A DRAGONBALL HONEYMOON © 2004 Darke Angelus
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The tiger clock with the wagging tail and rolling eyes claimed it was ten to five in the morning.
Trunks' eyes snapped open and did a quick scan of his new bedroom, as was usual. He had been moved out of the nursery into his very own "big boy's bed" a month before his parents marriage, even though he was barely a year and a half old. The logic of him continuing to sleep in a crib was ludicrous. That became clear when he not only demonstrated his ability to easily jump out when the mood suited him, but to also break through the flimsy wooden bars when he really wanted to make a point. He was developing fast for his age, with arcane reflexes and coordination skills that a five-year-old human child would envy. But that was the whole crux of the present dilemma; Trunks was only half human and that half was being quickly swamped by his other side that was fast becoming the dominant one. The one that was alien, and adversarial to any change in his routine, no matter how minute.
He was not responding well to his parents' absence. He didn't understand the explanations that his increasingly harried grandmother was trying to offer him as his irritation grew; words of "honeymoon", "Dragonballs", and "private time" were meaningless. All that he knew was that it was six fingers' worth of days (he could already count to fifteen) that his parents had gone off without him. And, in true Saiyan fashion, so much like his father-
-he was getting royally pissed off.
He slid out of bed and navigated the inky blackness of the room easily (no nightlight for him, Saiyan boys learned to accept darkness as an ally early in their lives), heading for the door. The furnishings were alarmingly Spartan for a boy of his age. Against the far was a small desk where Trunks did his coloring and its legs, like that of the matching chair, were riddled with teeth marks. Mercifully, the boy's period of rabid teething seemed to be nearing an end. There were no stuffed animals that survived more than a week of his roughhousing without ending up a pile of tattered stuffing. The few battered survivors; a poorly re-stitched Eeyore, an Elmo missing one arm, and an earless raccoon, watched his progress from their shelf, almost seeming to cringe.
His room was across the hall from his parents and his bright blue eyes sparkled with hope when he went to their door and opened it.
"Daddy? Momma?" he squeaked, craning his small head inside of the dark room. He sniffed the air curiously and the scents (or lack of them) confirmed what his eyes already noticed when they flicked to the king-sized bed. Everything was undisturbed. His parents were still missing. They had left him behind. They had... forgotten about him?
Angry tears welled in his eyes and he sniffed them back, proudly straightening his spine. Little princes didn't resort to immature tears, his father told him so. Little princes could scream until their lungs burst, smash anything within reach, and behave atrociously to anyone they saw- but they didn't cry. Not EVER.
Taking a deep breath, he let it out in a huff and approached the bed, clutching the thick comforter with angry fingers. He pulled all of the bedding to the floor and tramped on it, jumping up and down and making angry snorts until he literally exhausted himself. Collapsing into the rumbled sheets and blankets, he drew them around and around his small form until it resembled a cocoon and he fell asleep that way, comforted by the faint smell of both parents that enveloped him.
Bulma's father found him that way late that same morning. The boy hadn't been in his room and Mrs. Briefs had gone on a hysterical search of the headquarters building looking for the boy. A little more methodical then his wife (but still eccentric as hell), Dr. Briefs calmly walked across the hall and into his daughter and son-in-law's room and found his grandson curled up on the floor amid a littler of bedding, still sleeping away.
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"So he is all right?" Bulma confirmed with relief, staring at her mother on the video display built into the console of her small hoverjet. It was a redundant question, really. She could hear the small boy arguing with his grandfather in the background.
"He's just fine, dear-" Mrs. Briefs chirped pleasantly.
As if in denial, Trunks was screaming "Nonono!" It sounded as if he was having a Grand Mal temper tantrum in the living room.
"-Just entering the Terrible Two's a little early is all. He's such a precocious child," she tittered with delight.
Bulma heard something fragile break followed by a staccato of small fists and feet thrumming the carpet in frustrated fury. A rivulet of nervous sweat ran down the small of her back. "Mom, if things are getting too much out of control, we can cut our Honeymoon short-"
Behind her, in the small lounge area where Vegeta was helping himself to a snack, she heard the Saiyan release an irritated growl.
"Nonsense!" the blonde chirped. "Everything is completely under control-"
In the background she could hear her father yelling, "Trunks! Don't you dare-!"followed by a crash of glass.
"-No problem," Mrs. Briefs finished serenely. "So, where are you two lovebirds headed now?"
"Uh..." Bulma called up a readout on the GPS system. "Africa, from the looks of it."
"Oh! Excellent!" the older woman squeaked in excitement. "Could you pick me up a Vegeta while you're down there?"
The Saiyan appeared over Bulma's right shoulder and glared down into the monitor. "Woman, if you'd open your eyes for just once in your life, you would plainly see that I'm right here, and I'm one of a kind."
"Oh, I know that, you silly, silly man!"
His eyes bulged in sudden fury. "What did you-"Bulma raised a hand in his face before he exploded.
"A Dietes Vegeta is an African Iris, a Butterfly flower," Mrs. Briefs explained cheerfully. "It would be a beautiful addition to the Capsule Corp. grounds, don't you think?"
"Hear that, Vegeta? You have a flower named after you. You're famous!" Bulma teased.
"Of all of the humiliations..." he grumbled under his breath.
Mrs. Briefs was still smiling pleasantly. "Can you do that for me, sweetie?"
"Sure, mom. No prob-"
Unable to endure any more delays, Trunks bodily shoved his grandmother to one side and pressed his flushed, screwed-up face into the monitor. He wasn't crying, but he was very close. "Want'chu home! Want'chu home mommy! Right NOW!"
Vegeta had finally had enough of this bullshit. "Trunks-" he cut in, or tried to.
"Now! Now! RIGHT NOW!"
"Trunks!" he shouted, making Bulma shield her right ear and glare at him. What was it about Saiyans always having to scream? "How many days have we been gone?"
Without hesitation, the little boy held up six fingers.
"We won't be back for another-" Vegeta showed him eight fingers.
Alarm registered on his son's face. "But-"
"No 'but''s. I have a mission for you: I want you to learn to count to one hundred by the time we get back. It's very important."
A mission! Trunks' blue eyes, dulled by anger and loss, immediately brightened with purpose. He nodded excitedly, "'Kay, daddy! A hunnert fingers for you!" he held up both hands and waved them into the monitor. He reached for the cut-off button just as Bulma was saying, "Good bye, baby. I love-" She slapped her hand to her forehead. Every damn time... She looked over at the Saiyan who was looking unusually smug. "Since when has he been able to count?"
"He picked it up when I started teaching him a kata. He's learned fifteen stances so far."
Blinking in surprise, Bulma felt a surge a maternal pride in their son's accomplishment. "That's wonderful! But... what's so important about him learning to count to a hundred?"
Straight-faced, he responded, "Absolutely nothing."
"Excuse me?"
"The boy needs something to occupy that hyper mind of his."
"Vegeta! He's only a year and a half!"
"And a product of both our genes. Neither of us are exactly under-privileged in the brain department and our brat appears to be following the same track. Whether he accomplishes the 'mission' is inconsequential. It'll keep him occupied to try and learn his numbers until we get back, and hopefully it'll keep him out of trouble."
Considering this, Bulma asked, "Do you think he will? Learn to count that high, that is. Not the trouble part. Being our son, that's inevitable."
"I have no doubt," he wearily answered, to both parts.
She flashed him an adoring smile. "You're a really good father, you know that?"
Suddenly feeling self-conscious, he shifted his weight in his seat. Accepting praise should come as second nature to him but he always suspected it was meant as thinly veiled sarcasm; justified paranoia left over from his days serving Frieza and his lieutenants. "I'm not doing anything that wasn't done to me," he muttered.
"So you could already count that high?"
