Dragon Ball/Z/GT Fan Fiction ❯ Barracks ❯ Part 48 ( Chapter 48 )

[ X - Adult: No readers under 18. Contains Graphic Adult Themes/Extreme violence. ]

Disclaimer: I do not own Dragon Ball Z – it belongs to its respective owners. This fan fiction is not a commercial project, and I am not making any money from writing it.
Warnings: Alternate Universe. Yaoi (male x male). Goten x Trunks and vice versa. Other pairings.
A/N: Starcut’s crew members:

1.Captain
2.Backup Captain - (Kandar)
3.Master Sergeant
4.Navigator  - (Adriel)
5.Communications Specialist - (Sildara)
6.Programmer - (Rokunda)
7.Gunnery Sergeant - (Monteira Fawa)
8.Arms Specialist – (Hazel)
9.Arms Specialist – (Mandro)
10.Flight Officer - (Reyn Dueri)
11.Flight Officer - (Jadenas Ealt)
12.Head Engineer - (Nohail Ofura)
13.Maintenance Technician – (Mirun)
14.Maintenance Technician – (Landan)
15.Doctor - (Tamahi)
16.Medic - (Yereli)
17.Head Cook
18.Cook
19.Soldier - (Edesha)
20.Goten

Barracks

by chayron (lttomb@yahoo.com), beta-read by quatreofdoom

Part 48

“Goten’s fighting in the toilets!” Adriel gasped out as soon as he was able to speak. He had run all the way from the toilets as soon as he had seen what was happening in there.

“Really?” Reyn asked sulkily. “Good for him.” He had been trying to figure out why Goten was so cold to him after his conversation on the phone. His attempts to make the younger male talk had been to no avail – all he had managed to do was to get himself drunk.

The rest of the crew shot to their feet and rushed for the toilets. Most of them were drunk, badly at that, but the urgency sobered them a little. They swayed, tripped, but kept their course.

“No!” Adriel shouted at Reyn. “You don’t understand! It’s four elites! Go and stop them!”

Reyn glared at him. “Why should I? Let them fight.”

The navigator let out a growl overflowing with annoyance. “You freakin’ idiot! Go and separate them before they kill Goten or any of those idiots who went to save him!”

Reyn gave him an indifferent look. “He has powered up, hasn’t he? Then he can deal with them on his own,” he muttered when Adriel nodded quickly. The navigator was giving him a baleful look, and Reyn shrugged. “He’ll just go ‘I can do this own my own! Don’t patronize me! I’m a big boy now’, and all that crap. Hate that bastard.”

“You can bitch and moan later. Now do something!” Adriel yelled, beside himself with anger.

“Oh, fuck it,” Reyn said, standing up. He swayed lightly but stayed on his feet.

When they reached the toilets, it was already over. The toilets were swarming with Starcut’s crew; there was hardly a space left to put one’s foot. Three elites lay sprawled on the floor. The fourth was standing in the middle of the toilets, holding his hands up. Two broken washbasins were spraying fountains of water; the floor and Goten  were dripping wet. The third-class was still glowing with powerful ki but, at the sight of Reyn, powered down.

“So, you know,” the flight officer said, stepping over the sprawled bodies on his way to Goten.

“So, I know,” Goten snarled at him.

Reyn’s answer was a soft drunken sigh. With the back of his hand, he motioned at the fourth elite, who stood motionless. “What about this one?”

“I don’t think he ever intended to fight me,” Goten said. In fact, the elite hadn’t moved a muscle since the very beginning of the brawl.

“I didn’t,” the elite confirmed solemnly. “Just get the hell out of here before they come round.”

“I don’t think you’re in any position to tell him what to do,” Reyn pointed out.

“Shut up,” Goten told the flight officer. “I can speak for myself.”

“Fuck you!” Reyn spat.

“Well, this is getting ridiculous,” Sildara said, moving away from the door and back into the hall. “Let’s scram before the local police come.”

“A good idea,” Goten agreed.

“It came a bit too late, though,” Adriel said at the sight of the yellow creatures filling the hall. “Damn, the bastards are fast! Oh, oh. They are coming right here.”

“Okay. Move away from that wall,” Goten said, motioning for the elite to stand aside. “Ki-shields on,” he commanded, at the same time launching a ki blast at the wall. An explosion shook the entire building.

