(Author's note: This story takes place after Dominion: Reprise. If you haven't read that fic, then this won't make a whole lot of sense to you. :) If you have, on the other hand, then I hope you enjoy this pointless, silly, romantic little tale.
-Trin)

Love's Labours Won: a Love Story

A thousand ages ago, adventure happened, and then came peace; for a long while, children grew, flowers bloomed, and nothing of great importance occured. All of the heroes and heroines of stories past began to relax their guard, to age and enjoy their aging, as was their right and earned due. All, that is, except for one.

His name was Cumber.

Cumber loved this side of the hill at this time of day. It was on the lee of the complex, and the wind just barely danced over the top of the rise, ruffling his hair and keeping the air cool without becoming a constant bother. The clouds - large, white and fluffy as clouds could be - positively flew by overhead, belying the seemingly tame speed the wind chose to manifest down below. It was like life, he thought to himself as he watched them, occasionally squinting when the sunlight broke through and struck his gaze. Like life, or any other number of things that semeed to be something that they simply weren't.

Like life...

Or like Bra.

...best not to think on such things.

Cumber, of all the remaining people on earth, did not appear to have changed at all since the Black died and the worlds became one. The nature of his body did not allow him to age like everyone else, and unlike the rest of the world he had no companion - no one of his species, male or female - to communicate with. After the Black had gone and everyone had begun to adjust to the newness of what Gai had done, there was a long period of time which he spent, simply put, alone.

Gokuu had eventually found him, and, in typical Kakarotto fashion, forced Cumber to join in the Capsule Corporation group with a vengance. He... he had...

...encouraging people to like him, showering him with food while insisting that he was a good guy now, giving him yet more food and forcing him to frolic with everybody else and telling stories of how most of the OTHERS there had been "bad guys" at one time and weren't any more and giving him more food and offering to spar with him and did he want anything to eat?

Gokuu in host-mode was completely too much; for that evening, Cumber felt himself being caught up in the fantasy of friendship and love, and almost... FELT as though he were one of them, FELT that he were part of what was affectionately known as the "Z-Warriors."

And then he woke up.

He saw Vejiita looking at him; cutting eyes, cautious expression, arms tense and ready for ANYHTING that Cumber might try, and he knew then and there that the beautiful fantasy was just that: a fantasy. None of them would really ever accept him after what he'd done; after what his people had done. Centuries of murder and spiritual vampirism could not be swept under the carpet for the sake of a few drinks.

Knowing this, and knowing the ache in his heart would not die after what he had seen, Cumber left the party, intending never to return.

He left the building, left the yard, and walked toward the road with every intention of just going until he had to stop; such utter and complete happiness as he saw behind him was alien - ironically - and he could neither understand it nor accept it. He had never known such behavior in his life.

What finally stopped him was Bra.

"Where are you going?" Bra asked from behind him, her child-voice slightly squeaky and overbearingly cute; she had followed him out. Cumber swallowed and turned to face her, bending down. Pretty girl; she'd be a gem when she grew up.

"Away," he said softly, not knowing what else to tell her and hoping she wouldn't run back and inform her parents.

"Why?" she asked, her eyes filling with crystalline tears as if he'd told her he hated her and never wanted to see her again.

Oh, gods, he thought to himself. How you could look at something like THAT every day and not end up with a little girl spoiled rotten...

"I... I have to," was all he said, leaning a bit closer so he could wipe away one of the stray tears.

She sniffled once, looked in straight in the eye - and then changed completely.

A calculating look appeared on her face; one he'd seen before, surely, but not in this little girl. Bra tilted her head a bit, summing, it seemed, what he'd said and the reason he'd given; then she pronounced her judgement.

"That's a stupid reason," she said, looking like herself but not quite, and Cumber straightened and stepped back. What...

"If you're going to damn yourself, do so in private; but now you've gotten these people to love you - you can't leave. You're obligated. And besides..." and the weird, cold logic suddenly evaporated, to be replaced by little-girl misery once more. "I don't want you to goooooooooo!" she wailed, flinging herself at him and wrapping all four limbs around his torso with such force he nearly fell over.

"B - Bra!" he said, trying to push her off, but of course, little-girl wailing brought the little girl's papa - who looked less than pleased to see said little girl wrapped around what papa still considered to be the enemy. It was fortunate for all that Gokuu was right behind Vejiita, or Cumber probably would have been killed. As it ended up, instead of dying, Cumber finally agreed to stay at the Son house and be... one of them.

Accepted.

