Hey!
All right, you asked for it. Here comes the second part of my little story. I got a pair of rave (I think, I hope) reviews from two (count them two! I'm so excited!) people.
Oh yeah, and before I forget like I did last time, DISCLSIMER TIME!!!
Don't sue me.
________________________________________________________________________
It was very dark. Very dark, and she was utterly alone. Her footsteps echoed in the darkness, but no matter how far she walked she never got anywhere.
"Hello? Is anyone out there? I'm afraid. Someone, please, say something!" She begged, her voice taut with fear. "Somebody... help me..." She fell to her knees in the blackness and wept. "I don't want to be... I don't want to be... alone..." That last word echoed cruelly, taunting her, and so did the wracking sobs that followed.
Still weeping, Bulma woke up. Her sheets were tangled in a knot at her feet, her hair was sweat drenched and spread haphazardly across her pillow. Shaking with more than cold, she got up and pulled a robe on over her thin summer nightgown. She pulled the twisted sheets up over the bed again, smoothed the lumps out of her pillow and crawled back into bed.
For a very long time she lay staring at the ceiling, unable to sleep again. Like it had echoed through the blackness in her nightmare one word echoed through her sleepy mind.
Alone...
He was trapped. Behind him, a sheer cliff, and before him stood two glowing figures with cold green eyes and hair the color of gold. The two glowing figures sneered at him and ridiculed him, and he could do nothing. A little voice in the back of his mind told him that he should have been able to do something, but he couldn't remember what.
"You are pathetic," said the taller of the two figures. "You were supposed to be the one, but you failed. You are nothing."
The shorter of the two just smiled coldly and stepped forward.
Vegeta took a step back. "You'd better leave now," he said, attempting to sound confident. All he succeeded in doing was showing exactly how unsure he was.
"Or what? What can you do to us?" the shorter figure demanded contemptuously
"You are nothing."
The taller of the two continued in the same manner, "You are a disgrace. You dishonor all of us. There is only one solution."
Vegeta swallowed hard. He knew what the tall figure was thinking. He had thought it himself often enough. "You are wrong," he hissed, fighting back the overwhelming unreasonable fear that was washing over him. "I am destined..."
"You were destined and you failed, how pitiful," both glowing figures said in unison.
"You know what you have to do," said the tall one.
"Don't make this difficult," added the short one.
"Do it," they said, in unison again, their voices urging Vegeta to some course of action he did not understand.
Vegeta took another step back, and found there was no more cliff behind him. Unbalanced he fell, his arms flailing wildly like. And he fell, and fell and fell.
He woke in the same position he had fallen asleep, in a heap on the hard floor of the gravity room. Feeling a little out of sorts, Vegeta stood up and stretched his
sleep-tightened muscles. Once again his stomach rumbled noisily. This time he gave in to natural law. After all even the Prince of the Saiyans need to eat sometimes.
Exiting the gravity room, he took a deep breath of the early morning air, cool, sweet and heavy with dew. He felt the firm ground beneath his booted feet, but for some reason he still felt like he was falling.
After several hours of restless sleep Bulma woke up again and dressed. Granted it was pretty early in the morning and Bulma was not a 'morning' person, but she wanted to finish up the latest batch of tests on her current pet project before dinner. That and she needed to keep her mind off her personal troubles. That and she didn't want to have the time to think about how lonely she was.
As she left her room something rubbed up against Bulma's leg. She reached down and picked up her father's black cat, remembering that she needed to feed the affectionate little creature.
"You're not used to having to wait for your breakfast, are you little guy?" she asked the cat, scratching behind his ears. The cat purred and put is cold wet nose up against Bulma's cheek. She carried the cat downstairs with her.
As Bulma opened the kitchen door the cat leapt out her arms and rushed in. Curious, Bulma followed. She found the cat purring loudly and rubbing its head against none other than the Prince of the Saiyans himself, Vegeta. And oddly enough, Vegeta didn't particularly seem to care. He was wrapped up in his search for something edible that he might not have even noticed.
