Trunks and Goten sped away into the wilderness. The purple-haired boy led the way his backpack strapped firmly to his back. He flew in the direction that the equipment had indicated shielding his eyes from the rising son.

"Are you sure we’re going the right way?" Goten asked the boy flying ahead of him.

"Yeah" Trunks replied, "I’m sure. It won’t take long." With that he sped up slightly.

"Hey!" the younger boy shouted. "Not so fast. I’m not that good of a flier yet," Goten protested.

Trunks sighed and slowed down. After all, Gohan had only been training his brother for a few months so he had to be patient. At least that’s what his mother would say if she were there.

"It’s right down there" Trunks exclaimed quickly descending.

Goten followed as speedily as he could towards the rock resting in the large crater below. Trunks was already climbing down inside of it when he touched down. "Trunks wait for me!" Goten cried.

Ignoring his friend’s protest Trunks immediately engrossed himself in running his hands over the surface of the large rock examining its texture. "This is so cool" he told Goten once the other boy had reached him. "Do you realize that meteors almost always completely burn up before they reached the ground?"

"No" Goten stated simply before attending to the task that he had come there for. The boy leaned over and began rooting through the pieces of broken off rock for the perfect prize for his collection. His mother had let him start one, because he seemed to like to eat rocks so much, hoping he would "learn to appreciate looking at them instead of stuffing them in his mouth." He however found something very different than what he was looking for. It was a long thin piece of metal sticking out from the bottom of the meteor.

"Trunks look" he said excitedly.

Trunks rushed over and smiled. "It looks like someone drilled this into the meteor" he said excitedly. "Quick look around and see if there are more," he told his friend.

After they had been searching for a while they found there were four identical rods all on one side of the rock, the side lying on the ground. It looked like someone had deliberately tried to hide them in the rubble.

"What do you think they’re for?" Goten asked.

"I don’t know," Trunks said. "But I bet my mom would know."

"But we can’t tell her about us finding it" Goten said.

"Yeah" Trunks said sadly remembering. "I’m sure they’ll see them when they come here though."

"Maybe" Goten replied stooping down to search for a suitable candidate for his collection.

"Well I’m going to see what other readings I can get" the lavender-haired demisaiyajin stated swinging the backpack off his shoulders. He unzipped it and pulled out one of the instruments he had pilfered from his mother’s lab. Trunks was about to turn it on when it was ripped from his hand and stuck to the rock. Both boys stared wide-eyed at the device as it clung to the meteorite.

"What happened?" questioned Goten.

"I think this rock has been magnetized," Trunks said walking over to the device. Trunks tried to remove the object from the rock but the instrument stubbornly clung to the surface. Trunks next braced his feet on the meteorite and tried yanking it off but it didn’t budge. Goten giggled and Trunks glared at his friend.

"Don’t laugh. If my mom comes here and finds this sticking to the rock then were both sunk!" Trunks told him.

"Sorry you just look so funny" the black-haired demisaiyajin said.

"Stop gawking and help me already!" Trunks ordered loosing his patience. Goten shrugged and got behind Trunks and grasped his shoulders. "Okay on 3 we pull, got it?"

"I understand" Goten replied thinking that for some reason they had done something like this not long ago.

Trunks gave the countdown and both boys heaved with all of their might without even moving the object one centimeter. "Damn!" Trunks exclaimed beginning to loose his temper. He took a deep breath and tried to calm himself like his grandmother taught him. "Maybe if we power-up we can do it," he said to Goten hopefully.

Goten shrugged and jumped down. Trunks frowned at the other boys perfect composure not understanding in the least how the thought of facing an angry Chi Chi, Bulma and Vegeta didn’t seem to be fazing him. Just then a lance of energy shot uncomfortably close to his head slamming into the rock.

Bulma felt like her soul was wrapped in a warm comfortable blanket as she slowly began to rouse from slumber. She stirred and moved her head feeling the silky, smooth, softness brush against her cheek. She smiled, without opening her eyes, yet still knowing by feel and by instinct just what is was that held her close and tight and just what her arms now encircled.

