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CHAPTER 73
The Rise of Paradox
When Kibitoshin Kai popped back onto his planet, he was feeling mighty proud of himself. He had dropped Vegeta off by his wife Bulma so quickly that she never got a glance of his face. It only took 30 seconds to apply the Mystic tea to the spaceship's water supplies, and that would be enough for the Tuffle citizens to rid Baby's eggs from their systems.
After heading to Earth, it only took ten minutes to apply the drops to all water sources on the planet. It was as simple as some basic instant transmission telekinesis. He had first visited Dende to give him and his aides the tea, and from there, while Dende and his colleagues slept during their nerve refractory reconfiguration, Kibito had a clear view of the world to make his move. The humans would be feeling better in no time… after a few bathroom visits, of course.
Wiping his hands, he was happy to be done with work for the day.
However, his satisfaction vanished as soon as he heard the elder Kai running down the hill of his planet toward him.
"What did you DO?!" Ancient Kai screamed in frustration as he shook his right fist in the air during his run.
"What do you mean?" Kibito sighed. Great spirits, he wanted this Elder off of his planet, but he was stuck with him for eons.
Ancient Kai shook his fist more as he stopped and panted by Kibito, "You interfered with mortal lives and you blew it! This is why we do not interfere with the living! You botched this!"
Kibito growled impatiently, "How did I make a mistake?!"
Ancient Kai's voice was grave and frantic, "You tried to assassinate Trunks!"
Kibito was shocked to realize Ancient Kai had known, but then furrowed his brow because of course he'd know - Ancient Kai was a former Grand Kai, and admitted defensively, "Yes, to prevent Paradox."
"You dolt! Goku saved Trunks."
Kibito gasped. Witnesses were bad.
"And Vegeta witnessed you trying to kill Trunks!"
Kibito grabbed the top of his head of hair. This was worse. "No!"
Ancient Kai waved both arms and spun to show Kibito his back as he pointed his nose to the air. "See, this is why I should have been reinstated as the Supreme Kai! This is why Kais should not vote Kais up into being the Supreme Kai! You triggered it!" Ancient Kai spun and pointed to Kibito, "You, you, you!"
Kibito's brow knitted and he opened his mouth to reply, but Ancient Kai continued to steamroll him with his accusations, shouting "It was not going to happen and now it will happen! Because of you trying to prevent the prophecy, you triggered the prophecy! YOU were the one to trigger Paradox!"
"What." Kibito swallowed a lump in his throat as his aether ran cold.
"Paradox has already started!" Ancient Kai flailed his hands. "We used to be in the THIRD JUMP prime, and now we're in the FIFTH JUMP prime! The spiral is starting! Now it's up to you to mitigate it, you clumsy doofus!"
"Did he get the time machine yet?"
"No," Ancient Kai shook his head. "But now you have to interfere and prevent it from happening! This Trunks must not get the time machine! Now there will be more butterfly effects!"
Kibito groaned and pulled his hair, "Oh no, I really messed up."
Ancient Kai stopped and pointed a waggling finger to Kibito. "You should be fired for what you did!"
"Aahh?!" Kibito's aether was flooded with sudden rage from his offense. He glared daggers, "How dare you!"
"You're disqualified!" Ancient Kai stomped his right foot, "Your actions will bring about the end to this universe!"
"We don't know this. There are other forked prophecies that can break out of the Paradox loop."
"You want to rely on chance?! You PICKED YOUR DESTINY on this!" Ancient Kai began to pace back and forth with his hands behind his back. "You need to fix this, Kibito, because the destiny you just made could be even worse than if Majin Buu were to win this fight. And now who knows?! He just might win this fight!"
"… How do I fix it?" Kibito's head throbbed.
Ancient Kai stopped and sighed, "It's now up to prophetic forks. Paradox is written, Kibito. But the ending is not yet determined. However, I would say we are lucky to be in the fifth jump timeline now. I do not envy the lives of those who lived through any of the previous jumps."
"Wait." Kibito straightened his pose and frowned to Ancient Kai. His eyes widened as he realized his own limitations. "Are you able to see the lives from the previous jumps?"
Ancient Kai huffed. "Of course I can. Can you not? All the jumps have converged the timelines into one continuous stream. This is why the balance of souls and scrolls is threatened!"
Kibito scratched the back of his head, running it down his long straight white hair. "I confess… I can't see the whole stream." His cheeks reddened in his amateurish embarrassment. "What happened before?"
"Oh, you want to know!?" Ancient Kai's eyes lit up, which was a clear sign of the Kaisplaining that was about to happen. Kibito wanted to die inside as Ancient Kai cooed, "This will be quite the story."
"Oh no," Kibito moaned. The story was coming.
Ancient Kai put his hands behind his back as he began to pace again, preparing for his rhetoric. "You'd better sit down for this one."
