Disclaimer: I don't own Dragonball Z.
A/N: Thanks again for all the reviews and encouragement, I really appreciate it!
Bulma
Year 755
She steps into the ship's common room and finds that all three Saiyans are already there, their voices low as they speak in the heavy, guttural phrases of their own language. Speaking anything other than Standard was forbidden within the Planet Trade Organisation, and surprisingly, it's a rule the Saiyans appeared to comply with, but here on the ship she has become used to the odd sounds of the Saiyan language.
Though their conversation continues without falter, all three men glance at her as she strides past them to claim the remaining couch, and although she's spent the last four months stuck on this ship with them, the hair on the nape of her neck still prickles. She has become painfully aware of the Saiyans' instincts and her very Human reactions to them on this journey – the way the Saiyans observe every movement in a room is so predatory in nature that it never fails to send a shiver down her spine, her body recognising that she is physically weaker, slower, and more vulnerable.
It is this that has strengthened her resolve to build better weapons to arm herself with. It's her pet project, and she settles back into the couch, scribbling designs for her next set of weapons in her notebook. She ignores the men, their deep voices nothing more than white noise as her focus returns to her work.
She is so engrossed in working through an equation that at first she misses that they have switched to speaking Standard.
"Bulma" Vegeta snaps, loud enough to make her jump. She looks up to find three pairs of black eyes staring at her with a level of intensity that makes her uncomfortable.
"Huh? What's up?" she asks, doing her best to appear unfazed. The holograph of their destination, the planet known only as NX5GVT4, glows blue in the centre of the room, and she sits up straight, noting the stiff set to Vegeta's shoulders. "What's wrong?" she asks him directly.
Nappa answers. "Vegeta says you were the one who found the planet we're heading for."
"Yeah, and? It's only five days away – I though you guys would be happy to get off this ship."
Nappa snorts, a cruel smirk tugging at his lips. "I am, and I can't wait to see the moon," he says, nodding at the hologram, and the sadistic tenor to his voice puts her on edge. Out of the three Saiyans, he's the one she's the least comfortable with. "Do you even know what happens during a full moon, girl? You better be hiding when it happens."
Ah.
She crosses her legs with a sigh, the fabric of her heavy workpants rustling. Vegeta's brow lifts – in curiosity, she thinks – and she sets her notebook aside, girding herself for a discussion she has both anticipated and dreaded. She's so far avoided disclosing just how much she already knows about Saiyans.
"I do, actually. I've seen it before."
"Seen what exactly?" Vegeta's brows draw downwards, distrust and impatience marking his voice. His tail, unfurled and resting across his thighs, twitches, a sure sign of his irritation.
Still, she finds an irritated Vegeta easier to deal with than a sadistic Nappa. Raditz, thankfully, is actually relatively mellow for a Saiyan – it must run in the family, she thinks – and simply leans back in his chair, observing everything.
"The… transformation," she answers, gesturing at Vegeta's tail. "Oozaru, I think you call it?" she adds, the Saiyan word feeling thick on her tongue. Vegeta's gaze sharpens, his frown becoming even more pronounced, and the other Saiyans still. Suddenly it feels as if the all the air has been sucked out of the room.
"Explain."
She shifts forward, reaching for the tablet that sits beside Vegeta. He hands it to her woodenly, and she ignores his glare as she begins to key in demands for the holograph display, searching through the files she has backed up on the ship's main computers.
Raditz snorts. "Relax, Vegeta. She's seen it on a video file."
"No, I've seen it in person, actually," she replies, and although she doesn't look up from the tablet she's working on, she practically feels the weight of their eyes on her. "There," she adds, and looks up as the holograph changes to display a Planet Trade Organisation file titled Kakarot/Son Goku. Goku's face stares out at them, his childish features drawn back in a snarl that she can now see is so very Saiyan in nature. She knows it is a screenshot that was taken directly from Zarbon's scouter feed moments before he killed Goku.
It hurts to stare at the image for too long, but she can't look away either, feeling somehow bound to acknowledge the sacrifice Goku made for her.
"He is the first Saiyan I ever met," she says.
Silence fills the room, and she can hear her own heart hammering in her ears. It's been six years since Goku's death, but her grief still rises, clawing a raw wound in her heart. Raditz pales as if he has seen a ghost, and though his expression remains cold, his eyes fail to mask his shock.
"Kakarot," he reads from the file. "Saiyan. Deceased. Son of Bardock, deceased, and Gine, deceased. Brother of Raditz, PTO soldier." He turns towards her, an angry snarl curling his upper lip back to reveal sharp canines. "What the fuck is this?"
"This is me telling you that I knew your brother," she says, and her voice sounds cold to her own ears. She feels as if she has left her body and is observing everything from a distance, waiting patiently for a disaster to unfold. Saiyans, she has learnt, do not take well to surprises. "He was sent to Earth to purge it by the Saiyan regime on behalf of the PTO. He suffered a traumatic brain injury as a child and his memory of Vegetasei and his programming was wiped. He had no knowledge that he was a Saiyan – he was raised as a Human. I met him when he was 12. I didn't know him for long – only a few months, but he was a good kid. I saw him turn oozaru under our full moon, and he lost all control of himself. Someone cut off his tail before he could kill us all, and he had no memory of the incident."
She swallows back the lump that has formed in her throat. "He was an amazing fighter, and he died fighting Zarbon. He was trying to save me. I owe him my life, and I suppose it's one of the reasons I was open to working with you guys."
Raditz frowns back up at the holograph, and for a moment she catches a glimpse of the man Goku would have become, had he lived to be full grown. You look like him, she wants to say, but instead she bites her tongue and scrolls down the file on her tablet until the text in the holograph displays all the grisly the information about Goku's death, and the details about his relationship to her. She chews on her bottom lip as the three Saiyans read quietly.
"There was nothing on your file about this Kakarot," Vegeta says, his voice dangerously low, and when she meets his gaze it sends a cold shiver down her spine.
"I erased it," she replies, her voice no more than a whisper. "I wasn't… I didn't know how to have this conversation with any of you."
"You said you wanted to be transparent," Vegeta spits, referring to their last private conversation before they escaped from Frieza, and she feels her face flush, a physical reaction to the waves of anger rolling off of him.
"You have to understand that this is difficult for me to talk about," she says defensively, her voice rising. "He is dead because of me. He was my friend. I loved him like a brother."
Vegeta's face shutters, and he disappears entirely, reappearing only an inch from her face. She rears back, her head hitting the wall behind her as Vegeta's arms strike at the couch behind her back, forming a cage around her. For the first time in years she is afraid of him.
He can smell it, too. She sees his nostrils flare, and his gaze darkens. "Do not claim a relation to one of us Saiyans, you weak Human. You are beneath our kind," he sneers before stalking out of the room.
Nappa and Raditz rise, shooting death glares her way as they follow their leader. Nappa, petulant as ever, shuts off the lights on his way out, leaving her alone in the glowing light of the hologram.
She reaches forward, shutting it off, and Goku's face blinks out of sight.