"Try it - you'll like it!" Gokuu said, cheerful enough to be hit - which Vejiita did - and then a year passed, and more years started passing, and before he knew it...

Present day. Bra was turning nineteen. And Cumber had stayed around.

Cumber watched the boys play from his position on the hillock; pardon - boys and girl play. The three were doing some sort of frisbee-dodge-ball combo, and apparently the goal of it was to behead one another in true Saiya-jin fashion.

"Think fast!" Bra shouted, meanwhile throwing the ball she held in her hands with such force that the it hit Goten before the words were even out of her mouth. Goten fell backwards as though he'd been kicked.

Bra - beautiful, beautiful Bra, every inch the girl that Ru Sa and Vejiita had seen in their vision - cackled like a madman and attacked him.

"B... Braaaaaaaa!" Goten wailed, blushing because Trunks was laughing at him. "Get off!"

"No!" she exclaimed, crouching over Goten like like a hungry tigress. "Shove me and die."As it was, Goten was loathe to touch her anyway; she had her mother's proportions and her father's strength, so tousling with her was a dangerous proposition. Bra had been known to break the bones of people who had even accidentally copped a feel.

Goten looked at Trunks. "Will you get it OFF me please, Trunks-dear?" he asked with dripping sarcasm, absolutely glaring bile.

"Sure, sure. In a minute," Trunks laughed, rather enjoying the sight of his baby sister making mincement out of a young man five years her senior.

"Argh," said Goten, and Cumber smiled, watching. Children... the three of them were so happy together; Dende couldn't have known what he was talking about. What about Bra was not compatible?

"Oh, I don't know, Dende," Cumber said, walking slowly with his head down, watching his feet, hands in his pockets as he studied the dandelions along the path. "It's been a long time since I... I dunno."

Dende laughed, slightly taller than Cumber was and accompanied, as always, by Reep. Reep simply bounced in circles around them both, laughing as if for pure joy.

"No, no, NO," Reep said, leaping right into Cumber's face and startling him. "There IS a way! You and the child! Yes! Supposed to be! You and the child and the drained one and the - "

"Reep, dear, I think you're scaring him," Dende warned gently, eyeing the strange four-legged creature with fondness. "Cumber... I think you are missing the point. The point is that Bra has absorbed Chive, and that this, along with her physical make up of Saiya-jin mix, makes her the perfect counterpart for what you are."

Cumber made an uncomfortable noise that was supposed to be a laugh, and shrugged off Dende's arm. "Dende," he said for the twelfth time. "She's SEVEN YEARS OLD."

"Not for long," Dende said. "In a week, she turns eight."

"DENDE," Cumber said, remembering to calm his voice after his initial outburst and the mildly disapproving look from earth's Kami. "Dende. I appreciate what you're trying to do - but this is ridiculous. I don't need a mate. I'm not looking for a mate. Even if I were - and assuming I wanted a female - the entire issue of my immortality kind of comes into play, and that would make things a little difficult, don't you think?" This, for Cumber, was virulent arguing; it was about as acidic as he got.

"No," said Dende calmly, as though he were detailing a shopping list, "because I am going to make you mortal. More important than that, however, is the fact that because of what Bra has absorbed, she is no longer compatible with any other male being on the face of the planet; either she marries you or she dies alone."

At this point in the conversation, Cumber had to sit down for a while.

Cumber sighed and watched the grown children play. Aside from that most bizarre evening, Dende had not contacted him again about Bra or mortality or anythign of the sort; Cumber had to wonder if that were due to required kami-mystery or if it were merely negligence on Dende's part because Dende himself had no gender issues at all.

Bra looked up at the hill just then and spotted him. He could almost swear her eyes gleamed like those of a tigress. Here we go, he thought, seeing what was by now a familiar, playfully predatory grin sharpen her featuers.

"Cumber!" she shouted, as usual forgoing the honorific of -san. "Catch!" And with no further warning, hurled the frisbee at him at speeds no human could ever see or hope to intercept. Cumber, however, was far from human; reacting almost like a bookworm with reflexes he never knew he had, Cumber sat up and DID manage to catch the frisbee before it slammed into his chest - and then proceeded to fumble and drop it.

"Kami!" he exlclaimed, looking with mild irritation at the melted plastic on his hands. "Didn't your mother tell you NOT to use the regular frisbees for this game anymore?"

