by DoraMouse
Part Six: 763 A.D.
The sky was awash with color - reds, yellows and oranges lingered near the distant horizon, fading into pale blue, dark purple and sheer black further up. The natural landscape was peaceful, quiet and filled with the sort of dignified presence that tends to be a result of age.
A sunset.
Vegeta had seen countless sunsets in his lifetime and regardless of the planet he was on, it was always the same type of view. Whether on the saiyan world or some alien planet - a sunset was a sort of universal expereince, something that almost everyone could understand or relate to. True, there had been planets with multiple suns or abnormally long nights but those kinds of traits had just seemed to make the sunsets on those worlds all the more noteworthy.
He was on Earth now, he had been for a few months. It was the second time that Vegeta had ever been on this planet and while he felt stranded, it wasn't a total loss. He was alive again anyway. That was more than he'd expected to get from the humans, a second chance at life. Plus they'd tried to kill Freezia for him.
Vegeta scowled as he hovered. He'd wanted to kill Freezia on his own. Vegeta didn't know what to expect from these Earthlings but he knew that they'd have some favors to ask of him eventually since he did owe them now. It was a debt of honor and he wanted to be free of that debt. He had his own plans, his own life to get on with after all. Vegeta wished that the Earthlings would make up their minds already and just ask him to do something so that he could get on with his life. He wasn't sure what to do with himself in the meantime.
The silly blue-haired girl that seemed to follow Earths better warriors around had offered him a place to stay. The offer had been tempting since it looked like she lived in a palace but she'd also taken in around sixty namek refugees. So Vegeta had declined. He wasn't going to push his luck by hanging around a batch of green creatures that he'd previously murdered.
Speaking of luck...
Surviving in the wild wasn't all that hard. Camping, hunting, being independant - Vegeta had done it plenty of times before. He'd kept wandering, moving his camp site often in case the half-saiyan brat or tall namek changed their minds about letting him stay alive. And the deeper into the forest Vegeta had gone, the more often he'd stumbled across pawprints.
Raditzs final words had been utterly scambled by static but Vegeta had occasionally wondered, out of sheer curiosity, if the reverse ocelot was still alive.
As he drifted downward Vegeta glanced around, scanning the area and trying to decide which spot looked most comfortable. He usually slept in trees. Being off the ground meant that you were a little bit harder to see and in some cases, harder to reach.
Abruptly Vegeta blinked and squinted in a certain direction. Then he flew off in pursuit of something. Not flying at full speed since he would pass whatever he was chasing if he went too fast.
Vegeta couldn't have had any idea that roughly 26 years ago, a spacepod containing a saiyan infant had landed in this very forest.
The chase ended at a small wooden shack that was surrounded by giant weeds. The cat disappeared inside, jumping nimbly through a hole where the wall had been forced aside by the roots of a plant whose vines covered the hut and almost seemed to hold the meager structure together. Vegeta was intrigued - this place could definately be more comfortable than sleeping in trees. The creaky door came off its rusted hinges at his touch but he remained cautiously optimistic.
Inside, the place was lit by rays of fading sunlight that shone down through the cracks in the ceiling and the walls. The floor was carpeted by a green moss that had little yellow flowers and the whole place was heavily perfumed by the various native plants that had reclaimed the area. The few pieces of furniture present were covered in dust and had plants growing either on or around them. A bundle of black fur dotted with gold markings was perched atop of a sturdy retangular metal box that was held shut by an oversized padlock.
"Hmmm." Vegeta flicked the lock. It crumbled to dust. "Lets see what you've found."
He only had to start to lift the lid of the box before the cat took the hint and went to sit elsewhere. Out of habit, Vegeta gingerly threw the lid back and quickly stepped away from the box, as if half expecting it to explode or contain some other sort of trap. The lid of the box squeaked, swinging on its hinges but nothing else happened.
Vegeta cautiously peered into the box. He found a lot of paperwork with writing in the Common language. At a glance, it looked like most of the stuff was the correspondance of someone called Gohan. Vegeta flinched then assured himself that it couldn't mean the Gohan that he knew. Some of the letters were dated and there was just no way the brat was that old.
Under all the papers were a few other items - some books, a photo album, a sword and a handful of assorted trinkets. And a blanket that was wrapped around something.
Vegeta tugged at a corner of the cloth, trying to get an idea of what the item was without unwrapping it. He was startled to catch a glimpse of his own familys emblem, inlaid in ivory on a framework of silver that was studded with precious stones.
The ceremonial saiyan crown.
Vegeta hadn't seen this thing since he'd been four or five years old but he recognized it instantly. Back then, when he'd been five, the crown had been kept on a short velvet pedestal in the throne room of the saiyan palace. Now, 26 years later, here he was pulling the very same crown out of some tiny abandoned hut on an alien planet.
