Chapter 6 – Nightmare – Part 2

 "But please, Papa!" the little girl begs, staring up at her father with enormous, glossy eyes.

The mustached man chuckles as he ruffles her brightly colored hair.  "No, sweetheart.  How about a cute little kitten?"

"No!" she cries, stomping her foot in aggravation, her charm dismissed in favor of fury.  "I want a tiger!"

"Bulma, darling," he says soothingly, trying to reason with the temperamental five-year-old, "tigers don't make good pets.  I know he looks cute now, but when he grows up he'll turn mean and you'll have to get rid of him!  That isn't very nice, is it?  He'll be much happier in a zoo."

"No he won't!  He won't turn on me!  He won't be happier locked up in a cage!  I'll look after him and take care of him and love him, and I'll love him so much that he'll have to love me back, and he'll protect me!  He'll love me so much he'd never hurt me, he'll never even think of hurting me, and he'll fight for me, he'll kill anybody who tries to hurt me…"

Dr. Briefs tries to speak as Bulma finally stops to breathe, but she quickly continues on.  "He'll love me – me, and nobody else!  I'll be the only one in the whole world he cares about, and I'll love him for ever and ever!"

Bingo.  "If he loves you and no one else, though, what will keep him from attacking me or Mommy?"

Her face falls.  "I guess you're right, Papa."

Her father fades away as she stares through the glass at the tiger cub.  "I'm sorry," she whispers, as blue eyes meet tawny yellow.  "We could have been such great friends."  The cub yawns, baring his teeth.  She continues to watch, fascinated.  She chants her favorite poem, the words capturing her like a spell.

Tiger! Tiger! Burning bright

In the forests of the night,

What immortal hand or eye

Could frame thy fearful symmetry?

Everything disappears save the girl and the tiger.

In what distant deeps or skies

Burnt the fire of thine eyes?

On what wings dare he aspire?

What the hand dare seize the fire?

His yellow eyes twist and darken, becoming coal black, but never shedding their cold intensity.

And what shoulder, and what art,

Could twist the sinews of thy heart?

And when thy heart began to beat,

What dread hand forged thy dread feet?

His face and body morph into human form as they watch each other with unblinking eyes.

What the hammer? what the chain?

In what furnace was thy brain?

What the anvil? what dread grasp

Dare its deadly terrors clasp?

She has long since stopped speaking, but the words drone on.  Blake was writing about Satan, some part of her remembers. 

When the stars threw down their spears,

And watered heaven with their tears,

Did he smile his work to see?

Did he who made the Lamb make thee?*

Lucifer: the fallen angel.

He slowly steps forward – or is it she who moves closer?  She can't tell.  She can't really see anything.  All she knows is that she's still staring into darkness.  She feels, rather than sees, his hand reach out and touch her cheek.  "Who are you?" she murmurs as she finally closes her eyes.

*****

Vegeta looks down at the sleeping woman.  His expression is blank as he touches her cheek with his bare hand.  Her skin is still warm and dry with fever.  She mumbles something, and he jerks his hand away.

 Stupid woman, he grumbles silently.  Couldn't you have told someone to fix the training room before running off to that idiot?  Not that he could really train with his injured foot, but he could at least have supervised the renovations.  Instead, he's stuck here, watching a woman toss and turn with fevered dreams.  The washcloth on her forehead has gotten warm, but the maid will be back any moment to attend to that.

As if on cue, ChiChi bustles through the door, swatting Vegeta aside as she turns to Bulma.  Vegeta quietly sits down on the chair he has pulled close to the woman's bed.  He watches the maid work with a fixed expression of faint boredom, his arms folded over his chest, his eyes vacant.

He wonders briefly why the maid hasn't bothered to scold him.  When he carried Bulma out of her chauffeured car last night, ChiChi simply took one look at the soaked, unconscious woman and nodded him inside.  She'd already called a doctor, and she even had the man look at Vegeta's foot when he was finished with Bulma.  All this she did without a single question.  To this moment, she still hasn't asked about what happened.  He gets the feeling that this is about to change as ChiChi opens her mouth to speak.

"I take it you were both attacked."

He grunts.

"Was it…was it Yamcha?"

"Perhaps."  He doesn't like all of these questions.

"Have you said or done anything to make him think that Bulma is being unfaithful?" she demands.

