Time (and universe) travel was still not a tested science. Trunks arrived on the intended day, but she was at least an hour off according to her watch. She was late. The larger town she'd indicated as first impact was already devastated, but not in full; clearly something interrupted the cyborgs, and they took the fight elsewhere. She focused on her senses, trying to find larger energies, finding it hard to fight the dread that it was already over and that the cyborgs had won. And she found Gohan's, way north, way up north. So she rushed to him, and as she flew in that direction, she started feeling a larger ki even further north. She'd have to investigate. But Gohan first.
The boy was flying slowly, and the closer he got, the more kis she felt; a group further north, and Gohan with three smaller ones. Once she could see him, she understood he was carrying people, and his direction was West City (which she had already passed). They met mid air, and Trunks immediately noticed who the boy was carrying: her mother with a little baby, and another armed man with a round face she didn't know. At least she was born. Bulma exclaimed her name, and she looked back at her in recognition. As expected of the genius, she put things together. That or Goku spilled the beans. Trunks never mentioned her mother being Bulma four months ago. Or rather three years ago. An energy spike caught her attention north, she frowned, then looked back at the group with a questioning look.
"Gohan-kun is flying me home, my plane was destroyed by Dr Gero," Bulma explained.
"Gero?" Trunks indicated down, and they landed, and while she reached for her capsule case, Gohan relaxed a little about not having to balance comfortably Yajirobe, Bulma and the baby, and looked happy to see her friend again. There was a lot of catching up to do. She couldn't take her eyes out of herself. Bulma walked away to change her baby, grabbing Yajirobe to use his scarf as her baby stash was in her destroyed vehicle.
"Report, please, Gohan-san," she asked with worry.
"Yessir," Gohan quickly responded, and more or less tried to organize the information needed for the time traveler to seize the situation. "So we went where you told us, and we couldn't sense the androids, and they stole Dad's energy with their creepy hand things, and he just came down with the symptoms of the illness so Yamcha-san took him home to take the medication. Vegeta-san dismantled the first one, kinda sorta saving my dad in the process. The other one, the old one, ran away, we chased him but he absorbed a lot of Piccolo-san's energy, and he attacked Bulma-san's plane to distract us." Trunks didn't need to ask whether Bulma and the baby were fine, but there was still a worry about the woman putting herself in harm's way like that. "Bulma-san told us that the old guy was Dr Gero, the scientist who created the cyborgs, so he became a robot himself somehow. And everyone else went to find his lab near North City."
While listening, Trunks threw a capsule to the side; her green and white flying car; she'd tell the others to fly to Capsule Corp once baby-Trunks was changed and cleaned. The ki fluctuations further north weren't lost on either half-Saiyan, and the story profoundly bothered Trunks.
"This can't be right. The cyborgs are enhanced humans, not androids, and they don't steal energy because they have an infinite supply. Moreover, Seventeen and Eighteen look my age…" Old guy? Robot?
"The one Vegeta-san destroyed was a robot. They called each other Nineteen and Twenty," Gohan remembered.
"And Son-san just got sick right now…"
"We saved the medicine but never used it, because you said 'when the symptoms started'," the boy was worried, perhaps they'd made a mistake about the treatment, but Trunks reassured it was what needed to be done. The teenager didn't know how much her intervention changed things. Surely they should have opted for the safer route, but fighters wanting a good challenge be damned.
"Bulma-san, take my car and go," she indicated when the mother and baby came back, a little hasty. "There's a chance Seventeen and Eighteen weren't activated, I need to go and destroy them before that happens." And to hell with everyone's desire to fight. The spikes of energy she felt weren't a good sign, and she prayed that it was the battle with Dr Gero and not the other two.
Bulma agreed, and handed baby Trunks to Yajirobe so she could start the vehicle and adjust the seat so she could properly pilot it. The controls weren't hard to adjust to, even if that model was clearly modified. The baby wasn't happy about being apart from her mother and pouted. Vegeta's scowl was inherited for sure.