“Are you freakin’ insane?” Monteira yelled amidst a cloud of white dust.

“Just drunk,” Adriel said instead of Goten. “Okay, I heard nothing, saw nothing,” he said, climbing over the rubble to the other side of the wall. “See you back on the ship.”

“What a scumbag,” Sildara said, already following his lover. “But I kinda agree with him.”

“Oh, one of those rare times,” Adriel said.

“What now?” Reyn asked when he, Goten, and the elite were the only ones left. They could already hear the police marching.

“I’ve got no idea,” Goten said. “But it’s no use running.” He pointed at the elite who was leaning against the wall near the hole with his forearms crossed. “He will tell them everything. And them as well,” he added with a glance at the three elites sprawled on the floor. “And why are you still here? You’re of no use to me anyway.”

“Well, I’d rather be of no use to you where I can see you than be of no use to you from far away.”

Goten rolled his eyes at the same time as the door to the toilets burst open.

“Okay, okay, I’ve got the situation under control!” Goten shouted as if talking into a scouter, manhandling a stunned Reyn to the wall face-first next to the spraying sinks. He ki-cuffed the flight officer and pushed a few buttons on his scouter, making it beep and seem as if he had ended a conversation. Then he pulled a colorful piece of paper out of his pocket and started waving it before the yellow faces. “I’m a National Security agent. This here,” he shook Reyn and then motioned at the destroyed toilets for emphasis, “is a very dangerous criminal. Make way, make way,” he commanded, pushing past the police. “The car is already waiting for us.”

Once they were back in the hall, Goten dispersed the ki-cuffs from Reyn’s wrists and shoved him forward, kicking at his behind. “Run, you idiot.”

The other third-class stumbled, then caught himself and turned around. Goten expected a punch to his face, but instead the flight officer burst out laughing. “Was that the flyer for their new beer you showed them?” he wondered amongst his giggles.

“Run, you motherfucking asshole!”

Reyn doubled over laughing.

“You fucking idiot!” Goten cursed when the door behind him opened and the Ardarians filed into the corridor.

The Ardarians weren’t certain what to do with the young Saiyan male. The only conscious elite inside the bathroom had not explained anything, giving them a glare and motioning for them to go away. Somebody, however, was responsible for the chaos in the toilets.

“Oh, I’m with him,” Reyn said, pointing at Goten while the younger man was being ki-cuffed. “Don’t forget to take me into custody as well.”

The Ardarians gave each other a look, then shrugged. “Sir can follow us if he wants,” the one who seemed to hold the highest rank among them said.

“Great,” Reyn said, grinning.

Halfway to the detention center, Reyn started sobering up and his amusement started fading. Now, following Goten into his cell, he wondered what the hell he was doing there. There were about twenty other cells in this corridor, most of them empty. Two Ardarians were sharing a cell right next to the entrance, the other four were occupied by Namekians. Reyn wondered what they had been detained for; Namekians were usually very peaceful and obeyed the law even when they shouldn’t.

“Not too bad,” Goten said, looking around in the cell. There was a two-story bunk, a table with a TV set on it, a sink, and a toilet.

“I need to make a call,” Reyn said to the warden who was locking the cell.

The Ardarian nodded respectfully, entered the last two digits into the electronic lock and disappeared in search of a phone. Reyn took in the green glow of the thin power field surrounding the cell. He figured neither he nor Goten would have difficulty breaking through it. The problem was that they couldn’t do it at the same time or there still was a possibility that, instead of breaking the wall, they would attempt to kill each other.

“They didn’t even take our scouters off,” Goten said, flopping down onto the lower bunk, claiming it as his own.

“Common law on the colonies does not allow them to disarm a Saiyan,” Reyn explained. “That applies to scouters as well.”

“Can they arrest us at all?” Goten wondered.

“Usually they can’t. They need to get permission from the consulate first. And usually it has to be at least mass murder of innocent bystanders to get a Saiyan arrested on backwater colonies like these.”

“But I messed with elites, and messing with elites is bad anywhere,” Goten said.

“Yup. The consulate is quick to deal with cases like these. They will be sending in their investigator in half an hour or so after they receive the report.”

