Becoming a Family
Chapter Nine: Losing It
Disclaimer: Characters and premise belong to Akira Toriyama, I'm just borrowing them for some non-profit entertainment.
Author's Note: I'm a manga fan first so I use the term Cultivars for the creatures the anime called Saibamen.
Trunks watched closely as Gohan rolled his ball back and forth. The ball was fun to jump on but Trunks had bigger prey in mind. The little boy crouched on all fours and sprang just as the ball left Gohan's hand. He overshot the ball. There was a moment when Trunks thought Gohan was going to snatch him out of the air the way his daddy snatched toys out of the air when he threw them but it passed and he landed squarely on Gohan. The older boy obligingly toppled over backwards and Trunks found himself perched triumphantly on Gohan's chest.
"Ahhh! You caught me!" Gohan exclaimed playfully. "Now what are you going to do with me?"
Trunks thought about that for a moment then growled and tried to bite the older boy the way he had been biting his ball and pretty much anything else that would fit in his mouth and didn't smell utterly revolting.
Gohan restrained him. "No biting," he said firmly.
Trunks scowled. He was given the freedom to choose what to do with his prey but the first time that freedom was exercised he got slapped down.
Gohan sat up, smoothly shifting Trunks from his chest to riding him piggy-back style.
"Ride!" Trunks cheered and forgot his sulk. "Ride G'han!"
"Do you have a good grip Trunks-chan?" Gohan asked.
Trunks knotted his fists in Gohan's hair. The older boy winced. "Yep, you've got a good grip. I'm going to have to cut my hair short before my little brother or sister shows up or I'll end up plucked bald," he said as he removed Trunks' hands from his hair and shifted the little boy's grasp to his shoulders.
"Gohan, the dishes aren't going to wash themselves," Chichi called from the kitchen.
"But Mom!" Gohan protested.
"No buts, young man," Chichi said. "Just because we aren't at home doesn't mean you're excused from doing chores."
"But Bulma has robots-"
"I don't care - Oh!" Chichi broke off as she doubled over in pain.
"Mom!" Gohan exclaimed his eyes filling with worry.
"I'm okay," Chichi assured her son. "These things happen sometimes. It'll pass."
Gohan picked Chichi up and put her down on one of the kitchen chairs. "You just rest and watch me do the dishes okay Mom?"
"Alright dear."
Trunks climbed up on Gohan's head to get a better view of the proceedings. After a few minutes the little demi-Saiyan was making grabs for the dishes and suds as Gohan worked. Eventually Trunks got too enthusiastic and ended up falling head first toward the dish-water. Gohan caught the toddler by the ankle.
"Trunks, you've got to be careful," Gohan scolded. Trunks, still hanging upside-down, reached out and grabbed Gohan's nose.
"Here, let me take the little miscreant," Bulma said as she walked into the kitchen. Gohan happily dumped the baby in her arms. "And why are you washing dishes anyway Gohan-kun? I have robots for that."
"Chores are good for-" Chichi began then winced.
"Chichi?" Bulma asked.
"It's probably just false labor," Chichi said.
"You're sure? You are about due."
"Well of course it could be the real thing, but there's no point in getting worked up until I'm certain now is there?" Chichi demanded.
The dish in Gohan's hand shattered. "You're having the-"
"Gohan, I just said I'm not sure and there's no reason to get worked up yet," Chichi reprimanded him.
"Gohan, why don't you go find my parents. Let them know the baby might be coming. That way we'll have plenty of drivers on standby if this turns out to be the real deal," Bulma offered.
"Right!" Gohan exclaimed and rushed off, grateful to be given something useful to do.
"Chichi do you have your bag packed?" Bulma asked.
"This might not be-"
"Yeah but do you really want to wait until after your water breaks to worry about these things?" Bulma replied. "I swear I won't let Gohan cart you off to the hospital until that happens but you ought to be ready just in case."
"My bag is sitting behind the door in your guest room," Chichi sighed. "I threw the last few things in about fifteen minutes ago when the contractions started getting closer together."
"Good. Then the only thing to do is wait," Bulma said.
"You can wait," Chichi replied as she pushed herself to her feet. "I'm sure I'm forgetting something I need to do first. I've only worked out Gohan's study plan for the next two weeks and there are probably another dozen things I need to finish before the baby comes."
