It was not in Pan’s nature to avoid a problem and pretend it didn’t exist. That was more of her sister Hana’s way of responding to many of the things that popped into her life. Pan was more likely to tackle a problem head on, although as she had aged she had learned some patience and to take time to consider things before she grabbed the bull by the horns, so to speak. Mirai was like that also, although while Pan pretended to the world that all was well, her baby sister tended to brood over things. Mirai was a champion brooder and while you knew something was most definitely not right in the youngest Son’s world, you never knew what was wrong unless she came out and told you. According to their mother, Mirai tended to brood a lot lately and since Pan sincerely doubted her sister’s life had so many problems, she figured it was a just a phase of being a teenager or the young woman had inherited the brooding from Vegeta through osmosis since the youngest Son had been as cheerful and silly as Goten had been when she was a child.
But going back to the issue at hand, Pan figured she had avoided the issue of her true feelings for Trunks for most of her life so it wouldn’t hurt if she avoided it a little longer. And it wasn’t like she was avoiding it completely. Now that the blinders had been ripped off and she was aware that she was in love with Trunks with a capital L-O-V-E, life had forever changed and she couldn’t lock it all up again or pretend that her feelings were something that they weren’t. That hadn’t worked when she had let herself think it was only a hot passionate kind of lust thing. So she just put it in the back of her mind as she settled back into the flow of life back at home, considering and thinking as she tried to figure out how to deal with it and what to do now.
She didn’t think her straight-forward approach to life would help her in this situation. Just because she was in love with Trunks didn’t mean that he would be in love with her, although it sure would have been nice. But then again, if the Prince of Sayians had been in love with her she was pretty sure he would have given her hint of it as soon as she hit eighteen and stopped being jailbait. Maybe even tried some of that charm and seduction that he was infamous for, but that was a big maybe considering who her father was. Protective fathers were always a deterrent to seduction as Gohan and Vegeta had proven to do over the years.
If she revealed her feelings to Trunks, it might damage their friendship since she knew she’d be hurt if he didn’t feel the same (even though logically she knew better then to expect it but then when did logic have much impact upon love?) and he’d feel horrible that he was hurting her which would make her feel worse and thus a viscous cycle of pain and hurt feelings would ensue and destroy their friendship. Of course, she might have been being overdramatic but that didn’t seem to matter as much when she was unpacking her belongings at two in the morning, being unable to sleep despite a full day of shopping for essentials for her home with her best friends and having had a sparring session in the afternoon with her sisters (both who had improved at a level that she hadn’t expected, particularly of girly Hana-chan).
Still where did that really leave her now? In love with a man who’s affections towards her ran to that of brotherly and a best friend? While those feelings weren’t anything to sneeze at, Pan knew that it just wasn’t enough. Or maybe it would be enough if she knew that she had put an honest effort to turn his affections into something more and it just hadn’t been in the stars for her? She wasn’t sure, but it seemed like a hell of a better idea then wallowing in despair. Wallowing in despair just wasn’t Son Pan’s way of operating and it was better the nothing and certainly better then thoughts of ruined friendships after rejected declarations of love that kept running through her mind.
But now that she had considered how to deal with her feelings, she still needed a plan of action. While she had her fair share of dating experience, that still didn’t given her any idea of going about trying to get Trunks to fall in love with her. She thought back on her past relationships as she moved out of the disaster zone that was her bedroom and into the living room, not bothering to turn on a light. Whether it was arrogance in thinking she could navigate in the dark, having above-normal sight in the dark thanks to her Saiyan blood diluted as it may be, or having a fairly good idea of where all furniture and boxes were, it turned out to be a bad idea.
A very, very bad one.
“OWWWWWWWWWW!” she howled in pain, hopping away from the offending box that had attacked her defenseless toe. She could have sworn that the box and the ones around it had not been there before she had gotten ready for her failed attempt to go to bed earlier that night. And she certainly would have never left boxes near the entrance of the kitchen like that; the only explanation she could think of was one of her capsules had rolled off the table and opened and left its contents which she had the misfortune to find out in a painful manner.
She plopped down onto the couch, clutching her foot as the pain began to slowly ebb away. She whimpered as she massaged her abused digit. If it wasn’t for the residual pain it would actually be kinda funny. After all, she had worse happen to her while sparring or during the hopefully once in a lifetime fighting to save the Earth from bad guys episode of her life; so why should stubbing her toe against a box hurt more then what she had gone through then?
Come to think of it she had noticed all her friends and family do the same thing at one time or another (well Vegeta had never howled in pain, but he had scowled a lot harder then usual when he had hit his knee against some invention of Bulma’s; the next day the same invention had been discarded by the inventor and had been used for target practice by Vegeta). Trunks wasn’t as stoic as father, although he wasn’t as big of a baby as Goten who usually hopped around and looked like a retarded one-legged chicken half the time. No, Trunks usually cursed a blue streak (incidentally it was his fault that she was able to curse so well by the age of five, which he denied and tried to blame on his father) and then pouted when she pointed out that he was being a baby about it (hypocritical of her she knew).
KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK
Pan glanced up as she heard the sound of somebody knocking on glass, glancing around until her eyes landed on the sliding door leading to her balcony where one lavender-haired demi-Saiyan was standing dressed only in a pair of black pajamas pants that were probably silk (nothing but the best for the Prince of all Saiyans and president of Capsule Corps). She had to force herself to tear her eyes away from the smooth sculpted muscles of his chest; damn man had a lickable eight-pack.
What the hell? It was like her thoughts of him had conjured him up.
In reality, he had probably heard her howling before. He lived in the penthouse (no regular apartment for the Capsule Corps president) above her apartment. The walls and floor of the apartment weren’t thin or anything, but Saiyans did have superior hearing after all. She was surprised that Bra hadn’t come to investigate since she lived in the apartment below Pan’s, but then again she might not be home right now.
She got up and made her way across the room to the sliding door, cautious of the boxes since she didn’t care to have a repeat incident. It had been a few days since she’d seen him; actually she hadn’t seen him since the party because she had been so busy with moving in and shopping; a likely excuse, her conscious prodded at her. She was avoiding him as much as she had been avoiding the truth of her feelings.
“Shouldn’t you be asleep,” Pan asked, as she unlocked and slid the door open. She moved back to let him inside, feeling a jolt when he hand accidently brushed against her own. ‘Whoa,’ she thought, talking to herself as she was another individual. ‘Down girl. You haven’t even made any decisions on what to do, so let’s not let the cat out of the bag. Trunks isn’t slow, you know.’
“I had some contracts that I had to go over for tomorrow,” he replied. There was a glint in his eyes that she recognized, one that meant he was about to tease her. “Besides even if I was sleeping, do you think I could sleep after that dying cat screech you let out a few minutes ago?”
“I did not screech,” retorted Pan indignantly; even if she knew he was only teasing, it never failed that he got a rise out of her. He was good at pushing her buttons, always had been since that year in space they had spent together. Then again she had annoyed the hell out of him as much as he had her. Yet the trip had made them better friends, best friends. Before they had been little better then acquaintances, one who knew each other because of their connections to Goten and Bra.
“I don’t want to hear it from you Trunks Vegeta Briefs.”
A wicked grin graced her lips as she got ready to get her payback. While she had been unpacking boxes and putting things where she wanted them, she had come across one that was filled with photo albums. One of the albums was small 10 x 2.5 x 8.6 inches, that was made of black leather and had some of her most prized photographs. Prized blackmail photographs that is. There was one particular picture that was a great favorite of hers.
“Or should I say Trunksette.” She held up the photo album and flipped it open to a photograph that she had taken of Trunks during their space odyssey.
On the planet Gelbo, they had located the Six Star Dragon Ball being used as hair ornament by Leena, the princess of a village. Said village had a monster that spent its days terrifying the inhabitants until they would agree to give him a wife. As the village princess, Leena had been expected to sacrifice herself for the good of the village. The Saiyans had made a deal with Leena to help her in exchange for the Dragon Ball, which had led to Trunks dressing up as Leena so he could be ‘captured’ by the monster. Unbeknownst to Trunks, Pan had taken a ‘few’ pictures of him in that getup for future blackmail use.
Pan watched as the man paled, which considering he was rather tanned, made it quite the feat. His jaw dropped and his eyes had that kind of deer-in-the-headlights and I’m-fucked combination look as he stuttered for a few minutes, clearly too shocked to make intelligent conversation. Of course, Trunks wasn’t slow so it didn’t take long before he got his act together again.
“Hand it over Pan,” he demanded, sounding as bossy and arrogant as the Saiyan Prince he was. As if by demanding and gesturing impatiently with his hand would make her hand over one of her prime pieces of blackmail.
And yet in this moment, everything had shifted back to normal again with their normal banter like it had been before she had started starring as the lead in her X-rated dreams. Before she had her baby sister point out to her what she had always known deep in her heart of hearts even when she hadn’t been ready to admit to it. Or perhaps before the whole lust thing she hadn’t been ready to deal with it because she’s still been more child then woman who wasn’t ready to see her best friend as the man he was, let alone someone she could and did love.
But right now, everything was almost normal. Yeah she still knew the truth in her heart and her dreams since returning home had become increasingly more erotic and the reason why she was taking cold showers in the morning (never let it be said that only men benefited from a cold shower), but before anything else Trunks was her friend. One of her best friends.
“Nu-uh,” Pan retorted. “You’re out of your mind if you think I’m handing over my best piece of dirt on you.”