"Silly woman. By that age I knew eighty stances and was fluent in Saiyajin and Galactic Standard. I'm just going easy on him out of pity for the human taint in his blood."
"Wow, that's pretty impress-" Her eyes bulged when it dawned on her what he said, "'Human taint'? Hey! That was uncalled for, Vegeta! And completely untrue! I was taking apart my baby monitor and rewiring it when I was just two years old! I was dismantling anything I could get my little hands on-" she caught a glimpse of the smirk on his face just before he turned to look out of the passenger side window and let her outburst trail off. He had baited her and, like a sucker, she fell for it hook, line, and sinker. "You asshole," she grumbled, slouching in her seat.
After several minutes of tense silence, Vegeta decided that enough was enough and piped up, "The boy's intelligence is impressive."
Bulma said nothing.
A few more minutes ticked by until he added, "Interesting hair color, too."
Sometime later, he tried again: "And those unique blue eyes-"
"You can try and butter me up all you want to!" she finally yelled back at him. "It won't work."
"It got you talking, didn't it?" he grinned.
She released an exasperated snort. "I've never met anyone who could get under my skin like you do. If I didn't love you so much, I'd slug you."
He rolled his eyes. "As if a weak, little, non-powered human female like you posed any kind of a threat-"
"Agh! That's IT!" She unbuckled herself from her seat and launched herself at him. He didn't bother himself with the silliness of chair restraints and they fell to the floor of the cockpit in a mass of splayed arms and legs. Although he could have ended the fracas in less than a second, Vegeta enjoyed the feel of Bulma writhing on top of him and fended off her half-hearted blows with practiced ease. He could feel his groin begin to stir. It didn't take much. The woman could simply breathe on him and start an erection happening.
"I don't like it when you make fun of me, Vegeta," she fretted, trying to pull her arms free. He had his hands around both of her wrists and the grip, though loose, was as strong as iron shackles. "Just once, I'd like to hear a compliment come out of your mouth instead of your usual bullshit."
"I've already said you were smart. What more do you want?"
"I want to be told I'm beautiful-"
"Uh huh."
"With a fantastic figure-"
"Uhm."
"And gorgeous eyes-"
"It sounds like all you need is a mirror. Not me."
"Bastard!" She brought her forehead down and purposely collided it with his. She had seen the fighters do that move on several occasions, and it seemed to be quite affective in getting away from another opponent. What no one had warned her was how badly it could stun the instigator. It simply caused Vegeta to wince, but Bulma saw an explosion of stars take over her vision. Dimly, through the ringing in her ears, she heard him remark in a dry tone, "So, do you feel better now?"
"Let me go," she said and tumbled off of him when he released her. They sat side-by-side on the cockpit floor while she tried to shake off the effects of the blow. To his credit, he kept his witticisms to himself at this particular moment. He didn't have a whole lot of choice in the matter. Their little wrestling match had started his groin countdown and he figured if he was going to get any chance for 'take-off', he had best shelve the taunts.
For now, anyway.
"Ow. I don't know how you guys can do that move," she said, massaging her aching forehead. "All right, go ahead. I'm waiting."
"For what?"
"For another one of your infamous put-downs about my pathetic fighting skills. Let's hear it."
He appeared to consider it for a moment and then gave a brief shake of his head. "No."
"'No'?" she parroted, eyes narrowing slightly.
"What's the point? You're a builder. That's your skill. I'm a fighter and that's mine. I've had to accept that both Kakarrot and his brat are stronger than I am. Who are you second or third to?"
She blinked in surprise at the unexpected question, hesitating, and he answered for her: "No one. You are at the top of your game, woman. How much more of a compliment can I give you than that?"
It pained him to admit it; she could see that vulnerability deep in the ebony depths of his alien gaze. When he started to look away, she placed a hand on his jaw and kissed him.
The sensual taste of her, mingled in that kiss, lessened his resentment of her abilities; ones he admired from a distance and mocked when they were close together, and the kiss went deeper. Her hands sent curling fingers through his thick hair, moving softly down over the curves of his shoulders. As tongue met tongue their hands entwined, and he moved from her warm mouth, his lips softly searching along her jaw line, sliding sensuously down her neck, to nibble and kiss the softness of her skin.
"We can't-"she gasped. "The ship... it's on autopilot b-but-" A low moan escaped her when he lowered his head and flicked his tongue over one pert nipple. "Oh, screw it."
"No," he growled. "You're going to screw me."
And she did.
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Sometime later, each were back in their seats and the jet was still cruising easily towards its southbound destination, completely oblivious to the break in human supervision. Bulma was quietly typing into her laptop and trying to find out more details of where they could find the African Iris for her mother. In a rare display of contentment, Vegeta was lounging in his seat with his feet up on the dash, ankles crossed, hands behind his head. Once in a while, his foot would move in time with a particular beat of music that was playing low on the stereo system.
Over the course of their traveling, Bulma tried to introduce the Saiyan to different types of music to figure out his preferences. He had absolutely no patience with the radio with its inconsistent music choices constantly interrupted by commercials and the idle banter of announcers. Remembering the "The Sound of Music" disk she found in his DVD player, she popped the musical CD into his jeep's stereo when they left the compound right after their wedding. After one chorus of "The Hills Are Alive", the disk became a Frisbee as Vegeta pulled it out of the CD player and hurled it out of the vehicle. So much for that.
The same thing happened when she attempted to play Ravel's "Boléro" while they were making love. Mentally, she crossed Classical music off of her list and figured that perhaps this "music to tame the savage beast" approach wasn't going to work. She put away her Zamfir, Yanni, and John Tesh CDs and tried another approach. Given his rough nature, she wondered if he could be a headbanger in disguise and tried playing some Heavy Metal. Halfway into Klank's "Downside", he accused her of trying to cut their honeymoon short by rendering him insane.
So much for THAT.
At a loss, she went back to the radio again, idly changing channels when he started to fidget into his seat. She flicked across one band that was playing John Fogerty singing "Run Through the Jungle" and was about to move on when he caught her wrist. "Leave it there," he said.
As it turned out, it was the simple chords and lyrics of Creedence Clearwater Revival that he tolerated. Saiyans hadn't been musically inclined (and still weren't) and had only evolved far enough to pummel crude drums. As long as the tune was simple, with a good beat, and kept at a low volume, Vegeta could listen to it all day. And that's precisely what he was doing now: relaxing to "I Heard It Through The Grapevine".
When she looked over at him, smiling, she saw there was an odd expression on his face. It appeared to be an unusual mix of amusement and confusion and it prompted her to ask, "What's wrong?"
He glanced over at her with half-lidded eyes. "Nothing. I was just thinking about Trunks and what he did with our bed, that's all."
"It was a little strange," she admitted.
"Not so strange. The boy made himself a hrasa'an."
"A what?"
"A hrasa'an. It's a..." He scowled and briefly shook his head, "The English translation is 'nest', but that's not accurate. It's where Saiyans slept."
Bulma nodded politely all the while grappling with a sudden batch of questions. Over the course of their traveling together, she was discovering how his mind worked; if she launched what he would view as an interrogation, he would automatically clam up. If she appeared only marginally interested, it prompted him to speak his thoughts out loud. "That's very interesting."
He nodded in distracted agreement. Staring out of the cockpit window, he mused, "In the early days, long before the Saiyans defeated the Tuffles, a hrasa'an was considered a communal area where the entire tribe slept together. The Royal family would occupy the center, Elites would sleep in a circle around them, and different classes would spiral out until the lowest ranks were exiled to the outer fringe, often sleeping on the stone floor. It was out of protection, our numbers were few back then, and also for warmth. Nights out in the 'Barrens were said to get extremely cold."
"What were they made out of?" she asked in as neutral a voice as possible.
"Leathers, rough hides, pelts; basically anything that was soft enough to sleep on, I suppose. Mine was made of-"
This time she lost her hold on her act and turned around in her seat to look at him. "Yours? You had one?"
