Oh, persistent woman of Earth . . .
Asking about my first meeting with Vegeta, as if you think it to be an easy tale to tell. I know so little of this world and the habits of its people. I don't know if you'd be able to even understand what I would tell you. Perhaps with more time . . . Ah, but you're not going to give me more time, are you? I can see that in your blue eyes. You have spirit and intelligence all rolled into a helm of exquisite beauty. I can see why my brother bedded you. What I still don't understand is why he took you for a mate, or fathered your child. Vegeta is ill-suited for civilian life. You said he'd accepted this existence for twelve years. I can barely comprehend that. You should be dead and this beautiful world reduced to a barren husk. That is what my brother does best, it is what all the Saiyans did best because they-
Wait.
How much do you know of the Saiyans? I suppose I should start there and try to explain how we were conceived in indifference and treated no better once born. The concept of "family" was an alien thing to our people. Common soldiers donated their sperm and eggs to the gestation chambers and that made it easy to abandon the resultant offspring with barely any thought or emotion attached to the act. Without intimacy, how can there be affection? And when there's no place for affection, the heart becomes detached and starves to death. The Saiyans were doomed long before Frieza ever destroyed our world, you see. They were already dead inside; it just took longer for their bodies to be embraced by the void that had already existed in place of their souls.
Saiyan royalty made reproduction more complicated because the son born in succession had to be as strong, or stronger, than the current ruler. My father, the King, was the pinnacle of power and bearing. He was also the most brutal, callous, opportunistic ruler to ever lead our people. It was his greed that started our race's downward spiral. He wanted more planets to rule and in so expanding the Saiyan Empire it attracted Frieza's attention. An unholy bargain was struck between them and it placed our soldiers into bondage under the guise of an "alliance". Saiyans care only for destruction and carnage and Frieza offered them that and more, so they were content in their place as hired killers. They were the best in the galaxy but in so doing, their unique traits came under closer scrutiny. Frieza did not know of the Saiyans penchant for growing stronger after being wounded. Each cadre sent on a mission often returned stronger than previously rated by scouters and that began to worry the tyrant.
King Vegeta knew he had partnered with a being that far surpassed his own treacherous nature and, realizing that his life might be in jeopardy, went about the task of securing an heir. The first born had been a little girl who was put down quickly after her birth. Where her remains were placed, or her name, are unknown. The second had been a healthy boy, but when scouters detected that his power level was beneath that of the King's he, too, disappeared. Then came a third, a fourth, a fifth . . . All innocent babies and all discarded like refuse because of a ruler's twisted thirst for perfection. It was generally believed that the King was on a fool's errand. He was the most powerful Vegeta to exist in one hundred generations and for him to hope to sire an heir that was even stronger . . . Well, most said it was an impossible feat (not to his face, mind you).
I do not know what forces were in league that led about to my brother's odd birth. The King offered his natural contribution, as was expected, but he decided to forego the use of a gestation chamber and resort to the means that nature intended. It was a controversial choice; the power level and strength of Saiyans had grown so much since the days of natural childbirth that choosing this method placed both female and child in great jeopardy. The Saiyan female chosen to bear the prince had not been a soldier trained in any aspects of warfare; she had been the King's personal courtesan, a woman skilled in other -more exotic- arts and she had stood by the King's side practically since he had come into power. Any other race would have called her "wife", for she was the King's favored, but I can tell you that he shed no tear when my brother tore himself out of her, brutally ending her life. As far as the King was concerned she had served her purpose, and served it well. The babe's presence immediately sent scouters screaming and the King was triumphant where none had thought possible. The child's power level was unprecedented, far above that of the King of Saiyans, and so the boy was permitted to bear the coveted name of "Vegeta" at long last. The only thing of any concern was his small size but it was considered a tolerable side-effect of having endured a natural birth, and if there were certain geneticists who were executed in secrecy because of it . . . Well, you didn't hear that from me.
From the day of his birth, Prince Vegeta was turned over to handlers and trainers all eager to impart the knowledge that would become crucial when he would come to age and inevitably challenge the King for his throne. And his life. It's probably for this reason that the King had little to do with his son from that point on, aside from the odd public formal where both were expected to be seen together. It is a hard thing to embrace your executioner and the shrewd monarch knew that he had sealed his own fate the instant he secured an heir. Still, to Saiyans, the power levels of Elites were important matters and the King often bragged about his son's accomplishments and abilities, unfortunately to the wrong ears. By the time Vegeta was five years old, he had garnered Frieza's interest.
