Chapter 10. The Science Project

Vegeta snapped out of his meditation by urgent ramming on the gravity-tank's entrance. He leapt to his feet irritated and opened the door, finding an alarmed looking Turles behind it.

"What?" Vegeta spat.

In his haste the third-class forgot all about the usual respectful gestures. "My Prince. It's the Captain. Something is wrong."

Vegeta stepped out to join Turles on the front lawn. "What happened?"

"She collapsed. Just like that. We don't know what is the matter with her." Turles answered with frantic movements of his arms. "She won't wake up."

"Take me to her." Vegeta forced himself to keep his composure as he followed the frightened third-class back into the house.

He had not seen the little Captain since the night he made her his concubine. For some reason he couldn't get himself to face her again. In a way he felt rejected by her. Rejected by the way she had acted. Was becoming his concubine really something to be sad about? She should have been happy… or proud at least. It wasn't the rejection itself that worried him. Hell, he couldn't care less about being rejected, not after all the slights he had suffered in his time on Earth where no one gave him the respect he deserved for being a Prince. He couldn't care about that anymore. He knew what he was worth. He was the fucking Prince of Saiyajins. Above everyone else. Why should he care about what others thought of him? He was the best.

The fact that her rejection actually managed to touch him, that was what troubled him. Her rejection, that was something entirely different. It… hurt? No, hurt wasn't the right word. It disappointed him. To some extend anyhow. He wasn't feeling bad or sad or anything, it just got to him… A little. That was all.

And why had she been so sad? He asked her to stop fucking her men, didn't he? She wouldn't listen. He had to do something to make her stop dishonouring him with those third-class pricks… Right? What the hell had they been doing together if she never had the intention of taking it seriously? Why had she been so fucking sad?

There it was, the bleeding guilt again. He had absolutely nothing to feel guilty about. This was a natural course of action. What else had she expected? He told her he wouldn't be her damn pet, he told her he wanted her for himself. She started this whole thing anyway. She seduced him. She came onto him with that cursed smile and those lustful eyes. He merely reacted on her enticement. She tempted him into this. It was her own damn fault!

Vegeta called himself back from his musings roughly. He took note of the forceful flexing of his own hands and the grinding of his teeth. She made him so furious. That… that… that little… He stopped himself there. He shouldn't finish that thought, or any thoughts concerning her for that matter. He didn't care… Did he?

Luckily there was the third-class bleeder to occupy his swimming mind. A good thing. Vegeta should forget about the little Captain and just listen to what the bleeder had to say.

"… returned here. We were on our way up when she keeled over. Nothing was wrong with her before that." Turles recaptured swiftly as they climbed the stairs to the first floor.

There in the hallway lay the little Captain sprawled on the floor. Kaito was kneeled at her side shaking her shoulders and bidding her to wake up.

Vegeta wasn't going to panic. There surely wasn't anything seriously wrong with her. She just keeled over. These things happened all the time. And if it was something serious and she ended up dead, well he would survive. It would be a waste, like it would be a waste to throw out good food, but nothing more. Nobody would catch the Prince of Saiyajins falling apart over the loss of a half finished pizza.

There, he was at ease. Calm and collected as always.

Vegeta shoved Kaito aside so hard the third-class crashed into the wall beside him with a startled cry. Vegeta ignored him and bent over the little Captain's lifeless form, searching her with his ki. Her power was dwindling.

"Something is draining her power." He muttered more to himself as he reached out to feel her pulse in her neck. It comforted him to detect the faint tremor of her heart beneath her cool skin. She was still there.

"I think it might be the chip in her head." Kaito said as he crawled to the Captain's other side quickly. Vegeta took note of the gash in the tall male's forehead from his encounter with the wall, but the man seemed to notice nor care. He was evidently much too worried about the little Captain.

Not Vegeta, he wasn't worried one bit. Just a pizza.

Vegeta scooped the unconscious little Captain up in his arms and rose with haste. "How did Cold control the chips? Was there a devise?"