He scowled at her and she had time to think, Idiot! He was doing so well and you just had to blow it! until he actually responded with; "We all had one. It was where we slept," he said, as if speaking to a child. "In my time, they were reserved for individual use. Being royalty, mine was huge. It occupied a circular depression in my quarters that was about three feet deep and fifteen feet across and filled to overflowing with cured furs, silks, and other rich fabrics. It was like sleeping in a cloud. When I didn't want to train, I would burrow into the bottom of it so that Nappa wouldn't find me."
She stared at him with feigned astonishment. "You? Not wanting to train?"
"I had my moments. I was very young. And stupid," he growled.
"I'm just teasing."
"Frieza's warship introduced the concept of a mattress to me and I hated them. They were too small, very hard, and uncomfortable. I couldn't sleep so I used to tear them apart and make a hrasa'an out of the bedding and sleep on the floor."
"Just like Trunks did with our bed!"
He made one curt nod. "I got away with it for awhile but ultimately I learned to ...adapt."
Bulma didn't ask him what he meant by his sudden acceptance. She had a pretty good idea who had motivated the change and didn't want to hazard so much as a guess as to how it had been accomplished. She didn't want to know. In an attempt to keep the mood light, she commented, "That concept of a-a ...harashen?"
He shrugged. It was close enough.
"It actually sounds rather comfortable. Your version, not what your ancestors had. They didn't have much privacy, sleeping like that."
"Early Saiyans were gregarious creatures and sexually promiscuous," he responded wanly, as if the topic had run its course and was now boring him. "I doubt that screwing out in the open was much of a deterrent."
"Ew," she muttered and had to remind herself that they had been caught in an alleyway doing precisely the same thing until a disgusted cop broke it up. Her cheeks felt warm on her face at the memory, not all of it from embarrassment. "I guess I shouldn't be surprised. I have to keep reminding myself that you're from another world."
He released a dry snort. "You just got lucky with me, that's all. You wouldn't have been compatible with anything else out there."
"Excuse me?" she asked sharply.
"I thought that you had gotten a suitable taste of different alien species on Namek," he said, almost as a sigh.
"What do you mean, Vegeta?"
"Nameks are asexual; they breed by creating plant pods in the earth. Zarbon's race contained traits of both genders. Dodoria could change his sex at will-" He made a disgusted face at some memory and shook his head to try and escape it. "I'm not even going to get into what the Ginyu Force were all about. What I'm trying to say is that gender lines among other 'civilized' worlds aren't as cut and dry as they are here on earth. What you would consider a male may have female... attributes, and visa versa. Or something else that was entirely incompatible. It used to get damned confusing at times."
"I find that hard to believe. Look at you- you're perfectly normal," she said, waving a hand in the general direction of his crotch.
"You're forgetting that I had a tail," he grumbled peevishly. "It was a very long, VERY malleable appendage that allowed for some... variety during sex." He leaned towards her and added as a suggestive purr, "I know that you would have definitely liked mine. I could make it soft enough to tickle or hard enough to thrust. Woman, I knew how to use it."
She felt her arms break out in excited gooseflesh and had to submerge a shiver. Clearing her throat with difficulty, she managed to ask, "So... how did you know for sure? Which alien was which, I mean."
"Me?" he betrayed a raunchy grin. "I just selected the creature that had the biggest tits and made sure that the lights were off when we screwed." He threw his head back and laughed out loud.
He was the ONLY one laughing.
When he broke off, he saw that Bulma was glaring daggers at him and he did an amazing thing before her angry gaze. For no clear reason that she could fathom, a sudden dramatic flush suffused his dark features; it went from his hairline and disappeared into the collar of his shirt. His exposed ears turned a bright crimson. He actually swallowed.
Just as he opened his mouth to say something (what could possibly top THAT little tidbit, Bulma had no idea), the hoverjet lurched and he tumbled out of his seat onto the floor. He immediately looked around in indignant rage, "What the hell happened?"
Grateful for her seatbelt (as well as the diversion), she regarded the console with concern. "We've just lost our port engine!" she said, grabbing the yoke only to have it jerk out of her hands. "You have to help me pull it up before we crash!"
He leaned in behind her and grabbed the flailing steering device with strong hands while she was trying to steady the aft rudder. "Not too much pressure or you'll snap off our tail," she scolded. "This jet is delicate! You can't be so rigid or you'll' break-"
"Do you want me to hold the damn thing or not?" he shouted in exasperation.
"Okay, okay," she muttered, trying to get a read-out from the onboard computer. In front of them, the flat expanse of African grassland was coming in much too fast. "I can't get any details that explains why that engine went off-line. The sensors are dead-"
"So are we if you don't find some way to slow us down," Vegeta muttered, glancing at the side door. He was wondering if he had enough time to pull the door off and fly out and correct their descent but there was no time for such heroics. The ground was a rapidly approaching blur and damned if herds of peculiar striped beasts were just peacefully grazing in their path, oblivious to what was about to happen. "Woman!"
"I've cut out the starboard engine. We're gliding now."
"It's still too fast. How can you brake this thing?"
"Well, I can pop the aft parachute," she said, gesturing to a yellow button next to the accelerator. "But you're not strapped in-"
"No time!" he snapped and brought his fist down hard on the button.
A bright yellow parachute exploded from the back of the hoverjet. It immediately caught the rush of air and deployed to its full size, slowing the jet with such sudden force that Vegeta was thrown off of his feet and out of the cockpit in a spray of reinforced glass. In less than a second he disappeared out of Bulma's sight.
Shielding her face against the hail of glass, Bulma chanced a glance and saw only the gaping hole in the cockpit, and the rapidly approaching ground. "!!VEGETA!!" she screamed over the howling wind.
There was no sign of the Saiyan and she had no time to run to the back of the jet and look out of a porthole. The jet had slowed, thanks to the parachute, but something told her that it was either fouled up somehow, or some straps had broken off. The jet had flipped over and was plummeting upside-down towards the earth, not even allowing her the option of using the ejector seat from this position. The yoke was a dead stick and she released a sick moan as the flat ground became a swiftly approaching blur. Helplessly ducking into a tucked crash position, she waited for the impact that would leave her a red stain across the grasslands.
It never came.
There was a sickening lurch that made her grateful for her restraints, but otherwise no bone-breaking crash. The jet righted itself and then settled easily on the ground as if it had floated there. Bulma was absorbing this miracle with unusual shock, guessing that the parachute must have finally deployed after all. She was still dwelling on the miracle when Vegeta stepped around the front of the jet, cursing a blue streak: "...stupid, useless, piece-of-human shit, pile of garbage, motherfucker..." he disappeared from her sight, hardly sparing her a glance.
That was when it dawned on her that Vegeta had saved her; not the parachute. He had crashed out of the cockpit, recovered in midair, and captured the jet in a span of seconds. She unbuckled herself with shaking hands and rushed outside to find him standing beside the port engine, studying it. His shirt was in tatters and his hair was a windblown tangle but otherwise he looked all right. She almost knocked him down with a full body tackle and covered his face with kisses. "Thank you, Vegeta! You saved my life! Thank you-thank you- thank y-"
He tolerated that for all of ten seconds and then pushed her away, grumbling; "That's why I let Mirai Trunks save you that first time: You would have made a similar embarrassing scene in front of everyone."
She pulled back. "Always the tough guy," she sighed but eyed him with true relief. There didn't look to be so much as a scratch on him. As she continued her loving inspection he nodded to the engine. "What does that look like to you?"
Startled, she looked down and saw a perfect circular hole was punched through the turbine. It was only as big around as her finger and the edges of the metal were melted. "A ...laser?" she asked, looking down through the smoldering circle and easily seeing the ground through the hole. "Did someone shoot at us?"