I'll admit I don't know much about Frieza. Even now, fourteen years after his death on Planet Namek, there are few who want to talk about him. I do know that he was the youngest son of King Cold and that he was given his section of the family Empire as a coming-of-age present. In the span of a few decades he more than tripled the range of his territory. I've heard he was a ruthless leader who commanded unwavering loyalty from his forces. To be a soldier serving under Frieza meant one of two things; either your world had been defeated and you had no choice but to become a soldier (or die), or you were personally selected to join the ranks among his elite warriors. Prince Vegeta was chosen for the latter. It was considered a high honor to receive that distinction but the King wasn't happy to see his heir snatched away.
"He's too young," the King protested in an ante-chamber set off from the throne room, away from prying eyes. The only ones present were him, two of his Elite soldiers, Nappa and Shiitake, and Frieza. "Barely more than a cub, really. He needs more time to-"
"What?" Frieza drawled as he inspected his black fingernails. "Kill more Saibamen? Destroy drones? You've already exhausted all training resources for the boy, Vegeta. You have no Saiyans strong enough to beat him. My offer is a generous one: Under my tutelage he will become a warrior of great skill and power. He will become a feared soldier of my empire."
"He's destined to rule an empire of his own!" the King growled.
"You think you even have an empire anymore?" Frieza burst out into cruel laughter. "Foolish monkey! Your territory fell under my banner the instant you pledged allegiance. Your planet is mine, your people are mine," he dropped his voice and said with satisfaction, "Your son is now mine and there's nothing that you can do about it."
The hackles rose on the back of the King's neck and a dark red aura burst around his body, making his red cape billow out behind him as if he were standing in a windstorm. Nappa and Shiitake flanked him but it was all for nothing. Frieza made a casual back-handed motion and all three were sent crashing into the far wall by a flash of ki they had neither sensed nor seen. By the time they'd recovered their wits the tyrant was back to inspecting his fingernails again. "I'll send my lieutenant, Dodoria, to fetch the boy tomorrow," Frieza said casually.
The King was stammering, "I-I won't let this happen! You can't-"
"I can and I will. I really don't understand all this fuss over the runt of a defective litter, Vegeta. Given what resources you put into the boy, perhaps the next one will be of better quality." He cast the King a knowing smirk and in mere seconds the Saiyan royal dropped his furious glare to the floor. "Tomorrow," Frieza said again and walked out of the room, his tail waving lazily behind him. The door slammed shut behind him by unseen hands.
"Sire," Shiitake said at last. "What are you going to do?"
Ignoring him, the King said through clenched teeth, "Nappa, go get the prince. Escort him to the medical center."
"Yes sire," the huge Elite said and obediently left the room to fetch his charge. Shiitake was ordered to make preparations for Frieza's ship at the space port and the King abandoned his royal duties for the rest of the day, intent on private matters.
The next day Frieza's personal guard appeared, a bulbous, horned monstrosity named Dodoria, and took Prince Vegeta away. Nappa was permitted to accompany him and, so far as I know, neither ever set foot on Planet Vegeta again before its destruction. I rather suspect that my brother's training was harsh under Frieza but I also believe that he probably enjoyed the attention. He was his father's son in all the ways that mattered, you see, and causing grief and carnage must have satisfied the ache in his blood and bones, the product of a hundred generations of selective breeding.
But I'm getting ahead of myself again.
I was born six months after Prince Vegeta was placed into Frieza's service. There was no mother for me, just the bare, impersonal confines of a gestation chamber. For Saiyan babies all sensory input is stored to memory almost immediately, even if it doesn't make any sense at the time. The data is sorted through in later years, as perceptions increase. I remember spilling out of the chamber into the bitterly cold air and I remember screaming from the sheer shock of it. There were faces peering down at me. They appeared very excited. I'm almost sure that I saw the bearded face of the King smiling at me, but I could be mistaken. There were spoken words but they made no sense to me at the time. What I remember with brilliant clarity is only this: "His name in the Royal registry will be 'Tarble'. We'll make the switch later . . . when it's safe."
I was bathed, fed, and I remember sleeping for a very, very long period of time. When I woke up, Shiitake was there as my personal guardian and it was a position he dutifully maintained for the next ten years. He raised me without a word of protest or complaint, protected me from danger, and became my best friend, teacher, and father all rolled into one. I loved him very much. It's a relationship that I imagine my brother had with his own bodyguard, Nappa.
It was probably a year that passed by until I realized that we weren't on Planet Vegeta but on some other, unnamed world. I knew that Shiitake was reserved, often morose, but I couldn't understand why. It wasn't until I was four that I discovered the reason for his somber disposition as he told me of our home planet's fate.