"Chichi!" Bulma protested as the younger woman started to leave the kitchen.
Vegeta was just walking in when Chichi determinedly marched out. She plowed right into the Saiyan Prince then bounced back like she'd hit a wall. Vegeta caught her arm and steadied her on her feet. "Watch where you're going Harpy." he growled.
Chichi glared at him.
"And what's your brat so excited about?"
Bulma grinned "Gohan's just-"
"Not that brat," Vegeta interrupted with a glance toward Chichi's stomach. "That one's ki has been spiking all morning."
Bulma's eyes widened. "So it's just false labor huh Chi?"
"What would he know about it?" Chichi snapped.
"Nothing," Vegeta said. "And I like it that way."
Vegeta switched the conversation over to his original reason for coming to the kitchen. "Woman, give me our brat. I know how to put a stop to his nonsense about the GR," he said.
"What's this brilliant plan of yours?" Bulma asked warily.
"He can watch me train," Vegeta said.
"The GR isn't fixed yet," Bulma pointed out.
"I couldn't take the brat in there if it were," Vegeta snorted. "He doesn't know the difference and that's the point."
Even given that the GR wasn't working it was still the best place for him right now Vegeta decided. It was sound proof and the door locked, the perfect place for him to stay while the rest of the Capsule Corps' inhabitants went insane over the impeding birth of Kakarrot's second brat.
Trunks had carried on like a little banshee for the first twenty minutes then realized that he was in boringly empty room. Then he promptly quit wailing and set about making a nuisance of himself. Trunks decided that his father's feet made excellent prey, especially since there wasn't anything else for him to chase.
Training with his brat constantly getting underfoot wasn't the most efficient use of Vegeta's time but to his relief Vegeta found that the boy wasn't triggering flashbacks anymore. Trunks wasn't quite as helpless as he'd been and Vegeta found he had a few memories of himself at this stage of development, a few hazy scraps of recollection from a time before he'd been aware of Frieza, when irritating Nappa had been his biggest worry and his biggest temptation. There was something oddly relaxing about having to alter the pattern of his kata after every fifth movement to avoid stepping on the toddler and Trunks found his illusive quarry endlessly entertaining. Two hours passed peacefully for the pair.
Vegeta frowned when the inter-com's cackle invaded his sanctuary. "Vegeta, Bulma needs to talk to you," Bunny chimed. "I'll just patch her through shall I?"
Vegeta grunted something that wasn't outright refusal, Bunny chose to take it as an assent and a moment later Bulma's voice was piped over the intercom. "Vegeta, I really need your help. Gohan's working himself up into a real state. He going Super Saiyan every time his mom screams. I tried explaining that giving birth isn't exactly a picnic and nothing's wrong but he's not listening very well at the moment. He won't leave and him being here is only getting both him and the medical staff more nervous. You're the only one who has any chance at all of making him do anything."
Vegeta considered the situation. If the brat snapped Bulma would undoubtedly be at ground zero. "Fine woman," he said. Maybe if he got lucky he'd get a decent spar out of situation. 'Or end up in a bloody pulp,' a little voice reminded Vegeta, he'd seen what Gohan could do when pushed too far.
A few minutes later Vegeta walked through the hospital doors. He had suppressed his ki because Gohan felt like a pulsating wound from a mile away and Vegeta didn't know how the boy would react to sensing another warrior's approach. He found Gohan and Bulma in the waiting room. The situation had degraded since Bulma's call and Gohan was constantly flickering between Super Saiyan and his normal state. The boy was fighting to control his power and he was losing. The air in the room was electrified and flowed under the influence of the invisible currents of power swirling around Gohan.
"Brat, you're making the humans jumpy," Vegeta stated in a low, calm voice. "Leave."
"I won't leave her!" Gohan exclaimed as he gave into the urge to ascend.
Vegeta matched him. "I am your prince and you will do as I say," he ordered without raising his voice.
"Try and make me," Gohan hissed as his power soared even higher.
"It's no concern of mine if we take out this entire block," Vegeta said. "Go ahead and resist." Vegeta smiled darkly in triumph as he tossed Gohan over his shoulder without opposition.
