Bulma yawned drowsily, pulling her hair through an elastic band. She stumbled over the clothes strewn colorfully across the floor, and yanked on a shoe rather ineptly. For the billionth time she asked herself why she was up this early, and for the billionth time reminded her slow, caffeine-denied brain that it was her own fault.
She tugged on a baggy pair of sweatpants and a halter top, and walked/tripped/fell down the stairs. When she got to the kitchen, she looked around, eyes shifty. They darted everywhere, and of course, to the coffee pot. She almost decided to make a dash for some of the miracle beverage, but her body didn't really seem to be listening to her at 5 in the morning.
Walking over to the door, she grasped the handle, and looked up. Startled, she froze. Through the glass door she could see the vast grounds of the capsule corp., the plains of grass, and one lone figure, working gracefully.
Vegeta's outline was visible against the rising sun, and from a distance she could see the thin sheen of sweat clinging to his backside. The dew from the grass had made the whole scene psychedelically sparkly, and she smiled a bit. He seemed so educated, so skilled in what he was doing, and in truth, he was of course. Every movement he made was calculated, and as she watched, never once did he stumble or stagger. She marveled and wondered over this, about how many years of practice it had taken him achieve his faultlessness in combat.
She frowned slightly. There was a lot she didn't know about him, and she didn't know if he would ever open up to her. When she looked at him, sometimes the pain almost radiated from his eyes, and when he was hurt, she seemed to hurt also. It was odd. The more she thought about him, the more she became almost intimidated by him, by his expertise in training.
Groaning, she let her forehead bang against the door. "Bulma, you're a dork." She whispered to herself fiercely. She could only imagine the scenes when she got out there with him. Of her stumbling along, flabby and crude, and him flowing along, toned and refined. She continued running possible happenings through her head, and looked out again, to see what Vegeta was doing…
To discover him right in front of her face. "Ahhhh! God!" His eyes and nose were pressed up against the other side of the glass, and it had startled her so much she stumbled backwards, limbs flailing, and almost fell in the process. He stepped inside the door, grabbed her wrist, and yanked her out.
"God! You scared the crap out of me!" She panted, hand over her heart. Her face was flushed, perhaps because of the thoughts she had been thinking. Sometimes he almost seemed to be able to pull her thoughts straight from her mind…
Vegeta chuckled. "You should have been paying attention. You should never let your guard down in the presence of your enemy."
Bulma raised an eyebrow. "But you aren't my enemy…"
Vegeta smiled rather sadistically.
Bulma gulped.
"Now," Vegeta began, stealing her moment of panic. "We will begin with some basic stretches…" He barreled through an assortment of movements while Bulma tried her best to follow along. "Basic my ass." Bulma grumbled in her head. He never did say anything, but at times she could see his mouth and a tiny-almost-barely-there expression of amusement. She grit her teeth, and tried her best.
He continued with a few stances, and with monotone one-word corrections on her form. Sometimes he had an almost painful look on his face when he told her to adjust a certain limb, or to spread her feet farther out. She could swear she heard mumblings of another language under his breath. Finally he cracked, and yanked her arms into place. He tugged her feet around a bit, and pushed her so her weight was shifted to one side. She quivered nervously under his touch, but didn't make a sound. When he moved her arm, she felt his breath on the back of her neck, and she stayed as still as she could be.
Vegeta noticed this rather disappointedly. The woman was frightened of him. He was confused as to why this realization brought on such a mixture of emotions, and why he even cared at all. He was almost…hurt. He was hurt.
Eventually, he stepped back to see his work, and when he did she had a strange expression on her face.
"Hey…" She began. "This feels…right." Now that he had fixed her stance, her limbs didn't feel tangled. Her arm didn't feel like it was behind her back, and her legs didn't seem to be over her head. She giggled happily. He rolled his eyes, but he knew he had once felt the same way, a very long time ago.
He let her continue onward until dark, and then sent her inside for sleep. She grinned and glowed with thanks, and it made him feel strangely satisfied inside. They worked out a usual routine; he woke her up in the morning and trained her until noon, leaving the whole rest of the day to train himself. It went this way for weeks, and some days he would get lost in himself, quietly thinking while instructing her. She pondered what went on inside his head, and longed to get inside him, to decipher his inner workings.