"The official word was that a comet destroyed it," the muscular soldier rumbled while we were staring up at the stars one evening. "But I know that it was Frieza."
"Why would he do that?" I asked in dismay. I had no memories of my home world but I started crying anyway because homes are meant to be special and because I had looked forward to returning there some day and seeing my people and meeting my father, maybe even my long-lost brother. I couldn't comprehend how it had all been taken away from me by a villain I'd never even met.
"Because that's what he does," Shiitake said sadly. He'd fathered three children over the duration of his fifty year career as a soldier and had been fond of a female who had trained the inductees to the palace guard. All were dead and reduced to ashes now drifting along the eddies and flows of vast solar tides. The Saiyans were a destructive, terrible race but even they deserved to meet their end in noble battle instead of in their beds by a casual blast from space.
"Do you think my brother is still alive?" I asked hopefully. All I knew of Vegeta was from the stories told to me by my guardian and they had built up my expectations if we were ever fortunate enough to meet face-to-face. The look Shiitake passed me shattered that fantasy.
"If he was lucky, he died soon after the loss of our world," the huge Elite said. "And if he wasn't . . ." he let the words hang in the air. In the days and months that followed whenever I brought up the topic again he would quickly change it to something else.
In time, we were met by the inhabitants of the world we'd made our refuge and, reluctantly, our home. Gure's people had kept themselves cloaked from us, for they were powerful psionics, and had watched us for almost five years in secrecy as they tried to determine our intentions. They were a timid but curious people and completely ignorant of Saiyans or other races. Without that prejudice to influence them we were quickly accepted as friends. We moved to the outskirts of one of their larger townships and, although Shiitake rarely associated with them, I was encouraged to socialize and make friends, and that was precisely what I did.
Shiitake dutifully monitored the space bands with the technological gear he'd brought to this world, and by the time I was six a name began to surface amidst the random chatter. My brother was alive! I was euphoric with the idea of a possible reunion until the day I listened to a transmission being broadcast from a world that was under attack. What transpired there haunted my dreams for weeks afterward.
"-the protection of the western shield has been lost!" a voice shouted from the speaker, made tinny and faint from the distance between systems, but still perfectly understandable. "I've lost contact with the battalion stationed there!"
Another voice cut in with, "We'll send reinforcements! How many in the advancing army? Do you know?"
"It's one person. It-I think it's a-a child!"
That was met by a few seconds of stunned silence. "Say again, trooper? We didn't copy that."
"It's a little kid! He's surrounded by a blue shield and he's taking out the tanks like they're nothing!" There was a warble of static as an explosion resounded dangerously near where the trooper was stationed. His voice faded back to clarity, "-now moving into the city and killing everyone! What do I do, base?"
There was a confused babble of conflicted voices that followed, including shouts of alarm and fear. There was only one clear word that made it through the chaos and it made my blood run cold to hear it being screamed from someone in the throes of agony: "-Vegeta!" Right after that the transmission was lost.
"Oh Shiitake," I moaned, feeling sick to my stomach. "What does that mean?"
"It means your brother is lost to us, Tarble," the other Saiyan said gravely.
By then Vegeta was only eleven years old and already he was committed to razing whole cities and burning innocents alive. I'm not sure if that was the product of Frieza's intensive training or his own innate desires. Probably a combination of both. He had been liberated from the constraints that would have come with being a ruler of our home world and was probably enjoying himself now that he could revel in his true nature.
"He's so powerful," I mused, forming a tiny bubble of ki before it popped in my face, showering me with sparks. It was a common result anytime I utilized my power, although I learned greater focus in later years. "I thought you said my power level was higher than his?"
"It was. That's why we were sent here. The official reason for sending you off Planet Vegeta was for having an inferior power level, but that was a ruse so that Frieza wouldn't be suspicious."
I remembered Shiitake's earlier stories of what had happened to royal babies that were inferior. "The lower classes sent their weak children to other planets all the time. Why did royalty kill theirs off?"
"There can be only one Prince Vegeta," Shiitake answered evasively, which begged the question again why I was spared.
"When you emerged from the gestation chamber, your power level was massive. Far stronger than that of the Prince, who had already achieved the recognition. You were sent away until the King could . . . remedy the situation."
"Remedy it how?"
My body guard thought for a long moment and then rumbled, "I don't know."
"If I had such power, why am I so weak now?"
"Sometimes the trauma associated with a birth can elevate a power reading. I think the King was hasty and should have run some more tests, but he didn't want Frieza to know about you."
"He loved me," I said, beaming up at the immense man with all the innocence of the six year-old child I was.
