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Chapter 4

by: ljv

What does not move is dead.

-Robert Greene

***

He had to test her strength. That process alone was more difficult than he had imagined. It was not that she was incapable. It was the opposite rather. He could not get an estimate of her strength. It was so frustrating. This would be so much easier if he could just get a reading on her ki. Yet, as all times before, it seemed almost nonexistent. When he reached out to feel it, it was barely more powerful than a human newborn's. It hardly made any sense.

He had locked her inside of the gravity machine with him. She stood in the center of the room while he stood over at the control panel. He would systematically increase the gravity with a push of the button. If he could not get a reading on her strength, he could test her stamina. As he increased the gravity to fifty-six, she remained standing – looking at him expectantly; almost bored. Vegeta was becoming increasingly frustrated. Never once did her ki fluctuate.

Vegeta scowled at her.

None of this was making any sense in his mind.

"Brat, who trained you?"

During the short time they had been in space, Vegeta found she had 'qualities' about her that were not exactly natural. Qualities he had never encountered before in his life. Her unchanging ki being the most disturbing thing about her. He was also coming to learn with a twinge of frustrated disapproval that the girl had an insolent mouth on her. The sharpness and insults of her words were comparable to his own.

"I told you before," she answered sharply, "nobody."

There was a finality to her words the Vegeta did not completely believe; an arrogance that Vegeta did not like. Vegeta turned the gravity up to eighty.

Her eyes widened at the sudden fluctuation of gravity as she nearly fell down to her knees. She barely caught herself in time. He had only been turning the gravity up by single intervals before. Her 'mystery' was becoming entirely too frustrating and her blatant insolence vexing. This change of gravity was without a doubt a stress to her body; her face showed her shock. Vegeta smirked. Finally, something other than her calm arrogance. Vegeta did another reading on her ki. He was scowling now, a least more than before. Still the same; still pathetically weak.

Things did not equate in his mind. If she was as weak as her ki suggested she would have been dead at ten times earth's gravity. At eighty she struggled but was not anywhere near her limit; whatever that limit was.

She was breathing heavily now as she struggled to balance. She directed a malicious glare into Vegeta's eyes. He smirked at her. He still had not found her threshold, yet. It was his full intention to do so. He increased the gravity to ninety-nine as she crashed to her knees.

The fire in her eyes sparked. He turned the gravity up another five notches.

***

While the girl healed in the rejuvenation tanks Vegeta trained. Right now he was at nearly five hundred times earth's gravity. Normally he would turn it up higher, but the machine had limitations in space. The gravity machine based its force on the gravity around it. In space, the gravity levels were nearly nonexistent. When the machine was on a planet, its potential would be greater than it would be in space. Bulma had warned him not to push the machine too high unless he was on solid ground. The limitations were more than frustrating. But he supposed it would be more frustrating to be stuck out in space with a broken ship.

It was more difficult than he thought it would be - training like this; trying to improve his strength while simultaneously trying to teach another. Perhaps if the child were closer to him in strength it would be easier. But now he had to train her. It was self - defeating to kill your student in the effort of teaching them. A fight with him was too dangerous for her. Her strength had to be increased if she was ever going to spar with him.

He thought back to how she had ended up in the rejuvenation tank. At one hundred and twenty times earth's gravity, he finally felt a fluctuation in her ki; it was tiny and barely noticeable, but it was there. And when he felt it; she fainted. It was not much, but at the very least it was something. Now he knew her ki could be manipulated. That fact was strangely a relief to Vegeta but he was not sure why. As low as it was, she was incredibly strong. For a brief moment, Vegeta's stomach fluttered in something akin to fear. If her ki was that low and she displayed the type of strength she did now, what would happen if he increased her ki? What kind of strength and power would that bring forth? Vegeta punched an invisible opponent that felt more tangible in the moment than he cared to admit.

***

There was a message waiting for him when Vegeta finished training. Vegeta glanced at the machine confused. He had made the woman promise him not to initiate contact unless there was an emergency of some sort. It would be easier that way. No contact unless absolutely necessary; there was no point in opening painful wounds.