"Looks like it," Vegeta muttered, turning to look across the flat grassland towards the sparse tree line. She could feel the heavy throb of his thoughts and knew that he was flaring out his ki, searching the territory with his mind. Remaining silent beside him, Bulma suddenly felt exposed and vulnerable. It was probably how a lone antelope felt when it knew that it was surrounded by a pride of lions, knowing they could pounce from some unseen hiding space.
"I'm not sensing anything," he finally admitted, frowning with true agitation. The short spikes at the base of his neck prickled and rose like the hackles of a dog. It was one thing for him to be stalked by an enemy, but quite another for his new mate to be included as a target as well. He had never felt this protective of her before and was bewildered by how strong that emotion ran. It was just another damnable indication of the domestication he had confessed to Dorothy Pereaux. What other explanation was there?
"What does that mean?" she asked.
"It could be someone simply hiding their ki, or it could be some ...thing."
"An android?" she whispered.
He offered an indifferent shrug but the set of his face said something else entirely. "I can level the area with a Final Flash-"
"No."
"-It'll char anything human and expose anything that isn't," he finished.
Bulma glared at him. "Didn't you hear me? I said, 'No'."
He glared right back. "I'm not asking for your permission, woman. I'm just thinking out loud."
"You aren't killing anything until we rule out that it was an accident."
"An accident!" he shouted. "If that laser had punched up under your seat, we wouldn't even be having this conversation!"
My seat, Bulma thought with amazement. He said 'my seat'. It didn't even dawn on him to worry about himself. She didn't have time to dwell on his concern. With a grunt, his blue aura burst around him and he was starting to power up. Steeling herself, she reached out and touched his arm expecting to get burnt. Her skin tingled as his ki prickled at her flesh but it didn't hurt. It was like receiving a mild static shock. "Calm down, dammit! We don't know what we're up against!
"You are NOT my keeper!" he shouted directly into her face. Without another word, he whirled and released a blast that ran parallel along the ground and exploded into the gnarled trees of the Serengeti Plain. It wasn't a Final Flash, he hadn't had the time to power up, nor was it a Galactic Gun. It was a standard shot meant for non-powered targets and it was sufficient to level the area and reduce it to smoldering cinders. Gradually lowering his arms, Vegeta surveyed the damage with his trademark smirk while Bulma fumed on the sidelines. "Nice shot, Mister Wizard-"
"Thanks."
"-And just how did you know our supposed enemy was over there?"
He glowered at her, not understanding what she was getting at when all of a sudden another laser punched soundlessly through the hoverjet, going right between his legs. It missed his groin by about two inches. All he had time to utter was one outraged, "Shit!" before diving for the ground. Bulma was huddled beside him, unsuccessfully trying to submerge her shrill giggles. The look on his face from his near-castration was one of absolute horror. It was an expression so out of place on his usually guarded features that the contrast had her laughing.
"Now is NOT the time for your hysterics," he hissed at her.
"Can't ...help it," she wheezed, ducking her head into her sleeve.
He picked her up by the waist as if she were a bag of potatoes. He was back to cursing again, "...inconsiderate witch, I fuck-near got gelded and you're laughing your fool ass off..." Which, of course, only made her laugh even harder. Moving with a burst of supernatural speed, he flew them further out into the grassland, disturbing a large herd of agitated zebras that burst apart and galloped away into nervous little clusters. Keeping low to the ground, Vegeta crawled along on his hands and knees in between the straw-like vegetation, trying to look everywhere at once. "Do you see anything?" he called back to Bulma.
The brevity of the situation was beginning to dawn on her at long last. She crawled up along side of him. "I don't know where to look," she whispered breathlessly. "Isn't this exciting?"
He flashed her an uncomprehending glance. She was breathing very quickly and her color was high, her eyes were two sparkling sapphires. "I'll be damned," he said in amazement. "You're actually getting off on this."
"It's just been so long since I've been on a real adventure," she said, flashing him a wide grin. "I feel like a teenager again. This is great!"
He continued to stare at her, frankly disbelieving. How long had it been since he'd last had a companion he could share some fun with? Mirai Trunks? No, too damn serious for his young age. Radditz? Nappa? Perhaps it didn't take a Saiyan breed to revel in some cat and mouse diversions after all. Bulma was unique even among her own kind; a genius, a rebel, a woman who didn't take shit from anybody.
And she's all mine, he thought with deep satisfaction. That thought served to relax him a little. "I'll take to the air and draw fire. We'll both try to see where it's coming from."
"Be careful," she said seriously.
"Feh," he dismissed and shot up into the air like a rocket.
He leveled out at a height of about three hundred feet directly above her. Crossing his arms across his chest, he slowly revolved around in a 360-degree circuit, his dark eyes scanning the terrain sprawled out below him. Saiyan farsightedness was designed for thorough reconnaissance like this; as sharp as a hawk's, he was searching for the glint of glass, a snatch of glaring color, any movement that didn't look natural all the while keeping his mental sense on guard for rogue ki's.
He had been hunted before, this was nothing new to him, but he was acutely aware of a new vulnerability he'd never previously known. One in the form of a brilliant, albeit powerless, heiress who was crouching in the dirt below him. It limited his admittedly few options: An attack could hurt her, a retreat would hurt him. Neither was an acceptable strategy and his mind whirled with other possibilities; testing some plans, immediately rejecting others. This second-guessing was opposite of his alien nature that just wanted to fight first and sort out the bodies later. It was a distraction that, although he didn't know it, left him more vulnerable than Bulma.
As the seconds crossed over into tension-filled minutes, she continued to pop her head up at irregular intervals and scan the horizon. Like Vegeta, she had been hunted before too, and she was experienced enough to know that something felt wrong about this attack. Even more, it felt eerily familiar. Shielding her eyes from the sun, she spared a glance up at the Saiyan and was shocked and dismayed to see him staring down at her. She recognized what was wrong right off the bat: He can't concentrate as long as he thinks I'm in danger! Shit! What am I going to do? She noticed a speck of movement directly over his shoulder and pointed, screaming; "Behind you! It's not on the ground- it's in the air! Look out!"
"Wha-?" He turned too late and received the full assault of laser batteries directly into the face and chest. A small robotic craft with a red bowtie logo on its side slammed into him and drove them both down into the hardpan. They collided with the ground with enough force to make it shudder. Bulma feared the worse when she heard a muffled explosion and saw a small mushroom cloud rise into the air. "VEGETA!" she screamed as hard as she could, leaping to her feet.
When she began sprinting to the crater, something wound around her feet and she fell hard, sliding across the dirt on her chest. Sputtering on a mouthful of dust, she looked back and saw someone walking towards her, barely discernible in the heat haze that rose from the ground. Working at the tangle of ropes from a bolo that was wrapped around her ankles, she saw that the person had drawn close enough to reveal their features and that person wasn't alone.
"You-" she shouted in a mixture of amazement and dismay.
----------
An unknown length of time passed before Vegeta's eyes snapped open and he saw that it was pitch black out. Sonovabitch! he thought with impotent fury. I've been out of it for a whole stinking day!? His entire body ached but when he experimentally flexed his muscles, he didn't feel a rebelling pull of anything dislocated or broken. It was too dark to tell if he was bleeding but he didn't think he had anything more serious than a few shallow cuts. The attack had been designed to take him out with minimum fuss and it had sure as hell had done that!
He continued to lie there dazed and sweating in the heat. Even though it was nighttime, it was still as hot as hell and he could swear that he could feel the sun baking into his exposed skin. Of course that was obviously impossible. He didn't have time to dwell on the anomaly, or his discomfort however. There were far more pressing concerns, the most prevalent being-
-Bulma! he projected as hard as he could. Where are you? BULMA!