"Uhm, sure, if that's how you want to put it," the Saiyan Elite said, shifting his massive bulk uncomfortably.
I looked towards the sky as it neared towards dusk, the setting sun transforming the clouds into a canvas of gold and orange. "Will I ever see my brother, Shiitake?" I asked quietly.
He shook his head. "No, Tarble. It's best to just forget about him."
In the following years, Vegeta's name became synonymous with senseless slaughter and mindless violence as he expanded Frieza's empire and filled the ruler's coffers with the profit of purged worlds. Heeding Shiitake's words, I filled that familial void playing with the youngsters of Gure's world. They looked strange with their tiny bodies and over-sized heads but they radiated such pleasure and peace that it was impossible to ignore them for very long. They played such marvelous games and were skilled in music and art and it wasn't long before I began to spend more and more time in the township living among various families and accepted as if I were their own child, than I was in the makeshift shelter I shared with Shiitake. If my guardian was disappointed by my conduct I have no idea, for he never spoke of it, but I knew that he was desperately unhappy and often spent the dark nights staring at the unfamiliar constellations as he listened to faraway battles. I wonder, now, if he was thinking of his children, or lost love, and wished he had died with them but –as I've said- at that time I was only a child and so I blindly sought comfort from a people not my own. In the years that followed, I thought less and less of my Saiyan heritage and adopted farming and peace as my way of life. Shiitake still hunted for me, for I could not completely adopt the vegan diet that Gure's people thrived on, but aside from the odd visit from my old friend I was content to live with them. I was safe and I was happy.
That all changed when I was ten.
The first hint that something was wrong happened the afternoon I was sitting in the town square with several of my friends. We were listening to an elder of the township read from a book of his poems when he suddenly gripped his head and released a shrill cry of pain. That was quickly taken up by old and young alike until I was the only one unharmed by this invisible attack. My friends and all of the villagers were keening in pain while I looked around wildly for the sign of their distress. Then an earthquake shook the ground, strong enough to topple a few of the taller buildings and I tried to help those trapped in the rubble. I wasn't very strong, and still had little in the way of power, and it wasn't long before my hands were reduced to bloody ruins. Still, I wouldn't give up. My vision was blurred with tears of pain and frustration when I hauled the first broken little body from the debris. There were five victims in all but only one of them was still breathing by the time I'd finished.
"Th-the anger," my friend was gasping, his arms wrapped around his mid-section and his large head turning an ugly purple from a gash along the temple. "Such rage . . . Run Tarble! He-he's coming f-for you-"
The ground was still shaking and I watched a fissure open up along the street and swallow several booths of a nearby market, goods and all. "Who's coming?" I couldn't get a grasp that this wasn't a natural disaster. "Who is-"
The ground suddenly stopped moving and what followed in its place was only deathly silence. Then, directly behind me, growled a voice, "There you are."
I started turning when a white boot connected with my cheek and sent me flying until I landed a considerable distance away. The impact stunned me, and I lay blinking down at the dirt wondering how things had gotten so bad, so quickly. I couldn't wrap my thoughts around it and spared an urgent glance for help and saw that the town had vanished. Gure's people had cloaked it, using the united power of their minds to flee the notice of this unknown threat just as they had done to Shiitake and I. My friends, all my adoptive families, had left me to fend for myself.
I looked up at my attacker and saw that he, too, was casting the area a puzzled glance, trying to figure out where everything had gone. It gave me some much needed time to examine him.
I was shocked to discover that he was a Saiyan, unmistakable with that brown tail flailing angrily back and forth behind him. He was clad in a blue body suit with distinctive white armor protecting his shoulders, chest, hips and groin. He was wearing matching white boots and gloves but what struck me most was the red cape that was taken up by the wind and billowed out behind him. He glanced at me, his left eye hidden by a scouter, and I swear I have never seen such hatred etched into another's features before or since. He wasn't an adult, that much was plain, and not much taller than I was but I could feel the sheer power he was radiating as if he were a compact star. "Tarble," he growled, baring his teeth.
There was only one survivor I knew for sure that had survived Planet Vegeta's destruction. ". . . Brother?"
"Don't call me that! You have no right!" he screamed and released a wave of energy that tossed me backwards across the ground as if I weighed no more than a pebble. My back slammed up against the hard base of a tree and I watched helplessly as Vegeta stalked towards me, intent on finishing me off. "Broth- Vegeta," I pleaded, outstretching one hand in entreaty. "I've done nothing to you! Please, can't we just talk?"
