Chapter 5
"I bed your pardon? For a moment there, it sounded as if you just said that Frieza, the one trapped in the Black hole, is coming back."
"He is, thanks to our father." Sophia lowered her head in shame and hatred for her father. Before she had resented him, but now she hated him with a passion.
"Tell me is it isn't true."
"It is true." Vegeta in a state of shock himself, took his sister in his arms, held her tight and took her inside. He sat her on the couch and sat besides her. Bulma and Trunks wandered into the door way.
"Leave us. Take Trunks with you."
"But father."
"Do not back talk me boy. Go with your mother." Bulma ushered Trunks upstairs and made sure he was in bed. She then tip toed as quietly as she could, curious by nature she had to hear what had happened that Vegeta didn't want her to hear.
"Now. Tell me what happened?"
"From the beginning?"
"Yes." Sophia took a deep breath and tried to calm her raging emotions, and succeeded, for a while.
"I arrived on Planet Vegeta. Father didn't want to give up his thrown and I have no idea how to run a planet or how to act as queen. So I let him keep him with the intention of taking it from him at a later date." Sophia clenched her fists as she prepared herself to continue. "Father had a council meeting this morning. He invited me to attend as he thought it was the least I deserved. He didn't tell me that it was a meeting of all the old allies. And I mean all the old allies."
"You mean the Ice-jins were there too?" Vegeta queried in disbelief. His eye widening as his sisters sorrowful gaze answered him.
"Yes. King Kold himself." Sophia closed her eyes as she felt the burning rage churn in her stomach. "He was there for a reason too. He asked the council to give him the coordinates to Frieza……and they gave them to him…"
"That's absurd! They surely didn't?"
"Oh they did. And our father was the one who gave them over to him." still unable to open her eyes in fear of her brother seeing her inner pain, she kept them closed. If she opened them, tears would surely gather and seep through her defences, showing her as weak. That was one thing she never allowed herself to be in public, weak. Not even in front of her own brother that she loves dearly.
"So is Kold on his way to Frieza now?"
"As. We. Speak." Sophia growled through gritted teeth. Desperately trying to contain her livid rage.
"We have to stop him! Frieza is still one hundred more powerful than any of us. As much as I hate to admit it. No one would ever defeat him in battle and he will not likely fall for another ploy like a trap again. I don't even think there are any other ways to trap his kind other than a black hole and I am sure he would avoid them from now on." Vegeta returned his momentarily distracted gaze to his sister. From the way she was crushing her eye lids shut, she had to be hiding something. "There is something you are not telling me, isn't there?" when he was met with silence he noticed just how tightly her fists were clenched. It was hard to miss when blood was escaping through open cuts in her white knuckles. "Soph. tell me. Do not be ashamed in opening up to me. You know that no matter what it is, I can handle it and will not judge you on it."
"Father." She spat with disgust, her entire body began to shake. At first Vegeta thought she was upset, but she wasn't. She was burning from the inside out with a strong sense of betrayal and hatred, loathing and livid anger, and ready to kill. "That wasn't the reason he called the meeting." Her mind's walls and defences betrayed her and all the information of her situation hit her mind in a wave of hatred, disgust and eventually, sorrow. She was trapped and that had been the worst feeling in the universe. That is what drove her to leave. That, and her blind hatred for her father for making her trapped and vulnerable.
"Tell me Soph. why did he call the meeting." Vegeta and his unseen wife were desperate to hear what was making her act this way. But Vegeta didn't just want to know, he needed to know. His beloved sister was shaking vigorously, tears were trying to burst the dam that was her eyes and flow down her cheeks. Her fists were still bleeding and her teeth were bared in distaste. "Tell me. Please Soph." he took her shoulders in his hands and forced her to face him fully. She snapped her eyes open. She didn't care about her pride anymore. She didn't care about her ego or her need to be controlled and on guard at all times. Vegeta for the second time since he had seen his sister, saw a story unravel in her eyes. One of pain, torture and hatred. Her brilliant blue eyes seemed to pale and became consumed in the watery tears that gushed from her tear ducts. The tears flowed, but silently. She wouldn't sob, wail or whimper. Vegeta didn't know what was scaring him more. The fact that something unknown to him had reduced the prideful Sophia, the trained assassin, to tears, or that she was crying. As long as he had known Sophia, she had been as controlled with her emotions as he was. And here she was, crying. But she wasn't crying like he knew. When ever the woman had cried or one of her friends, or even his own son, they made wailing screaming sobbing sounds and looked distraught. But that was very different from what his sister was doing. True, tears did flow, but she made no sound. No sound came from anywhere. The deathly silence could drive you insane, and it was tearing and tugging at Vegeta's very soul. He had to break this cursed quiet before he went mad with worry.