"Yes but we don't know where it is." Kaito replied as he rose too. His eyes never left the Captain's ashen face. "We've visited the crash site a couple of days earlier to look for the controlling devise in case someone got hold of it. We couldn't find it. Cold always carried it with him. Maybe the bloody thing got destroyed when he was killed. Otherwise someone might have beaten us to it."

"If someone got hold of it we would all be drained from our powers right now, wouldn't we?" Turles asked, concern making his booming voice uncharacteristically high-pitched.

Vegeta frowned at him. They were both so worried. Those idiots! Why, for the love of battle? She was nothing but a damn pizza! Bloody hell, he was loosing it. He was turning into a fucking mental case and it was all her fault.

Calm and collected…

"Maybe there is a failure in the chip itself." Vegeta mused. "Return to the crash site to make sure the devise isn't still there. I will take care of the Captain."

The two males nodded grimly before running down the corridor to execute his command.

Vegeta hurried through the compound with the little Captain in his arms, light, lifeless. How could he think of her as a pizza? Just look at her! She was at least an all you can eat buffet down in Satan City.

Vegeta found the woman inside one of her various labs. Bulma was dressed in a white lab coat and a pair of narrow framed glasses balanced on the branch of her small nose. "Quick woman. You have to help her. Her power is fading."

Bulma shot up and hurried over to him. "What happened?" Her hands instantly darted out to examine the unconscious woman. She lifted the female's eyelids.

"She keeled over. It might have something to do with the chip in her head. It was used to control her powers. Can you help her?" Vegeta asked urgently. Was that his voice? Why did it sound so shrill? Perhaps he caught a cold or something. The Prince of Saiyajins, coming down with a weakling virus like a cold? Maybe it was some other, more powerful virus. Certainly, that had to be it. Even the woman noticed how weird his voice sounded. She looked at him very strange with those big blue eyes.

"Her pupils are dilated. She's in shock. Get her into the examining-room." Bulma commanded.

Vegeta did so quickly, followed closely by the woman and he laid the little Captain onto one of the examining tables fighting the pangs of panic in his chest. Okay, pretend time was now officially over. He gave a fuck. That troubled him, but he couldn't be bothered with it right now. He just needed the little thing to get well.

Bulma silently examined the female Saiyajin more thoroughly. She pushed Vegeta aside to give herself more room to work. "Get her up." She demanded. "Where is that chip exactly?"

Vegeta pulled Akane's lifeless form into a seated position. "I don't know."

Bulma searched the back of the female's lolling head with her fingers for a scar or any other indication of where the chip could have been implanted. "Hold her head steady." She snapped.

Vegeta took her face in his hand, at her chin as he liked to do in the midst of passion when he sought her lips. Those pouting lips… That fascinatingly small mouth... That gorgeous face with those fascinating scars… The pangs in his chest were getting more difficult to suppress because her power was slipping away at a frighteningly fast rate.

"Hurry up, woman." He snarled fiercely.

Bulma threw him an assessing stare before returning to the lifeless woman. She drew the wild black hair up and continued her search. "There it is." She mumbled when she found a small scar just above the back of the neck.

Vegeta looked at the scar. He had never noticed it before. Why not? She had been so close. Had he been paying attention to her at all? Damnit, she was like a freaking goddess. He should have noticed. He should have known everything there was to know about her. Now it might be too late...

"Can you take it out?" Vegeta asked urgently.

"It is risky. She is very weak. I don't know if she will survive surgery in this state." Bulma let go of the woman's hair and motioned Vegeta to lay her back down. "I will try. Get my father."

.

.

"How is the Captain?"

Vegeta was jerked from his trance by Turles' concerned voice. He had been so caught up in disturbing thoughts that he hadn't even sensed the two males come in.

