Chapter Three - Lament
Vegeta shot up from his sleep with a startle. Rosemary curiously squinted an eye open after hearing him rustle around in the grass. She seemed adequately rested for now.
'Was he dreaming? I guess I'm not the only one.' She watched as he took his first heavy breaths, refreshed. Occasionally she forgot that Vegeta, while a fearless warrior with nerves of steel, still had weaknesses and feelings. 'I just wish that mine didn't have such a habit of becoming reality.'
She sighed. The guilt from past nights of fitful dreams still weighed on her to the day no matter how much she wanted to move on.
'I can't stay mad at him for mentioning it forever… It makes perfect sense for him to be angry. It was all too much of a coincidence that the two things happened to correlate, what are the odds…'
She got up to greet the prince as he panted for air.
"Bad dream, I take it?" She asked half-heartedly in an attempt to stir some kind of small talk.
Vegeta stubbornly crossed his arms.
"Not all of it." Vegeta dryly answered. "Memories, mostly."
"I see." She responded back. "Well then, are you ready to relocate? It's hard to determine how long we've been sleeping, this planet doesn't have a day and night..."
"Move?" Vegeta clarified, still coming to. "Why?"
Rosemary firmly placed her hands in her lap, pensively looking out into the distance with a firm nod.
"I'm fairly confident that Zarbon will come back to see if you were truly taken care of. Whether he likes it or not, you're a valuable source of information." She explained, logical as always. "And judging by the fact that you aren't in the same place that he left you, that's a pretty good indicator that you're not dead."
Vegeta smirked.
"Well, aren't you on top of everything today." He teased as he took his time getting up, his body still aching from the fight he had been retrieved from.
"I can only assume that you made me your Advisor for a reason." Rosemary rebutted with a proud grin. "Our lives are on the table here, and I'd prefer not to spend the one day I'm finally free fighting for it the entire time. Unlike you, I prefer to avoid fights."
She shot him a cheeky wink. Ah there it was, her confidence was coming back.
Vegeta stubbornly looked away. Her tenacious spunks looked and felt even better now than they ever have.
"Whatever, let's go." Vegeta shot back and took to the air, with Rosemary following after.
…
Zarbon frantically flew over the Namekian waters in a fury, recalling landmarks and island formations in order to Vegeta's body and retrieve him. Time was growing thin - it had easily been more than what he'd been given, but Frieza tended to be more generous and forgiving to him when it came to slip ups. Zarbon preferred to think that Frieza's right-hand general was more difficult to replace than the countless bodies that littered the planet thus far, and presson onwards.
"Why does everything look the same on this stupid planet?" He muttered away, impatiently quickening his pace. "Plateau to the left, two islands beside it, ugh... This might be it."
He dove down and firmly landed on the ground and took to scanning the area. He hoped that he'd be more successful this time than the past four or so islands he'd investigated. After retracing his steps from the battle he spotted a darker patch of grass, laced with blood - the very same patch of grass that he'd then taken Vegeta's body from and carelessly thrown into the lake he'd made during the fight.
He bitterly dipped into the water and began his search. He thought he'd been done with this pathetic man, and ending the Saiyan's life brought him a pleasure that he rarely experienced. He wanted nothing more than to see to his death and watch as Rosemary screamed and hollered while her beloved Vegeta fell to his end before her very eyes.
He grimaced. He didn't even get the joy of that when he'd finally carried out the deed.
He continued to swim downwards, only to find the empty floor of the lake with not a single point of interest in sight. 'This is clearlywhere we fought, but why isn't he here?!'
He crossed his arms in defeat and hovered among the water for a moment, then remembered Rosemary flying away halfway through the fight to flee.
'She must have come back to retrieve him.' He looked up to the surface. 'And if I did just leave him knocked out, then the two of them could be conscious and on the move by now.'
He promptly made his way back up to land and carefully eyed the sky. He took care to note the position of the clouds - if they were meddled with recently, they would still be streaked from the disturbance in the air…
Instead, the clouds looked perfectly intact. Plump and fluffy, exactly the opposite of what he wanted.
He uttered a heavy huff of disappointment and shook his head.
"Of course I'm going to have to find them the hard way." He groaned. The situation couldn't get much worse than it had so far.
He took off from the ground and went about his search from the sky once again. It seemed that death was a powerful motivator today.
Vegeta flew as fast as he could in an attempt to overtake Rosemary but no matter how hard he tried, she quickened herself ever so slightly so he couldn't. It's like she was toying with him - she constantly looked back with a cheeky smile but said nothing.
Something rubbed him the wrong way. It wasn't a race, but he hated that he was losing.
