A/N: So this is something a little different; a chapter completely based on Vegeta's perspective. This is definitely my favorite chapter so far and for that reason I really hope you guys enjoy it. If you do, don't forget to Read and Review! I feed off of those. ;)
DISCLAIMER: There are actual FUNimation quotes in here, from ep. 109, Z Warriors Prepare. Those I don't own. However, I DO own the cool DBZ characters I made on the Sims 2. Hell yeah I do. I just need a TURTLE.
Vegeta stood idly next to his father, the two of them watching shuttles fly past the loading dock balcony. Outside it was so blue the child felt as though he could swim deep into the sky. He closed his eyes and scuffed a white boot against the tiled flooring, stoic.
"Those ships are headed to distant galaxies," voiced his father, breaking his daydreaming. "From the day we are born, we Saiyans are examined for our power and leadership. The weakest of our people are sent to planets far away where they face no threat from our enemies."
Vegeta folded his stubby arms across his chest, determined to gain an ounce of the great Saiyan king's respect. "Good-bye, pests!"
His father turned completely to face him, his shiny armor reflecting in the fluorescent lighting and stinging the boy's eyes.
"Vegeta," he said sternly, "you come from a strong bloodline and you possess the potential power to join the Super-Elite of all Saiyans! Never forget where you come from and train very hard my son because, if you have proven yourself worthy, perhaps some day you will become a Super Saiyan!"
An adult Vegeta now stood alone, in torn battle armor, white haze around him. He was finally swimming in the sky.
I haven't forgotten what you said, father. I haven't forgotten my destiny. And now I know that I will be stronger than Kakarot… I am a Super Saiyan!
Vegeta bolted upright in an unfamiliar bed. The oxygen mask that had been covering his mouth and lower jaw fell onto the sheets. He took a moment to look around and realized that he was in one of the in-patient bedrooms at Capsule Corp.
He relaxed his head on the cool, crisp pillow beneath him. But he did not relax for long. He could feel a low power level very close to him. Moving only his head, Vegeta looked to see where it was coming from.
What is she doing here?
His servant woman had fallen asleep at the bedside table next to him. Next to her was a half-empty pail of water, a drying cloth inside. Had she been administering to him all this time?
He decided it did not matter and sat up once more, this time pulling the sheets from him and swinging his legs over the side of the bed. Vegeta instantly regretted it. Each of his limbs felt as though they were ablaze.
Cursing softly so as not to wake the woman, Vegeta slowly and painfully rose from the bed, planting both feet on the ground. He put a hand on his heart to steady himself. His chest felt as though it had caved in.
Vegeta put an unsteady hand on the brass doorknob and gathered breath. By the time he had left the room and plodded down the hall, he could hardly breathe at all. And each time he looked down at himself, seeing the bandages and wrappings covering his body, he wanted nothing more than to collapse, but he could not.
He would not!
Too intelligent to attempt flying in his state, Vegeta opted to continue walking to the Brief's laboratory. On his way he narrowly avoided a run-in with the woman's mother, who no doubt would have given him an earful about moving around at all in his condition.
Damn them all!
Vegeta had perilously made the journey down several flights of step into the laboratory basement of Capsule Corp. Now he stood in front of large steel doors with red and yellow signs across the door marked 'Warning' and 'Specialized Employees Only'. There was an electronic numerical keypad on the wall across from the doors, apparently for entering codes.
Vegeta, looking straight ahead, slammed a fist into the keypad.
"Access Denied," came a cool female voice from overhead.
Angry that he was having to wait at all, Vegeta punched the doors instead. The steel door fell in, and the prince pushed past it wordlessly, only to find himself in front of another pair of doors.
"This is getting ridiculous," he growled aloud, already irritated that he had wasted time he could have spent training.
"Failed Voice Recognition."
His left eye twitched.
"Vegeta?"
He turned at the sound of his name. Behind him, holding a large shard of steel in his outstretched hands was the woman's father, his eyes round beneath his glasses.
"Did you do this?"
Vegeta crossed his arms and narrowed his eyes. "What does it matter? I order you to begin work on my simulator. It needs to be rebuilt immediately!"
To his surprise, the woman's father did not scuttle off to labor. Instead he sat on the ground and began examining the metal in his hands. He adjusted his glasses.
"Oh, that was done ages ago my boy! It's in tip-top shape!"
Vegeta was absolutely flabbergasted and he forgot for a moment that he was pissed off at the world. "B-but how?" he demanded to know. "How could you have finished so quickly?"
Dr. Brief shrugged his shoulders. "Well I am no ordinary man, Vegeta. In fact, it only took around three days for myself and a few others to get the repairs done! It was an all-nighter, believe me- AAAAH!"
Vegeta had lifted him by the scruff of his coat and pinned him to a wall. "What do you mean three days?! How long have I been unconscious? Well? Speak up old man!"
Shaking in the prince's grasp, Dr. Briefs put out both hands to indicate he wanted peace. "You were out for four days, Vegeta! And truth be told you shouldn't really be out of bed at..."
Vegeta tuned out as he held the woman's father against the wall. His actions might have spoken otherwise, but Vegeta was not angry with the old man. He was angry with himself. Angry because he was a weakling, because he had unknowingly taken off four days of his regiment when Kakarot had not.
"V-Vegeta? Not to be rude or anything," the man said to him and Vegeta turned to let him go, "but why didn't you just ask Bulma? Isn't she upstairs?"
Vegeta released him and gruffly replied, "She's not awake."
The old man looked happy to hear this. "Well, that's fantastic news! She hasn't slept more than a few hours since you've been in the ward. I told her I'd take a shift but she flat out refused!"