The three Saiyajins were outside the examining room. Vegeta stood with his back leaned against the wall, a leg drawn up and his arms folded. He didn't know how the Captain was. He was kicked out of the room before they started surgery. He clenched his teeth. The woman and her father had been in there working on his little concubine for hours. What the fuck was taking them so long?

"They are removing the chip. Did you find the devise?" He demanded with a snarl.

Turles shook his head aggrieved. "Nothing. We have searched the whole area." His sad eyes fell on the door at Vegeta's right. "Is she in there? I can't even sense her."

Vegeta nodded wordlessly. He couldn't sense her either and it affected him in the same way.

Kaito sank down along the wall to sit on the floor. He took his face in his hands with a woeful sigh. "What if she doesn't make it? I couldn't… I would just… Blood…" His weak voice trailed off.

Vegeta wanted to kick him in the bloody head. He didn't need the damn prick to voice his own fears. She had to make it. She would.

"The Captain is tough. She will be fine." Turles reassured his comrade, though he didn't sound certain of it at all.

Vegeta eased up a bit. Indeed, the little Captain was very tough. The idiot was right. She was going to be just fine.

A silence fell between the three male Saiyajins as they all got caught up in their own thoughts while waiting for news on Akane's status.

Vegeta pushed away from the wall when he sensed the woman heading over to the door. She came out dressed in full surgical attire. There was blood on the front of her clothes and she was pulling off blood soaked latex gloves, a sheen of sweat glistening on her forehead. Vegeta had never been impressed by the sight of blood, in fact he rather liked it, but this was the blood of his little concubine and the amount of it alarmed him.

Kaito shot up from the floor instantly. "Is the Captain going to be okay?"

The three Saiyajins eyed Bulma alertly.

"Yes. The chip was removed successfully."

Vegeta suppressed his sigh of allay unlike the other two males who practically cried out and fell over in relief.

"Can we see her?" Turles asked stringent.

"Later. The surgery went well but she is still very weak. She needs rest." Bulma spoke calmly.

The woman's father appeared in the doorway dressed in the same attire as his daughter. His smile was a rather happy one and Vegeta cursed him out internally. That old fool was doubtlessly intrigued by these chips and their ability to control power. Blasted technical freak. Vegeta then took in the woman's blue eyes and those too were shimmering with hunger. The bitch. This was nothing but a thrill to them. They didn't care one bit about his little concubine. To them all this was just one big scientific experiment.

"Are there chips in your heads as well?" Mr. Briefs asked with poorly suppressed anticipation.

The male Saiyajins nodded.

"I think we should remove them." Bulma announced airily.

She managed to conceal her motives a lot better but the eagerness in her face didn't go by Vegeta unseen. "You're liking this a bit too much woman." He hissed warningly. "My men will not serve as your experimental subjects."

"Your men?" Bulma repeated haughtily. She threw him a dirty look before smiling reassuringly at the other Saiyajins. "It is just as a precaution."

"We want to examine those chips more closely. Unfortunately the one we retrieved from the miss's head is busted." Mr Briefs continued shamelessly frank. "I gather the ones in your heads are still functioning in order. Can we have a look?"

Bulma silenced him with a sharp glare. "It would really be for your own good. There is no saying what caused the failure in her chip. For all we know this could happen to you as well. It is better to remove them straight away."

"What, now?" Turles asked bewildered.

The two geniuses nodded heavily. "It's a minor procedure. You're both in good health. You'll be up and running again in a couple of hours." Bulma assured them.

The two Saiyajins looked at their Prince for guidance. Vegeta had to agree with the woman that it was better to remove the chips before those would malfunction as well. He didn't like it but she was right. "Let them be removed." He ordered quietly.

His revolted glare didn't pass by the woman unnoticed, but she refused to acknowledge it and motioned the Saiyajins inside the examining room with a comforting smile. Mr Briefs followed after them briskly. Bulma remained in the doorway with a thoughtful look on Vegeta. She opened her mouth to speak but Vegeta cut her off harshly.

"Let me know when I can see my Captain." He growled before leaving her behind perplexed.