Rosemary laughed heartily as Vegeta's face warped with anger as they flew onwards, performing corkscrews and rolls through the air delightfully. The feeling of flying on her own terms again was pure and liberating, and she had to admit, his usual frustration towards her speed was refreshing as well.
'How is it possible that she still has absolutely no strength but always outdoes me in speed on both the ground and in the air…' He enviously complained to himself. He grew more competitive by the second, trying to push himself to fly faster just to prove a point, but just as he sped up even more, Rosemary adjusted her pace just a bit to further ensure he couldn't get an edge yet again,
She indulged him with a playful snicker.
"I hope one of those memories of yours back there was of the hundred times I've beaten you in a race!" She boasted cockily through some of the first genuine bits of laughter that she'd had in ages. "Ah, this feels great! Gods, I've missed these days so much, you know..."
Vegeta ignored her to put full concentration into pushing past her but was met with a protest of pain, causing him to drop back a few feet.
Rosemary worriedly came to a slow to rejoin him.
"Hey, take it easy." She sincerely scolded. "You're still in pain! I haven't forgotten!"
"Of course you haven't." Vegeta brushed it off, crossing his arms to pout as they continued on their path. His whole body ached, but he refused to let it best him. "Can you not sense how powerful I am? This is nothing."
Intrigued by the concept, Rosemary tilted her body to face him.
"Um, sense your power?" She asked, intrigued. "Well, we've always had Scouters for that… The thought didn't even cross my mind."
She paused to entertain the idea and got lost in pondering.
"How does one do such a thing?" She prodded curiously. "I imagine it would have to do with your energy patterns, like how certain emotions resonate differently with our energy? Could you show me?"
She looked at him with wide, eager eyes, hoping he would give some kind of insight. She tried to imagine the processes herself, then felt an ominous aura creep in on her.
"Now that you've mentioned it, though… I did just get a scary feeling, but I'm not sure if it's your strength…"
Vegeta huffed heavily, annoyed, and took a crack at it himself. Someone was approaching them, there was no doubt in his mind, but there was no possible way she learned to sense whoever this was that quickly. Besides, it couldn't be his strength that she was sensing - she would be absolutely astounded if it was.
"Not exactly, but you're onto something." He admitted, then the energy hit him full force, and it was big. 'Damn it, she wasn't joking…'
The two of them came to a halt and shared an awkward moment of silence.
"B-But that is definitely something I'm feeling, right?" Rosemary questioned for clarity, seizing up in fear. "That huge something or other heading straight for us?!"
Vegeta looked down, checking the ground for a place to evade whoever it was that was approaching them, spotting an island with two mountains, immediately side by side.
"Down there!" He quickly called over to her, pointing towards an opening between the mountains. "There's a crevice! Hide!"
Rosemary nodded in agreement, then dove down at the island faster than Vegeta wished he'd ever seen.
As Rosemary came closer to the ground, she hadn't bothered slowing down and went in for a more challenging landing this time around. She reached out her arms to ready herself and allowed her hands to make firm contact with the ground, swinging off of the points that she'd planted in the hard dirt. She flipped once, then twice, calculating every bend that she made with her body as she detected the changes in her momentum. She finally kicked off to begin a layout, twisting her body seamlessly to produce a perfect display, comfortably landing on her feet. She let out a deep exhale, satisfied - she was still as agile as ever.
'Well that was exhilarating, some things don't change.' She noted as she stretched back out. Her abdomen disagreed and prodded her with a small cramp. She instinctively put a hand to her gut, and stepped into the narrow canyon.
'Definitely feeling it afterwards though.'
Vegeta watched in admiration as he followed not far behind.
Krillin and Gohan, who happened to be hiding at the same spot, ran over to see who had joined them.
Gohan looked at Rosemary for a brief moment and immediately remembered her from the same Namekian village where they had rescued Dende. His face lit up with joy - he no longer had to regret leaving her behind as a captive.
"Hey, you're here!" Gohan cheered, looking over at Vegeta. "Did Vegeta help you get away?"
"Well, I broke free on my own, but he helped me escape, yes. I just needed the right time." She gladly explained. Finally, she had accomplished something worth noting. "More importantly, though, can you feel that energy coming our way?"
"Ah, you guys felt it too, huh." Krillin followed up. "Hey, Vegeta, you'd probably know better than us, uh… Is this something we can handle?"
'These two know Vegeta…?' Rosemary peculiarly inferred. She couldn't say the same about herself. 'Perhaps he'd gotten close on some sort of mission…'
"If it means anything," Rosemary went on and held up a finger as-a-matter-of-factly. "We fought one of Frieza's generals earlier. It didn't really work out in our favour."
"Does that mean you have powers, too?" Krillin asked, narrowing his eyes and shooting a look at Gohan. "Told ya." He mumbled.
Rosemary took a deep breath. The time to explain herself was bound to come eventually.