"Vegeta-san's and Bulma-san's baby uh.." Gohan had followed where Trunks was looking, but the time traveler didn't hear it. Goku was out of commission, but not dead. Bulma, Gohan, the baby. The three original survivors. With Goku alive, perhaps they'd fare better even if the rest falls.
"Gohan-san, go with them," she said keeping her eyes on her past-self, and darted off to the direction of the fight she'd been feeling over the past few minutes. Perhaps she'd be able to change things there, and if not, then Goku would surely find a solution. Gohan must survive no matter what.
Trunks recognized the energy as being Vegeta's once she got closer, and there was a hint of pride and relief sensing it was a super Saiyan type of energy. Unable to sense another energy fighting, she hoped it was Gero, but her hopes came crashing down when she heard Eighteen's laugh. Her eyes darted, looking for the pair desperately, and saw Tenshinhan, Piccolo and Krillin. Seventeen was near-ish, talking to the earthlings. Eighteen was fighting Vegeta further on the mountain road. And there was another. A tall bulky man with red spikes. And the Red Ribbon logo on his green armor. Who's that?
Vegeta was holding well against Eighteen, from the looks of it, as long as Seventeen didn't intervene... He's gotten really strong, I'm glad. Trunks landed by Piccolo, Tenshinhan and Krillin who had all looked up when they felt her. She kept her eyes on Seventeen who was a dozen meters away on the road, and the red-haired giant who was even further back.
"Trunks." Krillin half noted, half asked, and Trunks briefly acknowledged.
"Excuse my tardiness. Gohan-san filled me in."
"Are those the right ones? We fought two others," Piccolo didn't take his eyes off Vegeta and Eighteen.
"Eighteen is the blonde one, Seventeen is the one with the black hair. I don't know that one.."
"Hey there Lilac! Told your friends earlier, but if you intervene, I intervene, hmm?" Seventeen repeated the warning he'd given the three others a couple of minutes before. Trunks looked straight back at the cyborg, tense. Seventeen not ganging up on Vegeta with Eighteen like that was.. strange. But from his speech pattern, his posture, his smug smirk and the stupid nickname, it was the same. The message was heard, but Trunks didn't give it a proper response, just an intense, hateful stare.
"That's Sixteen, it seems," Tenshinhan stated.
That broke Trunks' fixation on Seventeen and she looked back at Tenshinhan with disbelief. A third one? Or rather, a fifth one? Trunks loathed unknown variables with a passion. She had tried to sense him, but he had no ki either. No, she needed to calm down and analyze the situation. On the plus side, Goku got sick much later than in her timeline (and would survive with the medicine) and Vegeta was holding his own against Eighteen. On the downside, there's another enemy.
"Gero?" she had to ask the three-eyed man.
"Seventeen killed him" At least that was reassuring. Gero being a cyborg didn't change that event. Or perhaps he was one too and they just never found out in her own timeline...
Vegeta threw Eighteen up against the cliff of the mountain road, and they both ended up landing on what was left of the road. The Saiyan Prince had heard Seventeen warning the others to not intervene.
"I'd rather die than rely on Kakarot's cowards or that brat!" Vegeta spat out. "I'll kill her and then you, washing machine! And you weaklings stay out of my way."
Eighteen chuckled, Seventeen applauded. Sixteen did nothing. Vegeta and Eighteen went on to round two, and the Z fighters observed. Trunks felt something wrong in Vegeta's super Saiyan's energy. It didn't feel like Gohan's, or Goku's. Or her own, in a sense.
Trunks considered her options. Her fists turned white. If they ganged up on Eighteen while she held Seventeen off, perhaps they could do something, but uncertainty of Sixteen's presence bothered her.