Slowly she opened her eyes and a sea of black, thick hair met them. His head was resting in the crook of her neck and hers was resting against the crown of his head, smashing flat his crest of upswept hair, and using it as a soft and firm pillow. She smiled as she felt the even rhythm of his breathing as it caressed and tickled her chest. They were curled into each other. His arms were wrapped around her waist and held her firmly against his body in a grip that even in sleep was impossible to break. Their legs were entwined in a curious twist with each other and the damp bed sheets that would be difficult to untangle without effort. They were just as they had fallen asleep the night before.

It was rare when she woke before him and so she was careful not to move for he was a light sleeper and she wanted the moment to last. Bulma loved the feeling of just being held close by her prince and she could never get this when he was awake. It wasn’t that he didn’t hold her and allow her to cuddle with him, because he did in between their fevered bouts of lovemaking, but he was never merely content with just being still and holding her as he was now. His hands were always caressing and his lips were always leaving a hot trail of kisses somewhere on her body and sometimes all Bulma wanted was the simple joy of being in contact with him. The only time she got that was in sleep. He held her as they slept and so it was only in the brief moments when she was drifting into or was waking from the world of dreams that she could enjoy the feeling of just being close to the one she loved.

She kissed the top of his head burying her nose in his thick, soft, fur-like hair before laying her cheek against his head once more. He stirred making her regret her action and she closed her eyes trying to make the moment last but to no avail. She felt his grip shift his head begin to move. Lifting her head and opening her eyes again she was met by a pair of sleepy black eyes. He shifted his gaze and looked at the clock on the wall before looking into her depths of blue.

"You are up early woman" he said with a smirk "I thought after last night you would be sleeping in."

Bulma smiled. "I guess I’m just anxious to get out there and investigate the landing site, find out what I missed from my party, and get to work on my project" she said.

"It’s a little early for those things" Vegeta answered nuzzling her neck. "There’s not enough light to investigate yet and no one else is awake" he said rubbing her back and nipping at the skin of her neck. "You will have to find something else to do with your time."

Bulma laughed as he crushed her in his embrace. "Didn’t you get enough last night?" she asked him breathlessly before he claimed her lips in a passionate kiss.

"For last night I did" he told her telepathically not breaking the kiss shifting his body directly on top of hers "but today is a new day." Vegeta reached deeper into her mind with his own sparking their connection. He felt the flow of her emotions as she answered his amorous ministrations with her own. When their minds were linked he could feel the familiar urge to complete the bond but he ignored it concentrating only on the shared emotions pouring through the connection.

Bulma felt her mind begin to fill with Vegeta’s affection and longing and gave into it as always. She didn’t understand how or why it happened but knew that saiyajin were telepathic and that somehow he was able to forge a connection between them at will. Normally she simply relaxed but lately she had begun to feel a pull; A pull that wanted her to reach for his consciousness. Normally she ignored it but recently the drive had become stronger and more pronounced than it had been in the past. She found herself delving into his mind and, at first he seemed to half reject it, then she began to feel his mind merge with hers. It felt like they weren’t just in each other’s minds but were sharing one consciousness and she began to see into his thoughts. A warm feeling of completion began to wash over her and she gasped as it was suddenly ripped away despite how desperately she tried to hold onto it.

Vegeta looked down at Bulma in shock at what she had almost accomplished. "She had almost completed the bond" he thought to himself "but how? She is not telepathic." Still more disturbing to him was the fact that he had nearly opened his mind to her. She nearly had seen everything he had been so careful to hide from her.

Bulma was confused. Vegeta was clearly agitated and he had shut her completely out his mind. "Vegeta" she began to ask before he cut her off placing a finger on her lips.

"It is nothing woman" Vegeta told her falsely. "Just ignore it."

"It is important" she said. "Otherwise you wouldn’t have reacted like you did." Lazily she began to trace circles with her hands down the length of his back as she always did to calm him. "I’m sorry," she said soothingly as she watched the agitation begin to melt away. "I don’t want to upset you I’m not sure why I did it or what exactly I did. Maybe, if I understood what this connection is that we seem to have I could prevent it from happening again."

