Gohan was going to kill him.
Sweet, understanding, rational Gohan, was going to beat him into a bloody pulp.
Trunks sighed and looked down at the girl in his arms.
No, not girl-woman. She was a woman now.
She'd finally grown up, but at the same time, she hadn't matured at all. She'd graduated from baggy pants and tee shirts to designer jeans and camisoles. Moved on from 'dress' just being a dirty word and something one did every morning, to being something acceptable, something comfortable. She'd let her hair grow out, once shoulder-length, it now spilled over her shoulders in a beautiful cascade of blackest night, soft and gleaming in the moonlit darkness.
But despite the sophisticated and mature image, it wasn't a total change of heart. Her sneakers, though not trashed, were obviously at the comfortable point between slightly-used-but-still-acceptable, and I-can-see-your-socks. Her skirt was sporty and flirtatious, but lost the effect to the oversized jacket that concealed her small frame. And, of course, her signature accessory was still there: the orange bandana, worn tied over her black hair. The same orange bandana she'd worn since almost forever-ago, everyday, no matter the occasion, since she'd been given it.
Trunks sighed, rubbing his forehead, upsetting his lavender hair.
Gohan was going to kill him.
Pan had been out of country, across the Pacific Ocean in fact, at college, for nearly four years, and hadn't been home once in all that time. It had left Trunks with four years with no way to escape his dreaded office or his hated job, four years of missing one of his best friends, four years to reconnect with Goten.
Four years to realize that he was head over heels in love with her, and that-wrong as it was-he couldn't imagine himself with anyone but her.
Trunks whimpered softly to himself, terror-stricken at what was going to happen to him in less then three hours.
He glanced back down at Pan, at her sleeping face, her deep, midnight blue eyes, complete with stars, closed to the world; her face snuggled into his chest, one hand under his shoulder, the other gently clutching his wrinkled dress shirt.
Gohan was going to beat him beyond the help of sensu bean, regeneration tank, and dragonballs.
Trunks had only meant for it to be a dinner between friends, a time for them to really catch up, without the burden of parents to wonder about his attitude and her antics.
It hadn't turned out that way.
When he'd picked her up at six that evening, he was immediately taken by the fact that no matter how tom-boyish she still was, she was still a shockingly, breathtakingly, stunningly, make-your-heart-stop-and-make-you-think-of-not-so-kosher-things-to-do, beautiful 21 year old woman.
She'd been in the living room, talking to Gohan, her skirt a short little black number with buttons up the front, and a useless little cargo pocket just to the right of the buttons, right above the hem, which rested two or three inches above her knees. Her light blue blouse was neatly pressed, but the sleeves were rolled up to just above the crook in her elbows, the front tied in a little knot that gave a tantalizing view of her belly button.
She looked absolutely gorgeous in that outfit-and Trunks wouldn't mind helping her out of it. But he'd kept that opinion to himself.
She'd laughed when she'd noticed him standing there, open-mouthed and gaping like a fish, and she'd tied her bandana on over her hair. Her father had laughed too, saying that he still thought that his Pan, the real one that had left for college four years ago, had been abducted by aliens, and that this Pan was a clone sent to destroy them all. Which was really ironic and funny when looked at from their point of view.
Gohan wouldn't be laughing so good-naturedly in a few hours. Oh, he'd be laughing alright, but it'd be one of those morbidly sick laughs (one worthy only of Vegeta), and Gohan would be breaking every bone in his body.
Thus, the laughter.
Gohan told him to have her home by midnight, and Pan had laughed almost bitterly at her father's protectiveness.
"Daddy, it's just Tr-unks, he'd not going to date rape me or anything!" she'd argued, apalled, as she'd shrugged on her jacket. Trunks had finally been able to recollect his thoughts as the jacket sleeves covered her toned arms, and as her words registered in his head, he blushed crimson.
Gohan had only laughed. "I know Panny, it's more or less what everyone else you come across will want to do."
Her deep midnight blue eyes had narrowed to tiny slits as she pouted. "Daddy, I'm perfectly capable of taking care of myself. Besides, Trunks'll protect me from the big bad bogeymen."