Vegeta slammed Eighteen down, then with his palm, he charged a powerful ki blast down the rubble where she'd landed. She stood back up and threw her jacket away, her clothes damaged, but herself completely unscathed. He landed by her but Trunks didn't hear their exchange. Something she said must have made him furious because he viciously attacked her. She fought back just as well, but some blows landed on both sides. Trunks gathered Vegeta was at least as strong as her now, and matching Eighteen was a feat she believed she would be able to do herself if Seventeen didn't always get involved. But the other factor of the battle wasn't lost on her... nor on Piccolo.
"Vegeta's going to get himself killed." Piccolo noticed with a growl. "He's losing energy, but she isn't."
"We need to retreat and go in together with Son-san," she whispered. She needed a plan, fast, to get Vegeta out of there, but Vegeta was not the kind to retreat or abandon. Putting him out of commission, without killing him, and without letting the Cyborgs kill either of them was a three-way fight that required far more preparation time than she had.
Eighteen's sudden kick broke Vegeta's left arm and his howl of pain echoed on the mountains. Every strategy, caution, and common sense Trunks had tried to come up with shattered with her father's bone. Rage overtook her, the super Saiyan form taking her as she threw the biggest blast she could in Seventeen's direction, hoping to distract him and raise enough dust for him to be blinded, and launched herself, sword in hand at Eighteen. She completely forgot about Sixteen's existence, her muscle memory going after the two enemies she knew.
The blonde's forearm stopped the blade and broke its edge. Her Eighteen had always dodged her sword. Trunks realized she (they?) must have been holding back all along, but next thing she felt was a mother of all punches on the back of her head, slamming her down on the ground. Seventeen was fast. She closed her fists on the dust and rock, forced to take a second to recover from the sudden hit. Piccolo and Tenshinhan jumped on Seventeen, who basically kicked them out of the way, and Trunks was able to get back on her feet, blood in her field of vision, her scalp bleeding. What she saw was that Vegeta had launched himself at Seventeen, but Eighteen had stopped him by grabbing his foot, and spun him to throw him back at Trunks. She managed to brace herself to soak the incoming 'Saiyan canon bullet' and soften his fall. His arm looked like it was in a painful angle. She let him go when the momentum ended, and launched herself back at Eighteen with a desperate battle cry. She didn't register Tenshinhan being locked in a chokehold by Seventeen. She sent Eighteen off flying with a kick, and went after her. The blonde cyborg stopped herself, putting her feet on the vertical surface of cliff, and blocked the following punch and closed her fingers on the fist, holding the teenager in place. Eighteen's feet sank on the rocks, but her body didn't flinch.
"Strange, I have no data on you. You can go blonde like Vegeta, what's that about?"
Trunks' answer was her left fist on her enemy's stomach, but she also grabbed it. She now had both of her hands secured. The cyborg's blue eyes studied the other's teal ones. Trunks pulled her hands down suddenly, figuring she'd not let go and using gravity to her advantage, all while launching her knee up in the open guard, catching Eighteen's chin. That broke the lock and sent Eighteen further above her, and before she could follow up with another attack, Trunks saw the cyborg avoid an incoming blast. Vegeta never gives up. Seventeen phased in front of Trunks and landed a frontal flat kick to her sternum, sending her back down against rubble. The transformation wore off, and she struggled to keep conscious, the front of her binder shattered, and if her breathing was any indication, she guessed something punctured her lung underneath. Sternum was surely broken too. She expected Seventeen to follow up, but he didn't.
A few minutes later, Krillin arrived near her and gave her a Senzu bean, and offered a hand to help her up. She took it hesitant, then wiped the blood off her face. The binder was broken but it more or less held in place under the black tee and the straps. Not that it mattered anyway, since she was born now; she'd only put it on as part of her fighting gear and didn't really intend to hide her gender anymore. She saw the monk tend to the others, giving a bean to Tenshinhan, Piccolo, and finally Vegeta, who stayed afar. Everyone surviving was good news, all in all.
"What do you mean, they knew about the Senzu? Why didn't they kill us then?" Tenshinhan asked.
"They said it was kind of fun to fight us, and to find them after getting stronger... They just want to kill Goku, it's just a game to them. Sorry I didn't fight."