"…Soph…"
"Am I some sort of toy? Am I some sort of child's Doll!" Vegeta was taken back by the sudden harsh pitch in her voice. She sprang to her feet, showing she was far from finished. She looked up to the ceiling rather than Vegeta, tears still flowing as she interrogated it demandingly. "Was the soul reason I was born, to be passed around like a play thing! To be used and played with as some sort of amusement! Is there someone up there, looking down and laughing at me! Have they doomed me to this endless cycle of 'pass the Sophia'? To see how long it takes for me to break and snap in two! Well here I am and I am broken. It has taken 25 long Saiyan moons but here I am. Broken. I am broken and a cursed woman! Here I am! ARE YOU WATCHING UP THERE? LAUGHING AT THE MOCKERY THAT IS MY LIFE? You should be…" she lowered her head and it hung from her neck in shame. She fell to her knees and held the sides of her face in her hands. "…I am broken…who will fix me?" she pleaded with no one as she broke down into full fledged, raging sobs for the first time in her life. In her memory.
"I will fix you." Vegeta said lovingly as he gently lifted Sophia in his arms and on his lap as he sat down. He held her close as he continued. "I don't think you are a cursed woman. You are a free woman with the mind of your own. With your own rights and hell I have never met anyone who has lived to object to that! I love you Soph. I really do. You are the strongest woman I know. If Frieza coming back is scaring you do not worry. I will have my mate get me a ship and we will stop his rescue."
"That…isn't it. It is. More than you know. But not fully."
"Then tell me so I can help you. You know I will do everything in my power to help you and more. But you have to tell me first."
"At the council. The reason they met was because of me."
"What?" after she grew silent again Vegeta shifted her on is lap until he was just about cradling her. "Soph?"
"I am 25 moons. So I am young, beautiful, a war hero, powerful, the heir to the thrown and mate-less…"
"NO. He didn't!"
"He did. He practically sold me to the council. He even told them to go home, talk to their royal sons and come back to the next meeting to choose one of them to be the most suitable as my suitor. So that our children would inherit the Saiyan thrown." Tears began to pour from her eyes again. "He made me sound like a china doll at a market place. Waiting for the highest bidder. Like I was some sort of concubine to be bought, and used."
"I WILL NOT STAND FOR THIS!" Vegeta dropped Sophia on the couch and marched round the corner. He came back with Bulma who was crying at what she had heard. She ran to Sophia and hugged her tightly. "WOMAN! Get me a ship NOW!" Bulma ran outside in her dressing gown and vanished from view. "just you wait till I get my hands around your throat father."
"No. don't confront him!"
"why not!"
"I did and he…"
"And he WHAT!"
"He back handed me. Please don't."
"THST BASTARD! I WILL KILL HIS FUCKING ASS!"
Enraged to a murderous state, Vegeta stormed upstairs and Sophia simply sobbed on the couch. Shortly after, Vegeta reappeared with a huge bag to two over his shoulders and followed the route as Bulma. He reappeared again, this time with Bulma by his side. The bags had gone however. "Sophia" Vegeta demanded, still fumed as hell. "We are leaving NOW!" Vegeta turned to his mate who simply stroked his face and kissed him on the lips gently.
"You do what you need to honey."
"I intend to. Thank you for understanding."
"Just go so you can come back ok."
"Farewell. I love you." Vegeta turned from Bulma and scooped Sophia up in her arms. Her long white dress trailed behind them as Vegeta carried his sister away in silence. With a new purpose in mind, driving him forward, Vegeta walked into a new ship that Bulma had ejected from the underground lab/base. Once inside, he placed the still and quiet Sophia in the main chair and set the coordinates for their home planet. Vegeta gave his mate one last glance before closing the door and launching the ship into space.
"Where is my daughter? Have you seen her?" King Vegeta asked a passing guard to receive a shaking of his head and a no sire. "Very well." King Vegeta continued his way to his private quarters and his wife. Once there he found her at the dresser, brushing her long black hair. "my dear have you seen Sophia since this morning? I must talk with her."
"No I haven't my dear. What so you need to talk to her about May I ask?" the King let out a deep sigh and sat on the bed. He held his aged face in his hands and sighed again. "Is the reason you need to talk with her have anything to do with her being mated off? Or why you continue to sigh so?"
"Sophia wasn't pleased with my decision to give Kold the coordinates to Frieza."
"the is understandable but it isn't her decision to make."
"She also wasn't thrilled about having her mate decided at the next Council meeting."
"Once again. Not her decision to make."
"She confronted me about it."
"Oh…"
"Yes oh. I lost my temper with her and struck her. I regret doing it but at the time it was necessary. I had tried to talk sense into the girl but she does insist on being as awkward as her brother. And there was only ever one way to make him comply. I lost my common sense and in that brief moment I stuck her. She told me that she hates me and I don't blame her. I am a terrible father."
"No my lord. You are a good father. You simply made a mistake. And you love her. She will forgive you."
"But Vegeta will not."
"What does our son have to do with this?"
"I have been trying to find Sophia since this morning. She is no where and now it is night. I have good reason that she has left the planet and I think we both know where and who she will go to."
"Earth and Vegeta…she will still forgive you."
"Alas, of that my dear I am not as certain. Come. Let us rest. They will surely make an appearance soon. Let us sleep and await their impending arrival."
"Yes my love." The rulers of the Saiyan world went to their rather large bed and slept. They were right on one thing. Both Vegeta and Sophia would be arriving, and very soon…