Kibito sat down on the grass, wondering about his life decisions. He groaned again, "Oh no…"
"This," Ancient Kai stopped and lifted his hands with great enthusiasm, "is the Tale… of Paradox."
–––––––
*-*-*
First Prime Trunks. Record 07-01-01-001.
In Trunks' first life, he was born in an era without a vaccine for the viral heart disease. In this original timeline, Goku died and thus followed the era of Android Seventeen and Eighteen, who wiped out every Z fighter, including Gohan who had trained Trunks. With the help of his mother Bulma, Trunks managed to go back in time to change the past by bringing back the viral antidote, which enabled Goku to live. He also saved his younger baby self from an attack by Dr. Gero, thus cementing himself into an actual paradox and enabling the eventual spin-off of many sub-timelines from his Prime timeline.
In his original First Prime timeline, Gohan mentored Trunks and together they fought the Androids. Gohan was slain, though Trunks prevailed, and ultimately brought peace, with a few hiccups he had to deal with that were the result of other time traveling instances using his First Prime timeline as their base time thread. And even I don't want to get started on Zamasu, so let's just say… First Prime Trunks' timeline invited all kinds of time-related battles and other messes. It even involved Grand Zeno.
("Grand Zeno!" Kibito gasped in horror.
"Yes, Grand Zeno the Omni-King! And if we're not careful, we could accidentally involve him too, and lose our entire universe in the process!"
"Great spirits, I hope not."
"But I digress… Where was I? Oh yes.")
So years went by, and Trunks had his capers swinging his sword around and playing hero - in fact, he achieved tremendous physical power in the process, and a cool new sword, though nothing could ever compare to the Z Sword. And then there came a day he finally decided to stick to his own timeline.
Along his journey, Trunks met a woman named Mai who had some things in common with him, such as their shared memory of Goku from different times of his life, and after a complicated yet charming love story, they went on to settle down, marry and have two daughters.
Baby arrived on Earth in Age 815, when Trunks was 49. Baby had learned of Earth while in space searching for traces of the remaining Saiyan race. He came upon a rumor that Prince Vegeta had last been seen on a mission to Earth. Driven by vengeance and his pursuit, Baby eventually found his way to the planet Earth and tracked down Trunks.
Unsuspecting and unwarned, Trunks was ambushed and possessed by Baby in his own courtyard one spring afternoon. In a heroic act, his eldest daughter escaped just long enough to destroy his time machine and all its schematics. And then the Earth fell under the dark reign of Lord Baby, and King Kai immediately petitioned the Supreme Kais to intervene.
After hijacking Trunks' body and mind, Baby developed capsule-based weaponry and developed a fearsome space armada that became a threat to the northern quadrant of the galaxy. After ten more worlds fell to Tuffle control, King Kai was granted his petition for the Kais to intervene with the Mystic tea, and then proceeded to train a team of vengeful formerly-possessed fighters to overcome Baby-Trunks.
While it took a long time to defeat Baby due to his tricky capsule technology and immense strength, one major victory for the Kais was that Baby-Trunks was never able to regain his time machine schematics. Trunks' body perished in the Age 826, at the age of 60, or 11 years after he was first possessed. He was survived by his wife, two daughters, and fourteen grandchildren.
*–*–*
Second Prime Trunks. Record 07-02-01-001.
In Trunks' second life, Goku lived through the heart disease, the Androids fell, and Gohan defeated Cell, yada yada - you know the story, Kibito. Since Goku lived, new souls were created for this timeline. The closest in direct relation to Trunks were the souls of Goten, Bra, and Pan. There's also Krillin and Android Eighteen's daughter, but she's the result of a double-layered paradox that is another story.
Anyway, in this timeline, Second Prime Trunks, Goku and Pan went off to space to get the Black Star Dragonballs, and Baby learned of Earth while on M2 after encountering the Saiyans. After the Saiyan space goonies left M2, Baby also left M2 to directly head to Earth. He took a private shuttle and was never intercepted.
In this timeline, Baby arrived on Earth six months early. He had six months to completely reshape Earth and its people. When Trunks, Goku and Pan returned to Earth, Goku and Pan immediately fell to Baby, and Baby similarly wished back the Planet Tuffle with the dragonballs. Trunks and Giru barely managed to escape, and went off to space to search for the Black Star Dragonballs again. After a year of searching, Trunks realized that the dragonballs were permanently inert. Piccolo was dead, and so was any chance of using the dragonballs.
Trunks traveled to New Namek and forged a partnership deal with the Nameks in order to acquire use of their own dragonballs. He offered to trade his capsule technology in exchange for a wish. Unfortunately, Tuffle Goku, who was possessed, also had in mind to use the Namekian dragonballs since the Earth-based ones belonging to Dende were corrupted and unusable. Not long after Trunks had arrived, Tuffle Goku instant-transmitted to the planet with his own dragon radar, and thus began a race to get the dragonballs in time.