Vegeta debated over the pros and cons of opening the message. In the end, he had to trust Bulma. She would not have sent him something unless he needed to know it. He pressed the button to receive it. As Bulma's face appeared on the screen, he felt such joy at the sight of her beautiful face it was almost like pain. It took him a moment to understand what it was she was saying.

"I understand you did not want me to contact you. But I thought you should know this. I don't expect you to contact me back or to react to what I am about to say in any way… I just think you need to know…"

Vegeta watched the screen closely. Worry began to push at the edges of his mind. It had not looked like the woman had slept in days. Her bright eyes were uncommonly dull as if worn out by an excessive amount of tears. Her nose was slightly pink and her normally rosy face was very pale. Her voice, even, was not as smooth as before.

"We never expected it… his death was completely unsuspected…"

Vegeta tensed. The dark clothing Bulma was wearing made sense. Her normally perfect hair was slightly disarrayed. He continued to listen.

"I have been comforting Chichi all day… it has been so hard on her…" her voice would trail off desperately as if not knowing quite what to say what she needed.

Vegeta froze. Who had died? His mind raced. 'Not the boy. Not the boy.' He should not have left. If he had known the boy would do this… he would have stayed.

He nearly missed Bulma's next words his mind was racing so fast.

"The Ox King was nearly sixty years old. That's…that's a long time in human years…" She said the last part as some sort of justification for death.

Vegeta barely noticed it. He felt like collapsing from relief. Gohan was fine. Or as fine as he could be. He was alive. Vegeta mentally scolded himself for thinking the Gohan would kill… no a Saiyan would never kill themselves. It was too dishonorable. Never.

"He left behind a lot to Chichi and Gohan…"

Vegeta scowled at the screen. He could not think as to why the woman would deem this important information for him to know. People died all the time. This seemed hardly relevant. Bulma still had more to say.

"Ox… he ruled the largest kingdom on earth."

Vegeta immediately froze.

"A official successor has not been named yet, but traditionally the title goes to the next eldest male of the Ox line. Nothing has been official yet, but…" Bulma trailed off. However, Vegeta knew exactly what the 'but' meant. Vegeta never expected this.

His wife's voice had turned into something of a plea. "Gohan is so young. There is no age limit in their constitution on age requirements to rule, but… he is just so young. Barely twelve. I don't know if he can… how he can do it. Chichi is in no shape to be queen. She has barely gotten over Goku, now… now her father too. She cannot rule a country. Then again, I do not think a twelve year old boy can do it either."

Bulma looked desperately into the screen. "I don't know if Gohan is ready for this. He came to talk to me. He asked me what he should do. I did not know what to tell him. What can I tell him? He is so young. If he was older, it would not seem like such a problem." Bulma bit her lip as she held back a sob. "I know what you would say if you were here. You would tell Gohan it was his responsibility – that it was in his blood. I know what you would do. He seems to be waiting for my opinion though."

Vegeta's hands clenched.

"I can't ask you to reply to this message, Vegeta. I know that it is not your responsibility to do so… but please… I cannot even begin to know what to tell him. I know so much, but I know nothing about ruling a country. I have never asked for your help before. I have never had to. But you are the only person I know that could possibly know what to say to him. You are the only person that could possibly relate to him. Please, Vegeta."

Her small frame shook as she paused breathing in deeply as if to calm herself. He watched as she looked at the screen one last time before muttering 'I love you.' The screen then turned to black.

Vegeta did not know how long he sat there staring at the blank screen; his mind processing everything his wife had said. Finally, after hours of deliberating with himself, he sent his answer.

Vegeta was never much for words, but his would have to do.