Gohan had laughed again, defeatedly, but still amused. "Alright. But you be home by three, you hear?" Gohan knew that Trunks was trustworthy and responsible. He'd known Trunks all of his life-there was only a twelve year age difference between father and best friend. Gohan knew that Pan would be in capable hands.
Trunks swallowed thickly as Pan's fingers tightened into a fist, and then relaxed. He didn't relax though.
Dinner had gone smoothly. As they'd explored the buffet bar, he'd told her about Vegeta's failed attempt at anger management, and she'd told him about her roommate with the odd eleven pm habits.
"Seriously! She'd sit there for an hour, every night, and just make up stop-go animations! But they were weird." Here, her face had crinkled up like a child's, and she'd laughed girlishly. "My favorite was 'The Revenge of PanKake Girl!' Basically, she's smothered old Barbies and GI Joes she stole from her brother in pancake batter, and fried them up," she'd whispered conspiratorially as she'd filled a plate with mashed potatoes. He had laughed, thanking Dende that he had enough cash to pay for dinner-how couldn't he?
Over the course of 13 plates each (including 2 desserts), they'd caught up on four years as if discussing the events of that day alone. It'd been one of the most enjoyable times he'd had since baby-sitting her, since the hunt for the black star dragonballs.
Even despite their life-time banning from the all-you-can-eat buffet downtown.
Or maybe, in spite of it.
Afterwards, she'd wanted to spar, her rough-and-tumble, I-am-more-manly-than-thou attitude glaringly beautiful in the body she possessed. And as much as he'd wanted to, Trunks had turned her down, saying that he'd prefer to keep the country in tact.
"Why bother?" she'd asked. "Even though we don't have the dragonballs anymore, if we completely destroy it, you can always buy another one. I hear Cuba's a quaint little island."
He hadn't asked about what she'd meant by Cuba being a nice island, he'd been too busy getting her into a headlock.
On a whim, they'd decided and agreed to go to the beach; and in all actuality, they were still at the beach. He'd have to wake her up in another hour if he wanted to get her home on time.
Gohan was going to blast him until Cell's remains outnumbered his own.
Sweet Dende, he was scared. He'd never been more scared in his life. He'd been fighting since before he could remember, had helped defeat Majin Buu, had grown up as Vegeta's son, been in more life-threatening battles then he had brain cells, and yet here he was, stone cold and sweaty palmed terrified about what Gohan was going to do to him.
Pan sighed quietly and nuzzled up against him in the little bed they'd made at the base of one of the dunes. They'd been lying there for quite a while, but she'd only been asleep for about half an hour.
He sighed restlessly, wishing he had taken her up on that sparring offer.
At least then he'd already have the living daylights beaten out of him and Gohan wouldn't have a fresh victim to destroy and take apart.
But no. They'd gone to the beach and walked barefoot in the surf for a little while until Pan suggested they sit down, and so they'd walked a few meters from the tide line and laid back a respectable distance from each other at the base of a dune, staring up at the stars, laughing like kids as they made up their own constellations.
"Do you see that star right up there, the really bright one surrounded by a lot of really close bright ones that seem to dim in comparison?" she'd whispered quietly after a they'd been quiet for a while.
"Yeah," he'd replied, looking at the star but watching her out of the corner of his eyes. "What about it?"
"Well, I know that he's gone and all…but I've been thinking lately that that star is Grandpa Goku."
She'd been quiet, letting him see a side of her that she usually preferred to keep buried within a safe maze of walls and shields. She was letting him see right into her soul, letting him see the pain left by her grandfather's disappearance, and it had been all he could stand to keep from collecting her in his arms at that moment. He'd sat up instead though, scooping up a handful of sand and letting it trickle through his fingers, smiling at the memory of the child-like saiyan with his simplicity for life, and his genius for fighting.
"Why do you say that?"
"Well, Grandpa always had this way about him. You could never stay mad at him, no matter what he'd done. I mean, you felt good to know he called you friend. Felt like you mattered in the world when you were around him, and when you weren't, felt like you were on the outside looking in, on a world you didn't belong to, no matter how much you wanted to. Felt oddly full when he sat at a table devouring everything in sight that didn't breathe…Hell, even Vegeta lightened up when Grandpa was still around."