Trunks secured the dragonballs first and managed to make a single wish before Goku seized them. He wished for a time machine, and hastily made his way back in time to change the past, and to end Baby before he reached Earth.
While in the past, Second Prime Trunks intercepted Baby's transport ship from M2 before it could get to Earth. He had located the ship close to a star and found a vulnerability in its defense.
With the original intention of just killing Baby, Trunks boarded the ship in a surprise assassination attempt. Unfortunately, it resulted in Trunks being forced to use his weaponry and ki to kill everyone on board as Baby hopped from body to body. In the process, Trunks also became infected with Baby's egg. Trunks was able to shake Baby off with his energy, and Baby re-possessed an injured boy who fell unconscious before he could make any commands to possess Trunks. However, Trunks knew what was coming from what he saw of others infected with Baby's egg, and in an honorable effort to end Baby once and for all and to prevent him from gaining access to his time machine, Second Prime Trunks decided to suicide himself as he sent Baby's entire transport ship into its nearest star. Trunks died a noble death…
*–*–*
Third Prime Trunks - Mortal. Record 07-03-01-001.
… Or at least Second Prime Trunks thought he died a noble death. Unfortunately, in an ironic twist, Third Prime Trunks completely undid his Second Prime's work by showing up along with Pan and Goku, and together they saved Baby, who was within the boy they rescued from the transporter ship that was being pulled into a star. It was this ragtag goonie team who brought Baby to Planet Vidal, where they ultimately delayed Baby's return to Earth. As a result, this time Trunks fell to Baby; the Kais had enough forewarning from our prophecies to save Goku; and most importantly - Pan escaped without infection and trained under Piccolo, who was still alive for a majority of the time. This was the timeline of the Rise of the Legendary Mystic Saiyan.
You know the story. Third Prime Trunks used to be the current Trunks. This WAS the timeline that we were in. But then the stupid-voted-Supreme Kai Kibitoshin decided to go and botch it, and now we're in the FIFTH jump!
(Kibito sighed, "Please Elder Kai, continue with the story."
Ancient Kai huffed, and continued.)
TIMELINE 07-03-01-001:
In the Third Prime timeline 001 - what this timeline used to be, and where the prophecy was supposed to end - both Pan and Goten died on the Planet Tuffle. The dragonballs were unusable to wish them back because they had cracked due to the Dende's corruption under Baby. Even after their complicated repair, the dragonballs no longer had the same power to bring people back from the dead. As a result, the Son family was shaken and broken.
Gohan and Goku never got over the death of Goten and Pan. Gohan blamed himself and lost his marriage to Videl over Pan's death. Gohan also blamed the Kais for fooling Goku into not being aware of the true dangers on Earth. He believed Goku could have at least protected Pan or started his search for Goten earlier. Similarly to Gohan, Goku was angry with the Kais for tricking him and keeping him away from protecting his family. He blamed the Kais for his inability to find Goten, and believed he had been given the impossible task of finding his son as a ploy to keep him away from helping Pan.
And here is where your butterfly effect happened, Kibitoshin.
The original Third Prime Trunks 07-03-01-001 was supposed to only become obsessed with defense and protecting the Earth against future parasites and tyranny. He was supposed to just develop a defensive space program. He was never a true threat to the universe. Remember, Third Prime Trunks never re-acquired Giru! It is Pan who buried Giru, and all witnesses to the burial were dead with the exception of Hercule Satan, whom Trunks never thought to visit.
However, now that you were WITNESSED trying to kill Trunks, the Third Prime Trunks timeline split into the forked prophecy. It had an almost-zero chance of happening, Kibitoshin. It was never supposed to happen, but then you interfered, and then you were witnessed. And now you triggered the new timeline that spiraled EVERYTHING!
TIMELINE 07-03-01-002:
In the new Third Prime timeline 002, Trunks now became erratic and inconsolable about defending the planet, and believed that the best defense was an offense. ("Your inception of his mind, by locking this idea in his subconscious, was a critical fail, Kibitoshin Kai. You literally re-natured him and started Paradox."
"I see now, Elder Kai. I understand how I impacted the prophecy now."
"Oh no, there is more to learn about how you impacted the prophecy. Buckle up, Kibitoshin Kai, you're about to hear the Tale of Paradox." Ancient Kai coughed and cleared his throat. "Let me start over and be more clear.")
TIMELINE 07-03-01-002. Codename: The Rise of Paradox; the third forked prophecy of the Legendary Mystic Saiyan Arc:
After losing his closest friends to Baby and without an outlet for his declining mental health, Trunks developed a deep paranoia over parasites and similar enemies coming to the planet.
