The Wretched - Part II, Chapter 5
NCDavis
He came to with an arm wedged between two plates of stone and one leg under a boulder. The only other thing he knew, besides hurting everywhere, is that more than a half hour must have passed. The fusion had clearly run out. Damn, Broly packed a wallop even with pure force. And he shrugged off two fused Super Saiyans and a—
Trunks. He tried to pry the top slab of stone off with his free arm. My son. The stone wasn't moving. "Trunks!"
"Hey, I heard something over hear!" Kakarrot. And then: "We're coming, Dad." His son. He smiled. Weight above him began to shift slowly, light shone further into the darkness. The stones on his arm and leg finally moved, and Trunks slid him from the rubble "Easy." He shoved a senzu bean in his mouth. "You okay?"
He gazed up at the familiar lavender hair and blue eyes. He could barely believe what he'd seen, but there had been little time to marvel on it at the time. A twinge of envy, perhaps, but mostly pride. "I had a feeling you were on the verge of a new level. You did well."
"Yeah," he sat back on his haunches, "fat lot good it did us."
Kakarrot remained standing. "No, your father's right. You're a Super Saiyan 3. Be proud of that. If it hadn't been for you, we wouldn't have had time to fuse. At least we stood toe-to-toe with him, and he's even stronger than before."
"Until that big surge." Trunks scowled. "It was like something majorly pissed him off, and I don't think it was us."
Vegeta nodded in agreement, changing the subject. "What happened to the initial plan?"
The anger rolled off his son. "You remember that headband Broly wore when we first faced him? The one his father used to control him? Well, it looks like he had it remade, and he put it on Bulla. When we tried to leave, it sent pain into her body. The farther we went, the worse the pain got. I had to bring her back. It was killing her."
He was as angry with himself as he was at Broly. "You did the right thing. I take it he still has her."
"He's back at the Yalarian ship," Kakarrot replied.
He'd seen the band on his head, was surprised by it actually. No way Broly had willing worn the one his father controlled. To reuse the same device... "We find out why he wants to keep Bulla so badly, we may find a way to beat him."
"That sounds great, Vegeta, but Broly never struck me as a complicated guy. We'll still have to defeat him. Motivations may have to wait."
"I'm open to other ideas. We didn't put a scratch on him."
Trunks had been quiet. Vegeta wondered if he'd still been licking his wounds, but the boy had that look on his face both his children had inherited from their mother, one he got when he was figuring out a kink in a design plan. Steady, unblinking, unwavering.
"Fusion."
That's all. That pronouncement like all the world's answers lay in it. Vegeta waited.
"The Metamorese method. Two beings of relatively equal power fuse. 'Relative' being the operative word. The beings can actually be of disparate power levels, but if they can modulate that power into a balance, the condition for balance is met." Kakarrot nodded. Trunks continued. "So if conditions don't have to be there from the beginning for one aspect, maybe it works that way for the other."
His mate also got that same glimmer in her eye when she thought she had a working theory. "Out with it, Son."
"Look, the blast caught us off guard, but we were in a stalemate. I say we tip the scale." He stood up, motioning for him to the do the same. "Shall we dance?"
- - - - - - - - - -
The twin moons rode the night sky. Bulla had watched them in their course, willing them to give her answers. Dreams, she'd called them. And he'd stared at them so intently afterwards.
What man dreamed of death?
A man consumed by an unyielding anger, a fury with no cause other than a slip of genetics. A fury with no end. Grand mal rages, as she'd come to think of them, reminding her of the medical condition on which she'd based the name. Seized hostage by your own body and mind. Involuntarily and with uber-violence. In Broly's case, though, there was no treatment, and there sure as hell wasn't a cure.
Wretched. The similarity had not been lost on her; their paths eerily ghosted each other. Just like those moons.
She'd barely seen him in the past day or so. Food was left outside her door. Not so much because of any prisoner status, she thought, but because he was avoiding her. He could've killed her in the last rage. Heh, not like he hadn't tried before, but when she'd really thought about it, the last times she'd been in situations with a chance to defend herself. This time, she'd've been splat, and that had freaked him out to the point that he'd gone back on his word. The circlet remained. And the telepathic connection. She could always sense his power levels, but there was the deeper sense now, his presence ever-prowling, rubbing against the door of the metaphysical room she'd created for her private thoughts. She wouldn't let him in. The idea was too ... intimate. But it wasn't the impenetrable barrier she'd erected before, so though his presence constantly asked to enter, he seemed content to agree to the boundaries she'd set.
The other reason for the room was to keep him in the dark about other activities on the planet. He could sense her psychic power, she knew -- apparently the other unique link between them -- but he didn't seem to be able to read energy levels like they could. According to them, that was a learned skill, and Broly wasn't one who ever thought to gage an opponent's strength. He was the Big Bad Bully of the Block. She didn't want him gaining that ability now. Like he needed any help. The men were okay. Weird spikes in power crossed her radar every so often, weird like that "fusion" weird. Gogeta he'd called himself, though that wasn't a constant presence. Man, Gogeta had a lot of splanin' to do on the way back home. But one thing needed no explanation. They were planning their next strike. Which meant she needed to ditch the hardware. Supposedly it'd come off on its own if Broly died, but she didn't want to wait around for possibilities.
A sound outside the door caught her attention. "Broly," she called out, "stop hiding from me." Silence, but the door slid open and he entered, waiting for her to continue. No sense tiptoeing around. "You forgot something." She pointed at her forehead.
He didn't like the reminder. "The circlet needs to remain--"
"' I assure you I will be pleased to remove it once this is over'," she mocked. "That's what you said to me, Broly. You lied to me."
"No, I--"
"You LIED!" He didn't bat an eye, but the prowling that was he inside her mind slunk a bit from the door.
"Why does that shock you, Highness." It'd been a long time since he'd put any sneer into it. "You're a tool for my own ends. Nothing more. I will not give you up until I'm done with you."
He was bluffing. Not about needing her for a purpose, but about acting like he didn't concern himself with her beyond that. She wasn't nuts. "Affection" would be way off base. But she'd come to mean something ... precious to him, even if it was for such a morbid goal. But if he wanted to play this game... "I don't give a damn what I mean or don't mean to you, but cut the bull. You hate these things as much as I do.
"I know what you want, Broly." She barely whispered. "What you really want from me. There's no way it'll happen with my powers bound this way."
He grew still. Not just quiet. Still. His body, his presence. "Are you finally prepared for such as task?"
As if. But he didn't need to know that right now. And maybe it was a good time to test out something else. "My family is dead. Uncle Goku. My brother. My father. Motivation won't be a problem."
Seemed like forever waiting for his response. "Their ship is fast, and now likely the better stocked one. We will find it and then we will proceed."
Yes! He couldn't read squat. "I can't do anything to you like this. I assure you. I'm not going anywhere."
"Swear it. You will not leave my side until this is done."
His need to be reassured almost gave off its own scent. "I swear." That, at least, was no bluff.
She heard the click of the mechanism coming undone. The circlet slipped off, falling to the floor. Neither one was in a hurry to pick it up. He left her with her meal, and she wasted no time digging in and reporting in.
"Get him to fly back over the battle site," her dad replied. "We'll be ready."
Glad someone is. She hadn't told him about the death wish. She wasn't sure why. If their new plan worked, then it'd be mute she guessed.
She spent the rest of the night lost in her thoughts. But, she'd discovered, not completely alone. Even with the circlet gone, he was still inside her head.
All characters herein are the property of Akira Toriyama and used without permission. This work of fanfiction is for entertainment purposes only.