Trunks had laughed. "Yeah…Dad just hasn't been the same since Goku left…" She'd gotten quiet, too busy trying to stuff her emotions back into the little box she kept inside, to speak. He'd kept his eyes on the star, but watched her just the same as she pushed herself up and hugged her knees. "But your dad has that presence, Goten too. Hell, you have it when you're not trying to belittle me like you always do." She'd blushed, but seemed to have finished beating her emotions back to where she liked to keep them, and he'd smiled at her as she smiled back. "I think it has something to do with that goofy-assed grin that runs in your family."
Oh, what'd he give to see that "goofy-assed grin" when he took her home.
Gohan'd be too busy throttling him and beating him into the ground to smile.
Pan had wrinkled her nose and thrown a handful of sand at the back of his head.
"Better then that 'I-am-God' smirk that runs in yours!" she'd retaliated.
Laughing, he'd opened his big mouth a bit too far. "If we ever had kids we'd have moronically smirking clown gods seeking a good fight and country to rule."
But all she'd said, apparently not thinking anymore then he had, was, "Then we'd better not have that many kids," and laid back in the sand, staring up at the star she'd dubbed as her grandfather's.
They'd fallen into an awkward and yet comfortable silence and he'd laid back as well, counting the stars.
Pan shivered, burrowing against him as a cold breeze blew the spray from the tide over them. Trunks pulled her closer, as much for her need for warmth as his need to know Gohan wasn't going to incinerate his head.
He honestly hadn't meant to, but she'd just been lying there, staring up at the stars…he'd never seen her so beautiful-let alone anyone else-in all his life. he wasn't aware of what he was doing until it was too late to stop himself.
"Panny? Have you ever felt completely lost, like half of you was taken away and held for ransom?"
One corner of her mouth had curled up into a half smile. "Yeah, I've felt like that for a while." She'd turned her head to look hat him, her eyes probing his tan face, wondering what had gotten into him to turn his mood so somber. "What about you? You ever get that feeling?"
"It's been there for the last four years, but it's gone now," he'd mumbled quietly, his words registering in his brain the second the last had left his mouth.
Pan had been quiet for a few minutes, as Trunks had lain there, and then, stifling a giggle, she'd propped herself up on her elbows and smiled down at him. "That's odd…didn't I leave four years ago?"
"Yes," he'd replied automatically, too busy with giving himself a mental thrashing to notice she was deepening the pit.
"And didn't I just get back?"
Realization dawned on him, and a crimson blush spread across his face and down his neck, his ears burned as if the devil were pulling them from his head. Shoving his heart back into his chest, where it beat loudly enough to wake the dead, he found his calm and casually answered her question with a question of his own. "Point being?"
She'd leaned down, her nose pressed against his, one of her favorite games back when he'd still baby-sat her. But this was no ordinary staring contest. "You know what I think, Trunks?" she'd whispered, her eyelashes batting gently against his own, the palms of her hands digging painfully into his chest.
His heart flip-flopped into his chest, climbing into his throat, pounding loud enough for her to hear. Sweet Dende, if she couldn't hear it, she was deaf. She wouldn't need saiyan hearing to hear it.
"What?" he'd croaked, his voice husky as he forced his heart back into his chest.
"I think you like me, Trunks."
She'd said it so simply, so matter-of-fact, so…hopefully, that it was almost as if she was begging him to tell her "Yes, I do." And his heart happily settled back into his chest, but it still pounded as loud as it could, the pounds echoing in his chest. Smirking the smirk that he'd inherited from his father, he'd pushed himself up onto his elbows, then the palms of his hands, keeping his eyes locked on hers, his forehead and nose pressed against her own.
Her eyes grew wide, and blinked furiously, a pink tint creeping across her face.
She'd reacted exactly as he'd hoped she would; his smirk remained as he looked through his lavender bangs into her midnight blue eyes as they shone brightly with their own stars, their own inner light.
"And you know what I think, Miss Son?"
She'd swallowed tightly, her voice thick.
"What?" she'd croaked out, her beautiful voice breathy and light.
"I think you want me to."
Her cheeks had flamed into a furious blush that raced down her neck and over her ears, that seemed to warm his own face. She'd dropped her eyes, inadvertently looking has his chest, her face flaming even more.