Trunks processed his depression by instead projecting his energy toward a goal to empower future generations to defend the planet Earth and its people against similar parasites and invaders. His dream was to create an endless paradise for Earth, free from any more alien invasions or extraterrestrial threats.
He focused his energy and thoughts toward building a better future, and had strong concerns about how the Saiyan bloodline would soon be diluted and gone from the planet. He lamented that the Mystic powers died with Pan before he had an opportunity to truly explore his relationship with her. There were threads of true love that had started to grow within him from how she saved him from Baby. There was an incredible potential for something deep, and he viewed her as his hero. But she also was his martyr, and he found inspiration in her memory.
In addition to managing his grief over Pan, Trunks despaired over the loss of his best friend Goten, who was lost and died during the planetary cataclysm when Goku was unable to find Goten's ki signature. Trunks partially blamed himself for not being able to look after him better, and mainly blamed the Kais for holding back Goku from finding him in time. If at least Goten had lived, perhaps he could have saved Trunks from going down the dark path that he pursued.
Third Prime Trunks became obsessed with the idea that the Kais would never be trusted to defend the planet, and the only way to guarantee a planetary defense was to pour everything into offensive capsule technology. He was fueled by the love and memory of Goten and Pan as martyrs who died for a bigger cause that he was destined to fulfill - the need for Capsule Corp to develop a planetary defensive network that would protect the Earth forever.
It's funny how almost every evil tends to start with noble causes.
Trunks became obsessed with the knowledge that you, the Supreme Kai, had tried to assassinate him. This obsession was shared by Vegeta, who had witnessed your attempted murder.
On top of that, Vegeta was equally bitter and damaged by what Baby did while he was possessed, and blamed the parasite for the terrible things he had done to Bulma and his family. He also blamed the Kais for not intervening sooner with their anti-parasitic Mystic tea, before he did the terrible things to his wife and son. He viewed it as all preventable, and was resentful in his belief that the Kais had instead detained and tricked Goku into a false pretense of training. All of it led to the split of his family. Although they never officially divorced, Bulma and Vegeta never reconciled their marriage.
The memory of the Kai trying to murder his son fueled Vegeta's dedication to Trunks' dream of developing a planetary defense system with offensive capabilities, for he saw it as the path that the Kais were trying to prevent. And he was spiteful. He made a promise to Trunks early on that he would never again let a Kai touch his son, and he stuck to his word.
Trunks meanwhile devolved into a paranoia about creating offensive technology to eliminate all parasites, threats, and evil from the universe. Any of them could be supported by the Kais. He came to believe that the Kais did not see the world as a "Good versus Evil," which is true, and instead saw the universe as a toy for the Kais' agendas, which is untrue, but he was convinced that the Kais were chaotic neutral instead of lawful good.
That new thought - that we were chaotic neutral - that was a thought that you had incepted in his head, Kibitoshin. And your action warped his mind for what constituted as good versus evil. Trunks believed we could just as easily support an alien or a god of destruction coming to Earth just as much as we would support defending the planet.
True to his dream, Trunks utilized his capsule technology to develop a space armada - the likes you have never seen! AND HERE IS THE KICKER!"
(Ancient Kai jumped up and down to stress his next words, "To fund the extra amount, Trunks had gone to Hercule Satan to request him to be the brand image of the campaign!"
Kibito just stared, not understanding why there was sudden drama.
Ancient Kai shook his fist, "You dolt! In his meeting with Hercule Satan, Trunks learned of the whereabouts of GIRU!
"Dear spirits, that's how he got Giru!?"
"Yes, Kibitoshin. It all started with Giru. Giru - the true Paradox.")
Trunks re-assembled Giru and adapted his artificial technology to create drones that could exponentially multiply in scale for both harvesting and military functions, and with just their bodies alone, they could disassemble entire planets within minutes to absorb resources! Of course, as you can imagine, this pissed off the Kais!
But when the Kais tried to intervene and stop Trunks, we had to face all of the Z fighters, who had grown angry and suspicious of the Kais. And on top of that, Trunks eventually integrated Giru within his ship, so he had an artificial intelligence life form controlling the vessel. Giru was programmed to detain and even eliminate Kais. Trunks thus became an official villain to the Kais. His incentive that led to him leaving the planet Earth was due to anti-Kai security concerns, and his desire to keep all battles away from the planet.
The stress of all of the losses and Trunks' mental state ended up breaking up his nuclear family. Bulma took Bra away to protect her and raise her on Earth away from Trunks' increasingly vile nature, and Vegeta sided with Trunks, adopting Trunks' beliefs. Like Trunks, Vegeta viewed the Kais as responsible for the rise of Baby, and was frustrated that the Kais withheld the Mystic tea antidote for so long. Both Vegeta and Trunks were resentful that the Kais kept Goku under lock and key without properly training him while Baby paraded around with Vegeta's body without opposition. Vegeta, like Trunks, was led by his determination to never let another parasite control people again, and to never again trust in any Kai.