Everyday he worried about the future. He pushed himself twice as hard to make up for the time he dawdled with Bulma. He owed it to himself, he thought, to be able to protect this planet, because all that he had, if anything, was on its plains. Everyday he watched Bulma, pushing aside the hate and bad memories in his heart, unconsciously allowing a spot for her inside it. Each day without him knowing it, she moved into that spot, that emptiness, little by little making it full. Some days it was hard for him to send her inside at dark because he enjoyed her presence, her aura was inviting, and because he had become to accustomed to her wide open eyes and tart, biting spirit. She made him feel…alive. He would let her stay until the air was thick with heat, and until the sky turned the deepest blue, just as he remembered it in the deepest pockets of space.
It was on one of these nights that he watched her; to look as she tested out some of the new things he had taught her, and…just to look at her. She moved a bit clumsily, but she was very determined. She learned quickly and he knew she wouldn't stop until she had it right. He liked the little frown on her face that appeared when she was concentrating, so he just watched her for a few seconds.
He let his thoughts take over, and let his memories swim to the surface. He remembered things from long ago…painful, bittersweet things. Her hair was a bit shorter than Miikari's, he mused…and it was far too light. Her body wasn't as graceful or refined…but they both had that look of fierceness in their eyes…the same determination and resolve, the same unwavering spirit…
The things that had made him love them both…
Her eyes were bitter as she looked up at him.
She wiped the sweat and blood off of her face, and spit some out of her mouth. He panted himself, his youthful body almost past exertion.
The blue training uniform issued by Frieza was torn and ragged on both of them, but they refused to stop. She stood regally, refusing to look beaten. He smirked, amused by the stubbornness, amused by her pride. She quirked a slender eyebrow.
"What are you smiling about?" She asked in her nonchalant, irritatingly cool voice. She let her striking green eyes rest on him, and her head tilted slightly.
" I don't smile." He replied curtly in their own tongue, dropping the Standard speech they were required to use on Frieza's ship. Almost automatically he saw her lazy, feline smile stretch across her face. Her unhurried smile and the languorous, dreamlike way she moved always caught his eye, and drove him wild.
" I bet I could make you smile…" she replied lazily, an inviting smile upon her face. Her lithe form was before him in a matter of seconds, and he felt her breath tickling his neck, her body pressed against his.
The Saiyajin prince's mouth slowly twisted into a devious smile, but a smile nonetheless.
Vegeta jerked himself from the thoughts of his past. He sighed haggardly, feeling tired and old. His past had been fiery, as had been the feelings in his heart, and the lust he had for Miikari. He had been young, he had been desperate, he had been strong…he had been Saiyajin.
He had Miikari at the beginning of his manhood, when his instincts and hers were screaming. He had called to her and she had answered back. They were the last of their kind, and were desperate for understanding in each other.
He had loved her strongly and fiercely, with every primal bit of knowledge his people had acquired while they were alive, and with his soul. Their souls had been entwined. Everything he had been was hers, because they shared a bond, the strongest binding between two hearts that a Saiyajin pair could share. It had been racy, but it had been real.
The Prince shut his eyes in silent reverie. His heart constricted. He could still remember the feel of her heartbeat, the feel of her stomach… He could still remember the feeling of wonder when he had felt the tiny heartbeat of his unborn…. the life force of the child inside of her.
He grit his teeth. He could remember the day that Frieza had found out…when Miikari had suddenly gotten orders to do a planet sweep. It had been far too convenient for chance, and females were the last choice for planet sweepers. It had been Frieza's workings, all out of hate, just to destroy Vegeta.
Vegeta could remember everything. He remembered hate, pain, death and love. He remembered blood. He remembered her in his arms, her last breath, feeling the last bit of ki leak out from her and then from his child. He could almost hear his own screams echoing of the walls of the medical lab. Nothing left him, it all stayed, haunting the inside of his own mind.