Vegeta looked at her face and felt only guilt. What she had tried to do was natural, the way he was keeping the bond from completing was not, and yet she was apologizing to him. What was worse, she was asking for him to explain it. He had carefully avoided explaining bonding to her because he knew she would be hurt when she found out that he didn’t want to complete it. "It is not your fault," he told her. "Don’t worry about it," he added. "I’m going to train," he said dislodging himself from her grasp.

"Wait" Bulma cried. "Whenever I mention this strange feeling that we are connected somehow you pull away and it hurts me. Please explain this to me. I want to understand what’s happening."

"I cannot explain it," he told her.

"You can’t or you won’t?" Bulma insisted. He shook his arm from her grasp and climbed to the edge of the bed ready to get up but he felt her small hands grip his shoulders from behind and froze.

"Vegeta" she asked "Why do you shut me out like this? All that I want to do is understand you better but you never tell me anything. I’ve been your mate for five years and yet I don’t feel that I know you that deeply. I know that you don’t want me to and just want to accept it unquestioningly but I can’t."

"Don’t be ridiculous," he answered in confusion. He didn’t want a mindless automaton. One of the things that drew him to her was her proud independence and her stubborn will. "You are speaking nonsense," he told her almost soothingly.

"It’s not nonsense. I’m confused Vegeta" she in growing frustration. "Sometimes I feel like we are so close that we are joined at the soul and sometimes I feel like I’m not really a part of your life and that I mean nothing to you." Bulma felt his muscles tense beneath her hands but he didn’t try to leave either convincing her that there was a part of him that wanted to tell her everything but that he was repressing it.

"You are my mate woman," he told her. "Of course I want you in my life or I wouldn’t have taken you, there are just some things that are better left unsaid." He turned and looked into her deep azure eyes and his words caught in his throat as he saw how truly pained she was. "I have no desire to hurt you woman," he said soothingly brushing an aqua lock from her forehead. "You must believe that."

"Then let me in," she pleaded in a quivering voice. "Let me know you. Tell me everything there is to know about the saiyajin. Teach me all the customs, the history and the language so I can understand the words you whisper in my ear. Tell me about your father and mother and what it was like to be a prince." She gripped his arms tighter and looked deeply into his troubled eyes. "Tell me what your life was like with Freeza and how you were able to survive it."

"You don’t want to know me woman," he told her sorting through the confusing array of emotions he was feeling simultaneously "if you did you would regret it."

"I never could regret it," she said. "I love you and its part of who you are."

At last he was able to grasp one of the emotions that swam around inside his head. He allowed the familiar thread of anger to take over and stood up. "You think that your pitiful love can heal anything, don’t you woman?" he snapped at her. "Well it cannot. Sometimes the only thing that it’s good for it to make pain still deeper than it has to be."

"At first maybe it hurts" she said "but it does heal in time and it makes you stronger when it does."

"It only creates the illusion of strength," he told her pointedly yanking a bodysuit out of the closet. "Love is nothing more than a crutch to lean on, because when it is taken away you are just as weak and helpless as you were before."

"Is that how you feel about me?" she asked with tears in her eyes watching as he began to dress. "Am I just a convenient crutch for you to lean on when you feel like it or maybe you don’t even love me at all?" She saw his facial muscles tighten at her last statement but he made no answer as he donned his breastplate and pulled on his boots. "Please Vegeta," she begged "tell me what you want of me. Do you truly want me or do you just want someone to warm your bed, feed you and raise your heir? Why don’t you want me to know you?" He stood up and pulled on his gloves refusing to speak or look at her. Deliberately she leaned forward and grabbed him around the waist and he looked at her in surprise. "Maybe you’re right," she said. "Maybe love is a crutch but its but its not meant to be taken away. If it’s the right kind of love then it never will leave you no matter what happens. We both promised each other that we would never leave one another and I meant it. Somehow I think that you did too and you did because you do love me no matter how much you want to deny it."

"Sometimes it is taken away by force or chased away and there is nothing that can be done regardless of the promises that have been made," he told her.