Now for this next part, you must remember that Third Prime Trunks had two eras of his life - his Mortal life, and his Collective life. In the first era of Third Prime Trunks' lifetime, Trunks was mortal and within a physical, breathing body.
In his mortal era, Trunks ascended to space along with Vegeta, Goku, and Gohan, and together the Saiyans re-rose to power and became a vigilante group that established a new order within the galaxy. Together, they began anew the cycle of Frieza's empire, but this time under Saiyan rule, except it was worse! This time the empire had Super Saiyans, and capsule technology and Giru's artificial intelligence and unlimited resources among unlimited time jumps that secured the tyranny of his rule! Third Prime Trunks lived up to his legacy of being the heir to the Saiyan Prince.
Mind you, there was a period of time when Trunks stepped down from his high seat to focus on technological research and development. During that time, he let Vegeta rule with his iron fist and Gohan's guidance until Trunks took back over in Vegeta's old age.
In this first part of the Third Prime timeline in which Trunks was still mortal, he continued to tinker with Giru, and in the process, as I said before, he used his capsule scaling technology to turn Giru into a fully-fledged time-traveling Android-slash-Spaceship.
But also meanwhile, Trunks had also spent time fiddling and experimenting with his wedding ring - you know, the ferric draconic oxide one that fell off his finger after Pan died. In his research, he learned the secrets of his ring bonding. It wasn't hard since every Kai knows the dragonball stone, which even after alloyed with hematite, can store souls, such as those of dragons. Since the dragonmetal had already attuned to his ki from his short-lived marriage with Pan in his early years, it was not hard for him to adapt it to bond his own soul to Giru. Upon his mortal death, he transferred his soul into a robotic chip made out of his dragonmetal, and integrated it into Giru, which gave the robot his soul. Giru later adapted to shapeshift in the second era of the timeline, and chose to hold Trunks' bodily form as his favored appearance. But I get ahead of myself.
("Did you just say he transferred his soul into an Android chip?" Kibito's eyes went wide as stood in shock.
"Exactly! He figured out how to hack being a god! He gave a soul to an Android, to carry and transfer to new hosts after each jump." Ancient Kai grumbled, and continued.)
In the second part of Third Prime's timeline, Trunks, as Giru, became a hive mind.
("Wait, what?" Kibito interrupted again. "A hive mind? You just said his soul was within the robot."
"Yes, the robot communicates with the other robots! Let me finish.")
So as I was saying, Third Prime Trunks became a hive mind in the second era. After all of the Saiyans eventually met mortal deaths, and with Trunks on his own deathbed, Trunks bonded his soul to his Android, Giru, so he could continue his legacy as a hybrid digital presence.
And within the pure-Android Giru-Trunks, Paradox, Trunks' soul consciousness continued his primary objective to exact vengeance and establish order. Trunks, as Paradox, continued to lead and grow his fleet for hundreds and hundreds of millions of years. Since Paradox could time-travel due to the technology Third Prime Trunks installed in Giru, Paradox set up an almost-infinite loop in which he would travel back to the beginning of his vengeance journey with the compounded space navy gathered over billions of jumps. With each jump he figured out how to possess the body of each of his iterations.And by becoming digital, he was able to unify the signal across all the jumps to know exactly where each of his iterations was at any given time. He essentially became THE COLLECTIVE.
("Oh no." Kibito groaned.
"Oh yes. This is where the children's tale begins." Ancient Kai glowered at Kibito. "The story of the collective entity that wipes out all the universes and every Kai, and every mortal life. The rise of the Androids as the result of Paradox. You know it. It will happen. It HAS HAPPENED in at least ONE our alternate futures now, thanks to you.")
*–*–*
Third Prime Trunks - Android Collective. Record 07-03-02-001. Codename: Paradox
At the end of this collective set of jumps that defined the lifetime of Third Prime Trunks and his era as Paradox, the universe eventually ran out of energy. At some point, many trillions of years in the future, all of the stars blinked out, either burning out their own energy, or having been harvested by the androids. All light ceased. All planets cooled. And, for a while, the Androids continued their order by cannibalizing themselves for energy. Over time, their numbers whittled down more and more, until one last robot remained within the universe - the last Giru with all of Trunks' memories and database. The last Paradox.
And then in its last energy, Paradox went back in time to a date that Third Prime Trunks had set many, many years before, when he still had his body and his life… when he still had a heartbeat, and he still had the ability to love.
After traveling to the past, Giru, who was on autopilot and carrying the consciousness of Third Prime Collective Trunks within his capsule scouter trap, arrived at the very end of the Majin Baby Buu battle.