Goten gave the opposite wall a morose look. He didn’t even want to think about what was going to happen. He got into fights with elites frequently, but this was different from school. These were grown-ups, officers already, and there were four of them. He had been seen and he was going to be easily recognized and easily punished. He was also going to get Reyn and the entire crew of Starcut into trouble.

“I’ve got a request,” Goten said.

“Hm?”

“Can I count on you to lend me a thousand credits or so?”

“You think they will make you pay for the damage in the toilets?”

An unhappy grunt escaped Goten’s mouth. “Of course they will. They always do. And just when I finally started getting by!”

“Okay, I can lend you a few thousand if the need arises. I don’t think the repairs will cost that much, though.”

“Thanks.”

Footsteps echoed down the corridor and both of them turned their heads, waiting for the person to appear in their field of vision. It was the warden.

“You can make your call, sir,” he told Reyn.

The flight officer went forward to the glowing wall. The Ardarian gave Goten a mistrustful look, but quickly entered the code to let Reyn out. He immediately closed off the cell again when Reyn was in the corridor.

Fifteen minutes passed and Goten started wondering whether Reyn was coming back at all. He had no business here. Even if he had previously told Reyn to leave him to deal with his mess on his own, now Goten felt uncertain and a bit lonely.

Finally, half an hour after he had gone to make his call, Reyn returned. He strode up to the cell with a wide grin on his face, followed by a pallid looking Ardarian.

“What took you so long?” Goten asked while the warden was entering the key code. The wink and the smile Reyn gave him made Goten realize that his relief at seeing the flight officer must have showed on his face. Goten scolded himself mentally. These things were why Reyn babied him.

“Oh, I paid a visit to our Human friend.”

“Huh? Seriously?” Goten grinned, forgetting all about his inferiority issues. “Awesome! High five!” he chuckled, slapping his palm against the glowing wall.

The warden tried to steady his shaking hand when he accidentally pushed the wrong number into the keypad. He had not expected Reyn to be able to launch a blast past the power field. He had requested to see a Human detainee in the other wing of the building and, since the older Saiyan had just waltzed into the detention center on his own and was not accused of anything, he had agreed. The Saiyan powered up in an instant, blasted a part of the back wall next to the Human, then powered down just as quickly with a promise to find the Human anywhere and anytime if he didn’t withdraw his charges. The Human had pissed himself. And it was no wonder – not even the greatest elites were able to penetrate the power wall.

“Hey, hey!” Reyn said, alarmed at the sight of Goten powering up in an attempt to breach the power wall with his hand. “Don’t do that!”

“But I think I can…”

“Yeah, you can, but stop powering up! Do you want to kill yourself?”

Goten gave him a morose look and powered down. “So now let’s go back to the topic of why you didn’t tell me about powering up over a hundred thousand.”

“Are you still drunk or something?” Reyn grunted in disbelief. The green power field disappeared and he walked into the cell.

Goten glared at him. “I probably am! Who cares! I thought that we could use the time we have, since we’ll probably have a lot of it.”

Reyn met that with a stoic face but with a foreboding feeling inside. This was going to get ugly.

Goten wanted to tell the warden that he didn’t need to bother locking them up since they could just walk in and out of the cell anyway, but if he mentioned that, the next thing they knew, they’d probably be in ki-cuffs.

“So about that hundred thousand…” Goten repeated when the green glow reappeared. He tapped at his scouter to turn the translating device off. He doubted anyone was interested in what Reyn or he had to say, but it was better safe than sorry.

Reyn sighed, turned off his scouter altogether, and moved forward to join the younger man on the lower bunk. “Well,” he started while the Ardarian’s footsteps were echoing away, “at first, of course, I wanted to have an advantage over you, since you seemed to be completely oblivious about why we clash with each other so frequently. Later… I guess I just wanted to keep you to myself. I mean, there’s still no guarantee that you won’t bolt even now.”

And that was it. Quietly, Reyn was giving him an expectant look. Goten didn’t know what precisely he had been expecting, but this short explanation wasn’t exactly it.

“And here naïve me believed that you were fucking around with me just to get my attention.”

Reyn chuckled. “Oh, there was that, too.”

“So, basically, what you’re saying is that you didn’t tell me because you believed that it would give you more time to attack me when one of us was stupid enough to power up to a dangerous level.”

