A/N: Well, I seem to be back. ^_^;;; (knocks on computer desk) Anyone still with me? ^_^;; I'm so sorry about the delay – life really got in the way of writing for a while there again. I'll make this a short A/N this time, but let me just say many thanks to Renee, bararaven, unsigned, soyamiso, Zel, Viki, and Caralin Fury for the truly spiffy reviews, and I'll see what I can do about putting more humor, cliffhangers (smiles evilly), and smoochies into the next chapters. Oh, yes, and you've probably figured out by now that there's the usual secondary pairing in this story. (grins)
Prince Quest, a Cracked Fairy Tale
Chapter Eleven: Ghost in the Book
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The warmest of hellos to such a charming Audience. A humble person such as myself does not wish to interrupt your perusal of the Author's latest effort for any longer than I must this evening, so without further ado, please behold the next sequence of events in the further adventures of Bulma-the-Beautiful and Companions.
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Bulma strode down the hall behind the not-so-tall prince, still carrying her knapsack, which she'd completely forgot to take off during dinner, so nervous she'd been. For a short man, he walked very fast. Too fast, but she wasn't going to give him the satisfaction of complaining that he was difficult to keep up with. He'd only spite her and break into a sprint; he was just that type. She made a determined effort not to look at his backside, but raised her eyes to the small of his back and examined what she could see of his waist-wrapped tail instead. I wonder if it's soft, or bristly like a hairbrush? I'd love to find out.
There was a hissing sound from ahead of her. "Woman, would you stop staring at my tail?" the prince demanded.
"How did you know that I was?" Please don't tell me he can read minds or has hidden eyes in the back of his head. That would just be so unfair!
"I could feel it. Look at something else instead."
Bulma drew herself up to her full height, and sniffed at his back. "Prince Vegeta, I am a scientist, in addition to being incredibly lovely and possessed of intelligence beyond your wildest dreams. You are a member of an alien race. I have never seen a were-monkey before. I have an insatiably curious mind. What do you expect me to do? I will look at your tail if I want to!"
"You will not." He circled to the right. "Walk in front of me instead, or beside me."
Bulma came up next to him. "Oh, very well. You're not much fun, are you?" She noticed he had slowed his pace so that they could walk abreast easily. She was glad, in a sense, because it gave her a chance to track the direction in which they were going in this convoluted palace. Really, a building that resembled a fat, short-legged octopus shouldn't be so hard to navigate.
"No, I am not 'fun' at all. Why should I be?" He stared straight ahead, leaving the Baron's daughter to watch the walls go by or choose to force him to turn back to her. "Turn here," he said as they veered off to the right and arrived at one of the many sets of double doors that existed seemingly everywhere. This one was made of dark brown wood, with the same crest inset above that could be seen at the entryway to the palace. The prince pulled on the handles and the doors swung apart. He went in ahead of Bulma, pausing so that he did not run into the person who was currently occupying the space in which they wanted to be.
Bulma looked up, startled, at another very tall Saiyan. He had the longest hair she'd ever seen on any man, thigh length, and spiky all the way from top to bottom. He was quite attractive, also, in the same fierce way the other Saiyans she'd seen were.
"Radditz," the prince said in dark tones, having noticed Bulma's intrigued expression, "Your long-lost brother Kakarrot has arrived with this Human. You have my permission to go and meet him, though you will probably be disappointed in him. He seems to be an idiot."
The tall Saiyan stared at Prince Vegeta with some surprise. "Kakarrot is here? Father said he would return someday. I see…he is one of the Five then. That I did not expect." He nodded and stepped around Bulma and into the hall, a sudden, unpleasant smile breaking out on his face. "I will go, as you have said, and see what he is made of, my Prince." The doors swung closed behind him.
"You look like a fool," the Saiyan prince told his unwelcome companion.
"Oh? And why is that?"
"Are you not supposed to be of comparatively high rank? You are drooling over a Guard."
"Ewww, you're so tasteless. I am not 'drooling over' him. I was simply appreciating his musc – his hair. I didn't come here for him, did I? I came here for…to see if you were truly eligible."
"If I had been given a choice, I would have mated with one of my race long ago, only because my damned parents would never shut up about the importance of securing the succession if I did not. I had none. The Book says that either I take you as a mate, or we will all die. You heard this a short while ago. So, I am eligible – but only to you."