"Yes, but I couldn't find a new one," Bra answered simply, hopped off Goten, and then started jogging toward the hill. Cumber stared with wide eyes as she came; she'd never enjoyed flying as much as she had running, and just aesthetically, he had to agree. Her eyes, and the way she moved, and the sunlight caught in her hair like the deepest sea colors, and her smile, and she was coming over HERE, and -

Bra reached his spot on the hill and stopped, looming over him, hands on her hips, not impressed by his puppy-dog looks or by his wounded pride - or even his singed hands, for that matter. "Well?" she said.

Cumber stared up at her. "...well, what?"

"Are you going to give me my frisbee?"

Cumber blinked. "Oh," he said sheepishly, and picked it up again; at least it was no longer trying to melt on his hands. He glanced up. "You want it?"

She raised an eyebrow. "I said I did," she annouced, her look growing slightly wary.

The corner of his mouth turned up, a tiny smile. "Then say, 'please.'" Okay, Cumber, WHAT are you doing? he asked himself, meeting her gaze and holding on to the frisbee with both hands.

Bra's eyes grew absolutely huge. "PLEASE?!?" she shrieked, and instead of fulfilling his request, she jumped on him. Cumber was really not sure what happened then, exactly; suddenly Bra was on top of him, and they were tousling for the much beleaguered frisbee, and they both were laughing, and -

Vejiita's reaction made it seem as though he'd caught them doing something much worse than either tousling or kissing.

"WHAT IN HELL ARE YOU DOING WITH MY DAUGHTER?" suddenly thundered at them like judgment from a god, and Cumber - who wasn't quite sure what had happened - jumped off Bra and back a few feet, holding the mangled frisbee in his hands like a shield. Wait a minute... off her? She'd been on him. How had he gotten on her in the first pl-

Vejiita landed between them and glared, oozing an intimidation that suffered not a bit for his lack of height.

Cumber cleared his throat. "She wanted the frisbee," he said nonchalantly as possible, holding what was left of the poor battered thing up for inspection.

Vejiita looked at it; looked at him; glanced back at his daughter, who was still on the ground - and good gods, her blouse rode up and I did NOT do that on purpose - with her shirt halfway up her stomach; back at the frisbee; back at Cumber.

"If you ever touch her like that again," Vejiita said calmly. "I will take your dick and tie it around your throat. Is that clear?"

Physical improbability of that statement notwithstanding, Cumber's jaw fell open. He stammered for a moment, trying to come up with a defense of some sort because it was a very bad thing to have the prince of all Saiyans telling you something like that.

Bra saved him the trouble.

"Oh, for the love of hell!" she shouted, hopping to her feet and sounding every bit as firey as her father. "What's wrong with you, papa? We were just playing!"

"You are nineteen years old and that is too old to be playing that kind of game with any innocence, woman!" Vejiita said, not at all put off by the fact that she was two or three inches taller than he was.

"What kind of game?" Bra had her mother's brashness, as well. "It's not like I was screwing him on the front lawn," she smirked, and Goten and Trunks felt it wise to interceed at this point.

Vejiita's eyes had gone almost comically wide. "You... you... little..."

"Okay, okay, okay, caaaaaaaalm down, it wasn't anything," Trunks said, stepping in between the two and mentally telling his sister to tuck her damned shirt back in. Goten grabbed Cumber, meanwhile, and pulled him out of mangling range - which was to say, arm's reach. "Look, they were just playing, okay? We were playing the same way all day long, and if you'd actually been here you would have seen that, and then you'd KNOW nothing was wrong. Just relax, papa. We'd never let anybody do anything untoward to Bra. You know that. Right?" Trunks said, trying to catch and hold his father's eye contact and hoping Vejiita wouldn't decide to hit him.

Vejiita's eyes narrowed. "She is nineteen today," he said, speaking in low, deadly tones that thousands of beings had heard just before their extermination. "Don't you know what that means?"

There was puzzled silence all around for a moment, and then Cumber spoke up, trying to be helpful. "It means according to Saiya-jin royal culture, she's now eligible for marriage."

"Shut up!" Vejiita said, turning and sending a ki blast toward Cumber that would have done no small amount of damage had it hit. Cumber and Goten jumped in opposite directions, narrowly avoiding it.

Said blast took out part of the opposite hillside.

"Ack! DADDY!" Bra shouted and ran toward the impact crater, concerned about the things she'd left on that hillside for safekeeping. Vejiita neatly caught her arm as she went by and obviously was not going to let go for anything. "Let GO!" she screamed anyway, thrashing as if her life depended on it.

