Title: Coming Home – The Fast

Author: Stormy1x2

Word Count: 2470

Summary: Trunks has a few problems, due to his 'other life'. Vegeta isn't stupid, and frankly, neither is his mate. They'll find a solution for this one first before they tackle the rest.

The Fast

Vegeta watched silently out of the corner of his eye as they all ate dinner. His youngest son was inhaling his food in between bursts of rapid-fire chatter directed at both his elder counterpart and his mother. Bits of food sprayed out with every other word, his hand gestures flinging bits of his meal across the table. All was normal there. It was Mirai's eating habits – the ones he had been observing since the brat's arrival - that were worrisome.

Mirai ate far slower than Trunks or himself. He also ate human-sized portions. Probably still more servings than a typical human could ingest without digestive discomfort, but much less than what a proper Saiyajin needed to maintain and increase power.

Mirai had barely finished his third portion that evening before he was standing up and insisting on helping his grandmother clear the table. Among all the faults Vegeta could and would point out about his offspring, there was absolutely no problem with his manners and bearing. It seemed to come naturally to him – a royal, regal bearing that hadn't been trained into him, yet existed anyway. Vegeta would not lower himself to domestic duties, but he expected his sons to respect their elders – even if said elders couldn't back their words up with physical threats of any kind. Little Trunks would moan and sigh but eventually give in – lest he lose access to his rather generous allowance portioned out by his mother who gave him far more than she should. The brat was getting spoiled.

On the other hand, Mirai never needed to be threatened to help his grandparents or his mother. He'd been bereft of all family members save but for his mother, and he adored spending time with them now that he had the opportunity. He eagerly helped clear and set the table, fed the numerous creatures Bulma's father kept in the menagerie dome, and would spend hours talking science with his mother in that soft-spoken voice that seemed at times to ache with loneliness.

Vegeta shook his head off that tangent and scowled at the portions of food Mirai did not eat. It certainly would not go to waste – in the unlikely event that neither he nor Trunks could finish the remainder, the leftovers would serve as an adequate midnight snack. That was not the problem.

He'd seen this problem before. His father had been rigorous in his son's training as the future king of their planet back before Frieza had taken it over. King Vegeta had been a strict, domineering man but his madness had definite methods to it. One of his lessons had been about the value and power of the Saiyajin appetite and metabolism. Their bodies burned so many calories both during training and after it, they needed constant refueling. This could sometimes be a problem, especially when they landed on and purged planets that did not provide enough resources for the soldiers to properly feed.

As the most powerful race in the galaxy, there were not many alien lifeforms that could actually harm a Saiyajin. Nor did they suffer from sickness and ailments common to other species. The re-gen tanks had been designed and were mostly used for three reasons - to provide quick healing to those who trained to the point of death, to heal subordinates beaten by a superior, and to heal a Saiyajin who suffered from the Fast.

The Fast could be crippling for some warriors. Still, Saiyajins were adaptable and their systems were able to slow down to allow for the lack of food - for a short time. Vegeta's eyes narrowed. Mirai had come from a war-torn world. Food had likely been scarce, especially with two Androids destroying over eighty percent of the major cities on Chikkyu over a period of twenty years. Mirai hated to speak of his childhood, but he had given Vegeta enough details that he could put together a rough overview. He concluded, while watching Mirai smile at his grandmother and gently but firmly take the pile of dishes out of her hands, that Mirai had likely suffered from the Fast his entire life.

That was also likely why Mirai hadn't been able to reach Super Saiyajin status until Gohan had died. Vegeta's eyes flicked to his youngest son who was gnawing on the end heel of an entire french loaf he'd claimed for himself.

