It was fairly obvious to Dende that Vejiita was highly amused with himself. This, of course, was rarely in question; but it still made a decent conversation piece, and he intended to use it as a conversation segue. Dende paused, smiling at Mr. Popo, confident in the fact that since Mr. Popo had a gender, all of this would make perfect sense to him.
"Questions?" he said, just to be sure.
Mr. Popo, on the other hand, looked as though he were beginning to get a headache. "No, sir," he said, rounded shoulders slumped. "Go on. I'm with you." And thinking I should get Bulma a better insurance policy, he thought to himself privately, but didn't say it aloud.
"All right," Dende agreed amiably, his normally keen observational powers clearly not up to snuff quite yet since his experience in the Room. Settling back and feeling comfortable for the first time in at least an hour, he continued.
From that point on, Vejiita's taunting was constant. Every time he was near her - which was far more often than it used to be - he would smirk, sneer, cross his arms, and make some comment or other on her hideous appearance. After a while, he figured out that remarks on her intellect bothered her as well, so he threw those in for a little variation.
By the second week after their encounter in the kitchen, Bulma had had enough. And when Bulma had had enough, it meant that Bulma was going to fight back.
She fought dirty.
It was fairly simple; she began by making sure that none of Vejiita's seemingly favorite foods were in the kitchen. She'd noticed his tendency toward meats, especially lamb and beef, and his apparent love of ice cream. So, although it hurt her to do it, all three of those items disappeared from the kitchen and were not to be restocked.
Any annoyance she herself felt at the lack of ice cream - especially coconut macadamia - was offset by the change in attitude from Vejiita. He became grouchy.
A few days into this new vegetarian diet, he began routing through the cabinets and pantry looking for something more substantial than the rice and greens that were now the Briefs staple meals. Of course, he didn't find anything; and once the ramen noodles were gone (at least those things had some FLAVOR, damnit), his attitude grew even worse. He took to scowling at mealtimes, pouting his way through the kitchen and training far harder than he ought. As far as Bulma was concerned, this was all very satisfying.
The second thing she did was just about as low a blow as she could come up with: she began talking about Gokuu.
Anytime he was around, she waxed eloquent on Gokuu's features - his strength, his speed, his agility - and simply would not stop until he went away. If he tried to insult her, she responded by directly comparing Vejiita to Gokuu - usually making at least one reference to height and quite a few more to superiority.
There was a basic pattern to it; he would attack her appearance, she would mention some demon or other that Gokuu had effortlessly killed, and then they would glare. A few more rounds of that, and one of them would be somehow declared the victor and smirk while the other muttered and glared at something else for a little while.
It grew to the point where their verbal dueling was terribly obvious to anyone in the room, and the tension was absolutely palpable. In fact, it became so obvious that even Yamucha noticed.
"You know," he said blithely one evening as he watched Bulma scowl and grouse around the room because she'd theoretically lost some verbal battle, "If I didn't know any better, I'd say you were enjoying this."
"Enjoying what?" she snapped at him, picking up random objects and putting them back down again as she searched for something to help cool her off.
"This weird... war you have going on with Vejiita," Yamucha said. He was sprawled in front of the fireplace, wearing what he considered to be "sexy" clothing (and she considered to be cheap-ass disco playboy, but that's another story), and obviously trying for a romantic evening. Just his luck that Vejiita would have gotten her all worked up first....
Bulma sighed and turned to face him. "WHAT war, Yamucha?" She looked impatient. "There IS no war. He's on our side now, rememberr? At least until we can bring Gokuu back, and that's about 70 days from now. What are you talking about?"
Yamucha shrugged in carefree ex-bandit style. "I dunno. Wanna play?" he said, grinning, trying to change the subject to more amorous matters.
Bulma sighed. "You really think we're at war?" she said, running one hand through her hair - which, for some unknown reason, she was currently keeping in a wildly permed ball around her head. "I don't want it to be a WAR."
Yamucha snorted. "Bullshit. You love wars."
She eyed him.
"You DO," he insisted, sitting up and letting his half-unbuttoned shirt gape open. "You always love wars. You love to argue, you love to disagree, you love to have snappy comebacks and win and then lose and then have to win again - you've ALWAYS been that way, and it seems like Vejiita's giving you just what you - "
"Yamucha," she interrupted, looking at his chest with slightly narrowed, speculative eyes and using a tone he knew meant trouble. "What's that on your chest?"
Yamucha paused. He'd been intending to give her a warning regarding her new plaything, to try to remind her that Vejiita was DANGEROUS, was not trustworthy, was still - in his heart - the enemy - but now he looked down, and all thoughts of Vejiita fled from his mind. "What's what on my - ACK!" He gasped and jerked his shirt closed with both hands, using such exuberance that it tore under one arm. "I... uh... I..."
Bulma's eyes had narrowed further; menacingly, she picked up the poker beside the fireplace and advanced toward him. "You have LIPSTICK... on your PECS?!?"
Now, Yamucha didn't really need to fear a woman with a poker; she had no ki, and physically, while stronger than average, she was hardly on his level of power. However, Bulma's skills of communication were almost unrivaled when she was angry, and the look in her eyes now left no room for bravado. Her irises seemed filled with blue fire.
"Um," he said, sliding toward the edge of the leather sofa. "It... it's not mine."
"I KNOW that!" Bulma shrieked. "How COULD you! We've TALKED about this!"
Yamucha seemed to be gauging the distance to the door. "Um... yeah, I know, but it didn't mean anything, she just ran at me after today's game and planted a couple of kisses before I could stop her and then I left, I swear, I had nothing to - oh, shit!"
