans of energy.

As the rocks settled over her blast, Pan released the energy wave. She paused for a minute in consideration of a thought, and then dropped, agilely landing on the ground about ten meters from Trunks, not noticing him. Keeping her eyes and focus on Gohan's location under the rocks, Pan brought her right hand to her head, two fingers extended to touch her forehead.

Pan immediately began to charge her energy. Her ki rose as a combination of white and purple colors that cycled around and obscured her naked body. Around them, it was deceitfully calm. The dust settled on the landscape. The rumble of a distant fight thundered across the mountain range. The energy attack that Pan was building was nothing like Trunks had seen before. All of the lightning in the air around them began to condense and flow into her. Her energy started to gather at a steady pace, and with each passing moment it drew with more intensity. Within ten seconds, the lightning began to spiral in winds toward her. Within twenty seconds, the spiral became a howl, with winds that moaned HOOOOOOO around her, like music among the landscape. Time ticked, and the mountain range lay still. Thirty seconds, forty, fifty, sixty… And with each moment, her power escalated, its lightning of immense intensity as the winds shrieked around them.

Then silence. The lightning vanished.

The sudden absence of all sound and movement sent a shocking shiver down Trunks' spine. The air was placid and peaceful for a split moment - a breath. A calm before the storm. Trunks' hair came to rest slightly above his shoulders as still as he stood frozen, waiting for the next move.

Then, ZZGGGGGGG,the entire side of the mountain erupted and vaporized as Gohan blasted away the entire side of the mountain in his path. His hair was blindingly gold and his teal eyes betrayed both awe and anger as he struggled to free his foot from a massive boulder.

Wasting no time, Pan shot her right hand forward, extending her tips to point as a gun. Her voice was dangerously collected as she shouted, "Special Beam Cannon!"

ZHOOOOOOoooooooOOOOOOM! A perilous bright yellow and black-lightning spiral radiation beam erupted from her fingers like a cosmic laser ray piercing the mountainside. The light and dark energies twisted in a tight and ominous weave that spiraled and sucked all the dust and debris into it, converting it into an even bigger blast. Gohan freed his foot and dodged, but Pan was not aiming toward him.

The beam cannon exploded into the mountaintop, sending more shards of rock flying high into the atmosphere.

Pan then flicked her wrist, and the laser sliced into the entire mountain range at once, sending the tops flying upward, and all raining down as an entire upper half of a sierra upon Gohan.

The force of the energy cracked the land below it with a GRRRRGGG rumbling earthquake that split the face of the planet into a giant canyon fissure along the path of the spiral. The land began to collapse in on itself as a massive two-sided rockslide that resembled two immense waterfalls. Stone, rock, boulders, cliffs, and crags all trembled and and fell upon Gohan, whose hair was flickering.

Gohan cursed as he struggled fly upward through the collapsing debris under the continuous Kamehameha wave. With flickering hair as the rocks pummeled him downward and broke upon him, he batted away boulders and rockfalls as the stone rockfalls sundered around him. Pan shouted at the top of her lungs as she raised her ki even more and pushed her energy even more into her wave attack. Her extra ki welled into a ball that rode her energy stream, until it KRAK-AKed into the top of the mountain, sending the rest of the rocks shooting in all directions, up into the atmosphere and also falling upon Gohan, all at once.

The ground shook as a loud RRRMMM and began to give way underneath Trunks. He fell on all fours and was incredulous at the intensity of the power. He had never seen anything like this. It was as if the whole planet itself were a tool for her attacks. The quake of the planet was so large from the continuous impact of the beam that the adjoining mountain ranges were collapsing. The Tuffle Palace in the distance started to slide and crumble from the mountain it was built on. White marble disintegrated into dust that added to the massive dust clouds already swirling in the sky.

The rocks rained down from the atmosphere, creating streaks of fire and light as the sky wept its destruction around them. Trunks panted hard, his head spinning as he tried to understand what was going on.

And then the rumble stopped. There was silence again as Trunks heaved.

Pan lowered her hands, and the air suddenly fell silent except for the whistle of the meteorites pouring down like sparklers from the heavens.