"Well, yes... I do, but," Rosemary responded unconfidently, then looked to Vegeta with a frown. "I don't have the experience to match them. Everything I have managed to achieve as of late has been purely experimental and doesn't have any kind of known success rate."
Vegeta looked to the ground and listened further. He wasn't entirely surprised by her explanation, but he was still questioning how she figured out that she had such uncommon powers.
"That would explain why you didn't help us fight those guys while they were terrorizing the village." Krillin nodded his head. Based on the soldiers she was surrounded with at the time, he understood the risk of trying to pull a fast one. "It could have gone badly."
Rosemary nodded affirmatively. "Precisely. I haven't had enough practice to fully get a hold on how my new abilities work yet." She continued, a bit ashamed. "I've only been in situations where it was ideal that I conceal them even if I have them. And when I use them, I don't last very long, in terms of a fight."
Vegeta let out a chuckle.
"Yes, Rosemary won't last even ten minutes in battle." He added coldly. "But her powers are strange, I will admit."
"Must be pretty strange if they impressed Vegeta." Gohan whispered to Krillin, inquisitively looking from Vegeta, over to Rosemary, who had noticed them talking secretively.
Vegeta furrowed his brow.
"Ha-ha, I heard that." Vegeta scoffed, crossing his arms in retaliation. "And I've known her for ages, she's not new to me."
He sulked, acknowledging that the kid was right to an extent - Rosemary's abilities quietly thrilled him the more he observed her using them, and he eagerly wanted to see what she was capable of with some proper training.
Rosemary shot him a quick but questionable look, then turned back to the other two.
"I am a Saiyan, you see." Rosemary informed them after assuming they had already known Vegeta somewhat well, and followed with a respectful bow. "Forgive me, I should probably introduce myself. My name is Rosemary, formerly the Royal Advisor and an old friend to Prince Vegeta."
She blushed. It had been a while since she had so much harmless attention from a group of people, but she managed a smile. "It really is a relief to know that I am not the only one here against Frieza's fleet."
Krillin held up a finger, confused.
"Wait a sec," He began. "Isn't Vegeta fighting him, too?"
Rosemary nodded with a grateful smile towards Vegeta. Charmed, Vegeta fell off of his guard, leaving him awkwardly looking back at her, unsure of what to do with himself.
"Well, yes, of course, but I only ran into him out of happenstance." She answered shyly while Vegeta kept an artlessly firm, dominant stance towards the water behind them. "We're still getting used to each other again, it's been a very long time since we've crossed paths… He is, how do I put it, an acquired taste."
Vegeta nodded quietly to agree with her, yet had nothing to add. He felt a sharp jolt of energy immediately above them and looked up quickly, to find Zarbon patiently peeping down on them.
"Yes, hello, indeed." Zarbon joined in from above, causing Rosemary and the others to snap their head upwards in horror.
'Maybe I shouldn't have gotten so comfortable…' Rosemary thought dreadfully, her knees growing weak. 'Now what?!'
"Long time no see, my dear." Zarbon greeted Rosemary with a charming smile, ignoring the rest of the group. "You have no idea how I've missed you."
Vegeta could feel his face growing hot in resentment.
Rosemary's gaze fell away from him out of distaste.
"We've already had this discussion, sir." She told him in disgust, trying to hold some level of ground on her own. "Several times. I'm not interested."
"Hmm, we probably have," Zarbon taunted with a wink. "But I probably wasn't paying attention because I was distracted by your lovely face." He swooned over her devilishly.
'At least he can admit it.' Vegeta enviously scowled to himself, outraged. 'But this is just revolting.'
Rosemary shuddered. She hated his flirting, but in the end, she gave a defeated sigh.
'At least when I was chained to that horrible excuse of a person, I was constantly reminded that I was actually good-looking.' She compromised. Maybe one day she would hear it from someone who genuinely appreciated her.
Vegeta had already taken the initiative to throw a spiteful punch to Zarbon.
"I suppose I'm... flattered, among other things." Rosemary finally managed to say, looking upwards at the two of them fighting.
"Oh my gosh, he's handsome!" A woman with blue hair sighed dreamily as she approached the group of them.
Rosemary jerked away at the thought, confused.
"Which, Vegeta?" Rosemary asked her protectively.
She ignored the fact that she had no idea who this woman was for the sake of conversation.
"No, no!" Bulma spat in disagreement. "I can't stand him, he's a jerk. The other guy, though…"
Rosemary sighed heavily in relief.
'She couldn't be any more wrong, but thank goodness.' She rejoiced in private. 'I couldn't care less of this woman's opinion, Vegeta isn't this repugnant man, so he's got my vote.' Rosemary paused for a moment, her thoughts taking a foul turn. Who would want to be with Zarbon?!