He said those last words with such anger that Bulma recoiled from him. "I'm so dreadfully sorry you feel that way, Prince Vegeta, but I didn't tell the Ones to give you that information, so don't keep complaining about it to me."
The Saiyan's answer was to walk away from her, something the beauty was beginning to become unwillingly used to. Bulma tossed her hair, and trailed after him, her ponytail bouncing as she stared extra, extra hard at his tail, hoping that he could feel it. Pretty soon he would be well out of the eligible bachelor category on the Scale, and into "Run from this man fast; he's only fit to live with himself in a cave," territory. And yet, it didn't matter what he was like. If they survived, they would end up together. She could see that now. The Ones advocated free will, but in some cases, as in the heroic tales, Heroes had to bend their wills to deal with certain circumstances. I guess that makes me a Hero before I've even done anything heroic. What a strange thought. Well, I never asked for it. All I wanted was to be acknowledged for my superior beauty and genius, to achieve great scientific breakthroughs, and, of equal or greater importance, to have a family. What sort of a family could I have with someone like him? She suddenly realized she had been so deep in thought that they had gone down the hall to its very end without her having noticed a single thing about her present surroundings. The prince had not complained about her intrusive gaze, either, surprisingly enough. One of the omnipresent Guards stood by the door, her face inscrutable, though just for an instant, open fascination flashed across her dark features. She bowed quickly, and drew the doors open for the arriving pair.
"Go," said the prince.
Bulma went by him, making sure to take her time, and stepped into the room. It was very gloomy inside, and the only light was that which reached inward from the hall. "Candles or electricity, don't you have any?"
"Of course." But he shut the doors behind him, and left them both in the dark.
"Ahem."
Prince Vegeta started laughing in a most unpleasant manner. "Can you not see?"
"And you can?"
"I can see well enough, but if you insist, I will give you some light so that your feeble eyes can see the Book, and then you can remove yourself from my chambers shortly thereafter."
Bulma didn't hear him moving, but the room was suddenly flooded with red light. "Your chambers? I can't be in your chambers. That's completely inappropriate."
"You have nothing to worry about. This is only an outer room. I use it as what you Earth people would refer to as a study."
Gazing around the room, Bulma immediately fixated on the large table with the hefty book that rested there. "Oh!" she exclaimed, moving nearer. "Say, is it not possible to get some better light in here?"
The prince snorted. "You want paler light? Very well." He turned the dial on the wall near her a notch to the right, and the young woman's request was granted.
"Thank you. May I look at the Book?"
"Why in the hell else would I have brought you here? Sit down and open it to any page. It does not matter which one, for your answer will be there."
"I see. This should be interesting." Bulma sat in the chair nearest the Book, and gingerly opened it to what turned out to be page 369. She didn't know what she should expect, but the ornate script wasn't a surprise in an ancient book.
Once upon a time
There was a girl who wanted to marry a prince
But the prince was flawed and angry
So the girl thought she should go home
But she knew she must stay
For the good of the world
~Welcome, Bulma-the-Beautiful Briefs.~
"It talks! I mean, it writes! And it knows my name! Amazing." Bulma turned to the prince, who was standing a few feet from the table, arms crossed over his chest, her eyes round and wondering.
He sneered at her. "Consider yourself fortunate, for he appears to 'speak' but rarely."
Bulma turned back to the table. "Um. Hello, Book."
~You may call me Cilly, if you like.~
"Silly? Oh. That's your name?"
~A pet name, as it were. My name is Cillantro-Jicama, the Mad Prophet of Vegetasei.~
"I thought mad people didn't know they were mad."
~Dead mad people do.~
"Oh." I'm saying 'Oh' much too much here.
~I suppose you would like to know why you were brought to the prince's chambers.~
"Well, yes, I would." Bulma was feeling rather uncomfortable in a closed room with an attractive man who wasn't a member of her family, and who would be impossible to flirt with due to his pathetically bad attitude, so she was happy to have this 'conversation' hastened.
~I render advice to those of the royal family who need it. Sometimes they even listen to me. My advice to you, Honorable Crumpet, is that you will need to make a great change in yourself soon. Be prepared for it, but do not be afraid. I will speak with you more in the coming days, for I know you are tired, but this information you needed to know.~
"A great change? What kind of change? And what's a crumpet?"
~Just be prepared~
Page 369 went blank before Bulma's eyes. She gasped. "The writing's gone."