Small gray ash flakes began to fall like snow around them. The air was acrid and bitter with the scent of burning rubble. Sound and winds were still, with the exception the constant crackle of the purple and black lightning, and the far-off Booms and rumbles of a fight with Baby. That battle seemed so far away right now.

Trunks remained wide-eyed at Pan, and turned his eyes to scout the landscape. Goten was unconscious and in critical condition under rubble that rolled on top of him. Gohan was somewhere in that mountain range. Both of their kis were so low that Trunks couldn't sense them. He turned his eyes back to Pan, who was obviously sensing for them too. He saw her eyes were cool, her breath calm. For the amount of energy that it took to make a fissure of this depth, Trunks marveled at how she was able to maintain her herculean power level. He was struck in awe. She's like a… god.

Trunks' breath hitched as he realized the gravity of that thought. What happened? He tried to gather his thoughts, remember what he was supposed to do. His mind felt like it was emerging from a slumber, and all of his thoughts were groggy, behind some kind of veil or film. It was still so hard to remember how to think.

The black lightning crossed his vision again, and Trunks again realized that he, himself, was emanating the energy. The dark sparks around him created a DZZZ sound of static that raised the ends of his hair. What is this? He brought his hand up to his hair in puzzlement, his eyes glazed and perplexed as he ran his fingers through his hair. His hair length startled him. When did my hair get this long? His breath hitched. How much time has passed?!

Then Pan looked straight at him.

The intensity of her stare caught his breath. He suddenly felt vulnerable and intimidated. Her face was emotionless, her eyes cold. Was this really the same girl? His voice struggled to work, "P-Pan…"

She phased out, and then phased in front of him. She was nude, yet obscured through the black and purple lightning, just feet away. She was close enough that both of their lightning touched, danced, and sung as they resonated together. The magnitude of her power sucked the breath from Trunks. He felt his body tense, unsure of what she was about to do.

Pan reached behind her and pulled out a simple red bo staff. Something about it seemed familiar, but Trunks' mind was still reeling. "Wait," he choked.

Pan said unemotionally, "Get out of here." She swung her red bo staff back, and Trunks just watched in wonder as she held it like a baseball bat at him. This seemed like a deja-vu that his mind was unable to connect.

Pan swung the staff at full power, with lightning dancing around her arms as the Nyoi-Bo bat was propelled forward by a divine thrust.

But Trunks was faster. He shot up his ki and brought his powered left arm up to block the blow. His hair turned golden and in a tremendously bright flicker from light to darkness, Trunks' hair turned off like a ZZT, like a light bulb burning out. The black lightning around him BZZZZZed as it sucked the Super Saiyan energy right out him, and into the dark energy void. Trunks could only gasp in surprise and shock as he felt the electric devour his energy as his right arm lost its strength.

WOK! The red bo staff made contact with his arm - but it didn't. Wide-eyed in amazement, Trunks stared at the black bolts that had surrounded him and caught the impact of Pan's staff blow, like a linear shield that protected Trunks' body from the blow. Trunks just looked at his shielded arm in amazement. What is happening? "W-Wait!"

"I said," Pan gritted her teeth, her eyes cool, "get out of here, Trunks! You're in my way!"

Pan then stepped forward toward Trunks, and with all her weight, swung her left leg to kick his own legs out from under him. He was still faster - he leaped up to avoid her swinging foot. But he failed to see that she had planted her left foot, and used her forward momentum to shove her Nyoi-Bo forward. She shouted, "Extend!"

The red power pole staff rapidly extended with a HYUUN whistle while Trunks was in mid-jump, and there was no way to block it. The edge of it collided straight into Trunks' diaphragm with a GWOK impact, knocking the wind from his lungs. The force of the expansion propelled him backward, caught against the pole until he was freed in mid-air, but still unable to regain his composure or flight balance because his stomach was spasming. He struggled to take in a breath.

He sensed himself fly backward in the air, and before he could regain his composure, Pan phased in front of him with the Nyoi-Bo extended again and WHACKED him in the gut mid-air, using his propulsion to gain more of a KRAK as she hit home, again wheezing all breath out of him as he was batted backwards in the sky like a baseball.