"Pfft you couldn't have done anything, Seventeen took Trunks out in basically one blow, and he was a super Saiyan," Piccolo reassured and berated Krillin at the same time. Trunks knelt by her discarded sword and took a good look at the shattered edge. Were her versions of Eighteen and Seventeen that strong too? No, Gohan could match Seventeen when he was serious, and she was now stronger than Gohan was back then. Trunks knew Eighteen held back against Vegeta just from the state of her sword... 'It was kind of fun to fight us' sounded like what Seventeen and Eighteen had in her time with her and Gohan, at the beginning, when they were weaker... but this never applied to the initial fighters, as they were killed on day one, more or less.' Wait. He?
"We're not worth killing. Geez Trunks jumping on like that, you're truly Vegeta's son! All bravado and no brain, those Saiyans," Tenshinhan commented back. So they've not met baby-me? But they do know my actual name.
"They're incredibly strong, and I don't think Son's as strong as Vegeta and Trunks are right now." Piccolo mulled things over.
Trunks sheathed her sword, and finally managed to put together a coherent analysis. "They're stronger." She put a hand over her jacket's pocket. Good, the capsule case was intact. "They're stronger than the ones from my world." The possible alternative that her own versions of Seventeen and Eighteen were holding back that much didn't sit well. She missed the abject horrified look Tenshinhan and Krillin gave her at the information.
Vegeta blasted off without warning and without a word, and Trunks started walking to take off after him, but Tenshinhan put a hand on her shoulder to stop her.
"Leave him be, he was all pride and confidence since he managed to become a super Saiyan. Getting beaten by a girl ruffled his ego."
Trunks would have laughed if the situation hadn't been so dire; her mother clearly had been right about her not letting Vegeta know she was a girl before he could transform. She accepted letting her father go for the time being.
Piccolo who had remained silent and pondering the strength of the two (three?) menaces blasted off without warning either.
"We need to move Goku, his house is probably the first place they'll go." Tenshinhan noted.
"What about those two, where did they go?" Trunks had to ask.
"Ah, Piccolo's just like Vegeta and Goku, they want to get stronger. That way," Krillin said while pointing in the direction where Piccolo flew off. "is Kami-sama's lookout. Piccolo and he used to be the same person, so perhaps by fusing back together…" the monk continued with a brief explanation on his encounter with Guru on Namek and how Piccolo Daimao and Kami used to be the same person, and Piccolo would have been much stronger on Namek if he had been 'whole'.
"As for your father, I don't think he's the kind to give up. Too much pride to even consider defeat. He'll lick his wounds and come back with new techniques to defeat them," Tenshinhan added. Trunks nodded to show she'd heard, and somewhat agreed. Vegeta hadn't gone in the direction of West City, so she figured he'd rather be alone than be at Capsule Corp. She'll have to find him later.
"Trunks? To-ra-n-ku-su, eh?" As they lifted off to read the Son household and move Goku to another, safer location, Krillin asked for the final, definite confirmation about Trunks' identity. The teenager nodded slowly with a meek smile.
"Mother's family likes to have a certain theme with names, and Father never signed the papers, so Mother and I decided to use the symbol I usually sign with instead of my name. My apologies for hiding that from you."
"No need to apologize," Tenshinhan added. Both him and Krillin knew the teenager did it to still have a chance at being born in that era.
"Vegeta's the only one who doesn't know, we saw Bulma on that island with the baby, that's when we put two and two together. Same eyes, figures," Krillin added. Trunks wondered whether he was talking about her eye color (Bulma's) or her eye shape (Vegeta's). She also doubted Vegeta hadn't put two and two together, unless he'd not seen the baby (which was quite the possibility).
"The cure, how long until Goku's at full health?"
"Those who got it in my world have compromised immune systems and less than ideal recovery circumstances.. And they aren't aliens." Trunks had little reliable data, beyond the protocols established before society fell apart. "Excluding Saiyan oddities, perhaps between a week and a month."