He strained his mind to be as receptive as possible and got nothing back. There wasn't any wall in his way that would be indicative of her being unconscious (or worse). He was relatively certain that his mind was reaching her but it was very likely that she just didn't have the ability to project her thoughts back. She was neither a telepath nor a Saiyan and unless she was very close to him, he found maintaining their rapport extremely difficult. He got the impression that she was very far away.
Not for very much longer.
There was twisted wreckage wrapped all around him and he kicked away a piece that was lying across his legs and released a blast that knocked off the remains of the engine block sitting on his chest. Right away he knew that something was terribly wrong. Sitting up, he stared at his hand, or tried to, and waved it briefly across his face. He conjured up a ki ball and played it between his knuckles. He could feel the tingling pulse of energy and knew it was there.
He just couldn't see it.
He was blind.
"Fuck," he said in disgust.
----------
Bulma whirled in her seat the instant she heard Vegeta calling her name in her head. On her end, it had felt as if he were standing right behind her. -Here! I'm here, Vegeta! Are you all right?
She got no response and tried again, concentrating as hard as the bumpy progress across the terrain would allow her. What she received back was a perplexing sense of rage and frustration. Usually she also got images; surroundings from his perspective, but all she saw in his mind was confusing darkness. She didn't know what it meant and received nothing more even though she tried projecting her thoughts until her head started to ache.
The person who was riding shotgun in the moving jeep swiveled around to look at her and said mildly, "Your alien body-guard is out for the count, Bulma. He won't be joining us anytime soon. I had that war-drone packed with explosives and primed to detonate on impact."
Casting her abductor a sour look, Bulma snapped back, "Why the hell are you doing this? I thought we were friends!"
Arching one blonde eyebrow, Lunch regarded her with wary tolerance; nothing more, nothing less. "You and my ...alter-ego were friends. I've always just seen you as a means to an end."
"As in..." Bulma prompted when the other woman fell silent.
"As in being a rich, spoiled brat with a powerful circle of friends who always had more luck than brains," she drawled, her catlike eyes flashing mad green fire. Her once dazzling blonde mane was now dull and streaked with dark grey hair the color of steel wool. That red scarf was still in there, a tattered, ragged ruin- much like the woman's face, which was a blend of wrinkles and scars. Lunch lived hard and played hard and the past years had taken their toll on the professional thief.
Sitting beside her, the driver glanced over his shoulder and sneered at Bulma once before turning his attention back to the uneven trail of road ruts. He was an immense black man with a shaved head, exposing a startling white skull-and-crossbones tattoo that stared back at Bulma even while the giant looked ahead. He was wearing an old patched uniform jacket of the Red Ribbon army and seeing that red bowtie-shaped insignia roused a surprising burst of anger in the heiress. "You're hanging out with soldiers of the Red Ribbon army?"
"There is no Red Ribbon army. Not any more," said the driver in an amazing bass rumble that wasn't so much as heard as felt. "Your pet monkey, Gokou, saw to that."
"I call it a support group," Lunch said with a crooked smile. "There's a bunch more waiting for us back at base camp. I'm betting that they can't wait to see you."
"Laying odds?" her partner asked.
"Five to one."
"You're on," he said, fishing a fifty-zeni bill out of one trouser pocket and slapping it into her palm. Holding it up under Bulma's nose, the older woman cackled with insane glee.
----------
Vegeta got slowly to his feet and stood with his head down, keeping his stinging eyes shut. He didn't panic. Aside from betraying the odd lapse of anxiety once or thrice in his life, it could be said that he was incapable of retreating into a state of all-out terror. Reacting to the situation with his usual methodical manner, he tried to collect his bearings while he figured out a way to cope with this new liability.
He had been blinded on a mission once before; He had been twenty-one at the time, happily tromping on villages in his Oozaru form and reveling in his power under a full moon. Dawn had risen in sudden, unannounced fashion with absolutely no warning in the form of a brilliant solar flare. He had been caught out in the open with no protection. His uniform had flash-fried leaving his exposed skin to suffer third-degree radiation burns. His sensitive retinas had been charred to ash in an instant. Nappa and Radditz had been in the main city shielded by skyscrapers at the time. They were spared anything other than a shift back to human state that was rendered painful from the sudden appearance of the sunlight. Vegeta had just been at the wrong place at the worst possible time.
Story of my life, he thought grudgingly.
He raised his head into the wind and took an experimental sniff of air. It didn't reveal anything more than what he had just endured first hand; smoldering metal, melted rubble, and the stink of burnt oil. It made him sneeze twice. He wanted to reach out to Bulma again and immediately reined his thoughts self-consciously back. No, he didn't want her to be on the receiving end of what he was presently feeling. He wasn't in a panic, but he was about as close to it as he got.
No Nappa, no Radditz, he fretted. If not for those two, he would have just stayed on that damn planet, screaming in agony while clawing at what remained of his eyes. One of them had knocked him out, Nappa probably, and sent him back to one of Frieza's throne worlds for immediate immersion into a regeneration tank. It had taken two full cycles for the burns to heal and his eyesight to come back, and things had still been blurry for a fortnight afterwards (not that anyone had suspected that anything was wrong. Vegeta had kept that problem to himself, privately worrying that if the damage was permanent, Frieza would find him useless and put him down for good). Only Radditz had suspected anything was still wrong but, thankfully, his terror of his prince had been complete. He had voiced his suspicions to no one, silently watching as Vegeta waved his tail around far more than was normal; brushing it up against nearby objects, snapping in front of him when he walked, using it for balance...
And I don't even have that anymore, either, he brooded, rubbing the base of his spine with a pained scowl. He missed that wonderful extension of himself, just as any amputee would miss a limb. His mind strayed to the unresolved second wish that the Dragonballs would grant and had to shelve that train of thought for another time. It would sure come in handy right now! When his sight had been bad, it had helped him around objects and gauge distances. He hadn't needed to rely on it on training or battle because-
He snapped his head up in surprise. It was a longshot and he hadn't done it in ages but it just might work, just like before...
----------
Lunch leaned over and pulled out an object from under her seat. Not surprisingly, it was the two-star Dragonball. "You see?" the blonde said smugly, "One of the soldier-of-fortune guys I chat online with found this while he was smuggling diamonds across the border. He didn't know what it was." Her bland smile widened when she said, "But I did. I knew that you would come hunting for them sooner or later. Especially when I heard about that little theft at the London museum three nights ago. Nice work, by the way. I just sat back and waited."
"How did you know the hoverjet you fired on was ours?" Bulma asked. She was brimming over with indignant rage at how easily her former friend had laid in wait for her.
"Oh, come on! How could I miss a bright yellow jet with the Capsule Corporation logo painted on the side?" she laughed out loud. "Seriously, I just concocted a radar detector of my own to detect your radar detector. It can't home in on the Dragonballs, but it sensed your radio frequency perfectly. After that, it was just a matter of launching the drone and sitting back until you were left alone and vulnerable. Your alien husband caused me some concern, but he's not as tough as Tien made him out to be." She burst out laughing again.
"Tien... told you about Vegeta?"
All of the false humor immediately dried up on the other woman's face. It became deadly serious and more than a little threatening. Oh yeah, Tien had told her all right. "He tried to destroy this planet. He's responsible for Tien's death. He's killed thousands, maybe millions of innocent lives in his lifetime. Instead of being punished for his sins, he's shacked up with you. He should be hung!"
"He IS," Bulma shot back. "That's why I'm with him."
Lunch recoiled in shock and the huge driver arched a surprised eyebrow. The pair exchanged a comical glance. Of all of the answers Lunch had been expecting, it sure as hell hadn't been THAT one.