Little Trunks had never been denied the bare essentials, while Mirai had likely not been given the right nutrients and vitamins in his diet needed to sustain Saiyajin growth right from birth. That Mirai was as powerful as he was spoke volumes about his dedication to his training, and the strength of his blood heritage. Technically, if Vegeta's musing were correct – and they likely were, as he was never wrong – the boy shouldn't even be able power up much more than the moron Bulma had dated, or the bald-headed idiot that idolized Kakkorrot. Perhaps the Namek's level, but that would be pushing it. Definitely not his level, nor Kakkorott's, and yet... Vegeta stifled a growl.

Kakkorrott. The third-class idiot with mannerisms and beliefs so far off from the standard Saiyajin ideals it was ridiculous. Any species of Chikkyu's native fauna were more Saiyajin than that brain damaged moron. Nature routinely eliminated the weak links – Kakkorrot saved them and called them 'friends'. This gave strength to an argument Vegeta had been vehemently denying ever since he'd crash landed on Chikkyu and met the walking garbage disposal:

That a Saiyajin's heart, his love, his sacrifice for those he cared about – these were the things that were required to break through to the true power of a Super Saiyajin. The idea that his home world and race could have dominated the entire universe without a sweat if they'd only opened up their hearts and let love shine in as that idiotic song claimed, was a horrifying and nauseating contemplation. Vegeta shuddered at the very thought.

Still, it did explain Mirai's ability to attain Super Saiyajin status despite the crippling effects of the Fast. Mirai's heart was soft. He cared deeply for people, even those he'd never met, and loved as fiercely as any warrior would fight. To the death, and beyond.

This reminded Vegeta of his future son's horror of hurting anyone, which brought up another issue he had been contemplating for the past two days – ever since he'd found his son at the epicenter of a blast of considerable size in the shopping facility Bulma claimed was named the Galaxy Mall. No one had been hurt in the blast. Somehow, everyone had been moved prior to the explosion. Bulma didn't even see what happened, it had all gone by so quickly.

Vegeta recalled speaking to Mirai about the strange act they had caught him engaging in before they'd demanded him to return to his... well, technically it was his home at the time, though it was not worthy of being called such a thing. They'd needed to wait for him to recover before they could travel to the other, proper time line with him, and it had taken longer than he'd anticipated. His son, his warrior, had been cleansing cities, one by one, of the bodies of the dead. He used his ki in such a manner that it replicated telekinisis, and then vaporized them with a highly concentrated ki blast. He must have used the same move to relocate innocent bystanders before he could accidentally destroy them. Vegeta had meant to speak to his son about the technique but had decided ultimately to wait.

If he cracked his son's fragile mind, his wife would kill him.

Obviously Mirai had utilized the same technique to transfer the innocent shoppers in the Galaxy Mall parking lot before he lost his control. The loss of control was something else. Certainly it was not a side-effect of the Fast; the Fast was draining, depleting life from its host like an energy vampire. It didn't build up and explode with the force of a thousand pounds of C-4. Which was another point to consider – the power he felt should have had a much higher blast radius than what was displayed in the rubble he'd floated over.

Vegeta felt a telltale twitch at his temple as he tried to summarize his thoughts while snapping through a chicken bone with his teeth, sucking the marrow out with a relish. Mirai's body was in the grips of a lifelong Fast. Said Fast had not reduced his ability to power up like it had with generations of Saiyajins before him because he had a human heart like the Chikkyu-loving idiot Kakkorrot, and love was apparently a key component in building Super Saiyajins.

Mirai also had an ability to perform levitation on specific objects – perhaps based on mass? Density? - and the mental wherewithal to transport them away from himself, signifying a drastically opposite issue of control. If he could move people away, why could he not control himself from blowing up? Lastly, the blast he'd generated should have resulted in the entire plaza being vaporized into a thousand foot crater but it hadn't. The trees surrounding the blast zone had retained their leaves. No one's clothes were singed or their hair, even the tiniest bit windswept. A ki shield? At the same time?

What his conclusions were telling him was that he had a son with near-miraculously superb control and at the same time, almost none at all. A Fast-induced weakling with powerhouse levels. The vein in his forehead twitched again. The very inconsistencies of his logical reasoning were infuriating. Coming up with a training regime for this was going to give him a migraine, he just knew it.