"We'll need to stall them for that long then," Krillin wasn't optimistic. "But they can't sense energy and they're taking their time." That gave them time, but Trunks felt sorry for the cities that would be on their path. At least they had Dragon Balls.
Tenshinhan left off in another direction after stating he'd be going back to Chaozu, Krillin mentioned their destination would be Roshi's house, and Krillin and Trunks hurried back to Mount Paozu.
The teenager wasn't sure whether history had changed for the best. These cyborgs were three, even if Sixteen didn't fight, and they were stronger… that or the ones in her time were holding back a lot, but considering how much Gohan, and then she, could give them trouble even when they were serious, she doubted it. Especially Eighteen, who was careful to avoid Trunks' sword, or disarm her. That, and it seemed Bulma hadn't mentioned her child as being her 'baby girl'.. Or everyone was just that oblivious, which was also a possibility considering the stories she heard from Bulma about Goku's need to touch genitals to know whether someone was a girl or not.
Once at Mount Paozu, before they knocked, Krillin ventured a hard subject with the time traveler.
"The Cyborgs haven't killed anyone, yet."
"Yet," Trunks repeated with a raised eyebrow.
"It would be nice if... are they really that evil?"
"In my world, the two of them reduced the world's population to less than the entire population of West City, and take glee in maintaining the rest of us in terror and hopelessness," Trunks said coolly, staring ahead.
"Right- Sorry.."
They knocked and were greeted by Chichi. Trunks checked on Goku's sleeping state, and confirmed the medicine was working as intended- at least according to what she knew of the treatment (Trunks had never exactly been on nurse duty). Krillin explained to Yamcha, Chichi and Gohan, freshly returning from Capsule Corp, that the Cyborgs were after Goku and that moving to Roshi's island was a way to stall them. Krillin also filled Yamcha on how they were different Cyborgs than the android and Dr Gero they fought while Trunks carried the futon to the Capsule vehicle, a mix between a helicopter and a plane.
Yamcha piloted the vehicle while Chichi tended to her husband, Trunks sat against one of the walls, legs crossed, sword on her lap. The adrenaline wearing off had made her aware of how uncomfortable the broken binder was, but she couldn't just take it off right there. She'd have to bear with it and wait. She'd waited for hours with broken bones, she could manage the mild discomfort.
Everyone had kept using male language about her, all while acknowledging she was the same baby, so she wanted to see for herself first. Gohan sat next to her left side and started some homework, to keep his mother out of his hair (three years with minimal schooling didn't sit well with Chichi's desire to see her son become a great scholar one day). He also wanted to keep his mind busy with something else as his father was asleep and sick. Trunks accepted the nearby presence. Gohan had always kept her grounded when she was his age; she'd return the kindness and when necessary, help him work through some questions, at least the odd one that Gohan didn't get, but Trunks did get.
Yamcha and Krillin eventually had to discuss potential plans.
"So, what can we do?" The former bandit asked while piloting.
"Trunks, if I give you Gero's lab's coordinates, could you go back in time and destroy it before they're activated?"
Trunks pondered. How far into the technicalities she could go about the system she had a hard time understanding herself. "It is in the realm of feasibility, and it would work but it wouldn't work for this world."
Krillin's blank stare said it all. Trunks shook her head slightly.
"Gohan-san, may I borrow something to write on?" Gohan gladly grabbed an empty sketchbook and pencils and got closer under the teenager's left arm to see. Trunks being right handed welcomed him. Krillin also approached to follow along.