"...You've changed," she admitted at last, studying the heiress seriously. Gone was that immature, mouthy bravado that had characterized Bulma's personality when they had been younger. The heiress had always been a spoiled rotten, loud-mouthed, moody brat but now there was something else that Lunch hadn't counted on. Bulma was calm, amazingly so, handling this abduction as a matter of course and actually having the nerve for back talk even when she knew that she didn't have one of her precious fighters within running distance. "You've gotten a backbone over the years, Bulma. I'm impressed, not that it cuts any slack with me." She extended her hand, "Give me the rest of the Dragonballs you've collected so far. And the radar, too."
Bulma didn't budge. "What are you going to do with them?"
"It's pretty damn obvious: I'm going to collect the last two Dragonballs and make my wish." Lunch's jade-green eyes dulled and she looked away, her profile was distant and sad when she said in a softer voice, "Nothing was the same after your alien lunatic invaded the earth. Tien died, and when he came back he was... different. He didn't love me any more. I'm going to change that."
"It's a bad idea, Lunch," she said sadly.
"Shenron can do anything!"
"You can't make a wish that will change someone's feelings for you!" Bulma snapped. "That's not how they work!"
"Fine," the other woman said coldly, eyeing her with brilliant resentment. "But they can change time, can't they?"
Bulma felt her body grow cold with dawning realization. "No..."
Lunch nodded, her mind suddenly made up. "If I can't change my Tien then I'll change time. I'm going to make the Saiyan invasion never happen by wishing your man dead. How's that sound, you bitch?"
Shaking her head, Bulma could only come up with a weak denial. Trying to explain the consequences of that disastrous wish would be fruitless, the newfound resolve was clear on the woman's face. No Vegeta, no Trunks- no advance warning for the Z Fighters to prepare themselves against an enemy that made the Saiyans look like pushovers. If Bulma tried to elaborate on the tale of Mirai Trunks and the Androids taking over the earth, Lunch would look at her as if she were crazy. And rightly so. If not for her own firsthand experiences, Bulma would have been the exact same way. "You can't do that," was all she could think of saying. It came out sounding like a petulant whine.
"Watch me," came the cold response. Lunch was through screwing around. She replaced the Dragonball under her seat and pulled out her favorite Uzi. "Now hand everything over. I'll let you go once I've finished what I started, I can promise you that much. How many broken bones and bruises you'll have by then depends on how cooperative you'll be."
"All I have is the radar," Bulma admitted, fishing the oversized stopwatch-styled device out of her pocket and giving it to her.
"A likely story," Lunch sneered. "You hoard those damn things as if you created them yourself."
"No, seriously! Vegeta has the capsule containing the Dragonballs we've collected tucked away in his front pocket. You like to call him my 'alien bodyguard' and, in a way, that's what he is. There's no safer place for them."
The pair locked eyes for one long spiteful moment and, of the two, Lunch ended up blinking first. She wondered if the heiress had managed to become a convincing liar in addition to becoming braver and decided against it; no one changed THAT much.
She turned to her driver and barked out two simple words that filled Bulma (who, indeed, HAD been lying) with a sense of unimpressionable relief;
"Turn around."
----------
Sweating and cursing, Vegeta stumbled and tripped his way through thick sagebrush and prickly thorn bushes. He was deliberately following the scent of jeep exhaust, and that meant that he couldn't chance flying without risking the possibility of losing that scent trail. He was also noticeably limping.
During his hike, he had stepped directly into a meercat burrow and nearly broken his ankle. The area where he had fallen was now a charred ruin and far behind him. If Bulma had insight into his present mindset, she would be far more worried than she was. For every minute that passed, his fury was steadily growing- building deep within him like floodwaters attacking a defective dam. That rage didn't show on the rigid set of his intense features and that was alarming enough; when he played what Bulma called "his poker face" it meant that he was preparing for the worst.
After collecting his bearings, he had managed to back track and find his way to the hoverjet. Fumbling around the cramped interior, he had cleaned himself up in the small bathroom, drank about a gallon of water, and- operating at the height of vanity- even changed his burnt and ripped clothes, hoping against hope that his wife hadn't slipped in some of those brightly colored rags she was so fond of into his wardrobe when he hadn't been looking. It was her style. The thought of him stumbling across the Serengeti dressed in lime green pants and a pink shirt (again!) made him cringe. He had a water-soaked bandage wrapped around his eyes and a baseball cap pulled down low on his face, shielding him from any more sun exposure. He was sure that Bulma had a few senzu beans packed away in her luggage somewhere but was clueless where they could be. It would be up to her to find them when they were reunited. Thankfully, he wasn't in much pain. His injuries would have to be far worse to even register as anything more than an annoyance. It was the loss of his sight that was posing the biggest problem but, already, he was coming to terms with it.
Every so often he stopped and released a low pulse of ki that radiated outwards in a circle from his still form to a distance of about two hundred feet. In his mind, a picture came up of the local topography, showing him where that force had brushed up a tree, rock or bush. It was a crude form of radar and it was surprisingly effective. He was able to sidestep an obstacle without running into it. Back when his sight had still been bad, he had encased himself in this aura during training. That, and his own well-honed fighting sense, hadn't made anyone the wiser that anything was wrong. Unfortunately, such control was extremely draining and it wasn't much good at detecting burrows, either...
Sweating profusely in the hot, cloying air, he considered what his latest pulse revealed of the local terrain. His dark brows furrowed in concentration. To his right, just as the leading edge of his power release had dissipated, he had registered something large over there. He turned towards it, hands held low and ready to stop any brush that might spring up and nail him in the crotch (it had already happened twice). Mentally counting his steps, he stopped after fifty and released another pulse.
Yes, there was something there. It was very large and roughly rectangular in shape. Was it a jeep? Was someone parked there watching him in silence?
-Bulma? he sent, frowning that the uneasy note contained in his mental voice. "Who's over there?" he called out loud. "Answer me!"
He heard a rough snort and faced it, widening his stance and clenching his fists. "Whoever you are, you're going to regret pissing me off!"
Regarding him with bewildered animosity, a large bull rhino stamped its foot in the ground and snorted again in warning. It squinted myopically at the screaming intruder and flapped its ears, lowering its head and exposing a horn that was roughly three-feet long and sharp as a spear. The rhino was pretty pissed off, too. It was mating season and he was horny as hell with no females in sight. If this raving intruder wanted a challenge, so be it.
Another pulse of ki revealed that the jeep was moving towards him, but for some reason its engine sounded like the thudding of massive hooves. Too late Vegeta realized his opponent wasn't human. He had time to release two power blasts, both woefully off target, before an enraged, heavily armored mammal weighing nearly a full ton slammed into him head-on.
----------
Vegeta! Bulma jerked upright in her seat as her mind was assaulted with what resembled fireworks for a brief instant. It was the same lightshow she had endured when she had knocked skulls with the Saiyan earlier. - Where are you? What's going on?
His voice came back to her, distorted from the distance between them but still audible -... not ...good time ...busy...- It faded back out but hearing it filled her with relief. He was all right. She released a breath of air that she'd been holding in for quite awhile.
Lunch carefully eyeballed the woman while her face twisted up into a pained rictus of rage and jealousy. She had always been envious of the odd hair-colored twit and her carefree way of falling ass-backwards into the most ludicrous luck imaginable. It just wasn't fair! She was rich beyond belief, a friggin' genius, and a magnet for men. Now she was married to an alien prince who had enough power to make her beloved Tien look like a weakling. It had to end and it had to end right now!
Baring her teeth, she slid the lever back and cocked the gun into semi-automatic mode, pointing it at Bulma. The sudden terrified awareness on the other woman's face filled Lunch with a sense of indescribable joy. "End of the line for you. No lucky rescue this time-"
"AHH! Holy shit-!" the driver screamed as a rhino fell out of the sky and landed directly in their path. He wrenched the steering wheel hard to the right and the jeep bucked up on its side wheels and fell over on its side, skidding in the grass. Bulma dove out, tumbled head over heels for a moment, and tried to collect her bearings. She was certain that Vegeta was nearby because, the last she'd heard, rhinos hadn't yet mastered the ability to fly. "Vegeta, where are you?" she yelled.