“No, that is what you’re saying. It doesn’t work that way. Both of us have to power up. What happens after powering up is unconscious. You have as much chance to be the first to attack as to be attacked. I suppose I was just too naïve to expect we would not need to power up that high on Starcut.”

“You were an idiot if you really expected that,” Goten growled. “Think Orion.”

“There were no enemies on Orion, and I would have not powered up near you.”

“Yeah,” Goten snorted, “just like you didn’t power up today. Are you an idiot? Why the hell did you power up?!”

Reyn blushed thick red in embarrassment. “Umm… Well, I believed you were in danger.”

“You’re an idiot. Powering up at the same time as me to rescue me? No, seriously... Thank you for not killing me after having ‘rescued’ me. And if there had been enemies on Orion as well, one of us might have been dead more than a week ago!”

“Yes, I’m an idiot. I know I should’ve told you. I’m sorry.”

The way Reyn readily agreed with him and apologized gave Goten a feeling of superiority. It helped to disperse some of his irritation but, in turn, made Goten painfully aware of the fact that he would probably always compete with Reyn. He wasn’t certain if it was good thing, especially when he knew that it was more than a friendly competition – it was probably on a very instinctive level.

“Yes, you should’ve told me,” Goten said with a sigh. “But I understand why you didn’t.”

“Well, as said, I was reluctant at first, and later I just didn’t know how you’d react.”

“Yes, I got that. What I don’t get is why they put us together in such a closed space. Before, they seemed to want to protect me all the time. It doesn’t make any sense.”

“Scientists,” Reyn said with a roll of his eyes, as if that explained everything.

“Maybe they just want you to get rid of me,” Goten ventured.

Reyn shook his head. “No. Kandar said there’s nothing of the sort in their plans.”

“Kandar. You mean the backup captain? Why does he know what National Security's plans are?”

The flight officer suddenly looked sheepish. “Um. You mean you don’t know? He’s the one who reports to NS.”

“Oh my motherfucking god!” Goten exhaled, his fingers diving into his hair in stress. It suddenly appeared that, for every step he took, there were two people to report it. This was just… He groaned. “So that’s why he was interested in fucking around with me.”

“Not really. He was just annoyed that you didn’t take him seriously.”

With a flop, Goten stretched out on the bunk, his legs dangling sideways. Reyn watched him silently for a few seconds, then averted his eyes when Goten looked at him.

“So why do we attack each other once we power up over a hundred thousand?”

“I think it’s pretty clear.”

“Territory? Dominance? Females?”

“Probably all of that.”

Goten’s brow furrowed. “This sounds like what happens when an untrained group of males goes into Oozaru form.”

“Yeah, that’s exactly how it is. A peculiar thing, though, is that, unlike Oozaru form, usually this doesn’t work on relatives. If you and your father powered up together, you would not react much.”

“Define ‘not much’.”

“Well, it usually depends on the individuals themselves. If you don’t like each other, then, after powering up, you will like each other even less. It may lead to a brawl, but usually there’s no intention of killing each other. Just your common dominance fight.”

“But once the males are unrelated, they attack each other to kill.”

Reyn nodded. “Yes. I don’t know how to stop it. No one does. Nothing works except one of us keeping below the dangerous power level.”

“Then why didn’t we kill each other?”

The flight officer shrugged. “I don’t know. You were just above a hundred. I was at about a hundred fifty. I really don’t understand why we didn’t attack each other. And I can understand even less how you managed to force yourself to power down while my ki exceeded yours. I know you aren’t really competitive, but this is... If Kandar had seen that, he would have started typing away his report right there on the street.”

“But you didn’t attack me either.”

Reyn nodded. “Yeah, which is…” he trailed off. Goten’s eyes had a hard look in them, making the flight officer fidget with his fingers. “I have killed two of our kind,” he admitted finally. “That was a long time ago and both were your common accidents where we weren’t aware of the other’s presence and powered up at the same time.”

“Oh, that’s lovely,” Goten spat. “And I will be the third. You know, fuck you, really.”

“We are on the same fucking ship anyway!” Reyn snorted. “It’s not that we can avoid each other! And the knowledge of what happens after powering up would have probably given me only a fraction of a second anyway! Actually, back there you were the first to…”

“Don’t you start talking shit! Now you’re good to talk when nothing happened!”