Suddenly everything he said clicked in her mind and made sense. "That’s the problem isn’t it Vegeta?" she said. "You think that if I know too much about you it will chase me away. You’re wrong. I love you too much to let that happen. Have a little more faith in me Vegeta. Our relationship could be so much more than it is if you could just learn to accept my love for what it is. Trust me."

He stood in shock. Somehow she had figured out his fear of loosing her. That one day he would come to regret having allowed himself to care because of the pain it would cause. The truth in her words stung. He didn’t really trust her as she did him. She gave of herself completely and totally but he feared betrayal above all things, even from her. "I must go," he stated evading her eyes and steeling his voice. "Release me."

Bulma complied with his order and fresh pain stabbed her heart. He thought so little of her love for him that he didn’t want to get too close so it wouldn’t hurt him if she left. "You know if you push someone away often enough eventually they’ll listen despite how much it hurts," she said. "Don’t worry, I’ll never ask you to let me in again."

Vegeta looked at her face and could see the difference immediately. She now was putting up her own wall in response to his. He would be a hypocrite to reproach her from doing so and he simply retreated from her.

Trunks’ and Goten’s heads immediately snapped in the direction from which the ki blast had come planting their feet in fighting stances. Their eyes came to rest on a figure that stood at the edge of the crater. Automatically the boys reached out to sense the stranger’s ki while suppressing their own. There was nothing at all remarkable about the signature; in fact it was very weak. The boys relaxed a bit with this knowledge and the fact that the stranger hadn’t moved to attack was also of some comfort.

"What did you do that for?" Trunks questioned in the best imitation of his father’s demanding and dangerous tone.

The boy smiled, because he was a boy and probably no more than about 11 years old at that, and his green eyes twinkled with amusement. "I was only trying to be helpful" he replied. "My blast dislodged that instrument you were so interested in retrieving."

"What?" the lavender-haired demisaiyajin shouted in alarm and started searching through the rubble.

Goten continued to look fiercely at their blonde-haired intruder. "Who are you?" he demanded. "Why are you here?"

"My name is Wrench," the boy answered. "I imagine I’m here for the same reason that you are. To investigate this meteorite."

"You’re just lucky that my mom’s scanner isn’t broken," Trunks said crossly. "You could have gotten me into big trouble."

"Please" said Wrench "there’s no need to be so nasty." With that he jumped and gracefully executed a flip landing a few feet in front of him. "I was hoping that we could be friends," the boy continued as he stood up.

Trunks suspiciously examined the boy now that he was closer. His blonde hair was shoulder-length and full and he had a rather nice face set-off by his green eyes. His attire was a bit strange. He had on a long trench coat that almost touched the ground, and his hands were covered with a pair of black gloves. The clothing he had on underneath the coat somewhat resembled a gi. It was an olive sort of green and the neck hung down a bit revealing he had on a black undershirt. Around his waist was a wide black belt with a silver buckle in the middle. The large buckle had a strange symbol on it, the likes of which Trunks had never seen. The pants on the outfit were baggy and were tucked into a pair of black boots.

"And just who are you?" Wrench asked setting his gaze on Goten. His sensors had picked up the fact that he was half-saiyajin but he was not related to the prince and he was most curious to find out who his father was.

"My name is Son Goten," the black-haired demisaiyajin answered beginning to feel a little more comfortable. "I live in the mountains."

"And what about you?" the boy asked turning to the lavender-haired boy laughing internally. Of course he knew who he was. The scans had immediately picked up on the fact that he was the son of Prince Vegeta and his scientist mate that he had observed the night before.

"I’m Trunks Vegeta-Briefs," the boy said proudly and "I live in my family’s compound at the Capsule Corporation."

Obviously, from the way the boy said this it was meant to impress, so Wrench feigned surprise. "The Capsule Corporation?" he asked.

"Yes" said Trunks beginning to loose his inhibition. "My mom was just made President and she’s the genius behind most of our products."

"Really?" he asked with some interest. "I don’t think you’re who you say you are" he accused Trunks.

Trunk’s temper immediately soared. "I’m not a liar!" he protested.

"Then prove it," said Wrench. "I won’t believe you until you take me to Capsule Corporation and prove it."

"You’re on baka!" Trunks cried. "I’ll take you there right now!"