And this time, Paradox changed the past. Before, he had focused all of his future loops to gain more materials, knowledge and power. But this time Paradox caught Pan in her fall. He saved her life and handed her to Goku, along with a capsule titled "Legacy" for Goku to hand to Trunks. The capsule… was a trap!
The capsule inheritance was the modus operandi of how Trunks would always possess his bodies within his loops. He did it by securing his soul chip to a futuristic scouter within the Legacy capsule. It was a perfect trap for each of his iterations, who possessed immense curiosity to study it, and each version of himself easily fell without resistance and were incorporated into the Third Prime Collective.
The Third Prime Collective Trunks' time loop in which he had done his millions of loops had its origin point start after his mortal death, when he had already become a collective. Third Prime Collective Trunks started his jump loops with the intention to build a military force that would be unrivaled for all time, in a timeless and truly endless struggle to acquire infinite power. He always had the long-game intention of building up his forces into a trillion-year legacy to pass down to his younger self, since the Kais never granted him children under any timeline or circumstance.
That was the legacy that Paradox passed down to his younger self. An entire universe of technology and power.
And then that brings me to the most tragic Trunks of all, which you are responsible for. In fact, you're responsible for the Third Trunks rising to even become such a tyrant! He never would have become the Collective if not for Vegeta joining him on his space odyssey, which he did because he saw what YOU did!
("Just…" Kibito sighed, "Nevermind, please continue."
"I was just about to.")
*–*–*
Fourth Prime Trunks - Mortal. Record 07-04-01-001 overwritten to be 07-04-99-999-9999-97854-21456. Codename: Paradox.
("Holy Mystics," Kibito explained, "That's a lot of numbers in the record."
Ancient Kai nodded, "And the number is still increasing. The loop has not ended, and continues within all of the alternatetimelines. See what threat Paradox is?!"
"I should have made sure Trunks died when I had the chance." Kibito realized in horror. "Even if I did have witnesses, and even if Vegeta spent the rest of his life trying to avenge his son, we could have avoided this catastrophe."
"Too late, and you're too much of an amateur. This time around, you brought Trunks right over to where Goten was, so Goku could find him, and you triggered Fourth Prime Trunks! You already botched the timeline and created the third Collective, and fourth and fifth Primes the second you chose that spot."
"Please continue, Elder Kai," Kibito groaned dejectedly.
"Where was I? Ehh, I'll just start over.")
*–*–*
Fourth Prime Trunks - Mortal, again. 07-04-01-001, which was later overwritten to be Third-Fourth Prime - Collective 07-04-99-999-9999-97854-21676. The record went up 220 instances since one minute ago. Codename: Paradox.
As there is always an instance of random chance, the voted-Supreme Kai Kibitoshin Kai stupidly chose an area that was above Goten Son where he decided to try to kill Trunks to prevent the jump this time around. So now this time around, when Goku saved Trunks, he also located and saved Goten, which broke the cycle and now introduced Goten into the mix.
Now, mind you, this is after Paradox had gone eons and eons without Goten in his life. (And may I remind you, Kibitoshin, that if you had not interfered, Goku would have not found Goten, and we would have had a chance to enact the correct prophecy this time around!)
("I know. I messed up. Keep going."
Ancient Kai huffed, and continued.)
In the fourth timeline - both his wife Pan and his best friend Goten survived, and Trunks received a capsule containing his legacy from his future self. Within the capsule, in addition to the scouter, Trunks inherited many, many toys. He had an imperial fleet; different spaceships and cruisers; an entire defense network that spanned half of the galaxy. He had everything from weapons of mass destruction, to artificial planet-building drones. But the real kicker is that on top of all of his inheritance, he was body-snatched by the mind of Paradox who had billions of years of warmongering experience that ranged from his formative years among Saiyan elites, to his collective Android empire.
After he was snatched by the Third Prime Collective, the New-Fourth Prime Trunks became disconnected from emotions due to his new nature. He also was difficult to emotionally reach through all the psychological labyrinths that the Third Prime Collective built to protect his mind from accountability due to hard decisions he had had to make in order to enforce a subjectively better system of government on planets.
But I get ahead of myself again. I think I should first talk about the original Fourth Prime Trunks. It was a fairytale story while it lasted.
Trunks 07-04-01-001, or the original fourth Trunks was an interesting case. This Trunks iteration, from before his body-snatching, fell deeply in love with Pan after their experience with Baby. It was a beautiful love story and had so much potential, yet sadly, this timeline was the most tragic of all, since he had the most happiness to lose when he joined the collective.
Pan and the original Fourth Prime Trunks were forced apart when he inevitably fell for Paradox's scouter trap. His mind and his love for Pan that had grown and stemmed from realizations during the fight with Baby - all of it was lost - dissolved away in the melting pot of the many millions of Trunks minds that the Third had collected and merged within his lifetime loop.