Wind whistled past Trunks as he flew prone in the air, stunned and gasping as he shot across the landscape toward the mountainous rubble as a flying arc in the sky.

"Oof!" Trunks grunted as he crashed and landed roughly along the mountain crest and barrelled at full speed down the boulders the other side of the mountain terrain with a B-B-B-B-B-BM. The lightning shield around him took the majority of the blow as he rolled on the rocks until he came to a dusty, painful stop. Every part of his body ached, and his back was absolutely killing him. He rasped in agony as he breathed, shakily trying to raise himself up and see past the dark bolts. What just happened?!

His skin began to tingle, and as Trunks rose to look down at his hands and arms, he saw all the bruises and lacerations smooth out and heal, right before his eyes.

He slowly stood, panting, mind reeling in confusion. His already tattered clothes barely hung onto him anymore. His chest was exposed, and his beige jacket hung loosely to one side. Feeling more than irked, he ripped off the loose piece of jacket away from the threads that connected it, and proceeded to rip it again. He tore out a thin strip, and dropped the rest of the jacket. He brought his arms up and used it to tie back his annoyingly long hair.

His head was still reeling. He needed to get his bearings straight.

Pan was on the other side of the mountains, and as far as Trunks was able to tell, she was not in immediate danger. On this side of the mountain range, he heard the sounds of fighting, and they were getting closer. The ground under Trunks trembled with the shock waves of it.

Trunks couldn't get a good view of the fight because of several large boulders in the way of his sight. He tried to focus his energy on the bottoms of his feet and within his core so he could levitate and get a look at what battle was happening. Last I know, we came home. We dropped off the dragonballs. Trunks searched his memory, struggling to get off the ground. All of his ki control was thrown off by the black lightning around him, which continued to drain a portion of his summoned energy.

Despite losing energy, Trunks managed to lift himself up far enough that he grabbed ahold of the top of one boulder with his work gloves, and hoisted himself up with his raw strength. And now Pan is some lightning god. And who is-

Trunks froze.

Standing on the boulder, Trunks's eyes went wide as he looked upon the battlefield. His mind went blank as his eyes landed on Baby locked in battle with the familiar-looking boy from earlier. Lord Baby… Trunks choked and stumbled on the boulder as he felt a pressure inside him spasm and expel burning signals that tore through his nerves in trembling waves it called for his master. Lord Baby…

His stomach lurched. The static in his head roared as his mind felt it was pulled in two different directions. A splitting headache, nausea, and vertigo all hit Trunks at the same time as he sank to his knees and all fours on the rock, watching as a foreign mohawk-haired man and the body of his father fought.

Something within Trunks boiled and bubbled upon feeling the signature. He felt a pull as something invisible tried to drag him deeper within his body. This feeling of being on the edge, or the precipice, suddenly made Trunks lurch forward and gag.

And then the black lightning tore into him, shocking him without pain. A hundred bolts FZZed around him and ZAPPPed away the invasive energy that threatened his body. He felt his nerves tingle in a cool relief, and just as suddenly he felt light as a feather, or almost effervescent.

And then the memories all crashed back into Trunks.

His face contorted and pure rage flooded into him, boiling in a deep-rooted hatred and anger that was finally freed from its shackles.

A whole year of torment and torture slammed into his head as his mind and memory overloaded. All the pain, the anguish, the loneliness, the deceit…. A whole year of slavery and trauma and rape and unjustified killings burst into his mind through the veil that had blocked it. He felt anguish and despair. And overall, he felt the rage. He felt bloodlust.

In his madness, he sensed that whatever Baby was using to control him was still there, held back only by the mysterious energy. He could feel it like it were in a capsule, biding its time, waiting to reopen as the black static shielded him from within.

But, just as the black energy sucked the power and influence from Baby's egg, it also absorbed Trunks' own ki. The plasmic lightning was ravenous; he had to be smart about how he used his energy.

Trunks hopped down from the boulder with a small grunt, and then began to quickly make his way down the mountainside, running on foot toward the battle ahead.

––––––––

––––––––

–09/01/23–

A/N: This was a chapter long coming. I look forward to your thoughts!