"Thank you," Bulma mouthed silently.
"You owe me," Vegeta returned. He strolled out of the hospital acting as if he couldn't care less about the deadly aura gathering around Gohan. The boy fought to hang on to his over-taxed emotions until they were well clear of the hospital.
Vegeta flew just over three miles from the city before Gohan lost it. Forewarned by the changes in Gohan's ki, Vegeta tossed the boy away from him a moment before Gohan ascended to Super Saiyan Two.
Gohan caught himself in mid-air. For several seconds he just hung there while blue energy-discharges coursed over his body. Vegeta watched him with a mixture of jealousy and fear; he had yet to fully surpass Super Saiyan.
"You had no right!" Gohan cried and attacked.
Vegeta fell back under the onslaught but kept Gohan from landing a solid blow. The Saiyan Prince allowed himself a predatory smile. The power was the same as he remembered from the Cell Games but Gohan didn't hate him. The attack was undisciplined; not that of a warrior seeking a kill but a child lashing out in confusion.
For Gohan the lack of hate was a handicap in his fighting. He was scared and angry and railing against fate. Vegeta was providing him with something to loose his frustrations on but Gohan hated losing control. Gohan was a berserker, he needed to be driven beyond the moral beliefs he'd been raised to embrace before he could fight full out. Gohan was intrinsically a gentle person, he didn't want to hurt anyone. He held back when he sparred, winning meant less to him than not doing harm. Unlike his father, Gohan had never been able to trust himself to know when to stop if he let himself cut loose. He was fighting himself as much as he was fighting Vegeta.
For Vegeta the lack of emotion only made him more effective. His mind was cold and clear, completely focused on the task at hand. Gohan's faltering control was a problem that could be solved in the comfortable realm of battle, not the unfamiliar territory of a mind that had turned on him. Vegeta was a warrior, even before Frieza had taken him he'd been killing Cultivars as practice for real battle. Vegeta was a strategist, he fought with his mind, analyzing and using his opponents' weaknesses against them, adapting their techniques for his own use. Vegeta had always fought best when his mind was calm, it was only when the hot rage of injured pride or other emotion got in the way that he made mistakes.
Vegeta knew Gohan's handicap going into the fight. He knew he wasn't the real target. He knew if he fought defensively until Gohan was past the first rage the boy would defeat himself.
With the two most powerful beings on the planet going at it blazing with ki that rivaled the power of the sun it didn't take long for the rest of the Z-fighters to gather. They floated in the air in a rough circle around the warring pair.
"Vegeta, what did you do?" Piccolo demanded.
Vegeta dodged a punch then spun around to kick Gohan in the back. "The harpy is whelping," he said. "If you want to play with him be my guest." The vicious grin Vegeta sent in Piccolo's direction said he didn't think Piccolo had a chance of withstanding Gohan's onslaught.
Gohan kicked, Vegeta blocked and flew backwards to end up embedded in a mountain.
"You seem to be enjoying yourself," Piccolo commented.
Vegeta ripped himself out of the mountain a second before Gohan plowed through it. "Glad you noticed," he said. Vegeta's tone was sarcastic but the truth was the fight focused him on the here and now. It was a relief for him to know that if trouble came he could still trust himself in battle.
"What do we do?" Kuririn wondered.
"Watch," Piccolo offered. "Help Vegeta if it looks like Gohan might kill him."
"Why bother?" Yamcha asked.
"Gohan doesn't need the guilt," Piccolo replied sternly.
"I was just kidding," Yamcha protested.
However it quickly became apparent that Vegeta didn't require any help. He kept control of the fight until Gohan had spent enough of his frustration and fear to take control of himself.
Vegeta fell back to let the others deal with it once the fun was over.
Gohan floated in mid-air his head down, his fists clenched and his breath coming in harsh pants.
Piccolo put a hand on his erstwhile pupil's back. "Are you ready to talk about it?" he asked. "It is obvious that you are not 'fine'."
"Mom's having a baby and the baby isn't going to have a dad. Dad's gone and he's not coming back and it's my fault! It's all my fault!" Gohan cried.
"No it isn't, Gohan," Piccolo insisted.
Kuririn nodded. "I could have stopped Cell from becoming perfect but I didn't because I couldn't destroy 18."