"Ahem..." Bulma said, announcing her presence from the safety of the doorway. She figured that sneaking up on a Saiyan, particularly this Saiyan, was not a smart thing to do.
Vegeta ignored her and continued to root in the fridge for food.
"Excuse me," Bulma said, a little louder this time, "but when a lady enters the room it's considered polite to acknowledge her.
"I'll remember that in case a lady ever walks in the room," Vegeta muttered just loud enough for Bulma to here.
"You big... stupid... jerk!" Bulma squeaked, enraged. It was too tired to think of anything more scathing.
"Keep that up and you might just hurt my feelings, woman," Vegeta returned, obviously not as affected by the early hour as Bulma was.
"Keep that up and I won't feed you."
"That particular threat no longer works, woman, I've figured out how to work all the redundant machinery in this death trap that you humans call a 'kitchen'," was Vegeta's reply. He pulled his head out of the fridge along with what remained of last night's leftovers -chicken- a handful of pre-sliced sandwich meat -turkey, roast beef and ham- and full gallon jug of milk. Much to Bulma's disgust he was drinking the milk straight from the carton.
"You know, civilized people have such things as 'glasses' we pour our drinks into them instead of backwashing into the milk carton," Bulma sneered, getting back on her game.
"Why?"
"Because someone else might want some milk and I'm willing to bet they wouldn't want your spit with it."
Vegeta smirked evilly and drained the carton of milk in one long gulp. "Problem solved," he said.
"You're such an ass,"
Vegeta just grunted and began to eat.
Bulma sighed loudly and put the teakettle on the stove to boil while she opened up one of the cupboards to get out the cat food. Noting that its breakfast was about to be served, the cat left off rubbing up against Vegeta's leg and trotted over to Bulma to await its meal.
Feeling sort of like she ought to at least attempt to be friendly Bulma asked, as she poured the cat food into a bowl, "Hey Vegeta, would you like some tea?"
When the was no answer she looked up and found that Vegeta was gone, a pile of chicken bones on a plate and an empty carton of milk the only evidence that he had ever been there in the first place.
"What an ass!" Bulma muttered to herself. "I bet he expects me to clean up after him too!" Then again, at least he hadn't been horrifically messy and noisy while he ate, unlike Goku and Yaumcha or any of a number of the other men Bulma knew were.
Yaumcha...
Bulma wondered absently what his first day as a 'free' man was going to be like. Probably he would train all day and then go pick up some floozy at night. Probably he would have a lot better of a day that Bulma was looking to expect.
The teakettle began to whistle and Bulma turned off the stove and switch it to a different burner. As she took a teabag out of one of the cupboards she felt a whole lot less excited about her latest batch of experiments.
Out in the space ship turned gravity room Vegeta was warming up at an easy one hundred G's. Even a Saiyan couldn't go straight into hardcore training after a meal. The strain on his body was almost negligible as he practiced a fast paced series of punches, kicks, and flips. He was hardly even breathing hard.
After a half hour of that Vegeta kicked the gravity up to four hundred and fifty times earth's normal, and began to repeat the whole series over again.
Bulma was so wrapped up in her work that she skipped lunch, and only the fact that she got a call from her parents just before dinner kept her from skipping that meal as well.
"Oh honey, the weather here is fabulous. I wish you could have come with us!" Bulma's mother raved. "Isn't the weather lovely darling?" she called out to her husband.
The almost inaudible reply was, "Yes dear, the cumulonimbus clouds show no signs off becoming cumulofractonimbus clouds anytime during out stay."
"So how are thing at home dear?" Bulma's mother inquired.
"Fine, Mama, I'm almost done getting the bugs out of my new project. I bet I'll have it ready when you get back."
"What are you making this time, dear?"
"Oh just another analysis machine," Bulma answered. "I wanted to try and see if improved Daddy's gaseous reclamation unit in the space ships, and to do that I need to figure out whether or not my prototype is actually doing anything. The changes are so minute that the older analyzers just don't cut it anymore."
"That's nice dear," Bulma's mother said. None of that had made any sense to her, but it sounded like a good enough project to spend time on. "Have you fed the cat?"