"Words are for diplomats and weaklings," he spat, holding up one hand. Ripples of yellow ki began to coalesce into a bright ball that was guaranteed to burn and destroy. "Power is the only thing that matters!"
He threw the blast and I shielded my face to the inevitable. The impact guaranteed to end my life never came and when I dared to open my eyes I saw a figure standing in front of me. I barely recognized him for he had forsaken the black Saiyan armor soon after we had made ourselves at home here but I was relieved to see my old guardian had joined the fray in the proverbial nick of time. "Shiitake! Be careful!" I cautioned.
"Shiitake," Vegeta mused. "I remember you. One of my father's guards."
My bodyguard was holding his chest where the blast had rebounded and cracked the armor, and also hurt him judging by the expression of pain on his face. "Prince Vegeta," he muttered, and actually made a curious half-bow of reverence. "You look just like your father."
My brother's lip curled up in a sneer. "Hnh. You probably know why that is, right?" he shot back in a sarcastic tone.
"I don't know anything."
"And what about him?" Vegeta pointed a finger at me. "What do you know about him?"
"Nothing."
"You and Nappa . . ." he was shaking his head. "Still loyal to my wretched father right to the end of your miserable lives!" He moved in unbelievably quick and dispatched my huge guardian with blows that were a blur. In mere seconds, Shiitake was on his knees, blood coursing from a crushed nose. He spit several teeth into his palm and considered the smaller opponent for a moment. For some strange reason, there was a smile twisting his bloody lips.
"Nicely done, my Prince. Your training under Frieza has obviously left its mark on you."
Vegeta's only response was an animalistic snarl of hatred.
The pair flew into each other again and took to the sky in a battle that was lost to the eyes and had to be tracked by the mind. I lacked the focus but I could hear the muffled grunts of pain and knew their origin with acute dread. In the span of a few frenzied heartbeats, Shiitake was thrown to the ground, colliding with the dirt hard enough to leave an imprint in the shape of his body. Vegeta landed lightly beside him. There was a bruise on his forehead but, otherwise, he appeared unharmed. "Pitiful old fool," he said and raised his left hand again.
"Shiitake-!" There was another terrible flash and by the time I'd managed to blink the spots from my eyes and could see properly again, my lifelong friend and surrogate father was dead. I ran over to the charred body, screaming. "No! Oh stars-NO!"
Vegeta grabbed me by the back of the neck and threw me to the ground, planting a boot on my chest to prevent me from moving. "You're crying like a baby," he observed with disgust. "What a joke you turned out to be. Not that I'm laughing . . . yet."
"You killed him." I couldn't believe what I'd seen. "You killed another Saiyan! How could you do that?"
"I did him a favor," Vegeta said. "You obviously know nothing about your heritage, brat. Hiding out here, living as a native with these freaks-" his voice suddenly faltered and he was staring off to the side with an odd expression on his face. I looked over and saw one of my friends, the one I had hauled from the destroyed building, standing nearby. He was staring up at Vegeta. There was curiosity on his round, bloodied face, but also a great deal of puzzlement.
"Who are you?" he asked.
"Fuck off," Vegeta snarled, pointing a glowing finger at this new target. "I won't tell you twice."
"Kiro, run!" I shouted, but my friend just continued to ogle at my brother, his head cocked to one side.
Vegeta's sneer was back. "Warned you," he said shortly and fired.
The blast ricocheted off of an invisible shield and hit my brother in the left shoulder, knocking him off of me. He quickly recovered, executing a back flip and landing in a wary crouch. "Nice trick," he smirked. "Try this one on for size." He cupped his hands to his side and suddenly thrust them out, releasing a blast of blue ki at his tiny target. Just as he made the action, the rest of the villagers suddenly appeared around the child and all focused their gaze on their enemy. The destructive blast met an unseen barrier and bounced off, deflecting harmlessly into the sky.
"Sonovabitch," Vegeta marveled. He immediately took to the air and it was as if some terrible pocket hurricane wrapped his cape around his body and slammed him face first into the ground. Tearing the red fabric to shreds, he leapt to the air again, unleashing a barrage of ki bolts as a cover to get some distance. The blasts never came close to hitting their target. They seemed to turn in midair and all of a sudden I watched my brother having to execute some rapid aerial maneuvers to avoid getting hit by his own projectiles. Another fierce blast of invisible force battered him and sent him crashing into the tree I had been leaning against barely a minute before, breaking it in half. That finally seemed to stun him a little. He was slower getting to his feet and when he spit at the ground, I could see it was bloody. He wiped his mouth slowly as he considered the little aliens. The anger had left his face, becoming guarded and wary, especially when several of the elders broke rank and approached him.