"What?" Where is this coming from?  To his total shock, ChiChi looks like she's ready to scream or cry.  She does both.

"He'll kill her!  God knows he cares for her in his own way, but he's so jealous!  What if he already suspects something?  What if this was his revenge?" she shouts, tears spouting from her eyes.

"Damn it, girl, shut up!  You're giving the statues headaches!"  He sighs.  "You don't have to worry."  He remembers what he heard through the apartment walls.  "If he was behind the attack, it was aimed solely at me.  The woman didn't look like herself.  They probably thought she was disposable."

ChiChi shudders at the disinterested tone he gives the word...disposable...but he has succeeded in quieting her fears as well as her voice.  She doesn't trust him, but she can't think of a reason why he would lie.  She shakes herself, then decides to ignore him and concentrate on her employer.  He, on the other hand, has already blocked the maid out completely, lost in the memory of that day.

He tailed them all morning, following them through the art exhibit without difficulty.  He admired the woman's taste in art, but watched in disgust as the foolish man salivated over her figure.  His job, unfortunately, was to watch his enemy, as he kept reminding himself.  He wondered occasionally what he was doing.  It wasn't as if Yamcha would tell Bulma about his real "job."  Thinking about it at one point, he allowed himself a small smirk at the picture:

"Hi, honey, I'm home!"

"Hello, Yamcha!  How was work today?"

"Oh, same-old, same-old.  Threatened a few widowers and pensioners, blew up a grocery store, and rigged a dog fight."

"That's nice, dear.  Wash your hands before you come to supper."

Lunch was an incredibly boring matter, with the idiot blabbering on about New York, and the woman drinking it all in as if he had bought her Paradise.  Nothing could have prepared him for the scene in the fiend's apartment, however.  Having to listen through the wall as they…

He shakes himself, forcing his mind back into the present.  He watches ChiChi rub Bulma's feet, trying to bring the fever down.  He won't let himself think about what he heard.  The worst part of it all is the strange, alien feeling that claws at his stomach at even the idea of the woman with that slime.  He's no worse than you are, though, his subconscious tells him.  Not that it matters.  Nothing matters but revenge.  I can't let this blind me.  I shouldn't be here, damn it all!

An hour later, ChiChi turns to him, and is surprised to see that he is still awake.  He's just been sitting here all this time?

"I have nothing better to do, thanks to your idiot of an employer," he says, reading either her mind or her face.  She can't tell which idea is more unnerving.

She twiddles her thumbs as she looks at the clock.  "Well, if you really don't have anything else to do…"  She stops.  Is this a good idea?  She's completely helpless!  Do I really want to leave her alone with this man?  But I really need to see Goku.  What am I saying?  I've never even talked to him!  How can I be sure that he can help us?  He does work for Yamcha…but he seems so nice…perhaps it's worth the risk.

"Well, girl, are you going to finish your sentence before I do find something else to occupy my time?"

She still hesitates.  Am I doing this for her…or because I want to meet Goku?  She looks down at Bulma.  For her.

"I need to go see someone.  I'll be back soon, but I can't leave Miss Bulma alone.  Will you stay with her until I return?"

He gives her a penetrating look.  "You trust me with her?"

She stares straight back – she isn't so weak that she can be defeated with a simple glare!  "I have no choice.  If you lay one finger on her, I swear that you'll regret it for the rest of your life!  And you can trust me when I say that 'the rest of your life' won't be a very long time!"

He doesn't even blink.  "I wasn't planning on touching her.  Believe it or not, I do not consider pneumonia a turn-on!"

ChiChi just huffs as she walks to the door, taking one last look before she leaves for the speakeasy.

Vegeta doesn't move.  As the stars fly past, invisible to the people in the city, he stares at Bulma.  Clocks cycle in the silence for three long hours before the woman suddenly sits up in bed, staring at him with blind eyes.

"He'd never hurt me," she murmurs.  "He'll never even think of hurting me, and he'll fight for me…"  She finishes with innocent certainty, then closes her eyes and falls back onto the bed.

Vegeta doesn't trust himself to reply, even while Bulma is asleep.  He knows what his answer should be, but he has a haunting suspicion that his life has become much more complicated than "should" and "must."

"Damn you, woman," he mutters as he continues to watch her sleeping form.



* Blake, William. "The Tyger."