"Of course I did, Mama," Bulma replied indignantly.
"Did that nice young man get something to eat too?"
"Yes, Mama, Vegeta ate," Bulma said wearily. Damned carnivore that he is he ate all the meat in the fridge, she thought sourly.
"Oh good! Make sure he keeps that up. I wouldn't want him to waste all away to skin and bones."
"Of course, Mama," Bulma said resisting the urge to let out a big sigh.
"Well, I've got to go, dear, your father and I are going out to dinner. Love you honey, bye-bye!"
"Love you too, Mama, have a nice dinner." Bulma hung up the phone a few second after her mother. She turned back to her computer screen and went back to work. The cat pushed obsequiously at her ankles, begging for attention.
"Yes, I know, time to return to the world of reality," Bulma murmured to the cat. "Just let me finish with this last bit of work..."
Breathless and sweating profusely Vegeta slumped against the side of the gravity room. No matter how hard he sweated though, he wasn't getting anywhere.
Maybe if I try harder, he thought to himself, standing up on shaky legs.
He knew that wasn't the case.
A memory of his nightmare floated into his consciousness.
-You are nothing...
-You know what you have to do...
"But I don't!" Vegeta shouted angrily at the ghost in his mind. "I've tried everything and I've still failed! What more is there?"
-You know what you have to do...
Despite the crushing gravity the feeling of falling returned to Vegeta and along with it the feeling of utter hopelessness as he'd tried to back away from the two glowing figures in his dream.
-You know what you have to do...
"I don't!"
-You know...
Trying to shake the demons out of his mind, Vegeta stumbled over to the control panel and pressed a few buttons.
He never did find out if it was just because he was distracted or if it was some other self-destructive urge, but somehow instead of entering in four hundred seventy-five G's, he entered four thousand seven hundred-fifty. He didn't even notice his mistake until he began a set of sit-ups. As the gravity grew stronger he felt his body being crushed. The pain was overwhelming at first, but then he passed out. Just before he lost consciousness he thought bitterly, well, now I don't have to worry about failing.
All right, you asked for it. Here comes the second part of my little story. I got a pair of rave (I think, I hope) reviews from two (count them two! I'm so excited!) people.
Oh yeah, and before I forget like I did last time, DISCLSIMER TIME!!!
Don't sue me.
________________________________________________________________________
It was very dark. Very dark, and she was utterly alone. Her footsteps echoed in the darkness, but no matter how far she walked she never got anywhere.
"Hello? Is anyone out there? I'm afraid. Someone, please, say something!" She begged, her voice taut with fear. "Somebody... help me..." She fell to her knees in the blackness and wept. "I don't want to be... I don't want to be... alone..." That last word echoed cruelly, taunting her, and so did the wracking sobs that followed.
Still weeping, Bulma woke up. Her sheets were tangled in a knot at her feet, her hair was sweat drenched and spread haphazardly across her pillow. Shaking with more than cold, she got up and pulled a robe on over her thin summer nightgown. She pulled the twisted sheets up over the bed again, smoothed the lumps out of her pillow and crawled back into bed.
For a very long time she lay staring at the ceiling, unable to sleep again. Like it had echoed through the blackness in her nightmare one word echoed through her sleepy mind.
Alone...
He was trapped. Behind him, a sheer cliff, and before him stood two glowing figures with cold green eyes and hair the color of gold. The two glowing figures sneered at him and ridiculed him, and he could do nothing. A little voice in the back of his mind told him that he should have been able to do something, but he couldn't remember what.
"You are pathetic," said the taller of the two figures. "You were supposed to be the one, but you failed. You are nothing."
The shorter of the two just smiled coldly and stepped forward.
Vegeta took a step back. "You'd better leave now," he said, attempting to sound confident. All he succeeded in doing was showing exactly how unsure he was.
"Or what? What can you do to us?" the shorter figure demanded contemptuously
"You are nothing."
The taller of the two continued in the same manner, "You are a disgrace. You dishonor all of us. There is only one solution."