“Arrgh! Same shit again! I already apologized for not telling you! I can’t do anything else about it! In truth, it doesn’t even matter if you know it or not! It doesn’t make any fucking difference! I would not attack you or anyone else of our kind intentionally!”

“Yeah. You’d just pound them to death accidentally. And what about me? Did you fuck me just to get some kind of special thrill? Knowing I have no idea about all this shit?”

The flight officer’s eyes blazed and, for a fraction of a second, Goten was certain Reyn would hit him. Then the moment passed.

“Screw you!” Reyn spat, standing up and starting to climb to the upper bunk; if Goten didn’t want to listen, there was nothing he could do.

Goten wanted to tell him that he had already done that, but managed to hold the words back. Angrily, he listened to Reyn sitting down on the top bunk. Then Reyn set on pulling his boots off. Goten kicked his boots off too and stretched out on his back. He understood all of what Reyn was saying. The problem was that Reyn was more powerful than him. If it ever came down to a ki-fight between them, Reyn would kill him. That had been one of the reasons why Reyn hadn’t warned him. He might have tried to warn him not to power up if it was the other way around, or if they were at least of equal power.

Silence settled amongst the cells. Goten didn’t know what other detainees made of their conversation. Hopefully, to them, it had just sounded like a lovers’ spat. Then Goten thought that maybe it really was just that – a lovers’ spat. Except that he wanted to strangle Reyn. He felt like laughing.

“Don’t you go hysterical on me,” Reyn said at the sound of suppressed giggles. “Goten, se-”

“Fuck you.”

“No, really y-”

“Shut up!” Goten yelled, kicking the boards above him. “Shut the fuck up!”

“Fine! Fine! Just calm down!”

For several moments, only Goten’s rash breathing was heard in the cell. It quieted gradually.

“If there’s something else I need to know, you’d better spill it all out now,” Goten said in a few minutes.

Reyn was quiet for several moments and Goten thought that maybe he had already fallen asleep.

“No, there isn’t anything,” Reyn said finally.

The pause made Goten suspicious, but maybe it was natural to give it some thought before answering. “Fine,” Goten said.

“So we are okay now?”

“I don’t know. But I don’t feel like strangling you anymore.”

“That’s definitely an improvement. So can I join you now?”

“Join me where?”

“On your bunk, of course. Unless you want to climb up here.”

Goten sighed. “It’s tiny, Reyn.”

“So that’s a ‘no’?”

“Well, okay, fine.”

With an inward chuckle, Reyn started climbing down. Goten really didn’t hold grudges. That didn’t mean he was not going to remember. Next time something like this happened, he and Goten were as good as done. It was very likely that it would come to trading blows as well. Since it didn’t happen the first time, Reyn doubted it would ever go too far between them, even if the two of them powered up over the limit. No matter how strange it was, it seemed that the whole thing worked a bit differently when it concerned Goten.

Goten moved closer to the wall to let the flight officer in. After some shuffling about, they finally managed to settle down by lying on their sides.

“Who was that on the phone?” Reyn asked. He hesitated a long time before voicing the question. He felt he had no right to ask anything after what he had just pulled, but it was either now or never. He had promised there were no secrets anymore, and Goten was about to fall asleep and the chance would be lost.

“Mnm?” Goten mumbled drowsily. “The elite…told you about… Dog…  Stupid… asshole… Goldfish… With carrot and celery garnish…”

“What the hell are you talking about?” Reyn asked, his apprehension growing. If the elite was one of Goten’s hypothetical boyfriends, he was much more real than Reyn had expected. No sane elite would try to contact a third-class on the other side of the universe. And then…obviously he had been the one to tell Goten about the powering up limit as well. It was disconcerting to have him access this kind of information.

Despite the unusual surroundings and cramped bunk, Goten slept well. At some point, he felt something touching his stomach, under his jacket. Sleepily, he shifted away, trying to roll onto his other side. That went better than his fuzzy mind had expected it to happen in the narrow bunk. The touch returned, though. Now the hands were caressing his back.

“Goddamnit, Reyn,” Goten muttered irritably, pulling away from him even further, “I want to sleep.”

The persistent hands returned. This time one of them settled on his crotch. Goten ignored it. He was successful for about a minute, but soon all the rubbing and kneading made him harden to the point where he could no longer disregard it.