"Vegeta could have stopped him before he became perfect, but he was too arrogant," Yamcha added helpfully. "We all could have done things differently
"Everyone tells me it wasn't my fault, even Vegeta said it was Dad's choice," Gohan admitted. "But you're all wrong. It was my fault. I didn't destroy Cell when Dad told me to. Dad wouldn't have had to chose if I'd just done what he said. But I was stupid and cruel and I wanted to hurt Cell not just destroy him. And my dad died because of me."
"Gohan!"
"It's not your fault!"
"Your Dad would never have wanted you to feel like this!"
"Does it make you feel like you're in control?" Vegeta's low voice cut through the other Z-fighter's protests like a blade and his question left silence in it's wake.
Shocked, Gohan stared at Vegeta.
"Well?" Vegeta asked sharply. "Does blaming yourself make you feel like you could have changed the outcome?"
"Not that it does any good," Vegeta continued after giving what he'd said a moment to hit home. "You'll never change what happened. Remember what Trunks told us, even with a time machine his past was immutable. The only things you'll find in dwelling on what might have been are bitterness and ashes."
"What do you know about it?" Gohan demanded.
Vegeta's lips twisted in a parody of a smile. "Your world still exists."
For a long time after Vega had left the Z-fighter stared after him in stunned silence.
Finally Gohan said. "I thought I was okay, but then, with Mom and the baby and I have to take care of them but I couldn't stop Dad from dying and she was screaming and I just, it was just too much, I didn't know what to do or anything. Everyone is counting on me and I don't know what to do."
"Gohan, you are not responsible for everything. You are not expected to solve all the world's problems," Piccolo said firmly. "Your mother will tell you how best to help with your family. From what I know of Chichi she has extremely definite ideas about running her family."
Gohan nodded. Now that he thought about it his mom could be pretty bossy. He felt a little bit of the weight of the world that had fallen on his shoulders when he realized he was the only one who could beat Cell slipping away.
"And come talk to me when you feel overwhelmed." Piccolo continued. "You are not responsible for me. I'm still your sensei."
Gohan smiled weakly. "Thanks Piccolo-san."
"You may have saved the earth, but you can let the rest of us help out a little," Yamcha said. "You don't want us to all feel useless now do you?"
Kuririn smiled and ruffled Gohan's hair. "Yep, you might be the strongest but older and wiser has to count for something, right? You can always come to any of us." He glanced in the direction in which Vegeta had flown off. "Even him... I never would have imagined that. I never realized it but I guess he takes that Prince of all Saiyans stuff pretty seriously."
Vegeta flew back toward Capsule Corp. He wanted to be home before he gave in to the memories he'd stirred up.
He landed unsteadily on Bulma's balcony then staggered inside and sank on to the bed. With Bulma's scent surrounding him, giving him a life-line to the present he stopped fighting. He trusted Bulma's father and the man said that if he wanted the flashbacks to stop he had to deal with the memories not just push them away. He let go and the past wash over him like a tsunami.
Vegeta's joints and muscles were suffused with an intense ache that pushed him to the brink of insanity. He paced around his quarters on Frieza's ship like a caged beast.
There were three times in a Saiyan's life when they were supposed to be vulnerable: as infants, during the short, furious growth spurt that changed their bodies from child to adult and when they found the battle that would end their lives. The first was a dim memory for Vegeta, part of his distant past before Frieza. The last promised to be a momentary state that would quickly give way to oblivion. The third time was now and while six months sounded short in theory, in practice it was an eternity of pain that was both physical and mental.
Vegeta's instincts demanded that he seek a safe haven where none existed. Several years earlier he'd watched as Radditz screamed for his parents and his squad mates, all dead in the ashes of Vegeta-sai. Vegeta didn't want people, he wanted solitude, he wanted lightyears of vacuum surrounding his pod in all directions.
Frieza wouldn't let him off the base. The damned lizard made a point of visiting Vegeta regularly, 'To check on my favorite little monkey prince.' The bastard knew his presence drove Vegeta into shaking fits and sadistically enjoyed every moment of suffering that he caused.