"Uh Trunks" Goten said sheepishly. "If you brought him now then your mom and dad would ask where we’ve been."

"Oh yeah" Trunks said a bit perturbed. "I assume you know where the compound is?" he asked the blonde boy. Wrench nodded clasping his hands behind his back. "Come to the gate in 2 hours and then you’ll eat your words."

"I’ll be looking forward to it," said Wrench with a smile.

Trunks smirked cockily. "We have to be going now," he said. "Come on Goten" he told his friend before retrieving his backpack and flying away.

"It was nice meeting you" Goten said not forgetting his manners before joining his friend.

Wrench laughed as he watched them go. "Children" he said contemptuously "they are so easy to manipulate. Just find their weakness, exploit it and they’ll fall right into whatever trap you’ve set." Wrench was quite pleased with himself. In two hours he would be getting a personal tour of the place where all of the technology he had seen apparently had come from. "I wonder if dear old Vegeta will recognize me," he thought in amusement. "Of course, I’m much younger than I was then" he laughed at the thought and made his way to the ship. This mission was turning out to be very entertaining.

Bulma grumbled when the phone on her desk rang.

"Bulma Briefs" she said trying to sound as civil as she could.

"Hi Bulma" Gohan’s voice said. "I was wondering when you were planning on going back to where the meteorite crashed."

"Well" Bulma stated testily dropping her professional veneer at sound of the familiar voice. "The truth is I’m not really feeling like doing that right now. You can go and tell me what you find."

"Okay Bulma" Gohan said sounding a bit confused and worried. "Are you okay?"

"Of course I’m not okay!" Bulma answered. "I’ve just had the worst morning imaginable and I’m going to scream if I have to answer another stupid question."

"I’m sorry to upset you" Gohan said, "I’ll just stop by and get the instruments and do it myself."

Bulma sighed. "Okay" she said. "I’ll meet you in my lab. Don’t keep me waiting." She then hung up the phone and rubbed her temples.

To say that she was not having a good day was an understatement. After her confrontation with Vegeta she had gone to get Trunks up only to discover he wasn’t in bed. She frantically searched the entire house and came up empty handed. She went to Vegeta and demanded that he help which he did, after the exchange of a few choice words. He searched for Trunks ki and he determined that he was not on the grounds of the compound and that he was coming home as they spoke. He then told Bulma, or rather commanded her, to go ahead to work and that he would handle "the disobedient brat" when he arrived. This had sparked yet another argument over the harsh way Vegeta dealt with Trunks that continued until Trunks appeared. Bulma gave her son a severe tongue lashing about his behavior and sternly warned Vegeta that she would kill him if Trunks had a single scratch on him when she came home before she left.

Those events had proved to be a precursor to all the other problems waiting for her at the office. Already in a bad mood, and having trouble concentrating on her work, her father further fouled her disposition by bringing in the news stories on the ceremony last night containing all the speculation about why she disappeared from the function (including some doubts about her sanity) and lecturing her about taking her responsibility as the new president seriously. After that Mr. Murphy showed up and compounded the matter asking her if she was truly "mentally fit" to handle their merger deal. To this she had delicately replied by telling him he could "stick his money where the sun don’t shine" and forced him to leave thus sabotaging the year’s worth of work to make the merger possible not caring in the least.

She was near the breaking point, she could feel it, and wanted to escape. She didn’t care what anyone thought; she was calling it a day. "It’s my prerogative," she said to herself. " I’m President of the Capsule Corporation after all. I can do as I please and right now I need to go and release some steam."

Gathering her things up she told Ms Shortcakes to clear her schedule for the day and marched out the door. She headed towards her lab and threw all of the instruments Gohan needed into a bag just in time for him to show up.

Bulma opened the door and tossed the bag at him. "Just be sure you bring everything back in one piece" she told him before slamming and locking it. Sure her behavior was extremely abrasive and unmannerly but she didn’t care. Bulma didn’t want to see, hear or speak to anyone else for the rest of the day. She just wanted to forget about life and her problems for a little while, and the best way for her to do that was work. Honest-to-goodness technical work like her current project, the one she had been working on for the past four years.