Trunks sighed as Pan shifted in his arms, her bare feet tickling his ankles.
Gohan was going to make his life as difficult, and as painful, as if could physically be. Trunks would be lucky if Gohan killed him. Gohan was practically a genius, and would undoubtedly break every bone in his body, in the most painful order possible, and then keep him alive so that he could heal-and so that he could do something equally as painful.
Like get his own father involved.
He shuddered, and Pan shifted again, drawing his attention back to her. He smiled at the rush that accompanied the memory that swept over him as she smiled at her dreams.
After she'd moved into a full on blush such as should have make her head explode, Trunks's smirk had grown warmer, but hadn't left his lips. With his fingers, he'd stroked the underside of her chin. She'd brought her eyes back up to meet his.
As his hand slid along the side of her neck and settled in the warm spot beneath her hair and at the base of her skull, the world had dropped completely from sight as they both closed their eyes and let their lips meet.
It wasn't the most passionate kiss, or the deepest, or the sweetest, that he had ever known. It was simple. His lips didn't stray to other regions of her face, they stayed on hers, gently caressing her soft skin, as she began to kiss him back.
His hands hadn't roamed about her body. He kept himself propped up with one hand, kept the other at the nape of her neck, his fingers lost in her hair, massaging the back of her scalp. He sensed her hesitate and move with jerky-yet-smooth starts and stops before finally wrapping her arms around him, interlocking her fingers behind his neck.
Had Gohan seen them then, Trunks would have died instantaneously.
Trunks wished Gohan had found them and seen them like that. Anything was preferable to the slow and agonizing death that lay ahead of him now.
Gohan would probably peel off his skin, layer by layer, using a plastic spoon.
Besides, if Gohan had found them like that, at least Trunks would have died happy.
The kiss had ended, and they shyly pulled away from each other, flushing like children, before Trunks had smiled and traced her jaw with his fingers. She'd taken his hand and kissed the back of it, then sat there, holding his hand in her lap, tracing the tiny scars left there from hard lessons in learning how to block a punch, her fingers flitting gently over the calluses from typing and paperwork, from fighting his entire life.
Trunks had laid back into the dune, sliding back-slowly so that he wouldn't frighten her-until his hand no longer supported him. Then, he'd pulled her down next to him, and she'd snuggled into his arms.
Gohan was going to skin him and then fry him a new skin with his ki.
Trunks took both hands and raked them through his lavender locks, his movements jerky and stressed, his cobalt blue eyes grey and cloudy with fear and worry.
A few hours ago, any relationship with Pan just felt wrong. He was thirteen, fourteen years older then her, she was almost young enough to be his own daughter. Hell, he'd baby-sat her for Dende's sake!
And yet, now, after what had transpired since he'd invited her to go to dinner with him, it felt so right. So right.
There was no denying that he loved her and wanted to spend the rest of his life with her.
Something Gohan would not like to hear.
Trunks looked down at Pan as she shivered against him.
Well, maybe he would like to hear it, rather then assume that Trunks had reverted back to his old womanizing, man-whore ways. But he'd still kill him.
He reached down, sweeping a stray strand of hair out of her face.
If he went through with it, stayed with Pan and told Gohan that he loved her and wanted to see her romantically, possibly marry her after a few months if she'd allow him, Gohan would skin and kill him.
But if he denied it all, chickened out and ran away, Gohan would not only take a long time in breaking and killing him, he'd take a lifetime to do it.
Either way, Gohan would kill him, he died, and it'd be painful-for him alone-in the doing.
Pan yawned as he wrapped his arms around her, holding her close once more, assuring himself that he was still currently alive, and wishing that he had thought harder then he had before kissing her.
Pan shifted again, sensing his uneasiness. She really was beautiful; he really did love her.
Gohan couldn't be too mad though…while he would be mad enough to kill him, he couldn't really be mad enough to actually kill him, could he? Trunks had only kissed her, he hadn't ever kissed her twice. They'd just laid and stared at the stars, just enjoying the other's presence and warmth.
He'd only kissed her….
Trunks whimpered again and began to pray to Dende that Gohan nor kill him.
Gohan was going to have his head on a stick.