“What the hell are you doing?” Goten grunted, opening his eyes. “We are in a detention center with some five or six other people around and you suddenly decide it’s the best time to fu-?” he trailed off in confusion. There was something bright red in front of him. A huge sea of blood.

Goten started, sitting up suddenly and looking around wide-eyed. It was not a sea of blood; it was a huge red carpet, stretching from one end of the enormous hall to the other. Reyn tried to kiss him and, absently, Goten pushed the older man’s face away. He looked up at the countless rows of seats lining the lavish hall. Knowing what he would see behind him, Goten turned his head. Right. A platform with a tribune and a row of armchairs behind it. He knew the place. What was it called again? Brune-something?

Reyn touched him again, and, not even looking at him, Goten slapped at his hand. His mouth fell open in a silent gasp when Reyn suddenly took hold of his tail. His back arching, he turned his head to tell the flight officer to stop it, but just stayed openmouthed when his eyes met the so-familiar blue ones.

“Uh,” Goten stuttered dumbly, staring. The first thing that came to his mind was that the prince’s hair wasn’t so short anymore.

The prince chuckled at the younger man’s stunned face. Using the opportunity, and Goten’s open mouth, he leaned in to capture the third-class’s lower lip with his. Goten blinked and tried to move away, but the prince’s arm wrapped around his shoulders to keep him in place. The third-class’s breath caught when the other man’s mouth covered his. He thought about resisting at first, then realized that he had already lost his chance to resist over a month ago. That was just as well.

“Wh-why are you…you here?” Goten asked between their kisses. “I don’t…don’t think you’re supposed to…to be here.”

The prince raised his head, breaking the kiss. “And why can’t I be?” he asked with a grin. He ran his hand along Goten’s tail, making the younger man’s back arch again and a soft hiss slip from behind his clenched teeth.

“What…what the hell…you doing?” Goten managed to grunt out. His eyes nearly fell shut when the prince ruffled over the fur. He wasn’t certain whether it felt good or painful. “Let g-go.”

“You forgot to add ‘sir’,” the prince pointed out.

“Let go, you asshole.”

The prince’s lavender eyebrows rose. “Now, that’s no way to talk to your superior officer.” He leaned in with a chuckle. “A punishment is in order.”

“Superior officer mmhm…my ass,” Goten muttered between kisses again. His arms wrapped around the prince’s shoulders of their own accord. The older man’s right hand slid under his jacket to caress his stomach and Goten didn’t even try to bite back a soft pleasurable grunt. He wished this would never end.

“Did you miss me?” the prince asked, his lips leaving a trail of kisses along the side of Goten’s neck.

Goten swallowed loudly. “Who would miss you, you…” The prince’s fingers started playing with the very tip of his tail and he forgot what he had intended to say. The touch was somehow bordering between disagreeable and pleasant. It was simply too intense. His whole body was shivering.

“What are you doing?”

Goten froze at the voice, his eyes opened slowly, looking past the prince’s shoulder. “Uh…” he grunted at the sight of his father heading towards him and the prince. His first panicky thought was to shove the prince off himself and try to think of a damn good explanation for this. One look at the purple-haired man, though, revealed that he had changed back into Reyn. Goten panicked even more. He started begging all gods he knew that Reyn wouldn’t suddenly decide to turn into Gohan.

His father would be overjoyed.

“Umm…” Goten drawled awkwardly when Kakarott stopped next to him and Reyn. Both of them were sitting on the carpet. The other Saiyan was absently playing with the tip of his tail and Goten could feel that his nipples were rock-hard; his jacket felt rough against them.

“Stop playing around,” his father said. “We have work to do.”

Goten blushed fiercely. “I can’t really get rid of him.” He hoped that Kakarott hadn’t seen the prince. Or, if he had, hadn’t recognized him. That was a slim chance, though, since seasoned soldiers were supposed to know what their royalty looked like.

Kakarott took a good look at Reyn. Sexual fantasies often invaded these dreams. He had learned to deal with them pretty quickly but, since Goten was new to this, this erotic abomination was going to follow them around for quite some time.

“Do you want me to dispose of him?” Kakarott asked.

“Oh gods, yes.”

Goten’s eyes widened slightly when his father reached out to touch Reyn on his head. The flight officer disappeared with a soft popping sound.