"I don't require looking after!" Vegeta said, more angry now than before. "I am the Prince of all Saiyans! A Super-Elite!"
He didn't like the tender look in the old man's eyes, and he sure as hell didn't like being mollycoddled like an infant! And why hadn't he woken up the woman? He swore beneath his breath for his involuntary show of consideration for the earthling and her sleeping form.
"Stop looking at me like that old man or you won't live to regret it!"
Vegeta growled and stomped off in the direction through which he had come. He needed to make up for his lost time. Arguing with the scientist would not fix anything.
This time Vegeta did not carefully tread the steps. Alternatively he began taking them two at a time. It burned his legs and his back begged for mercy that he did not bestow. The pain meant nothing to him.
Vegeta entered the backyard of Capsule Corp and began the familiar path towards his beloved Gravity Chamber. And then, there it was in front of him, bright and working properly, 'Capsule 3' lettered with black paint across the front.
"So you have your uses after all, old man," the Saiyan mused, pressing the button that lowered the front door into a flight of steps.
Once inside Vegeta wasted absolutely no time. He activated the room, set the gravity for 100G and instructed the machine to increase in increments of 100 every ten minutes.
As the white light darkened to crimson, the gravity tugged ruthlessly on the broken body of Vegeta. This aggravated him to no end. Only four days ago he had been able to train in 300 times Earth's normal gravity! How foolish he had been to total the GR at such a critical time!
He dropped the floor, one arm squared beneath his chest, the other behind his back. Tirelessly, he began to do push-ups.
One. Two. Three. Four.
He grunted as a dull pain shot through his shoulders.
Thirty-three. Thirty-four. Thirty-five. Thirty-six.
Vegeta paced himself, the muscles in his arms straining so much he was certain he had torn them.
The gravity changed to 200.
Two-hundred forty-six. Two hundred-forty seven.
The gravity changed to 300.
Three-seventy. Three-seventy one.
Beads of sweat dripped off of his chest and his face, rolled down his arms and chin and onto the ground. Even his hair had begun to sweat, so much was the intensity.
His right leg was now in excruciating pain, but it was of no regard to the prince. Vegeta exhaled. Inhaled. Exhaled. Inhaled. Up. Down. Up. Down. His right hand was still behind his back.
"Initiate gravity simulation: 400 times planet's normal gravity. Warning: simulation exceeds human biological tolerance levels."
The pull of gravity increased once more, but Vegeta was not deterred. He continued his push-ups. Up. Down. Up. Down.
With extraordinary effort, he managed to complete a full headstand, using only his left hand to steady him. He began to do a series of push-ups in that position. The pain was almost too much.
To reduce the effects of the elevated gravity, Vegeta rose into the air. He began to rotate, his body pleading to be slammed into the ground, to die, to be given sweet deliverance from this madness.
Abruptly, a screen flickered and a very loud, very pissed off voice filled the room.
"STOP IT, VEGETA!"
It was the woman, and she had not forgotten to bring her attitude. Vegeta had seen anger before, but this time, as her large blue eyes mirrored her fury and rage, her teeth bared, he felt something a bit different.
"YOU ARE IN NO CONDITION TO BE DOING THIS RIGHT NOW!"
When he made a guttural sound in his throat as a response, the blue-haired banshee became infuriated.
"I KNOW YOU DON'T WANT TO BELIEVE IT, BUT YOU ARE MADE OF FLESH AND BLOOD!"
And maybe he had suspected that, because her comment annoyed the hell out of him.
"Stop pestering me, woman! Leave me alone!"
And unlike many times, when his prior statement was utilized to engage the woman in verbal combat, he meant it. Regrettably, in his rage, Vegeta had forgotten to mind the pull of gravity and he crashed to the floor.
"YOU KNOW I'M RIGHT!" The woman's face took over the entire monitor. "SO WHY DON'T YOU JUST KEEP QUIET AND DO AS I SAY?"
When Vegeta found it difficult to form even the simplest of sentences, she charged in once more.
"Nothing to say? Well, that's good." She looked haughty. "Now go back to bed and get some rest."
Such insolence! Vegeta raised his head off of the ground, gravity nearly breaking his neck. "Not yet," he spat out, "I do have something to say…"
Suddenly the woman looked very concerned. Her eyes grew large. "What? Is something wrong?" The look faded into a smirk. "Or maybe you're finally going to apologize to me! If that's the case then let's hear it!"
With one final surge of energy, Vegeta lifted half of his body from the floor.
"LEAVE ME ALONE!"
The surprise on the woman's face was irrefutable. She did not put up a fight, merely turned off the dual communications. Vegeta was not sorry.
He stood up in the GR, panting from his excursions, his blood boiling hot.
"I don't understand you, woman!" he growled, wishing now that he had not even granted her the opportunity to yell at him. He did not care for her pretend friendship. And yet he wanted, no needed to know why she bothered at all.
What the hell did she want from him?
Her faux-concern, as see-through as the space between her blasted ears! Such an enigma!
To have woken up so defenseless, to see her asleep at his bedside.
It could not be real!
She was deceptive, crafty, a paragon for the conniving earthlings he had grown to distrust! He had let his defenses down with her before, had even stooped so low as to let her touch him. What his father would think of him now, a Saiyan prince being taken by a pathetic Earth woman!
"Damn you!" he shouted into the chamber.
He would not let her take him for a fool.
A/N: Will Vegeta ever surpass the great Kakarot? It looks like an uphill battle for our prince, especially since we all know what Goku's power level is... Here it comes:
"IT'S OVER 9,000!" Ah. Sorry. Had to get that out. It's been clawing at my insides for days.