Nappa, filthy traitor that he was, wouldn't help Vegeta escape. Rationally Vegeta knew Nappa was right about a pod not being safe; he'd already had two incidents where he'd lost control of his ki. If he'd been in a pod he would have destroyed it and condemned himself to a slow death by suffocation in deep space but logic was playing a very small role in Vegeta's current thought processes.
Nappa himself was another source of confusion and distress for the teenaged prince. Vegeta's bodyguard since infancy should have been a reassuring presence. But for most of Vegeta's life Nappa had been an inadequate protector at best. Still the older Saiyan had picked Vegeta up and seen him put back together more times than Vegeta could count. But the spells of black rage that Nappa had begun to fall into after Vegeta-sai's destruction ended any sense of security that Vegeta might have derived from his bodyguard's presence.
Vegeta flexed and stretched his fingers, the joints popped like firecrackers and he would have sworn that he could almost see his hands getting bigger. "Father should have waited," he said feverishly. "Just five more years, he should have waited. I could have saved them. I'll be grown soon then I'll defeat Frieza like he told me to. I'll keep my promise. I will."
It was only the fifty-sixth time that day that Nappa and Radditz had sat through one of Vegeta's rants on how he'd soon be able to defeat Frieza, about how he could have saved their people if only...
Nappa grabbed the gangly teenager and slammed him against the wall. Vegeta screamed in outrage.
"Just shut up!" Nappa exclaimed. "Don't you get it you little idiot! You're never going to beat Frieza! King Vegeta lied to you! He sent you here to die and me to die with you!"
"He said I'd become a Super Saiyan here! That I'd save everyone from Frieza!" Vegeta shouted back.
"He lied," Nappa repeated. The older Saiyan's voice dropped to a venomous hiss. "They're right when they call you 'prince of nothing.' Your father had another heir chosen even before Frieza took you. You were completely expendable to him. All he expected from you was for you to keep Frieza distracted from the real Crown Prince Vegeta."
"NO!" Vegeta shouted. He knocked Nappa across the room with a burst of strength and stormed out of his quarters determined to get away. From Nappa, from Frieza and from a truth he couldn't face.
Vegeta used his tether to the present, surroundings that reeked of the woman's scent, to pull himself out of the memory. To look at it rationally. To use the perspective time and distance had given him.
Nappa had been torn between his role as Vegeta's protector and his desire to punish his young charge because Nappa never truly adjusted to having survived his race. Nappa spent years mixing protection with cruelty until Vegeta had grown past the need for a protector, until Vegeta became someone for Nappa to fear.
Vegeta had blamed himself for the destruction of his planetbut when Nappa told him it hadn't been his fault he only felt worse. Vegeta's father had given him a mission when he sent his young son into the monster's lair. Vegeta had failed in that mission and his people died. Nappa stripped away his responsibility for Vegeta-sai's destruction and left him with the unpalatable truth that he'd been nothing more than Frieza's hostage. Vegeta told himself he could have saved everyone if he'd only been stronger, better, if he'd only done things differently. Nappa told him he'd had no control at all.
"You were a toy the king allowed Frieza to play with to keep him distracted."
The guilt was preferable to the thought of having been helpless. And so he'd clung to it even when it was an anchor pulling him under.
Bulma's slender arms wrapped around him, he felt her weight come to rest against his back. When she spoke her lips brushed against the side of his neck. "Thank you for taking care of Gohan today. I'm sorry. It triggered another flashback didn't it?"
Vegeta shrugged noncommitally.
"I wish you'd talk to me." Bulma sighed. "I want to help."
Another memory came. To Vegeta's surprise it came like a bubble rising to the surface rather than as a tidal wave smashing over him.
Radditz dropped to the catwalk with feline grace. Vegeta scowled at the older boy, until he had finished his primary growth phase and had a chance to adjust to the changes in his body his own movements were going to remain painfully clumsy and he resented that Radditz had already gotten over this misery.
Vegeta's scowl deepened when Radditz dared to ruffle his hair before sitting beside Vegeta. 'Third class morons really had no place outside of a barracks,' Vegeta thought irritably. It had take Radditz three months to get over being in awe of his prince. After that he'd adopted the roughly affectionate 'older brother' mannerisms his squad had employed with him. Vegeta sneered and protested but had yet to do anything truly effective to put the older boy in his place.