He unwrapped the crown and sat in awe of it for a while, thinking about how much things had changed in his lifetime. And they had to change more.
Vegetas expression became determined, he lifted the crown and walked with it out of the hut. A carefully aimed energy blast leveled a tree. The Prince placed the crown on the tree stump and proceeded to cut the wood into smaller pieces. Though it was getting ever darker outside, the task didn't take long. Vegeta had soon built a pyre around the tree stump. He lit the pyre and stood watching in defiant silence as the flames licked against the metal.
Prince. That royal title was a source of pride. But King - that title could be nothing more than a burden.
If you were a King then you had to live your life in accordance with the cultures traditions, you had to live in the shadows of your ancestors achievements. It was as if you were just a puppet and everyone would always compare your preformances to the acts given by previous Kings.
Being a King meant having to get married to a noble women for political reasons by a certain age - Vegeta was already well past that age - and you had to raise a heir. Vegeta knew from the experience of being a heir that this essentially meant turning your own kid into your worst nightmare. Vegeta wasn't interested in raising kids, much less ones that wanted to kill him. Having a family in general was unappealing. Family meant having to compromise - having to be what someone else wanted you to be instead of being yourself. King... You had to have a good image, a few people you could trust and allies that respected you. There were all sorts of pressures and expectations.
Vegeta didn't want to deal with any of that. He was content to be a Prince, to be solitary and above all, to be himself. There was no point in trying to be King. He didn't trust anyone, he didn't have any political allies and he didn't really have anyone to rule anyway. There couldn't be more than handful of saiyans still alive and those were scattered out across the universe. Most of the survivors would probably never even realize that their homeworld was gone.
He was almost free.
Raditz was dead. Freezia was hopefully dead. Nappa was dead. Vegeta had killed Nappa - the only other saiyan elite he'd known of and the only person qualified to crown him as King. So there was just one saiyan left that concerned Vegeta, one warrior that might know about the crown and that might eventually somehow try to force him into being a King. Only one warrior that might try to convince him to take on the daunting chore of restoring their culture. Kakarott.
Vegetas scowl deepened.
So the one threat left to his personal freedom was an idiot that was too strong to die easily. Kakarott was supposed to be a low-class warrior but instead he had turned out to be legendary. It might prove a challenge for Vegeta to kill him. Although... Kakarott hadn't returned to Earth yet so maybe he was still battling Freezia or maybe that battle had killed both of them - Vegeta could only hope. If he didn't get news soon, he was going to have to find a way to return to space and learn what had happened.
The crown eventually began to melt, taking on several deformed and twisted poses as it was slowly reduced to a glittering puddle. Vegeta speeded the process along with a few small energy blasts before stomping out the silvery ashes and retiring to a tree branch. The hut was okay but it needed to air out - all the plant smells aggravated his senses.
Between having watched the fire and then being asleep, the Prince didn't notice a sleek dark shadow slipping in and out of the hut. This continued through the night. The cat walked on padded feet, hardly making a sound as it relocated every single one of the other items that had been in the box.
When sunrise came, the box sat empty and the cat was nowhere in sight.
Later that day, a young boy would go outside for a bit. He'd playfully chase his purple pet dragon around and because of the game of tag, he'd eventually be guided to the cave where the possessions were. Gohan would always wonder why the belongings of an adoptive great-grandfather that he'd never met had been in a pile in a cave outside his home. And he'd always wonder how Icarus had known to lead him there.
But, a little more than anything else, he'd always wonder what sort of creature he'd seen walking so nimbly across the tree branches outside the cave. With the amount of the studying that Gohan had done in his life, he had been mildly surprised to see an animal whose species he didn't recognize. It had been some kind of giant black cat...
Dedication
This story is dedicated to the two silent Looney Tunes characters that inadvertantly inspired it: the bulldog Mark Anthony and the adorable but nameless little Black Kitten that changes his life. May all of us be so fortunate as to have our bad luck come to us in such a likeable form.
Often times when I can not find a story that fills a certain blank, I write one. This story is an example of that habit of mine.
Please do forgive the shortness of this story. I realize that I have spanned approxmiately 26 years (the chapter titles were the years) in six parts. There are many reasons I did it this way but the main reason I wrote the story this way is because I am busy working on several other projects.
Raditzs age is not, to my knowledge, officially specified aside from the fact that he is older than Goku. However in case it helps anyone to picture him, for this story I've placed Raditz as being born in the year 730 A.D. Which means thatRaditz is 2 years older than Vegeta, 7 years older than Goku and 27 years older than Gohan. It also means that Raditz is shown as being around age 7 in the first chapter of this story, age 9 in chapter two, age 13 in chapter three, age 24 in chapter four and dying at the age of 31 in chapter five. He's been dead for about a year and half by the time chapter six takes place.
The story dates I've used fit with the official timelines.
I hope you have enjoyed reading this short story.