"No! Get away! It's not safe!" I was moving forward to stop them when Kiro grabbed my arm.
"Don't interrupt them, Tarble," he whispered, pulling me away. "Let them talk."
"Buh-but their mouths aren't moving!" I saw that my brother had crossed his arms and appeared to be considering the five elders, frowning thoughtfully.
Kiro smiled. "There are other ways to communicate. Your brother is skilled enough to link with the elders. They are trying to help him."
I couldn't believe what I was hearing. "Help . . . him?"
"He's damaged, Tarble," was all Kiro would say of it.
I stared at my brother trying to spot a serious injury but, aside from looking a little scuffed, I couldn't spot any wounds or the damage my friend was speaking of. Vegeta and the elders continued to stare at one another, neither side moving. At long last Vegeta looked away first, shaking his head furiously, and one of the elders stepped forward and reached up to touch his arm. The contact lasted for maybe five seconds before my brother shrugged off the contact with a growl and stalked off a short distance away. He stood with his back to us, head bowed and hands on his hips, for a very long time.
"What's happening?" I whispered to Kiro.
"Just wait and see."
Gradually, Vegeta became animated again. He turned his head to consider the five aliens for a few seconds and then spun on his heel and walked briskly in my direction.
I was close to breaking out into a mad sprint to get away but curiosity held me in place. Vegeta grabbed me under the jaw and stared into my face. I tried to break that grip but I might as well have been trying to pull away from solid rock. "Vegeta-" I protested.
"Shut up," he mumbled absently. His eyes had changed, I realized. That hideous lunacy had faded to the background and they were suddenly full of emotion. With a grunt he pushed me backwards, watched me pinwheel for balance and fall on my behind. When I dared to look up I was stunned to see a trace of amusement on his face. Or maybe it was simply wishful thinking.
"Brother." He gave his head a puzzled shake and abruptly turned around and took to the air, speeding a course out of the area.
I cast a baffled look to my friend. "Is . . . is it over?" As if to answer my question, the township came out of its protective cloak and the villagers began the task of cleaning up the damaged storefronts and tending to the wounded. Several rushed over to my side and began bandaging my wounded hands.
I was still looking over at Kiro for some sort of explanation. "The elders did what they could," the little alien said. "Your brother was not so far gone that he didn't understand reason. You're safe now, Tarble."
"I don't understand- Why did he come here?"
Kiro simply passed me a patient look, waiting for me to come to my own conclusion.
Realization dawned. ". . . To kill me? What for? I'm no threat to him!" When my friend stayed silent, I yelled, "Answer me! What did I ever do to deserve this?"
"It's extremely complicated, Tarble," voiced an elder who was walking over, having heard my plaintive questions. "We set matters straight as best we could."
"I don't understand," I said meekly.
"I will explain when you are older," came the response. It was one I'd often heard from Shiitake when I questioned matters that were far over my head. This appeared to be one of them.
There was a roar of sound and I started to tense up in fear again, and watched a space pod blast over the village on a course set for outer space. Vegeta was really leaving. A few heads turned to mark its course but for the most part everyone just seemed to ignore it.
"Will he be back?" I dared to ask the elder.
The elder met my eyes and then dropped them and left to help the rest of his people without answering my question. I watched him carefully sort through the rubble looking for other survivors and I couldn't believe the passive nature that had overtaken everyone, despite the destruction and death that had been wrought upon them. That was fine, I was suddenly angry enough for all of them; for the cruel execution of my protector, Shiitake; for the senseless slaughter of innocents. For the first time I could almost get a grasp around that word: Hatred.
A hand closed around my wrist hard enough to get my attention. "Don't," Kiro said, his round face was distressed but all I saw was the blood on his temple and that just made me angrier.
"'Don't' what?"
"I sense your fury. Let go of it. None of this is your brother's fault."
"Do you hear what you're saying? Look at that!" I screamed, flailing my arms at the ruined town because by then words had left me. I saw the four little bodies I'd pulled out of the rubble being taken away by their kinfolk and my vision warped with stinging tears. I forced myself over to where Shiitake laid. What was left of him. I dropped to my knees and put my face in my hands and sobbed, "I'll never forgive him for this. Never!"