For several minutes the two boys sat in silence on the catwalk, their legs dangling into the void as they watched the people on the deck of the hanger-bay scurry around like rats.
"My mom's unit specialized in protecting the supply lines for the big campaigns," Radditz said once the silence became uncomfortable. "Some of the Elites treated her like crap because she wasn't frontline but without her they wouldn't have eaten and you know how well Saiyans fight on empty stomachs. She did her part."
"Your point?" Vegeta snapped.
"So did you," Radditz said. "The way I see it you bought us six years to get ready for Frieza and that ain't too shabby."
"I actually listened to that third class idiot," Vegeta muttered.
"Goku?" Bulma asked.
"No. The other one, Radditz." Vegeta snorted. "Can't believe I was repeating that moron's advice to his nephew."
"Radditz!" Bulma cringed.
"You only met the walking dead man," Vegeta said.
For a time Vegeta was silent. Bulma waited patiently.
"Nappa was the only one of us who broke outright when the planet was destroyed," Vegeta said. "Vegeta-sai meant different things for us. Nappa's bloodline had guarded and advised the Saiyan King for fifteen generations, for as long as my bloodline had ruled. I was supposed to have been his king. He should have been reassigned when I was given to Frieza but my father was soft. Nappa would have gladly died for the Saiyan race but when our race died he had nothing to live for."
"For Radditz Vegeta-sai was the people he had ties to, his parents and his squad. A typical third class really. After they died he tried to forge new connections. It wasn't until Frieza made it clear that we would never be allowed to find new families that Radditz broke."
Vegeta glanced at Bulma. "I sent Radditz here to recruit Kakarrot. I had no idea he was going to try using Frieza's recruitment methods."
Bulma blinked in confusion. 'Was Vegeta apologizing for Radditz's attack?'
"Frieza was getting tired of playing with me, the mission he'd given the three of us was suicide but I still couldn't face him. I had to buy more time," Vegeta continued. "We could have explained Kakarrot. Radditz used to talk about his family all the time, Nappa and I couldn't shut the idiot up. It wouldn't have given the others away if Radditz had just happened to know the coordinates of the planet his brother had been sent to."
Bulma's mouth dropped open. "The others?" she asked.
"There were a few dozen Saiyans not accounted for in Frieza's slaughter. Before he destroyed the planet he recalled all the off-world teams to his bases and had them killed but there was no possible way to recall the children sent on Infant Missions. I don't know if Frieza planned to kill them as they returned or send assassins after them at his leisure, but we stopped it. Nappa and I destroyed the records after we'd memorized the coordinates. We had outside help..."
For a moment Vegeta's eyes widened in a look of complete astonishment. "No, that isn't possible," he muttered and dismissed what ever thought had crossed his mind.
"We had an outside ally," he continued before Bulma could ask. "We sent him after the children. He removed their programing and left them to blend into the worlds they'd been sent to destroy so that they would remain hidden and safe from Frieza until we were ready to fight him. Eventually Frieza realized his records were gone but he never guessed that I held the coordinates in my mind, he bought it when I told him they were lost." Vegeta genuinely smiled without a trace of bitterness. The sight of it took Bulma's breath away, for a moment she was seeing the person he might have been without the decades under Frieza ingraining rage into his very soul. Pride and joy in this one victory over Frieza, in having saved even a few of his people from the tyrant shown in his face.
Then it was gone. "It was pointless. Only males were sent on Infant Missions, the Saiyan race died with Vegeta-sai. Beyond that the return rate had always been low for the missions, the ones we saved from Frieza more than likely died at the hands of the people they were sent to conquer. I was grasping at straws when I sent Radditz here and he fucked it up."
Vegeta turned away from Bulma. "If there'd have been anything left of Radditz at all Kakarrot would have woken it up. His family meant everything to him, but he threatened the life of his nephew and ended up in a fight to the death with his kid brother. If I needed any proof that he was broken beyond repair his actions here provided it."
"What was Vegeta-sai for you?" Bulma asked softly when it seemed Vegeta wouldn't continue without prompting.
Vegeta stared into the distance but his hand curled around Bulma's. "Vegeta-sai was my goal." he said without inflection. "I was exiled from my world when I was four years old. Only when I became strong enough to be worthy would I have been allowed to go home. I never made it."