She thought that she could see a bright spot of color charging through the dense undergrowth. It had to be him. For some reason he seemed to be running in the wrong direction. "I'm here! Where are YOU?" he shouted back.
"HERE!" she screamed.
- You're going to have to be more specific! he said directly into her mind.
"What-?" a hand gripped her ankle and she saw that Lunch had a firm hold of her and was pawing for the Uzi where she had dropped it. Barely thinking, she threw a handful of dirt into the blonde's face. Lunch sputtered, trying to wipe the irritation away from her nose, but it was too late.
She sneezed.
A second later, the brassy thief was replaced by a bewildered, purple-haired woman who immediately recognized Bulma with her wide, beautiful eyes. "Bulma? Bulma Briefs? Hi there! Long time no see!"
"Hi Lunch," Bulma muttered, pulling herself up into a sitting position. Her right hand was squeezed into a fist and she had to submerge the impulse to clobber her. This side of the woman's split personality was a complete opposite to the other dominant, crazed part of her psyche. All that this lady wanted to do was bake cookies and sew doilies. She was no threat and, reluctantly, Bulma lowered her hand.
Still wiping the dirt from her nose, Lunch sneezed again. It was like some strange warped gift from the gods. Those slanted cat eyes zeroed in on Bulma with complete hatred. "You-"she whipped her left arm back.
"Psycho bitch!" Bulma screamed and plowed her fist directly into the woman's face at the same time that Lunch's fist collided with her jaw. The both of them keeled over in the dirt, sprawling atop one another, out cold.
Well, that's just great, Vegeta was thinking to himself, having seen most it through his wife's eyes. Now she was unconscious and he was back to being as blind as a bat. Just fucking great!
"Little man," a bass rumble sounded from nearby.
Instinctively releasing a ki pulse, Vegeta zeroed in on the ex-soldier with ridiculous ease, turning to face him. He could sense the barest hint of fighting ki radiating from the human and it was all that he needed to stay focused on his target. It was like a beacon standing out in the darkness of his mind.
Jake, the ex-soldier-tuned-mercenary, eyed the younger man with an experienced eye and took note of the injuries he saw right off the bat. The bandaged eyes, the slight limp, and a darkening bruise on his left cheek (from his rhino collision) that was bleeding. This was the threatening alien that Lunch had been warning them about? He was barely five feet tall, injured, and ...what the hell was it with that ridiculous hat he was wearing?
Shrugging to himself, he moved in quickly with the intent to get this over and done with. He punched out directly, not bothering with the usual leg work and finesse, and was shocked to see the small man duck easily under it. Vegeta feinted to the side and then dropped down into a crouch, doing a low sideswipe with his left leg and knocking the larger man off his feet. A quick elbow strike into the diaphragm, and it was all over. It took all of six seconds.
If I'd had my sight, it would only have taken two, Vegeta thought, getting slowly to his feet. He wandered away, trying to get a fix on where Bulma was lying, not bothering to make sure if the ex-soldier was down for good. It was a potentially fatal error. Underneath of his battered army jacket, Jake was wearing his flak vest and it had saved him from the worst of the chest blow. He rolled over onto his belly and forced himself to his hands and knees, getting ready to tackle the little creep who had made the mistake of turning his back to him. Here I come, little man, he thought.
Lying a few feet away, the rhino released a dazed grunt and raised its immense head, giving it a few brisk shakes. He stared blearily around, blinking dumbly, and then saw something large, and on all fours, within charging distance. His amorous instincts immediately took over. Clambering to his feet, the bull released a trumpeting love call and trotted happily over to poor Jake.
The ex-soldier saw that huge hulk of armor with the three-foot horn lumbering towards him and gave up all ambitions for battle. He had also caught sight of something else that the rhino possessed that was just as long as his horn and knew that he wanted no part of THAT either. Screaming at the top of his lungs, Jake sprinted off across the grasslands as fast as he could, chased by the love-struck rhino.
To Vegeta's ears, it all sounded potentially entertaining but he was hot, sore, and tired. He tuned out the excitement and tried to focus in on Bulma's thoughts. She was slowly coming to and he took his time closing the distance between then until he stumbled over her legs and fell sprawling. No ki, he reminded himself, struggling with his fierce temper. The woman has absolutely no ki at all. I have to remember that. "Bulma, shake it off. Wake up!"
"...uhm? Ow! My face hurts!" Bulma said in a fuzzy voice, pawing at her jawline where a bruise was rising.
-Welcome to the club, Vegeta thought tiredly and stiffened when he felt the metal barrel of a gun press up against his left temple. Someone else without a ki presence had managed to sneak up on him. Things being as they were, he supposed it really wasn't all that hard to do. "And who the hell are you?" he asked, almost as a sigh.
"Old family friend, Pinky," Lunch said, wiping blood away from her split lip. "Bulma and I go way back."
"Put the gun down!" he heard Bulma holler. She was finally awake now. It was about damned time.
- Keep your eyes focused on us, Vegeta told her directly. - Don't look around.
She noticed his face for the first time. Her gaze sharpened on the dirty bandage wrapped around his face and refused to budge from there. -Woman! he barked directly into her stunned mind. -Focus on us both! I need to see through your eyes!
God, he looks like hell, he caught flashing through her stunned mind but she did as he asked. Looking out through her own perfect sight, he clearly saw where the woman, a blonde, was sitting on his right holding an ugly, snub-nosed gun against his head. His initial irritation at being caught so easily deepened into a serious rage. Images from Installation 15 flashed across his mind, shared by Bulma who had never been told exactly what he had gone through while a prisoner there. Right now, this very instant, she finally understood precisely how he had received the bullet wounds on his back; It had been a desperate escape attempt that had gone terribly wrong. He felt her recoil from the scene in horror.
You -you never told me! her shocked mental voice rasped.
- It just went downhill from there, was all he offered her and closed his mind with renewed control, leaving behind only that rabid hatred of projectile weapons.
His hand was blur and seized the cold metal of the weapon's snout, clamping down and compressing the barrel and metal casing together under strong fingers. Lunch tried to pull the trigger but the barrel was warped and the trigger wouldn't budge. He wrenched the weapon away from her and threw it out into the grass. Using Bulma's eyes as his guide, he wrapped those same fingers around the woman's throat and pulled her in close, inhaling her scent. He expected the usual odors of sweat and deodorant but was surprised by the lack of fear. There wasn't so much as one hint of it. "Who are you?" he asked in bewilderment.
Lunch was trying to dig her claws into the Saiyan's arm but he was slightly powered up and all she managed to do was break several nails. She hissed and sputtered in rage, trying to pull away from his firm grip, but didn't betray one single word.
"Her name is Lunch," Bulma said sadly. "She is... was a friend of mine from way back. She's Tien's girlfriend."
"Girlfriend? I thought that three-eyed freak was gay?"
"That's a lie!" Lunch screamed and spat in his face.
Wiping away the slick moisture with a low snarl of disgust, he slammed her down into the ground and began choking the life out of her. She gargled and clawed at her neck as her face turned blue, releasing gagging, cawing noises. Despite it all, her green eyes only radiated hatred and fury. If he could have seen it with his own eyes, Vegeta would have been impressed.
Bulma actually hesitated in calling him off. The betrayal she felt was still raw and stinging, compromised by a fear she always had of this dangerous side of the woman's split personality. With a regretful sigh, she grabbed a blade of grass while tugging gently on her husband's arm. "Let her go. I know what to do."
Frowning in annoyance, he looked through her eyes again for some explanation and was confused when she began using the grass to tickle under the barely-conscious woman's nose. "What the hell are you doing?"
"Just watch. You'll see."