He shut his eyes, silently screaming….
"Helloooo? Vegeta?" Bulma snapped her fingers in front of the prince's face. He jerked to attention, shifting his weight to his back foot when he noticed how close Bulma was to him. He looked a bit shaken, and this disturbed Bulma on some level, because she had always seen him as the pinnacle of calm.
"Are you ok?" She asked, taking her hand and putting it to his forehead. It was hot and sticky with sweat.
"I'm fine." Vegeta said, voice drifting to silence and eyes shifting to his surroundings nervously. He took one last glance at her before turning away and briskly walking into the gravity room. The look in his eyes was frozen in Bulma's mind. He had looked so lost and so shaken…she wondered what he had been thinking of in his head.
She sighed, frustrated. She knew the way he looked at her; she saw the longing in his eyes. She knew. For a while she had tried to deny it because she was afraid, and tried to make herself believe horrible things, that he was ruthless and wasn't capable of feeling something towards her, maybe wasn't capable of feeling at all.
But she knew it wasn't true.
She knew she cared for him and felt things for him that she couldn't explain. She knew that sometimes, she could hear words from him, and without looking she would know that his mouth wasn't moving. She could feel where he was sometimes, too. She didn't know what it all meant, but there was no use denying that it wasn't there, whatever it was.
She was about to enter her house, when she heard the door of the gravity room open, and saw Vegeta slink out. She saw him strip off the sticky training suit, and watched his form against a black sky. He turned around with an unreadable expression, saying nothing. His eyes glowed in the darkness, inviting her along, daring her to follow. He took off in a heartbeat, and she watched his fleeting shadow as he headed towards the woods. Her head swam in the summer heat, and with her heart beating fast, she took off after him.
Okie dokie jokie smokie, faithful readers, many many apologies are due!
First of all, I apologize for how long it took me to get this chapter out. It is actually a compilation of maybe two short chapters, but hopefully this is long enough to keep you from biting me.
Second of all, sorry its not funny 0.o. I really do not know what happened but it got kinda serious.
Thirdly, sorry its odd…I don't really know where its going at all. I just sat down and wrote and let it happen.
Anyway, any and all comments are appreciated!!
Kuree (puppetmaster)
She tugged on a baggy pair of sweatpants and a halter top, and walked/tripped/fell down the stairs. When she got to the kitchen, she looked around, eyes shifty. They darted everywhere, and of course, to the coffee pot. She almost decided to make a dash for some of the miracle beverage, but her body didn't really seem to be listening to her at 5 in the morning.
Walking over to the door, she grasped the handle, and looked up. Startled, she froze. Through the glass door she could see the vast grounds of the capsule corp., the plains of grass, and one lone figure, working gracefully.
Vegeta's outline was visible against the rising sun, and from a distance she could see the thin sheen of sweat clinging to his backside. The dew from the grass had made the whole scene psychedelically sparkly, and she smiled a bit. He seemed so educated, so skilled in what he was doing, and in truth, he was of course. Every movement he made was calculated, and as she watched, never once did he stumble or stagger. She marveled and wondered over this, about how many years of practice it had taken him achieve his faultlessness in combat.
She frowned slightly. There was a lot she didn't know about him, and she didn't know if he would ever open up to her. When she looked at him, sometimes the pain almost radiated from his eyes, and when he was hurt, she seemed to hurt also. It was odd. The more she thought about him, the more she became almost intimidated by him, by his expertise in training.
Groaning, she let her forehead bang against the door. "Bulma, you're a dork." She whispered to herself fiercely. She could only imagine the scenes when she got out there with him. Of her stumbling along, flabby and crude, and him flowing along, toned and refined. She continued running possible happenings through her head, and looked out again, to see what Vegeta was doing…
To discover him right in front of her face. "Ahhhh! God!" His eyes and nose were pressed up against the other side of the glass, and it had startled her so much she stumbled backwards, limbs flailing, and almost fell in the process. He stepped inside the door, grabbed her wrist, and yanked her out.