“Is he someone you know?” Kakarott asked conversationally while his son was getting to his feet. “Your boyfriend, maybe?”

Red-faced, Goten buttoned a few buttons on his jacket, then brushed over it with his hands to smooth it out.  He was still somewhat hard. “Umm…” He didn’t really know what Reyn was to him exactly. They weren’t boyfriends, but they weren’t exactly sex buddies either. “Umm… My current partner. Probably,” he added uncertainly. Goten saw his father raise his eyebrows, but no comment came. Goten decided to explain: “Well, we work on the same ship and…”

“Doesn’t really matter,” Kakarott said, cutting him off. He turned around and, with his hand, motioned for Goten to follow him. “Just make sure that he doesn’t know about these dreams.”

“Umm… A little bit too late for that,” Goten said tentatively, starting to briskly walk behind him. He tensed when his father’s head whipped around to give him an angry look.

“You’ve been only seeing these dreams for… How long exactly?” Kakarott snapped at him. “And you can’t keep your mouth shut, can you?”

“Weeeelll,” Goten mumbled, feeling unbelievably stupid, “the dreams were the reason I saved him, so I kinda…”

“Oh, gods!” Kakarott snorted in disbelief. He pushed the heavy white doors open to reveal a huge wide corridor. Red carpet covered the floor here as well. Big, square windows let in bright light from the outside. There was another pair of white doors at the end of the corridor.

“Well, I had to tell someone!” Goten snapped back at Kakarott, falling into step next to him. “Maybe if you had told me about them and all that other crap in advance, I wouldn’t have felt like bashing my head against a wall in frustration! And I wouldn’t have tried to kill myself either!”

For a moment, Kakarott looked astonished. “Kill yourself?” he asked, alarm clear in his voice.

“I mean power up so high that I nearly blew up myself into bits!”

“Oh, that.”

Goten opened his mouth to say more about the appalling injustice he had experienced, but Kakarott looked so relieved that he contented himself with offering his father a glare. There was nothing to be relieved about! He closed his mouth without saying anything and followed Kakarott along the corridor.

“Where are we going?”

“I think it would be wise to look around. The assembly is going to take place in a week, and I am still two days away from the station. I was trying to figure out where the attack is going to come from and, from what we’ve seen, I’ve reached the conclusion that it is going to be an Imperial Star Destroyer.”

Goten pursed his lips. “What exactly are we talking about? I don’t really follow you.”

Kakarott turned to give him a searching look. “Do you remember the station exploding?”

“What station?”

Kakarott’s eyebrows rose. “I see. Let me ask you, then. How far away are you from Bruminan Station?”

“Uhh…” Goten drawled. There was something dangerous in his father’s eyes, as if he was expecting a certain answer. “Umm… That depends... Where exactly is this Bruminan Station?”

“Oh, gods. You don’t remember anything at all, do you?”

“Umm… No?”

“And you haven’t even started moving in this direction?”

“Umm… No?”

“Where are you now?”

“Err… On Meia Colony.”

Kakarott’s face brightened. “That’s not far away. Board any ship heading this way and come here immediately. It should take you only three to four days to reach it.”

Goten stared at him incredulously. “I can’t just go off whenever and wherever I want! They will send a military tribunal after me!”

Kakarott snorted, amused. “That’s even better. Let them tag along. Then maybe someone will start doing their damn job and protect the royal family.”

“They will sentence me to death!”

“Yeah, that’s very likely,” Kakarott agreed, opening the doors. “You save their asses and they sentence you to death. As per usual.”

“Have you eaten something strange?” Goten muttered, walking into yet another corridor just as wide and long. His father, however, often talked making no sense. “Okay,” Goten said, starting to summarize it all in his head. “So, this is Bruminan Station and it’s going to explode in a week during an assembly? Fine,” he said when his father nodded.

“It’s not fine. Prince Vegeta is going to be here,” Kakarott said. “I don’t particularly like the man, but his death will cause disarray and panic in the empire; this will complicate the war to an impossible degree. Besides, I like King Vegeta even less. It would be good for the prince to finally take over the reins.”

This was what Kakarott always said when Goten would ask him what he thought of the Saiyan Royalty. He had never liked any of them but, when asked why, had never elaborated on his opinion.

“We are talking about the crown prince here, right?”

“What? Ah, right. I keep forgetting there is a third one. No, as far as I know, the youngster isn’t coming.”