Prince Vegeta yawned. "And, now, so are you. I will have a servant show you to your room. I have better things to do with my time at the moment."
"Such as?"
"Such as resume my training, so that the Greatest Evil does not overwhelm us as soon as he arrives."
Bulma closed the book and stood up. "Fine. I can't believe I was dragged all the way here for one paragraph, and now I get thrown out, summarily, by someone who doesn't know how to behave in company. Now, do you know what a crumpet is?"
The prince shook his head. "I do not. The mad prophet speaks strangely. It is probably some type of armor. He spoke to me of doubloons, but there is no such word in our language or in Common Standard."
"He compared me to armor? Hmph. It can't be that. Mayhap it's some kind of gorgeous, night-blooming flower."
Prince Vegeta shrugged, and pressed a button on the wall on what Bulma now saw to be a complex intercommunications network. "Send someone to show the Blue-Haired Woman to an appropriate suite in Wing One."
Barely a minute later, while the reluctant pair was staring anywhere but at one another, there was a knock on the door. "Enter, damn you!" growled the royal Saiyan.
The door opened slightly, and a non-Saiyan face peered around it. Bulma recognized the ruffled hair and whiskers of a Darydican, one of the catlike creatures who lived on an island to the south. She had never seen one before save on A-22 Vid Vision's travel channel. Maybe she'd be able to talk to her or him later.
Bulma glowered at the prince. "I've basically said this before, and you'll definitely hear it from me again, because you deserve it, but you're nearly the rudest man I've ever met. If I'm going to stay here for a while, I will have to teach you some better ways to go on. Good night!" She left, hearing him call her a bossy serving wench as she went, and not much caring. She would be glad to rest for a chance, and think on the events of the busy day. Besides, she'd get him back for it sometime; she wasn't a member of the high-achieving Briefs family for nothing.
*** **** ****
While Bulma was eating and receiving her cryptic message from the Book of Prophecies, Possibilities, and Ponderous Utterances, Goku and Bardock had gone to the kitchens, which were on the first and second floor of the main building. Goku had learned what his father knew of the Prophecy, and had prepared himself in his own mind to fight this new enemy. After all, he was pretty strong, and he wouldn't back down from a battle like this one under any circumstances. He could care less about the Saiyans at this point in time; they sounded like they had lived to kill in the past, but Bardock had said they would train with him, and he looked forward to sparring with fighters of his own ability or higher. He would improve much faster that way, and they could always learn to be better people.
Upon entering the huge open room, with stoves and contrivances the like of which he had never seen in all his life, Goku's stomach immediately growled. He looked around, but saw no sign of Chi-Chi. Then he heard her voice coming from the upper floor, which he saw could be reached by a staircase at the back of the room. She was telling someone to hurry up and take a meal to Wing Seven. His heartbeat sped up a little. My bossy Chi-Chi. She hasn't changed. Of course, it's only been a few days, so I guess she wouldn't, really. I hope she isn't still mad at me. He went to the staircase.
"Chi-Chi!" he called. Two startled faces appeared at the top of the stairs. One was that of his wife, and the other was a person who looked a lot like a walking rat.
"Goku? Goku!" the black-haired woman said, first with the sound of disbelief coloring her voice, then with excitement. "Hurry up," she repeated to the rat person, and started down the stairs.
Goku bounded up them and met her halfway. "Chi-Chi."
"Oh, Goku…wait a minute, how did you find me here?"
She turned her face up to his, and the young man from Spargate felt a strange, painful tightening in his throat. Maybe he should have eaten first, he thought, for look what happened to him when he didn't get enough food. "I followed your smell…your scent. Remember how I always told you how good you smelled? That's how I found you. I met some new friends along the way, and it turned out one of them was coming here too, so we made to Vegetable in a less than a day. Chi-Chi, why'd you leave?"
"I remember." Suddenly his wife's eyes were awash in tears, which made him cringe. Usually after the tears came the yelling, and if she was really mad, the flying frying pan attack. "Goku, I didn't think you would even try to find us. I love you, and I've had such a lot of patience with you all this time we've been wed, but this time I felt I had to leave. If I didn't, it was like the whole world would come to an end."