"God! You scared the crap out of me!" She panted, hand over her heart. Her face was flushed, perhaps because of the thoughts she had been thinking. Sometimes he almost seemed to be able to pull her thoughts straight from her mind…
Vegeta chuckled. "You should have been paying attention. You should never let your guard down in the presence of your enemy."
Bulma raised an eyebrow. "But you aren't my enemy…"
Vegeta smiled rather sadistically.
Bulma gulped.
"Now," Vegeta began, stealing her moment of panic. "We will begin with some basic stretches…" He barreled through an assortment of movements while Bulma tried her best to follow along. "Basic my ass." Bulma grumbled in her head. He never did say anything, but at times she could see his mouth and a tiny-almost-barely-there expression of amusement. She grit her teeth, and tried her best.
He continued with a few stances, and with monotone one-word corrections on her form. Sometimes he had an almost painful look on his face when he told her to adjust a certain limb, or to spread her feet farther out. She could swear she heard mumblings of another language under his breath. Finally he cracked, and yanked her arms into place. He tugged her feet around a bit, and pushed her so her weight was shifted to one side. She quivered nervously under his touch, but didn't make a sound. When he moved her arm, she felt his breath on the back of her neck, and she stayed as still as she could be.
Vegeta noticed this rather disappointedly. The woman was frightened of him. He was confused as to why this realization brought on such a mixture of emotions, and why he even cared at all. He was almost…hurt. He was hurt.
Eventually, he stepped back to see his work, and when he did she had a strange expression on her face.
"Hey…" She began. "This feels…right." Now that he had fixed her stance, her limbs didn't feel tangled. Her arm didn't feel like it was behind her back, and her legs didn't seem to be over her head. She giggled happily. He rolled his eyes, but he knew he had once felt the same way, a very long time ago.
He let her continue onward until dark, and then sent her inside for sleep. She grinned and glowed with thanks, and it made him feel strangely satisfied inside. They worked out a usual routine; he woke her up in the morning and trained her until noon, leaving the whole rest of the day to train himself. It went this way for weeks, and some days he would get lost in himself, quietly thinking while instructing her. She pondered what went on inside his head, and longed to get inside him, to decipher his inner workings.
Everyday he worried about the future. He pushed himself twice as hard to make up for the time he dawdled with Bulma. He owed it to himself, he thought, to be able to protect this planet, because all that he had, if anything, was on its plains. Everyday he watched Bulma, pushing aside the hate and bad memories in his heart, unconsciously allowing a spot for her inside it. Each day without him knowing it, she moved into that spot, that emptiness, little by little making it full. Some days it was hard for him to send her inside at dark because he enjoyed her presence, her aura was inviting, and because he had become to accustomed to her wide open eyes and tart, biting spirit. She made him feel…alive. He would let her stay until the air was thick with heat, and until the sky turned the deepest blue, just as he remembered it in the deepest pockets of space.
It was on one of these nights that he watched her; to look as she tested out some of the new things he had taught her, and…just to look at her. She moved a bit clumsily, but she was very determined. She learned quickly and he knew she wouldn't stop until she had it right. He liked the little frown on her face that appeared when she was concentrating, so he just watched her for a few seconds.
He let his thoughts take over, and let his memories swim to the surface. He remembered things from long ago…painful, bittersweet things. Her hair was a bit shorter than Miikari's, he mused…and it was far too light. Her body wasn't as graceful or refined…but they both had that look of fierceness in their eyes…the same determination and resolve, the same unwavering spirit…
The things that had made him love them both…
Her eyes were bitter as she looked up at him.
She wiped the sweat and blood off of her face, and spit some out of her mouth. He panted himself, his youthful body almost past exertion.
The blue training uniform issued by Frieza was torn and ragged on both of them, but they refused to stop. She stood regally, refusing to look beaten. He smirked, amused by the stubbornness, amused by her pride. She quirked a slender eyebrow.
"What are you smiling about?" She asked in her nonchalant, irritatingly cool voice. She let her striking green eyes rest on him, and her head tilted slightly.
" I don't smile." He replied curtly in their own tongue, dropping the Standard speech they were required to use on Frieza's ship. Almost automatically he saw her lazy, feline smile stretch across her face. Her unhurried smile and the languorous, dreamlike way she moved always caught his eye, and drove him wild.