Years passed but not my resentment of what Vegeta had done. As much as I try to deny my heritage, I am Saiyan and holding grudges is part of our nature. My attitude changed as a result, making me sullen and withdrawn. That continued up to the day I was returning to the village after a fruitless day of hunting. I wasn't very good at it, and derived no joy in killing helpless creatures for their meat. I tried to adapt to the vegetarian diet as best I could but I suffered from the lack of protein, my strength often waning and my powers, what pitifully few I had, exhausting quickly. I could fly, Shiitake had taught me the lessons, but I mostly hopped great distances until I tired and had to walk. I also noticed that I didn't appear to be growing anymore. I often wondered what was wrong with me. All of these things weighed heavily on my mind as I endured my teenaged years, a time that was difficult for any Saiyan at the best of times, let alone one who was stranded on an alien world. I missed Shiitake desperately.
Meeting me at the town limits was Bora, one of the elders who had faced off against Vegeta five years before. "It is time, Tarble," he said directly.
I cast a worried glance around me, wondering if I had missed some sort of engagement. "Time for what?" I asked in confusion.
"Time for you to hear the truth," came the response.
I simply gaped at him, having long forgotten the promise he had made to me shortly after Vegeta's aborted attack. To Gure's people this might as well as happened yesterday. Their powers of recollection and great age made that possible.
"I'm now prepared to tell you why your brother came to us. If you still want to hear the motive?" There was an expression on his face that seemed to suggest he was more than willing to drop the subject if I wanted it that way.
I thought of Shiitake, of the way he had been reduced to a charred corpse with barely a thought. I buried him near the shelter I'd grown up in and only returned to pay my respects when I was feeling particularly troubled. The equipment and Saiyan armor lay abandoned. I didn't need the reminders. I didn't want them. The mere thought of my best friend made my anger swell up inside of me as if the five years hadn't helped ease my grief at all. "You can explain it. I doubt that it'll make any difference how I feel, though."
Bora spoke slowly in that melodious way that he had, his words conveying circumstances I could barely comprehend. It didn't take me long to realize just how lucky I had been to be squirreled away to this far-off planet and its kind, generous people. How fortunate I had actually been to have been spared Frieza's interest. I was told of my true connection to my savage brother and I was stunned and shamed to tears.
Bora took my hand and patted it gently as I sobbed. "Do not dwell on it, child."
"How can I not?" I wailed plaintively. "Why didn't Shiitake tell me about this? He told me everything else, why not this?"
"Your guardian told you what he thought you were old enough to understand. The specifics do not matter-"
"They don't matter-?" I gaped at him.
"You are your own person. An individual. Unique. That's all that you need to remember."
"By the stars, no wonder he was so angry-" I took my face in my hands and struggled to deal with this new information, this burden of knowledge. Kiro had been right all along. It hadn't been Vegeta's fault . . . or mine. We were both simply victims; pawns in a game older than the both of us. King Vegeta's last laugh. I finally understood my brother's fury at long last.
Armed with this startling insight, I began to obsess over Vegeta's untimely visit. I didn't know the circumstances of his relationship with Frieza but doubted that his jaunt to this world would have ingratiated him with the ruler. For all I knew, he had been killed as a result.
Frantic with worry, I familiarized myself with Shiitake's monitoring equipment and scoured the space bands, fearing the worst about my brother's fate. I began picking up his name almost immediately but none of it was good news. Vegeta had since been promoted to purging planets, not just eradicating cities, and the chatter among soldiers signified a deep, irrational loathing of him. He was carrying the burden of an empire's worth of hatred towards the now-dead Saiyans and attempts on his life were a matter of course. It was really amazing that he was still alive.
I spent many nights at Shiitake's simple home, staying there more and more each day, listening to alien broadcasts while I watched the stars. Over time, I was joined by another. Gure came from a faraway village, often bringing wares for trade. She had her people's innocent nature but lacked that innate trepidation when encountering anything new. Her first instinct wasn't to cloak herself and hide but investigate anything that caught her fancy. She was fascinated with me right from the start and me in her. It wasn't long before we fell in love and became inseparable.
There are other means of intimacy than the physical, our bodies were too vastly different for that, but we could unite our minds in a bond that went deeper than blood or bone and became one of the innermost soul. When we joined minds, our love for each other was radiated tenfold, encompassing our entire bodies in an explosion of bliss that eclipsed anything I'd ever felt before. It was like dying and being born all at the same time. It was a second of immortality. A caress of forever. It was . . . indescribable. If not for her, I might have spiraled into the decent of isolation and become feral. The more I listened to the broadcasts of violence, the more I found it difficult to separate my Saiyan nature from the peaceful upbringing I'd enjoyed all my life. Gure helped to keep me grounded, she let me become the embodiment of the best of both races but, oh, how it bothered me to hear my brother's voice over the space-bands boasting about his latest conquest:
"What's your status, Vegeta? Over."
"What the hell do you think? The mission's done. We finished it two days ago and were waiting around for you assholes to clue in."