Goku nodded, understanding crashing over him like a troll's fist into bread. "I know what you mean, and it's okay. It's all part of some prophecy. My father told me about it. He's right here…" He realized Bardock wasn't next to him any longer, but was watching them from the floor below while leaning against one of the counters, munching on a small cake of some sort. "Hey, do you want to meet him?"
"Your father?"
"Uh huh. I'm a Saiyan just like all the people here, though I'll always be a Human in my heart. I came from some place called Vegetasei before Grandpa found me. That makes Gohan half-Saiyan, and that's why we were born with tails."
"I thought you looked a whole lot like them, and you do look just like him, only," Chi-Chi's voice lowered to a whisper for the next word, "handsomer, but I don't see most of them up close. We've only been here a couple of days. Gohan and I were lucky like you, and we got a ride most of the way from an old couple who were visiting their daughter in Blue-Silver-Red. We walked the last few miles ourselves."
"I still don't understand how you knew to come here," Goku said, scratching his head.
"I saw an advertisement in the Cooking for Large Appetites monthly, and suddenly I knew I had to go, especially after you left for that tournament. You can't be gone all the time, and fighting all the time. You know that."
"Sorry, Chi-Chi, but you yelled at me when I didn't work, and at least I made enough money to keep us for a couple of years. Fighting's in my blood, and now I know why."
His wife sighed, and then her arms went around him. "Now I know why, too. I've seen the Saiyans training. You're an alien, and who'd have imagined it?"
Goku hugged her back, glad for the strength provided by her half-Demon blood, so he didn't have to be so careful with her. "You'll stay here with me? I've got to help the Saiyans defeat some kind of Greatest Evil, but we could go back home after that."
"I'll stay. I like this work. I've already had compliments on my cooking from the Royal Family, isn't that great?"
"Yeah, it is." The young man rubbed his stomach. "Nobody cooks better than you do! So, where's my Gohan?"
"He's upstairs. We have two rooms off the kitchen. And he's reading his books, like the good boy he is. Oh, and Goku? Nobody here knows he has a tail unless you told your father…I had him hide it when we were traveling, so we wouldn't attract any attention, and he hasn't been out of our room much. But your father might be pleased to know he has a grandson as wonderful as Gohan."
Goku stepped away from his wife, and looked to Bardock, who was now eating a leg of some huge, unidentified animal. Obviously the older Saiyan read what was in his eyes, for he swallowed the last of his meal, and set the bones down on a plate that lay on the counter beside him. Then he came over to join the pair on the stairs. "Father, this is my wife, Chi-Chi. Chi-Chi, this is my father, Bardock."
Bardock nodded curtly, and Chi-Chi said, "Pleased to meet you," with a wary smile. Goku asked his newly acquired parent if he wanted to meet Gohan. Upon his receipt of a grudging but positive response, he, his wife, and his father started up the stairs.
"Wait!"
Goku angled his head to the side and saw a tall, long-maned Saiyan approaching them.
"So, I hear that I have a tailless younger brother. I'm Radditz."
"You don't look much like me," Goku said abruptly, eyeing the newcomer, and wishing they'd all shut the hell up about his tail.
"He favors my mate, your mother, Shiriuma," Bardock put in. "Come, Radditz. You can meet Kakarrot's whelp with us, and then we'll all get something to eat. I'll page Shiriuma when we get upstairs so we can cover the initial boring, time-wasting meeting of the reunited family all at once."
Goku's eyes narrowed. Bardock seemed just like the rest of the Saiyans he'd met so far, outwardly unconcerned with the bonds of blood. All the man seemed to care about was whether or not he was a good fighter. Oh, well, he couldn't be expected to be a loving father at first sight, or probably tenth sight either. And as for himself, he'd prove his strength to his parents and see what happened after that. If it came down to that they didn't give a damn about him, well, that wasn't the main reason he'd come to the palace. One of the main reasons was standing right before him, and the other was at the top of the stairs.
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We have arrived at the end of another chapter, my dear Audience, and I thank you for listening so intently to this tale. What shall befall the Blue-Haired Beauty next? I should think it would be sleep, but one never knows. I wonder what she's wearing right now…ahem, never mind what I just said, Gentlefolk. Certainly we can expect that she will have further encounters with her Handsome Prince, sad as that fact may be to Yours Truly. Until we meet again, may sunflowers grow tall in your gardens, and all who cross your paths speak kindly to you. Good night, Timaeus Glib, long-suffering Narrator.
A/N: Thanks for reading! ^_^