Lunch sneezed and her appearance immediately changed into a woman with thick purple-hair. It was the first time that Vegeta had ever seen her and he was struck dumb. She looked a decade younger, her skin was paler, and that athletic body had given way to one that was slightly plump and out-of-shape. Only that puffy hairstyle was the same, otherwise it was a completely different person he was holding down. "Damn, woman!' he said in amazement. "You have the most fucked-up friends I've ever seen!"
"Yah, you're one to talk," Bulma shot back, but she was smiling.
Lunch coughed painfully and looked up at Vegeta's face. She blinked twice and attempted a smile. "Oh, hello there!"
Shaking his head in confusion, he backed away and let the tension ease out of his sore muscles as he listened to the exchange going on in front of him.
Surveying the damage, Lunch was overheard to say in a grave, fretful tone, "Oh no. Is this all my fault?"
Followed by Bulma's voice, "Indirectly, yes."
"And I was doing so good! I'm sorry, Bulma. I just have no control over her. I don't know what to do!"
They got up and wandered off, talking in low, urgent tones. Vegeta rubbed the wound on his swollen cheek and brooded: -Go ahead. Just leave the blind, injured Saiyan sitting all alone in the dirt. Doesn't matter that I saved your ass or anything like that. Go on, help your crazy friend. See if I give a sh-
-It'll only be for a minute! God! Bulma huffed into his mind. He had been unaware that he was still projecting his thoughts and he swiftly closed that mental door shut, flushing deeply from anger and embarrassment. He crossed his arms and retreated into a sulk while the women continued their talk.
An unknown length of time later, Bulma returned to his side and placed a gentle hand against his raw face. "Can you get up?"
"A better question is if I want to," he responded morosely, his face still turned to the ground.
"I need your help getting the jeep back up on its wheels. Lunch is leaving. She's going to try and get some treatment for her in the nearest city."
"And the next time she sneezes? In a couple of minutes, she just might use that vehicle to run us over."
"We found some super glue in the glove compartment. It's keeping her nostrils shut. When we were younger, she used a clothespin to prevent the changes and it worked. For awhile anyway."
"That's a comforting thought."
"Vegeta, please?"
After several more seconds of pouting, he got reluctantly to his feet. The sooner he did what she wanted, the sooner they could get rid of the freak and get on with their lives. It was turning out to be a very long day and all that the Saiyan wanted to do was lie down and catch up on some much-needed sleep. All of these stupid misadventures were finally beginning to take their toll on him. Vegeta was not a man who handled ambiguity very well; he was a creature of staunch routine and habit that resented things that fell outside of his sphere of control. This strange honeymoon was only into its sixth day and things were getting weirder by the second. His nerves were just about shot. "Where is it?" he grumbled.
"Over here, I'll guide you," she said, taking his hand while eyeing him with deep concern. The exposed lower half of his face was beet red from laser burns and the wound on his cheek was trickling a small rivulet of blood. His clothes were dusty and torn in several places. He looked exhausted and almost all used up. Still, he hoisted the jeep back onto all four tires with relative ease and was still cocky enough to flash Lunch the finger as the woman drove away.
Alone at last, Bulma returned her radar into her coat pocket and carefully set down the two-star Dragonball. She focused all of her attention on the battered Saiyan and unwound the dirty bandages from his face. Both of his eyes were completely swollen closed. "Are- are you in much pain?" she dared to ask.
He wouldn't admit it even if he was and they both knew it. All he said as his answer was, "Tell me that you packed some senzu beans."
"I have plenty. They're in my make-up bag." She shielded her eyes with one hand and scanned the horizon. "I don't have the capsule with me. We'll have to walk back to the jet. Do you think you can make it?"
"Sure," he said, pulling out a capsule from his back pocket and depressing the switch with his thumb. He flung it casually over his shoulder a far enough distance to detonate and Bulma saw it was their damaged hoverjet. "You actually packed it?!"
"I wasn't going to leave it behind. It has all our gear and a full water tank. Tracking you was thirsty work." He almost sounded smug.
She regarded him in amazement, unable to believing how methodical he was. He had been blinded, his wife had been abducted, and still he had the clarity of mind to search for the encapsulation switch behind the jet and bring it along with him. If their situation had been reversed, she would still be sitting out in the Serengeti bawling her eyes out. "You really are quite amazing, you know that?"
"Yes," came the expected answer.
Rolling her eyes, she led him over to the hatchway and for some reason pulled him to a stop. "Are you really sure that you're not in too much pain?"
"I'm sure. Why?" he asked warily.
"Just stay right there. I'll be right back," she said and he heard her run up the ramp and enter the jet. He figured that she had just gone looking for the senzu beans and leaned casually against the side of the aircraft. In a few minutes she was back and appeared to be setting up something a few feet away from him. "Woman?" That cautious note had returned to his voice again.
She was back, wrapping an arm around his shoulders. "Say 'cheese'."
"Wha-?"
There was a quick click from what she had set up earlier. Vegeta knew from bitter experience that it was from her damned camera. The woman was determined to take pictures of every humiliating thing he got himself into and the last straw had been when she had parted his hair in the middle (and taken pictures of it, no less!) up in Siberia. "Woman!"
"I had to, honey," she said, pulling off his baseball cap and giving him a quick peck on his unmarked cheek. "You'll understand when you see the picture. Honest."
"Oh, screw it," he mumbled and sat down in the grass to resume his moping. He heard Bulma gather her gear and return to the jet where she started searching through her luggage for her make-up bag. After a couple of minutes she returned to his side and poked a familiar bean between his tense lips. He accepted it without hesitation, crunching it between his teeth and swallowing. The darkness and exhaustion instantly lifted from his body like a heavy curtain. His abrasions disappeared, his burns healed, and he relaxed at long last as his surroundings came into view with perfect color and clarity.
"What a relief," he whispered, raising his eyes gratefully to the sky.
Sitting down beside him, she leaned up against his shoulder and knocked one knuckle against the metal of the jet. "Well, I guess the only thing to do is pack this crate up and head on over to the nearest city ourselves. I'll see if we can't get it fixed or buy a replacement."
"You don't have a back-up?"
"This was our back-up. I left all my traveling capsules at home by mistake, remember? I suppose we could drive across the African badlands on Daisy, if you'd like-"
He flashed her a sullen glare and she had to laugh. "It'll give us an opportunity to rest our head for a few days, too. There's only two Dragonballs to go and we have plenty of time. I'd like to wake up in the same place more than one day in a row. Truth to tell, Vegeta, all this globetrotting is wearing me out."
She was echoing his secret desire to perfection. With a rare smile on his face, he got quickly to his feet. "Then let's not waste any more time and get going," he said with true relief, pulling her up.
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Three days later, a postcard arrived at the Capsule Corporation headquarters building. The postman had enjoyed a good laugh when he delivered it to the front desk. Shortly after, everyone from Research and Development and the rest of the offices were crowded around the reception desk passing it back and forth, sharing a good-natured chuckle at the picture.
When Mrs. Briefs found them all standing around and laughing, she scolded them, but only half-heartedly. She took the card down to her husband's office and announced merrily, "You owe me a backrub, dear!"
Looking up from a device he was working on, the scientist's eyes widened in surprise. "Bulma actually got him to wear it?" he asked in disbelief.
"See for your self!" she said, slapping the postcard down on his desk.
As a fun bridal gift, Mrs. Briefs had given her daughter a pair of baseball caps. One was bright pink with the letters "BRIDE" stitched in blue on the front, and the other was dark blue, with white lettering saying, "GROOM". The original bet had been for Bulma to get the Saiyan to wear the groom hat in an actual picture. Some how, in some unknown way, Bulma had managed the impossible:
Posing together in the photo, Bulma was happily wearing the blue groom hat while the Saiyan, obviously in a pout, was sporting the bright pink cap that said "BRIDE".
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Chapter Eight: It's off to the land "Down Under", mate!