***

It was wretched; disgusting – like a one time shell of itself. This planet, the lush forests filled with unforgivable dangers, the violent mountains, and extensive oceans, were hardly there. In their place, there was a barren wasteland. The trees of the forests had lost all of their life. They sprout crookedly from the ground like skeletons hanging from the gallows. The oceans were not the purples and greens of his memory – they were ashen and grey, in some spots even black. The mountains were the only thing that retained their glory; only now instead of overbearing violence filled with divine beauty, these mountains shot up to touch the skies like the hands of the damned reaching up to a forever lost heaven.

Perhaps it was too optimistic of Vegeta to expect that Frieza would not mine this planet of its resources. It was a stupid fantasy to expect the planet would be untouched by time and by the Cold family rule. There was nothing left; nothing but desolation. It had been stripped of its beauty; been completely leached of its resources. At the very least, it still had its strong gravitational pull.

The blue-eyed brat had eyed the landscape with a hint of amused distain. He heard her quiet steps as she approached. "We are going to train here?"

Vegeta did not answer, but he really did not have to. She seemed to know, she seemed to understand that this would be her training ground. This place that so greatly resembled one of the layers of hell, would be the place she learned to fight.

***

She would have to improve the communications system. Bulma let out a low moan of frustration. No matter what she designed, no matter the brilliance of anything she created, whenever she finished she would immediately think of a way to improve it. Always another design. Currently, it was the message system that connected her to Vegeta.

It was too hopeful on her part to expect Vegeta to send her a video message. She scolded herself; she wanted to see his face more than she dared to admit. She knew him far better than that, but she was still disappointed when all that came through was a single written line.

The disappointment then gave way to frustrated confusion as she read his message.

'Suppose the student never learned to fly.'

She read it over once more. That bastard. Did he think what she had told him was a damn joke? She did not want a damn riddle; she had enough of those already. Her entire life was filled with riddles, one math problem to be solved, another engineering impossibility to perform, another law of physics to apply. Bulma never had the patience to stand a mystery. Her entire life had been dedicated to breaking them and turning the unknown and impossible into the known and very possible. She did not need his cryptic words, especially now.

Frustration was not new to her, but loneliness was. That paired along with Vegeta's obvious efforts to remain aloof was almost too much for her to emotionally handle.

Perhaps it was selfish of her to feel like the world was falling down around her. When Gohan came and asked for her help, she nearly screamed at him. She could barely handle her reality. It was not exactly as if the world was crumbling. Capsule Corporation had never been more successful. Her son, Vegeta's son, was growing at an astounding rate. She had been busy; exceedingly so. She liked being that way. She like not being able to move after a day of work; she like being mentally defeated every night before she went to sleep. This constant motion made it impossible for her to think of Vegeta. The more difficult and demanding her day would become the easier it was to deal with the fact that her husband was missing. It was so easy to pretend that she did not feel. Yet, sometimes the pain would come creeping back in. The loneliness would be overwhelming and it was nearly enough to destroy her where she stood.

The death of the Ox King was exceedingly painful. She was never close to the man. But Gohan, the boy she loved as a son, was. His heartbreak only reminded her of her own. It was almost impossible not to scream at him for bringing this upon her. When she found out that Gohan was next in line to be king of the largest kingdom on earth she felt suddenly very foolish for thinking that her life was more emotionally difficult than his.

She asked Vegeta for help and this was all he gave her. A cryptic, annoying message. The unimaginable prick. One message that hardly made any sense.

In her rage she curled her fist and punch the communications system's keyboard. She pounded it violently. She did it again and again until all that was left were sharp shards of plastic and delicate wires. She barely noticed that her hands were bleeding as she collapsed to the floor crying.

Damn, Vegeta. The selfish bastard. He did not care about anything else other than himself.

Bulma 's small body curled into an even smaller ball. She felt so cold, she felt so alone, she felt… she did not know how to feel. For the moment, it felt like too much.

She barely moved as she felt a hand upon her shoulder. She had no desire to open her eyes and look who had found her like this. It was despicable and embarrassing to be seen so weak. But as the hands closed in over her shoulders, she knew it was Gohan.