Trunks opened the sketchbook and set it on the sheath of her sword for support, and drew a horizontal pencil line with an arrow at the bottom of the landscape paper. "This is time, in my world." She put some dates on the line; August 764, November 766, December 766, May 767. "This is the Cyborgs first appeared; today. When you guys fought and died," she started to explain and indicated May 767, and moved back to December. "This is when Son-san died. I believe he fell ill a few weeks prior, right about here," she indicated November, "which is also when I was born. As for August 764, this was Son-san's return from space, and coincidentally, his disposal of Freeza." She moved back towards the right, and put in three other dates. February 780, September 783 and January 784. She let the pencil linger a moment on the first date, and ended up scribbling on it to discard it, before going to September 783. "This was when I left for the first time, and when I returned as well. And this is when I left the second time- this time," she added when indicating the last date. "When I return home, regardless of how long I stay, I will come back to January 784." If the return procedure works the same as it did the first time.
"However, in this world, this changed." She went back and tapped August 764, and drew another horizontal line, above the first one. She added August 764 to that new line. "I arrived here, about fifty five hours before Son-san. Freeza's ship arrived about three hours earlier than Son-san. Freeza's time of death should have been three hours later."
"This is how you knew Goku's ETA." Krillin noted and indicated the other August 764. Trunks confirmed the veracity of the comment with a smile.
"That is right. It is because Mother remembered the day and hour that battle happened so I was given that detail. I also stayed a month afterwards," she marked September 764 on that new timeline. She then used green to write an arrow going from September 783 to August 764, then another arrow from September 764 to September 783. "The return procedure had me return at more or less the same time as I left."
She then added November 766 and May 767 to this new timeline, still aligned with the one below. "This is when I was born in this world, and this is today. My May 767 is different from yours, because in yours, Son-san got sick now and not last November, he is alive, you are alive, there are three cyborgs instead of the two I know, and they're stronger. As for Nineteen and Twenty, perhaps they existed in my world, but I do know Seventeen killed the scientist in my world too." She never knew the name of Dr Gero, but she'd picked up that information during one of her encounters with the Cyborgs. They were chatty, sometimes.
"Son-san remained dead in my world, despite him being alive now. This is why me going back to an earlier time would only probably create another line that does not affect yours, as much as this line and the changes I've caused have not affect mine." Let alone the fact that she's unsure whether she'd be able to go back further in time, and then get home. She'd need to return home first, then do a third trip. And then, what? If she traveled to 767 again, would she land in this world, or the world she'd previously destroyed the lab?
She drew in red another arrow, from January 784 to May 767, to indicate her second trip. What were the implications of 'crossing' those green and red lines she drew, if she traveled further back than what she was at now?
"So why come back to begin with, if it doesn't affect your world?" Yamcha, piloting, didn't get all of the details, but he understood whatever the teenager had done served did not affect that other world.
"Well, we thought it could possibly affect our world, but the other reason was that Mother wanted to know a time existed where the menace would be dealt with, even if ours was doomed. As for me, I wanted to fight alongside Son-san and Vegeta-san, learn and see if we perhaps could find their weakness. Mother also considered asking Son-san to use my machine's Return procedure, so he could fight them in our world, then send him back so I could return, as a last resort."
Gohan looked intensely at the new sketch on his book, and pointed at the different gaps between the green arrows on both timelines. "You are free to choose years and dates?"
"Well it's not exact science- I was early the first time, I was late this time. But otherwise, yes. Two and a half years have passed for you, but only four months have passed for me- the time necessary to recharge the machine." She was still unsure about what could happen if she went back to an earlier time than her 'first' trip.
"So you're seventeen years old now?" the boy commented and indicated the birth month on the bottom timeline: November 766, then January 784. Trunks confirmed it.
"I am both seventeen years old, and about six months old," she traced between her supposed birth on this timeline and May 767, and her birth in her own timeline and January 784. Gohan made an Oh sound, he got the gist of it.
"Wait, when did you say your birthday was?" Chichi interrupted, something caught her attention.
"November. November 21st."
"Bulma's boy was born in June."
Oh.
This Trunks' birthday is based off FighterZ's birthday wish for Future Trunks on November 21st.
I do agree that whoever decided Future Boi was a Scorpio isn't right in their mind but what you gonna do :')
Main Timeline Trunks was born on June 1st.
Prepare for a whole lot of confusion ^^