Vejiita was completely unmoved. He looked all the men over, one by one. "The Kyuujinshu-jin is right," he said, refusing - as always - to call Cumber by his given name. "She is eligible for marriage. And she is not going to be coming to 'play' with you people unsupervised again."

Trunks scratched his head. "Um... I think mom's gonna have a few things to say about that - "

"That is between me and your mother," Vejiita snapped. "You stay out of this. And YOU, woman, are coming home with me." With that, he lifted into the air and flew off, dragging his struggling, howling daughter with him. Cumber stared.

"Gods, I... I'm sorry, I didn't mean..."

Goten started laughing; so did Trunks. Cumber blinked at them both. "What are you doing?" he asked. "This is horrible! How could you laugh at such a thing?"

"Because it's happened before, Cumber-san," Trunks said, still chuckling and picking up twisted bits of plastic from the earlier frisbee battle. "He did it when she was ten, when she was thirteen, when she got her period, when she wore her first brassiere... actually, I can't believe you missed all of those."

"He... what?" said Cumber, paling at the thought of all those things in connection with Bra.

"He flipped for a while and declared her off limits, that's what he did," Goten said, pouting a bit because between Bra and her father, his cool clothes were quite ruined. "Then Bulma had it out with him and Bra came back and everything was normal again. No big whoop."

Cumber was beginning to agree with Trunks; how had he missed all of that? "It must not have been a long time in between each... um... crackdown, then, right?" he asked, wearing a slightly lost expression as he searched the hillside for his shoe; the right one had come off during the struggle for the frisbee, and he wasn't sure where it had gone.

"Well... yeah. The first one lasted maybe all of two days. The third one was the longest, though - that's when she got her period, remember, Goten? She wasn't allowed out for a week."

Cumber blushed. "Gods, you guys are awfully blunt about private things like this," he said, kneeling to pull his sneaker back on.

Trunks chuckled weakly, his cheeks lightly flushed. "Well," he said. "When your father makes such a big deal out of every little thing... what are you going to do? Pretend it's not there?" He shrugged. "Besides, we can smell it."

Cumber paused; oh, yes - the infamous Saiyan sense of smell. He had chosen purposely not to adopt that particular trait when he formed his new Saiyan body, so many years ago. Honestly, it just seemed... unpleasant. "So you think he'll let her out again in a couple of days?" he asked, taking advantage of his knelt position to tighten his other shoelace as well.

Goten smiled. "Youuuuuuu want her baaaaaaaaaack," he teased, grinning more broadly than Gokuu ever could. "YOU want her back because YOU'VE got a crush! Ha ha!"

Cumber blinked. "I... what?"

"Bra and Cumber, sitting in a tree! K-i-s-s-i-n-g! WOOO!" Goten exclaimed, and did a very odd version of the Elvis hip-thrust.

Cumber, who had never heard that song, stared at him as if he were going mad. "Wh... tree? What are you talking about?"

Trunks gave Goten a chiding look. "Keep that up, Goten, and papa will hear you and come back he will kill Cumber," he said, and Goten obediently stopped. Of course, he pouted more.

"But I LIKE it," he said, and Trunks shook his head in mock disgust.

Cumber was still confused. "I... who said..."

"It's okay, Cumber," Trunks said, gathering up his lunch, his book, and the few other items he'd brought with him today. "She'll be back soon and everything will be back to normal. And ignore Goten. You know he sees sex under every doily."

"Woo!" Goten confirmed, doing another pelvic thrust.

Cumber coughed politely. That was about all he could do.

"Well, see you later," Trunks said. "Not much left to do here, and I have exams to study for. Ja." And he flew away.

Goten looked at Cumber almost apologetically. "Yeah," he said. "Me too. Dinner awaits."

"You're never going to go to college, are you?" Cumber asked, standing and neatly brushing off his slacks.

Goten laughed. "Why? I have all I need right here, including the perfect job. I'm not going anywhere - Trunks can, since he's got to RUN this place when his mom's gone, but... hey. That's his business, not mine. See ya!" And with that, he also flew away. Cumber looked around at the hillside that seemed to have grown so very quiet since Bra had gone.

"Well," he said, for some reason recalling the softness of Bra's skin as he fought her for the frisbee. "This was... quite a day." There seemed to be nothing more to say, so, after making sure he had all his own things, Cumber also flew away, leaving the hillside in complete silence.

On Kami's tower, Dende laughed. "Well, Reep," he said. "It's begun. I hope you're happy."

"I and many more," said Reep, who then refused to explain what he meant by "many more." The rest of the day passed in peace.