“Pan-chan,” Trunks snarled, stalking towards her and making use of the childhood nickname. He knew it would get on her nerves since she had declared it off limits after she hit fifteen, declaring it a baby’s nickname and she was no longer a baby, but a seasoned warrior (well she had helped to save the world once).
“Oh sure, that’s really going to make me do what you want.”
“Hand it over!”
“Noooo,” Pan cried, the word ending in a squeal as he tried to make a grab for the album. She dodged and began backing away to keep out a reach as he prowled towards her, intent on getting his hands on the album. Technically it really didn’t matter if he got his hands on it or not seeing as she still had the negatives. But if she gave in too easily then he would realize that and he wouldn’t give up until he had found every last shred of evidence of his most embarrassing moment.
“Getting slow with age, ain’t you old man,” she taunted, make the occasional quick glance over her shoulder so she didn’t trip over anything in her half-moved in apartment. By human standards, Trunks might have been old or at least considered middle-aged at 38, but he hardly looked it. In fact he didn’t look much older then 20 (a yummy 20), which was why gold-diggers tended to love going after him. If you had to go after a rich old company president, wasn’t it better to go after one that looked young and oozed sex from his pores?
“You’re really asking for it tonight, aren’t you Pan-chan,” he growled, which didn’t have the effect he was probably going for. Instead it made her feel rather weak in the knees and a shiver go through her, although she hoped he didn’t notice; or if he did, he’d just think she was cold. She did have the air conditioner on pretty high right now. She didn’t realize growling could be sexy, at least not until this moment. And oh Dende did her mind just take that and go with it and a very non-PG-13 kind of way.
“Yeah, yeah. You’re all talk Trunksette,” she retorted, trying to focus on their bantering. “Mirai’s already filled me on how you’ve been slacking on your training. I could take you on with one hand tied behind my back.”
“I haven’t been slacking. I’ve just been a bit busy with the company. That sister of yours is getting as disrespectful as you. Then again I think she’s been spending too much time hanging around my dad.”
Trunks made an attempt to snatch the photo album from Pan’s hand. She dodged, stepping to the side and scrambled back as he quickly rebounded and tried to make another grab for it. She really should have double-checked to check to see where she was going, considering she wasn’t exactly a familiar with her new place as she had been with the old one; but the Saiyan Prince was making more attempts to grab the album, hoping that he would be able to catch her off guard for a moment from the increased number of attacks, so could get his hands on the damn album.
She tripped on the corner of her coffee table, losing her balance so she began to fall backwards. She made a grab at Trunks’s arm as he tried again to get the album, having not yet realizing that Pan was actually falling. Instead of saving herself, all she managed to do was help him lose his balance so they were both falling. They hit the floor with a thud, the breath being knocked out of Pan from the impact of the floor and the heavy weight of Trunks’s body on her own.
“Oww,” Pan groaned, reaching up to rub the back of her head before she stilled as realization sunk it. Or maybe that was feeling the warmth of Trunks’s body on top of her. She had dreamed of being in this position a hundred thousand times, but her dreams couldn’t compare to the actual reality even if reality was a lot more plain vanilla then her mildest dreams. Being this close again, she couldn’t miss his scent, which had always seemed to her to be a mix of rain and sun, his cologne, and that underlying scent that was pure Trunks.
If it wasn’t enough torture to be this close to him and be seduced by his scent alone, she also became aware of something else that caused her eyes to go big like deer in headlights. In this position, she could feel him pressed up against her. ALL of him and a certain part of his anatomy was awake and hard. Definitely not something she would have expected from him seeing as their current relationship should have worked as a dip in a pool of ice water.
Seeing the look on her face, Trunks must have realized what she had noticed because he scrambled off her quick enough with his back turned to her so she couldn’t get the visual of the black silk pajama pants being tented. There was a tinge of red to his complexion, giving away his embarrassment. “Uh… I better go back to place, long day tomorrow,” he said, clearly wanting to escape the situation. He moved towards the sliding door, pausing a moment to glance back at her although his eyes didn’t quite meet hers. “About… sorry Pan. Female body, guys can’t help reacting so… just sorry.”
She watched him take off from her balcony to head back to his penthouse. The warmth of his body being on top of hers faded away as tears pricked her eyes. She knew he wasn’t being cruel with his words. Just embarrassed by his reaction and explaining himself. But the explanation hurt. He’d just reacted because she happened to be the female body under him and not because he had wanted her.
“Dende, sometimes it’s really fucked up to be in love,” she whispered.
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Final Thought from Pan:
Just another female body…?
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Disclaimer: I do not claim any rights to Dragon Ball/Dragon Ball Z/Dragon Ball GT or the characters associated with the anime/manga. Those rights belong to Toriyama Akira and anyone else he says has rights to it.