Bulma ran at him; Yamucha ran at the door. He zipped out into the night, evening ruined, covering the back of his head with his hands lest she decide to throw the poker after him.
"You bastard! You cheating... son of a..."
He was gone.
Bulma looked after him for a moment, not even breathing heavily; and then she dropped the poker to the ground, where it hit with a clang and lay still.
"...why," she said, so very quietly; there was no answer. "Why do you always do this to me?" Her voice caught, not quite a choke; betrayed, she leaned against the doorframe, arms hanging limply at her sides and her expression filled with defeat. "...I love you... I KNOW you love me... why do you do this again and again and..."
"Talking to people who aren't there again, Woman?" challenged Vejiita, stepping out from the hallway. "Pretty soon you'll be insane enough that you won't even notice you're alone. At least then you'll finally be content."
Oh gods, what a time for this, Bulma thought wearily, and looked at him with an attempt at renewed anger in her eyes. "What do you want?" she snapped.
Vejiita didn't hesitate, but he almost did; something about her expression was... off, somehow. "Nothing from YOU - obviously you can't provide any man what he wants."
He'd meant it to cut; it was one of their sparring matches, or so he thought, and he was already trying to work through the responses she'd likely throw back at him in return. Only, she didn't do it.
Something in her eyes crumpled. Bringing her hands up to hide her face from his view, she began to cry. It was voiceless, but her shoulders shook, and almost too quickly, tears escaped her hands and slipped down her arms to drip onto the floor.
This reaction was completely unexpected. Vejiita had faced weeping people before - usually right before he killed them - so tears by themselves had no effect on him at all, except to sometimes make him more cruel. But this...
He took a step back; took another one. And then, for reasons he did not understand, simply turned and flew away - running as much as Yamucha had, berating himself for it and furious because he did not know why.
Bulma stayed where she was. She cried for a while, suffering the pangs and pruries of a broken heart; then she wiped her tears and put the poker back by the fire. Yes, it was true that she didn't seem capable of holding Yamucha's attention. She never really had been, once he'd realized just how attractive he was - and his current occupation of Baseball Super Star didn't help, either. But she loved him - really - and so, would just... put up with his constant infidelity. She would WIN his heart back, and make it hers forever. That's what she'd to. She....
Somehow, she kept herself from sobbing again; lips set tightly, she put the fire out and went up to her room, alone, determined to go to sleep and invent something absolutely world-shattering in the morning. THAT would show him; would show them all.
She cried herself to sleep.
Vejiita, meanwhile, flew only a short way before landing and snarling at the ground. What in hell had made him do that? Just... LEAVE when it was so obvious he'd won. He'd never gotten her to that state before, in fact had never SEEN her do that before, and -
...well. So that was it.
Vejiita frowned as he realized why her weeping had disturbed him so. Crying was weak; and he knew she was not.
She was physically pathetic as a wet dishrag, yes; but her mind was not weak, and neither was her will, and he realized that for the last several weeks he had been thoroughly enjoying an activity that he had not experienced in many, many years - challenge.
She had a wit tinged with vindictiveness that could keep up with his own, and it was keeping him sane on this planet where no one could present him challenge.
Vejiita pursed his lips, thinking about it; so then - why had she cried? He had not heard the conversation prior to his appearance on the stairs, so her behavior seemed utterly bizarre. She was willful; this made no SENSE...
Maybe she had her peroid? But no, he would have smelled it, and there was no major hormonal change. Well, okay, maybe there was SOME hormonal change - it was obvious from the pheromones in the room that Yamucha had been there attempting to be erotic. It was just as obvious that Bulma had not been, but that was hardly any reason to cry....
Now clinically curious, Vejiita lifted into the air and took off in the direction he'd seen Yamucha run, using his newly honed ki sense to track the idiot. Which idiot, by the way, wasn't even bothering to hide his ki signature; apparently, he thought he didn't have to be on his guard when not actually in a battle.
The fool.
Shaking his head at the ease of this hunt, Vejiita tracked Yamucha down to a small house just a few miles from the Capsule Corporation. Narrowing the idiot's presence to a room on the top floor, Vejiita hovered and peeked inside.
Ah.
Well. That would explain why his comment had hit so hard.
Vejiita didn't bother watching; Yamucha's affairs - literal or otherwise - were really his own disgusting business, but Vejiita had learned enough about human culture to know that the idiot wasn't supposed to be in there DOING that. Even if his own mate HAD (apparently) turned him down.
Hell, he should have just forced her; but Vejiita had also learned enough of human culture to know that that wasn't exactly approved behavior. Of course, neither was infidelity; but Yamucha didn't seem to find that as evil a sin. Odd; maybe he thought the one wouldn't hurt Bulma as much?
Possibly; after all, there was no question in Vejiita's mind that the idiot DID care about the woman, although it was a mystery to him how in hell said idiot had gained the woman in the FIRST place.
That kind of will and wit didn't belong with an idiot like that; and, in Vejiita's own twisted estimation, did not deserve the disrespect of infidelity.
Vejiita came to a decision at that moment. He did not like to see Bulma cry - subconsciously because he knew how he'd felt the one time he'd cried - and it was a stupid, wasteful, wrong -
... did he say wrong? No, that was a mental typo; he disregarded it.
- thing to do.
And it was absolutely none of his business.
Mentally shrugging the whole thing off, Vejiita flew back to the Capsule Corporation and landed on the roof - a place where he liked to sleep - and relaxed, only partially distracted by the night-soft sounds of weeping coming from the woman's window right below.
He dreamed about war.