She headed towards the corner where Android 16 lay frozen in inactivity. She really couldn’t call him dead. He wasn’t alive in the typical sense but he wasn’t exactly dead either. What was left of his original "brain" still held everything that was vital about him, that which made him an individual and it merely needed to be connected properly and turned on. Then 16 would back virtually the same as he was before, accept maybe for a few lost memories and the enhancements she had made.

She walked over and turned on the lights surrounding the work area and uncovered the sleeping giant. She admired her work. He was a perfect replica looking exactly as she had remembered the original looking. She had even had her people copy his attire right down to the last detail, only she had them replace the Red Ribbon Army logo with the Capsule Corporation logo. She had used Gero’s blue prints to build him, working out the bugs and making improvements as she went. She built him almost entirely from scratch, using a new alloy that she had invented making him at least twice as strong as the original. She created a smoother more responsive synaptic system making this 16 agile as well as strong, which was a balance even Gero couldn’t even manage. The one thing however she didn’t try to improve on was the electronic brain because that controlled who he was. She knew that any change could alter his personality, which was something she didn’t want. She didn’t want another android that just looked like 16, she wanted to resurrect the old 16 and give him the chance to live out a decent life. He deserved that chance.

Bulma sat down at the computer terminal hooked up to the android and began to run a diagnostic. She watched as everything checked out perfectly until it stopped at the assessment of the "brain". Shortly after the Cell Games she had gone back to see what she could find of the android and was pleased to find two large pieces of his head containing vital circuitry. By studying the blueprints she had determined what parts they were and repaired them. Then came the challenging part, she had to build the portions of the cybernetic matrix that were missing and try to integrate the new and old circuitry together. This was what had been eluding her for the last two years.

Bulma sighed and opened her journal notes and prepared to run over everything she had already attempted hoping that looking at them after an absence would allow her to see something she had been over looking. She was starting at the beginning of her notes hoping there might be something there that would unlock the key to releasing his mind. It was extremely hard to work on a project all by one’s self with no one else’s point of view to help you. Often they would see things you missed. Her father used to do things like that but ever since she got married he started taking little trips more frequently and wasn’t around often enough to consult. Besides him there was really no one else that could understand these complex machines enough to help her. Perhaps Vegeta could, he had displayed an amazing aptitude for electronics and machinery when he helped her recreate some of the alien technology that he desired, but he abhorred the idea of androids so much she knew there was no way he would help her.

Just when she was beginning to fall asleep from boredom a sentence in one of her logs caught her eye...

"I never tried to completely match the two charges exactly" she thought excitedly allowing her fingers to fly over the keyboard. "Maybe today won’t turn out to be so bad after all," she thought loosing herself in the calculations.

Trunks strained against the small Ki blast trying to use his own ki to counteract it. He tried to focus his energy and bring the largest part of it in front of him with the shear force of will but it was too much for the 4-year-old to handle. It burst through his defenses and it struck him in the chest sending him crashing into the floor of the gravity room.

Remembering what his father always told him he forced himself up to his feet despite being incredibly exhausted and that the gravity level was up to 6, the highest he had ever gone. His head hurt, his body hurt and his soul hurt but then again it wouldn’t be punishment if it didn’t. Feeling his body was ready to give out he looked pleadingly up at his father who still hung in the air above him while he struggled to move. His father was being harder on him than usual, but he seemed to be in a bad mood, just as his mother had been.

"Please" he said to his father. "I can’t take anymore." He saw the disappointment cross his father’s face and felt sick at heart. "I’m sorry," he added shifting his gaze down to the floor.

"Computer restore normal gravity" Vegeta ordered setting gracefully down on one foot, his arms crossed over his chest and his brow furrowed. His son was worn down but not injured badly, however, his mate would not be pleased with the abrasions Trunks had come away with. "She does not understand that that the only way to advance is to push oneself to the breaking point and the only way improve is to raise the stakes the moment even a small breakthrough was made" he thought to himself. "She only sees it as needless violence. She doesn’t understand that mental toughness is also needed as well as physical and thus harsh words are also necessary. She only sees it as cruelty. She didn’t understand me or what it is to be a saiyajin." This thought however, brought forward the bonding issue again. "How could she understand unless I show her. Telling her would not be enough but that would mean showing her everything."