" I bet I could make you smile…" she replied lazily, an inviting smile upon her face. Her lithe form was before him in a matter of seconds, and he felt her breath tickling his neck, her body pressed against his.
The Saiyajin prince's mouth slowly twisted into a devious smile, but a smile nonetheless.
Vegeta jerked himself from the thoughts of his past. He sighed haggardly, feeling tired and old. His past had been fiery, as had been the feelings in his heart, and the lust he had for Miikari. He had been young, he had been desperate, he had been strong…he had been Saiyajin.
He had Miikari at the beginning of his manhood, when his instincts and hers were screaming. He had called to her and she had answered back. They were the last of their kind, and were desperate for understanding in each other.
He had loved her strongly and fiercely, with every primal bit of knowledge his people had acquired while they were alive, and with his soul. Their souls had been entwined. Everything he had been was hers, because they shared a bond, the strongest binding between two hearts that a Saiyajin pair could share. It had been racy, but it had been real.
The Prince shut his eyes in silent reverie. His heart constricted. He could still remember the feel of her heartbeat, the feel of her stomach… He could still remember the feeling of wonder when he had felt the tiny heartbeat of his unborn…. the life force of the child inside of her.
He grit his teeth. He could remember the day that Frieza had found out…when Miikari had suddenly gotten orders to do a planet sweep. It had been far too convenient for chance, and females were the last choice for planet sweepers. It had been Frieza's workings, all out of hate, just to destroy Vegeta.
Vegeta could remember everything. He remembered hate, pain, death and love. He remembered blood. He remembered her in his arms, her last breath, feeling the last bit of ki leak out from her and then from his child. He could almost hear his own screams echoing of the walls of the medical lab. Nothing left him, it all stayed, haunting the inside of his own mind.
He shut his eyes, silently screaming….
"Helloooo? Vegeta?" Bulma snapped her fingers in front of the prince's face. He jerked to attention, shifting his weight to his back foot when he noticed how close Bulma was to him. He looked a bit shaken, and this disturbed Bulma on some level, because she had always seen him as the pinnacle of calm.
"Are you ok?" She asked, taking her hand and putting it to his forehead. It was hot and sticky with sweat.
"I'm fine." Vegeta said, voice drifting to silence and eyes shifting to his surroundings nervously. He took one last glance at her before turning away and briskly walking into the gravity room. The look in his eyes was frozen in Bulma's mind. He had looked so lost and so shaken…she wondered what he had been thinking of in his head.
She sighed, frustrated. She knew the way he looked at her; she saw the longing in his eyes. She knew. For a while she had tried to deny it because she was afraid, and tried to make herself believe horrible things, that he was ruthless and wasn't capable of feeling something towards her, maybe wasn't capable of feeling at all.
But she knew it wasn't true.
She knew she cared for him and felt things for him that she couldn't explain. She knew that sometimes, she could hear words from him, and without looking she would know that his mouth wasn't moving. She could feel where he was sometimes, too. She didn't know what it all meant, but there was no use denying that it wasn't there, whatever it was.
She was about to enter her house, when she heard the door of the gravity room open, and saw Vegeta slink out. She saw him strip off the sticky training suit, and watched his form against a black sky. He turned around with an unreadable expression, saying nothing. His eyes glowed in the darkness, inviting her along, daring her to follow. He took off in a heartbeat, and she watched his fleeting shadow as he headed towards the woods. Her head swam in the summer heat, and with her heart beating fast, she took off after him.
Okie dokie jokie smokie, faithful readers, many many apologies are due!
First of all, I apologize for how long it took me to get this chapter out. It is actually a compilation of maybe two short chapters, but hopefully this is long enough to keep you from biting me.
Second of all, sorry its not funny 0.o. I really do not know what happened but it got kinda serious.
Thirdly, sorry its odd…I don't really know where its going at all. I just sat down and wrote and let it happen.
Anyway, any and all comments are appreciated!!
Kuree (puppetmaster)