At the very least, he would need to speak to his mate about adding some sort of supplement to the brat's diet. If she could design a Time Machine, then she could certainly devise a way to ensure her child didn't wither away from a lack of calories. His mate's progenitor had numerous bottles containing capsules that claimed to provide the necessities of life within them. Apparently they were easy to purchase. Which was another strange thing about the planet he'd learned to call home. He snorted – earthlings were the only species he'd ever come across that apparently needed to provide additional nutrition via pills and medications instead of through a proper diet.

It was exasperating. Don't even get him started on the weight-loss schemes his mate occasionally took part in. If the woman wanted to drink nothing but the liquid remains of plant life for a month, he was not going to be blamed when she got dizzy from a lack of nutrients and fell headfirst into the swimming pool. Again.

He watched as Mirai came back into the room to clear more dishes from the table. Bulma's mother, the yellow-haired oddity known to the house as 'Mama', was giggling and pushing Mirai into the living room, telling him to sit down and relax while she brought out dessert. Vegeta would give the woman credit for be able to do one thing competently: she did know how to cook. Apparently a cooking gene was not something that was able to be passed down to their offspring; never was such a thing more evident than when Bulma attempted to do... something... in the kitchen.

Mirai smiled that idiotic 'I'm so happy to be around people I'll do whatever you ask of me' expression and wandered into the living room. Vegeta glared at the amount of food still sitting on the table, calculating exactly what the brat had ingested and how much more he would need if they were ever going to turn the Fast around. He was comparing the calories to a chart he'd once had to memorize for his father when Bulma tapped him on the shoulder.

"What, woman?" he snapped, losing the numbers.

She stared at him in that 'watch it buster' way she had adopted as her primary mode of addressing him since the birth of their spawn – the one that was actually from this time line – and raised an eyebrow. "Something wrong, your highness?" She angled her chin at the food left on the table. "I'm guessing it has something to do with the fact that your son seems to eat less than I do at times."

This was a reminder of why he agreed to marry the woman. She was the only one on this planet with an intellect that matched his and could stand up for herself. He tossed another bun into his mouth and gave a short nod.

"Should I be worried?" He shrugged. "Is Mirai in danger?" He shrugged again. "If I threaten to design a buster rifle and shoot it up your ass, will you answer me with your words?" Before he could shrug again, she jabbed her pointer finger at his nose. "Keeping in mind before you answer that, I am the one woman on this planet that can actually back that threat up."

Yes, there was the proof he'd chosen well. The fact that she had chosen him was something he had refused to acknowledge out loud and this move had served their marriage well. He rolled his eyes at her and stood up. "We will speak of this later," he said, still gazing past her to where his eldest son was accepting a piece of cake from 'Mama'. He paused. "It will be somewhat... difficult to explain."

It was a testimony to his ability to pick the right mate when the woman looked at him, looked at the table, and then looked at Mirai and said, "Well, it's been a while since I delved into chemistry but I'm sure I can cobble together some kind of supplement for Saiyajins."

Vegeta gave a short nod and then barked at the child still sitting at the table, chewing on a ham that was bigger than his head, "To the gravity room!" Little Trunks dropped the ham, gave his hands and face a cursory wipe with a napkin and then bolted out of the dining room. In the living room, Mirai stood up and looked over. "Don't think you get to escape this."

Mirai smiled that ever-patient smile and nodded. Vegeta huffed and strode out of the room, feeling his son's ki fall in step behind him.

It would be difficult, training the brat without killing him due to insufficient caloric intake, but he was the Prince of all Saiyajins, and he would damn well figure it out. Between the woman and himself, they would get the elder brat back on track to a healthy weight level and then he would finally see some improvement in his strength and durability.

Anything less was unacceptable.

End

What did you think? And what problem should I tackle next?