Unlike his possession with Baby, when the Fourth Prime Trunks put on the scouter and accidentally bonded through its dragonmetal to Third Prime Trunks' soul, he was possessed from within his mind by his own mind - just a different version of his own mind, but still his own mind. There was no way to wish him back with the dragonballs, even if they did work. And as a result, the Third Prime Trunks Collective got away with snatching Fourth Prime Trunks' body.
(Ancient Kai paused, considering. "It's quite a fascinating example of bodysnatching actually. I don't believe in all of my sixteen generations of lifetime that I've ever seen anything quite like this. I must admit it is one of, if not the most wily and cunning parasite stories on record."
Kibito put his head in his hands. "Can you please get back to the story?")
Oh, yes! Another interesting tidbit about the Fourth's timeline is that the Third Prime Collective was trapped for years within only one copy of his Fourth Prime host. Despite existing in many bodies in the former third jump time, this Third Trunks Collective within the fourth jump timeline ultimately and ironically was re-compressed into an individual that identified as the second iteration of Fourth Trunks, 07-04-02-001, otherwise known as New-Fourth Trunks.
*–*–*
New-Fourth Trunks - Mortal Collective. 07-04-02-001.
Despite now being an individual, New-Fourth Trunks, 07-04-02-001 was nothing like the original Fourth Prime Trunks 07-04-01-001.
When Fourth Prime was overwritten by Third Prime's Collective, Fourth Prime never again emerged as an individual from the collective…. (though one could argue that within the collective, he had some influence because he introduced the concept of romantic love into the mix. However, that influence came much later in his mortal-collective life after he began to re-open himself to Pan).
In his younger years, Third Prime had completely overwritten the younger Fourth Prime version of himself that had fallen in love with Pan. In place of love and devotion, New-Fourth Trunks, the possessed Trunks, instead had his head filled with thoughts of revenge and oppression that were unwarranted and needlessly antagonistic in his new timeline compared to his previous lives.
In this new spin of the fourth jump timeline, and contrary to the third jump, Vegeta stayed with Bulma. Gohan stayed with Videl. Goku never rose against the Kais because Goten was safe. The Z fighters on Earth survived and started to heal their lives after Baby.
New-Fourth Trunks, however, was obsessed with his space odyssey and abducted Pan into space, bringing her with him in an effort to conceive a child. New-Fourth Trunks was not very good to Pan. He toyed with her heart to manipulate her to his wishes, and was selfish and controlling. He lacked empathy and tormented her emotionally as he needlessly blamed her for her inability to stay pregnant.
And it must be noted! The reason they never had a child is because the Kais never granted their children souls. We never assigned them, so each of their pregnancies resulted in a miscarriage. And before you question the morality of it, one needs to ask how could we even consider giving them a baby?! We could not risk the Mystic power being passed forward to the child of such a tyrant.
There was no telling what Trunks would do if he had a child with his Saiyan heritage and Mystic powers. He was insane with his lust for power, and the Kais had every reason to believe he would similarly want to possess his own child one day and become truly unstoppable. The only way to ensure that the Mystic powers were returned to the Kais was to eliminate their ability to stay pregnant by never assigning any souls.
Despite his treatment of her, Pan never left Trunks, and likely could not even if she had wanted to. In her early days with him, she was resolute in trying to save him and bring him back from the darkness. After they eventually left Earth, he never took her home. And then while in space, she got caught up with the war between Trunks and the Kais after Trunks killed you, Kibitoshin.
("What?! He killed me in the last timeline?!"
"Oh yes, Kibitoshin Kai, you got your just deserts from him in the Fourth timeline when he killed you in a defensive panic after you tried to take Giru, and your death is what propelled him to never return back to Earth within Pan's lifetime. He took shelter within his Giru-attuned spaceship, which is equipped with futuristic anti-Kai defense weaponry. He spirited Pan away with him and he never returned to Earth until much later in his life when he involved Goten. But I'll get there in the story soon."
"You're incentivizing me to go back and finish the job right now."
"You lost your opportunity, Kibitoshin Kai. If you kill him now, Goku will be your doom. He will end you to avenge Trunks' death for the sake of Vegeta, Bulma, Goten and Pan. The damage is already done with Goku's trust for us in this timeline. And he knows how to instant transmit here to this planet. So, unless you think you can beat him, I don't think our planet would stand a chance. Anyway, I digress. Where was I?")