Vegeta swallowed hard. He knew what the tall figure was thinking. He had thought it himself often enough. "You are wrong," he hissed, fighting back the overwhelming unreasonable fear that was washing over him. "I am destined..."
"You were destined and you failed, how pitiful," both glowing figures said in unison.
"You know what you have to do," said the tall one.
"Don't make this difficult," added the short one.
"Do it," they said, in unison again, their voices urging Vegeta to some course of action he did not understand.
Vegeta took another step back, and found there was no more cliff behind him. Unbalanced he fell, his arms flailing wildly like. And he fell, and fell and fell.
He woke in the same position he had fallen asleep, in a heap on the hard floor of the gravity room. Feeling a little out of sorts, Vegeta stood up and stretched his
sleep-tightened muscles. Once again his stomach rumbled noisily. This time he gave in to natural law. After all even the Prince of the Saiyans need to eat sometimes.
Exiting the gravity room, he took a deep breath of the early morning air, cool, sweet and heavy with dew. He felt the firm ground beneath his booted feet, but for some reason he still felt like he was falling.
After several hours of restless sleep Bulma woke up again and dressed. Granted it was pretty early in the morning and Bulma was not a 'morning' person, but she wanted to finish up the latest batch of tests on her current pet project before dinner. That and she needed to keep her mind off her personal troubles. That and she didn't want to have the time to think about how lonely she was.
As she left her room something rubbed up against Bulma's leg. She reached down and picked up her father's black cat, remembering that she needed to feed the affectionate little creature.
"You're not used to having to wait for your breakfast, are you little guy?" she asked the cat, scratching behind his ears. The cat purred and put is cold wet nose up against Bulma's cheek. She carried the cat downstairs with her.
As Bulma opened the kitchen door the cat leapt out her arms and rushed in. Curious, Bulma followed. She found the cat purring loudly and rubbing its head against none other than the Prince of the Saiyans himself, Vegeta. And oddly enough, Vegeta didn't particularly seem to care. He was wrapped up in his search for something edible that he might not have even noticed.
"Ahem..." Bulma said, announcing her presence from the safety of the doorway. She figured that sneaking up on a Saiyan, particularly this Saiyan, was not a smart thing to do.
Vegeta ignored her and continued to root in the fridge for food.
"Excuse me," Bulma said, a little louder this time, "but when a lady enters the room it's considered polite to acknowledge her.
"I'll remember that in case a lady ever walks in the room," Vegeta muttered just loud enough for Bulma to here.
"You big... stupid... jerk!" Bulma squeaked, enraged. It was too tired to think of anything more scathing.
"Keep that up and you might just hurt my feelings, woman," Vegeta returned, obviously not as affected by the early hour as Bulma was.
"Keep that up and I won't feed you."
"That particular threat no longer works, woman, I've figured out how to work all the redundant machinery in this death trap that you humans call a 'kitchen'," was Vegeta's reply. He pulled his head out of the fridge along with what remained of last night's leftovers -chicken- a handful of pre-sliced sandwich meat -turkey, roast beef and ham- and full gallon jug of milk. Much to Bulma's disgust he was drinking the milk straight from the carton.
"You know, civilized people have such things as 'glasses' we pour our drinks into them instead of backwashing into the milk carton," Bulma sneered, getting back on her game.
"Why?"
"Because someone else might want some milk and I'm willing to bet they wouldn't want your spit with it."
Vegeta smirked evilly and drained the carton of milk in one long gulp. "Problem solved," he said.
"You're such an ass,"
Vegeta just grunted and began to eat.
Bulma sighed loudly and put the teakettle on the stove to boil while she opened up one of the cupboards to get out the cat food. Noting that its breakfast was about to be served, the cat left off rubbing up against Vegeta's leg and trotted over to Bulma to await its meal.
Feeling sort of like she ought to at least attempt to be friendly Bulma asked, as she poured the cat food into a bowl, "Hey Vegeta, would you like some tea?"
When the was no answer she looked up and found that Vegeta was gone, a pile of chicken bones on a plate and an empty carton of milk the only evidence that he had ever been there in the first place.