It was strange to hear his father talk about his prince and shaii so dismissively. Youngster… Well, from his father’s point of view, he was. It was best, though, that Kakarott never shared his thoughts with outsiders.

“Listen,” Goten asked, “can we even do anything if it’s an Imperial Star Destroyer?”

“I’ve checked and it seems they do have some autonomous defense system right here in the palace.”

“Like laser cannons?”

“Yeah. The problem is, we have no idea what ship we need to aim them at.”

Goten nodded. “Right. Before and during the assembly, there will probably be about a hundred various ships in orbit.”

“Yes. So if we ignore the small fries, there will still be some twenty ships that pack enough power to destroy the entire station.”

Goten huffed. “Okay, even if we somehow manage to identify it, how do you think we can use their defense system? Nobody will allow us!”

Kakarott snorted. “Nobody will ask them. If anyone gets in your way, you just blast them. Our main priority is the Saiyan Prince. Anything else comes second.”

Goten blinked at the back of his father’s head. The part about the Saiyan Prince being their priority was absolutely true, but was Kakarott always so reckless during missions? It was no wonder he returned from his last assignment with a huge hole in his side and a couple of ribs missing, not to mention his broken leg. It was a miracle he was still alive.

“In the worst case scenario,” Goten said, “we’ll just have to take down all the ships. It’s either that or we’ll have the prince killed.”

Kakarott turned to give him a thoughtful look. In a moment, he shook his head uncertainly. “Too many useless deaths.”

“The prince is our priority, is he not?”

“That’s true, but…”

“Whatever,” Goten said dismissively. He suddenly felt that he didn’t even care anymore. This didn’t feel real anyway.

They finally reached a metal door. Noting a panel with a blinking screen that was asking for the entrance code, Goten gave his father a questioning look. What now? Instinctively, he stepped back when his father powered up abruptly. Without his scouter, Goten couldn’t tell how high Kakarott had powered up, but it must have been a lot since he easily punched two holes through the steel door, hooked his fingers on the other side and, with one tug, ripped the door out of the wall. Tossing the useless metal aside, he stepped inside.

“Is that a good thing to do?” Goten wondered, following him. He found himself in a room with about a dozen terminals and just about as many screens lining the walls. Five of them were on and were showing images of the surrounding area, but his eyes were immediately attracted by a couple of flashing lights at the opposite end of the room. Otherwise, there was not a living soul inside.

“It’s a reality that hasn’t happened yet. It will probably never happen either, since it is only one of many. And if it does happen… It’s just a door.”

“Hmm… How does it actually work?” Goten asked, looking around the room, his attention mostly on what the screens were showing. “I mean, why do we see these…mmm…dreams at all?”

“That’s a long story and we don’t have time for that. Check that screen,” Kakarott said, pointing with his hand. “Besides, even if I told you now, you’ll forget most of it after you wake up. Ask me when we meet in real time.”

“Alright,” Goten said, walking over to the screen. He pressed in the usual code, trying to unlock the terminal underneath it, but the screen threw up an error. “I don’t think I can help you out much. I don’t really understand anything about defense systems. If you tell me which button to push, I can do that, but when it comes to operating a terminal on my own, I am absolutely useless.”

“And here I expected them to teach you something in that officers’ school…”

“Well, they did. But I only spent six months there.”

Goten tried a few more times, but no code he entered worked and he gave up. Sitting on one of the desks, he watched his father fiddle with the main terminal. It was obvious Kakarott wasn’t having much luck with it either.

“You’ll just have to threaten someone into giving you access,” Goten said finally.

Kakarott shrugged. “No matter, I will have to come here while they are entering their passwords.”

Goten was surprised; his dreams were totally random. “Can you do that?”

“Sometimes. If I try hard enough.”

“Hmm… You know…” Goten trailed off with a frown when he heard someone call his name. The voice was faraway, soft, but he had definitely heard it. He turned around to stare at the doorway with the missing door.

“What?”

“I think someone has just called me.”

Kakarott listened for a few moments, then shrugged. The voice came again, louder this time, but Goten could see that his father couldn’t hear it.

“Hey, you two!”

Goten started and opened his eyes. For a few seconds, he just stared at something blue in front of him, not certain what he was seeing or what was going on.

TBC