Oh yes, so Trunks did not return to Earth within Pan's lifetime. In this very unfortunate timeline for Pan, she found solace bonding with Giru, whom she considered the closest thing to her child with her original Fourth Prime Trunks. Pan stayed with New-Fourth Trunks with the hope she could regain a glimpse of the version of him whom she loved, but she endured tremendous disappointment and heartache chasing a memory. New-Fourth Trunks was a beast to her psychologically. However, there was some consolation living with him. Overall, despite his reputation, he never hurt her physically due to two factors - one, she was able to defend herself quite well, and two - most importantly because of Giru. During the one and only time he tried to initiate something without her consent, Giru became self-aware and came between them in defense of his mother, Pan. He almost killed Trunks in defiance, and for the sake of peace, Trunks never tried to antagonize Giru again. He instead resorted to plastic performance acts of wooing Pan to try to get what he wanted.
Funnily enough, there is an expression that says feelings follow action, and regardless of his digital reconstruction, deeper feelings started to manifest within the collective Trunks. And, despite the reverse current of the collective, he pulled through to appreciate her and regain some of the feelings he had lost. ("You know, Kibito, Paradox could be a good example that we should teach the Kai children about the differences in the energetic powers of Love versus Mystic. Often Kais confuse the two as overlapping."
"Go on," Kibito sighed.)
It was a very slow-growth process as New-Fourth Trunks eventually did re-fall in love with her. But it was also a one-sided and complicated love, as Pan always yearned for the Trunks she had lost. The truest connection Pan had with her original Fourth Prime Trunks was on her deathbed, when he finally re-learned to cry and was beside himself with regret over his mistreatment and unappreciation of her during their one and only timeline they ever had together.
When Pan's lifetime came to an end, Trunks outlived her by many years due to his higher half-Saiyan life expectancy. And in a fascinating turn of events that made this version of Trunks even more different, it is Goten who stayed with Trunks after Pan passed!
("Goten?" Kibito's interest was piqued.
"You heard me. This is where Goten's survival during the Baby Majin Buu battle also made a difference.")
While Trunks was grieving his loss and was angry with the Kais for not allowing him to have children, his bitterness was softened by the consolation and companionship of his best friend, Goten, with whom he had reconnected after Trunks returned to Earth to cremate Pan's body with her surviving family. They bonded over their long history and also their loss of children. The rolling stone that Pan had set for New-Fourth Trunks to open up continued rolling with Goten, and together they found solace and even their own form of romance together when they gave everything up to retire to a private part of space as companions for many comfortable years, until Goten's eventual death.
*–*–*
New-Fourth Trunks - Android Collective. 07-04-03-001. Codename: Paradox
And then of course, all mortals pass, and the story repeated. Mortal Collective Trunks continued his legacy by fusing his body's soul within Giru and once again making himself into the Android hybrid, Paradox, and his prime objective kicked in. Paradox gathered more of his collective, and once again rode out the entire ending of the universe gathering resources for his legacy before storing his soul in a capsule trap for Giru to blip back to the past.
(Ancient Kai nodded, "And this is where we are now."
"Wait, is that it?" Kibito blinked. "What about the Fifth Prime? I thought we're in the Fifth Prime timeline right now."
"Exactly." Ancient Kai musically replied.)
*–*–*
Fifth Prime Trunks - Record 01-05-01-001.
Current Trunks. The one that Kibitoshin Kai decided to try to assassinate in front of Vegeta, and in the process started all of this fiasco. He should be fired or demoted. The original Grand Kai would never have stood for this kind of folly. And let's hope Grand Zeno does not find out!
"Wait, so you're saying that we are currently living the loop?"
"Yes, since you triggered it with your action." Ancient Kai nodded. "And the future is still yet to be written. We don't know what will happen." He then glared at Kibito, "For all we know, this time around there's the chance that Majin Buu will live! And that would be just as bad as Paradox."
Kibitoshin sighed deeply. "Great spirits…"
"But then again," Ancient Kai reflected, "there's always a chance that this time we can break the chain. But there's no telling if this time Pan will live or not. The New-Fourth Trunks collective, who is also an extension of the many billions of Third Prime Trunks, mind you - may have gotten savvy about how Pan threw him off course from his original main objective."
Kibito just looked at Ancient Kai. "But what if he changes his mind because of his experience with her and Goten?"
"This time around, even the Kais don't know what to prophesize. It's all the Wild West now, Kibito! All I can tell you is that the third prophecy has now been invoked multiple times, and Paradox is real now. Paradox will return with a pre-programmed mission. And we will be on the edge of our seats as we learn what it is, and how this timeline will unfold."
"Does this timeline need me to sit here too?" Piccolo huffed gruffly.
"ACK!" The Kais both jumped high and spun, startled with wide arms and surprised faces.
It seemed both had forgotten Piccolo was still sitting there against the tree.
"Oh, right!" Ancient Kai calmed as he remembered something, and put his hands behind his back. "Just sit tight, Piccolo." Ancient Kai nodded to Piccolo and then put his hands behind his back as he shared a knowing look to Kibito who nodded back to him, then returned his eyes to Piccolo, "It won't be much longer."
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–10/5/23–