"What an ass!" Bulma muttered to herself. "I bet he expects me to clean up after him too!" Then again, at least he hadn't been horrifically messy and noisy while he ate, unlike Goku and Yaumcha or any of a number of the other men Bulma knew were.
Yaumcha...
Bulma wondered absently what his first day as a 'free' man was going to be like. Probably he would train all day and then go pick up some floozy at night. Probably he would have a lot better of a day that Bulma was looking to expect.
The teakettle began to whistle and Bulma turned off the stove and switch it to a different burner. As she took a teabag out of one of the cupboards she felt a whole lot less excited about her latest batch of experiments.
Out in the space ship turned gravity room Vegeta was warming up at an easy one hundred G's. Even a Saiyan couldn't go straight into hardcore training after a meal. The strain on his body was almost negligible as he practiced a fast paced series of punches, kicks, and flips. He was hardly even breathing hard.
After a half hour of that Vegeta kicked the gravity up to four hundred and fifty times earth's normal, and began to repeat the whole series over again.
Bulma was so wrapped up in her work that she skipped lunch, and only the fact that she got a call from her parents just before dinner kept her from skipping that meal as well.
"Oh honey, the weather here is fabulous. I wish you could have come with us!" Bulma's mother raved. "Isn't the weather lovely darling?" she called out to her husband.
The almost inaudible reply was, "Yes dear, the cumulonimbus clouds show no signs off becoming cumulofractonimbus clouds anytime during out stay."
"So how are thing at home dear?" Bulma's mother inquired.
"Fine, Mama, I'm almost done getting the bugs out of my new project. I bet I'll have it ready when you get back."
"What are you making this time, dear?"
"Oh just another analysis machine," Bulma answered. "I wanted to try and see if improved Daddy's gaseous reclamation unit in the space ships, and to do that I need to figure out whether or not my prototype is actually doing anything. The changes are so minute that the older analyzers just don't cut it anymore."
"That's nice dear," Bulma's mother said. None of that had made any sense to her, but it sounded like a good enough project to spend time on. "Have you fed the cat?"
"Of course I did, Mama," Bulma replied indignantly.
"Did that nice young man get something to eat too?"
"Yes, Mama, Vegeta ate," Bulma said wearily. Damned carnivore that he is he ate all the meat in the fridge, she thought sourly.
"Oh good! Make sure he keeps that up. I wouldn't want him to waste all away to skin and bones."
"Of course, Mama," Bulma said resisting the urge to let out a big sigh.
"Well, I've got to go, dear, your father and I are going out to dinner. Love you honey, bye-bye!"
"Love you too, Mama, have a nice dinner." Bulma hung up the phone a few second after her mother. She turned back to her computer screen and went back to work. The cat pushed obsequiously at her ankles, begging for attention.
"Yes, I know, time to return to the world of reality," Bulma murmured to the cat. "Just let me finish with this last bit of work..."
Breathless and sweating profusely Vegeta slumped against the side of the gravity room. No matter how hard he sweated though, he wasn't getting anywhere.
Maybe if I try harder, he thought to himself, standing up on shaky legs.
He knew that wasn't the case.
A memory of his nightmare floated into his consciousness.
-You are nothing...
-You know what you have to do...
"But I don't!" Vegeta shouted angrily at the ghost in his mind. "I've tried everything and I've still failed! What more is there?"
-You know what you have to do...
Despite the crushing gravity the feeling of falling returned to Vegeta and along with it the feeling of utter hopelessness as he'd tried to back away from the two glowing figures in his dream.
-You know what you have to do...
"I don't!"
-You know...
Trying to shake the demons out of his mind, Vegeta stumbled over to the control panel and pressed a few buttons.
He never did find out if it was just because he was distracted or if it was some other self-destructive urge, but somehow instead of entering in four hundred seventy-five G's, he entered four thousand seven hundred-fifty. He didn't even notice his mistake until he began a set of sit-ups. As the gravity grew stronger he felt his body being crushed. The pain was overwhelming at first, but then he passed out. Just before he lost consciousness he thought bitterly, well, now I don't have to worry about failing.