She turned her head slowly opening her bloodshot eyes to look into the young boys' face. She felt relief at what she saw there. The intensity of his eyes was tender. It seemed to be speaking without saying words that he knew what she was feeling. It seemed to be telling her that everything would be okay because whatever she felt, he had felt it too.

She turned her body violently and threw her arms about his shoulders; hugging the boy tightly to her thankful for the look in his eyes. She was not alone. For a moment she forgot that she was the adult and he was the child. She felt so small in the moment standing next to him.

When she finally pulled away from Gohan, he stood there slightly embarrassed as Bulma's outburst. Bulma hardly cared. She stepped back and looked straight into Gohan's face.

"I have a message to relay to you."

He looked at her confused as he glanced over to the pieces communications system that Bulma had destroyed. With a twinge of regret, her hands began to string from the cuts.

She quickly reached over the piece of paper with Vegeta's message upon it. Some of her blood had splattered onto the white page.

Gohan looked at her curiously as she handed him the paper.

Before Gohan could look down to read it, Bulma spoke. "Whatever is on that page, whatever that message means to you, is my answer to your question. If you accept to be king or not."

Gohan stiffened as his eyes hardened. He looked down and read the words on the page carefully.

He then looked back into Bulma's eyes. His mouth twisted painfully before he muttered. "Thank you."

***

"Brat, you are doing it wrong again."

She was a fast learner. Faster than Vegeta had originally anticipated.

She did not hide her glare from him. He smirked at her.

"Once more. But this time do it right."

She nearly collapsed. For the past five hours they had been working on muscle memory. Over and over again, she would repeat the moves and stances Vegeta had demonstration. Over and over again until she got it right. When she had it perfect, they would do it once more. Vegeta intended to make the moves and defenses second nature to her and right now by the murderous glint in her eyes, he knew she hated him for it.

She was shaking. It was not exactly that the techniques he was teaching her were very hard, but at the pace he was teaching her was nearly overwhelming. The repetition was wearing her down. Vegeta hardly cared; after this she would have to spar him. It would be a shame to let all those new moves go to waste.

Ki manipulation still seemed impossible for her. Or rather, any ki manipulation that Vegeta could sense. He had attempted to teach her to fly fully expecting failure. She learned it within the first hour. Yet, he still could not sense her ki. There was no fluctuation as she at first floated and then zoomed across the skies. It remained at a constant. Never had he encountered anything like this before. It was almost as if her energy hailed from somewhere completely different than other organisms.

He barely had to teach her how to manipulate her ki to form ki blasts. She nearly figured that one out on her own. She learned the most effective punches came when she centered her energy. When her blows began to sting, Vegeta knew she had figured it out. He just showed her how to do the rest, how to push the energy outside of her body.

"Brat, you are getting lazy!"

Vegeta grabbed her wrist roughly and forced the movement out of her tired arm showing her how to do it right.

She snapped her eyes up at him as he let go of her arm roughly.

He glared at her. "Again."

She turned her head defiantly upwards. Vegeta growled at the sight. She was preparing herself to be difficult. So be it. He would show her just how difficult he could be.

"Are you deaf?"

Her lips curled as she stood stiffly.

"Brat, are you just going to stand there?"

She took in a quick breath before she spat. "I have a name."

Vegeta raised a single eyebrow. "I have no patience. Continue before I blast you off of this planet."

She sneered. "I want you to use my name."

Vegeta was still unfamiliar with her insolence. There had been very few people who had ever demonstrated such blatant disrespect to him. Frieza being one of the few. This blue-eyed brat had a self-assurance he had seen in very few people. Most of which men. Men who had ruled empires and men who destroyed them. Men Vegeta had been slaves to; men that still conquered his nightmares.

Vegeta smirked down at her. "You have to earn it first."

Her eyes burned as she spit at his feet.

He furrowed his forehead. Sparring could start early and it could run late. It was not as if they were running out of time.

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A/N: The polish on the chapter is a little lacking, but the general idea I believe has been delivered. You know the standard pleading of review.