Trunks looked curiously up at his father who uncharacteristically had not said a word from the moment he alighted on the ground. By this time he would normally be pointing out all the flaws in Trunks defense but, instead, he just stood staring at him. "Father?" he asked worriedly. "Are you alright?"

Vegeta snapped out of his dream world at his son’s words. He looked at the boy’s face looking up at him expectantly and felt guilty once again. "Don’t worry about me," he told the boy "you should be more concerned with yourself. You are fortunate that you are not on Vegetasei because you would have been beaten until you were half-dead for your disobedience. You should be thankful that I am not like my father or you would be in the regeneration tank right now."

Trunks could see that his father was upset and he naturally wanted to make him feel better. "I am thankful," he said hugging his father’s leg "and I’ll try to be good."

Vegeta was taken aback by Trunks sudden display of affection. It made him feel awkward. He never would have dared to touch his father as his son freely touched him. Trunks then smiled up at him adoringly and he felt the warmth it brought to his soul. Emotions confused Vegeta to no end. He had just given the brat a pounding for his punishment and yet he responded with love and not resentment. A few years ago he would have pushed his son away and chastised him for showing emotion so openly but he did not wish to hurt him. He smirked at the child realizing just how much he and his mother had changed him and placed a hand on the his purple mop of hair. "I will hold you to your word brat" he said to the demisaiyajin warmly.

Trunks beamed up at his father. He had long ago learned the great significance of small things where is father was concerned and knew that his father was returning his affection in the best way he knew how.

Vegeta felt a strange ki approaching from nearby. It was weak but there was something odd about it. Something almost familiar and yet unnatural hung about it. All in all it was not something he wanted on his family’s land.

Trunks saw the strange expression that came over his father’s face and recognized it as the far off look he got when he was sensing something so he opened himself up to search for whatever it was. Immediately he recognized the signature and released his father’s legs. "I got to go" he said slapping the control panel and dashing outside with a renewed burst of energy only to find himself lifted off the ground by the back of his shirt.

"Do you know who that is?" Vegeta asked his annoyed son.

"Yes" Trunks replied. "I invited him to come."

"Then I will welcome him with you" he told the boy setting him down and taking off towards the ki.

"Hey!" Trunks said rushing after Vegeta.

"Yahoo!" Bulma shouted spinning around in her swivel chair. Giddy with the excitement of finding a way around the obstacle that had long plagued her she jumped up out of the chair and danced happily around the lab. "I’m such a genius!" she declared.

She stopped and looked down at Android 16. "Well big guy" she told the immobile figure "it looks like you just might be joining us fairly soon."

Bulma bounded over to the phone and dialed Krillan’s number.

"Moshi, moshi" 18’s voice said disinterestedly into the receiver.

"Just who I wanted to talk to!" Bulma excitedly. "I think I did it 18! I think I can restart 16 now!"

"What?" 18 asked in disbelief.

"You heard me" Bulma spouted "I figured out the problem and I’m just dying to try out my theory so if you and your brother want to be here for it hurry on over."

"I’ll get him right away and we’ll be there as soon as possible" 18 said excitedly as well forgetting to say good bye before she hung up the phone.

Too elated herself to take offense Bulma set the receiver down without a qualm and then the phone rang immediately after it was replaced.

"Mrs. Briefs" a masculine voice said, "this is the security booth outside the compound. There’s a boy here that claims to have an invitation to come to the residence."

"A boy?" Bulma said in confusion. "Maybe he’s a friend of Trunks. He never asked if he could invite anyone."

She then heard a gasp of surprise and a bit of commotion on the other end including her husband and son’s voices. Not wasting anytime she went to investigate the situation. Once outside she un-encapsulated an air ski and rushed to the scene.

Upon reaching the scene she found Vegeta glowrring suspiciously at a blonde boy who immediately turned his attention to her as she walked up.

"Hey mom," her son said excitedly in greeting "Meet Wrench."

* * * * *