"Watch your tone with me, monkey. I don't need the attitude, just the specifics."
"Oh right, kissing up to Zarbon again, eh, Cui? Fine. All two million inhabitants are dead. Hell, we even collected most of them in piles and set them on fire just to tidy things up around here for you. How about that?"
"Unnecessary."
"Bite me."
"Stand-by for retrieval, runt. Base out."
Sadly, it was a typical transmission.
Several years later, I heard that Vegeta had gone AWOL with Nappa and another Saiyan survivor named Radditz. They went missing and I figured my brother to be forever lost, perhaps prey to an assassination attempt at long last. I settled back into my life with Gure and her people. We got married and lived a peaceful rural life. Occasionally, I would turn on the monitoring equipment just to hear voices of the life that could have been mine, if the fates hadn't interjected. Over the two years that Vegeta was missing, his name came up only sporadically. I think the soldiers were relieved he was gone.
Then Frieza planet #79 transmitted that Vegeta had returned to the base alone and barely alive. He had been in a fierce battle and was placed into immediate intensive care. The prognosis hadn't sounded favorable. I began to suspect the worst again when there was a later transmission to the Ginyu force, on Frieza's behalf, instructing the Special Forces team to change their mission and go to Planet Namek and deal with Vegeta, who was becoming quite a thorn in the tyrant's side. I was ecstatic by the possibility that my brother had finally come to his senses and was now fighting for his freedom.
My happiness was short-lived. Two days later, Planet Namek was destroyed along with Frieza. There were no survivors. My brother was dead. I could only hope that it was Vegeta who had managed to land the killing blow.
Civil war was inevitable as soldiers fought for the remnants of Frieza's empire. It seemed that almost every month there was a different alien proclaiming his (and occasionally, her) rule until another deadly skirmish broke out and someone else assumed fleeting control. It took years before the chaos settled down and a pair of newcomers named Abo and Cado began gathering up territories at a frightening rate. They were extremely powerful, able to keep contenders at bay with their might, and began to form a new empire of their own making. They weren't motivated to purge and sell planets; they just strong-armed the worlds under their banner for vast riches.
Eventually, the peaceful world that Gure's people had kept hidden from alien interference for untold millennia was eventually breeched. Abo and Cado were immune to the cloak that protected us and couldn't fathom why their forces couldn't perceive what was so plain to the two of them. Attracted by the prospect of amassing a powerful psionic army, the pair invaded the planet and caused great damage but, in the end, all they found were me and Gure. Her people had fled to bunkers deep underground. Eventually more soldiers came to search but of course, they found nothing and no one.
My status as a Saiyan caused a great deal of resentment. I was drafted and my clothes of a civilian traded in for ones more suited for battle. Rarely a day went by that I wasn't beaten for some infraction or other, no matter how mild. Gure was a curiosity and the only reason nobody killed her –I suspect- was because they greatly underestimated her potential and kept her around the camp for amusement, like a mascot. We were forced to aid the continued search for her people but deliberately created false leads.
Then came the whispers in the minds of the soldiers coming to our world, thoughts plucked out by an unseen people and transmitted to me: rumors that Vegeta was alive and living in a faraway system. I didn't question the accuracy, I was desperate. Gure and I each stole a space pod and raced to the only being who I knew was more of a threat than the ones that now plagued our peaceful system. I needed a warrior. A killer. And I knew that my brother was the only one who fit that profile. We came to Earth and, as we had hoped, Abo and Cado followed.
The rest is-
"Well?" Bulma said impatiently, crossing her arms and slumping against the backrest of her chair. "I'm waiting!"
I blinked at her, stunned from my thoughts and looked around in surprise. We were still in the dining room sitting around plates laden with breakfast food that had since grown cold. Gure was staring at me sadly, she had probably been following the trail of my thoughts and, Bless her, hadn't interrupted me. "I-I'm sorry," I said unsteadily, shaken from the detail of the recollection. "I was just wondering where to start."
"From the beginning would be best," the Earthling said coldly and I began to get an inkling what my brother saw in her. Temper and impatience ran strongly in this female specimen, that was for sure. Enough to rival any Saiyan woman that had ever lived.
I looked at Gure and opened my mind to her, questioning what I should do or say. Gure was neutral by her very nature but, in this instance, her response amazed me. I decided that she was right but I wasn't sure how to tell this odd-color haired woman without inciting a tantrum. I decided the direct method was probably best. "I'm sorry, Bulma, but this is between my brother and I."
The woman, quite literally, exploded.
Next chapter: Vegeta's side of the story.