She shivered.
Zarbon and Vegeta landed a few feet apart just outside of the crevice where the four of them were standing, only to lunge towards each other again.
'I really hope he doesn't get hurt this time!' Rosemary thought in suspense, now carefully monitoring the two of them carry on. There was no clear dominating side to this battle, and she wasn't pleased. 'Perhaps I should step in…'
Vegeta and Zarbon repelled out from each other in a flash.
Zarbon held a hand out to Vegeta and made a vile snicker.
"I've been hiding another side of myself, you see." Zarbon enticingly edged on. "I never really like to use this form, though, especially around Rosemary. It's quite hideous. I don't think she'd ever think of me the same afterwards."
"Well then, pretty yourself up, because you're not getting another chance." Vegeta shot back bitterly.
Rosemary stifled a heavy snort, only to blurt out into hysterics and curl over in laughter. 'Oh wow, that was clever, even for him!'
Vegeta turned around in an annoyed confusion. 'Really, now?!'
"What the hell is so funny?!" He shouted at her angrily. "Can younot see that I'm busy?!"
Rosemary wiped a tear from her eye and tried to steady her breathing.
"I'm sorry, Your Highness- I mean, Vegeta!" She replied, still getting over herself slowly, blushing profusely. "But that was so awful! Your humour is as dry as ever."
She looked back to Zarbon, now seemingly in the middle of his transformation. Several of Zarbon's limps began to horrifically swell and deform with the most gruesome sloshing sounds.
She looked away squeamishly. "Gods! That took a turn..."
'I didn't say that to encourage him to transform…' Vegeta shook his head in exasperation, watching as Zarbon completed his transformation.
Before him now stood a massive, ugly, fat, repulsive, lizard-like looking thug.
From inside the crevice, Gohan looked as if he'd been watching some horror movie that his mom told him not to watch.
"Hey, this doesn't look good! We have to help him!" Gohan cried out in dismay.
Rosemary continued to watch the battle as well. The boy was right, Zarbon looked to be almost triple in size, and in muscular mass. He was sweating, however… Whatever he'd done to himself didn't go without work.
'Zarbon wasn't joking about this form of his, it's certainly not a sight for the light-hearted…' She surmised. She wanted to believe that Vegeta could take this fight but couldn't - he'd already failed once. She needed to come up with a plan...
"I will go." Rosemary valiantly spoke out. "I need the practice, and some closure."
Vegeta stood there while Zarbon charged towards him, stunned in disgust. 'He wasn't joking, this new form is like night and day…'
"Not again, you won't!" Rosemary shouted, flaring her arms out in front of her to channel her power.
Zarbon's charge came to a slow, then grew completely still.
"This just isn't fair!" Zarbon growled angrily while he could still move his mouth.
Vegeta snapped out of his disturbing trance to notice Rosemary steadily approaching. Her arms were splayed out to her side as she took slow steps towards him, and her eyes seemed as sharp as daggers while she locked her sights on the petrified heap of filth.
He scowled. How reckless - did she have any idea what she was getting herself into? Did being subjected to this putrid general teach her nothing?
He ogled at her for a moment, baffled by her negligence and refocused on the task at hand.
"Guess I just saved you again, didn't I?" Rosemary teased, unaware of his daydreaming. "You know, I think I'm seriously starting to get the hang of this."
Vegeta narrowed his eyes at her, completely turned off.
"Hardly." Vegeta shot back. "I can take a hit without dying, you know."
Though he didn't mind the help - it meant he could learn more about the details of her perplexing powers.
"Yes, well," She countered in a snap. "I would rather the prince not be beaten and scarred when we're done here. I can't tend to wounds in the middle of a fight."
She struggled to make lifting motion with her left arm and shot out her right to lighten the load and steadily guide Zarbon off the ground. She grit her teeth while she continued to strain herself - three times the mass meant she needed triple the focus.
Content, Rosemary held her stance for a moment with difficulty, then finally threw her arms down. Before she could take her next breath, Zarbon came smashing to the ground with a loud thud.
The sound was blissful music to her ears.
Vegeta's mouth dropped, stupefied.
Rosemary managed a chuckle through heavy breaths.
"The bigger they are, the harder they fall, right?" She explained, giddy with gratification. She let out a short but pleasurable moan. "Oh, yes, that felt good to do... I'm beginning to see why you like this so much, Vegeta."
Vegeta chomped his mouth back shut.
"How the-" Vegeta began, then stopped himself and shook his head. "I'm not even going to ask how that's possible."
Rosemary giggled with glee.
"Well, to answer, I'm not quite sure myself, really." Rosemary replied, vibrating with joy. "I've only had practice on small objects, never people."
Vegeta rolled his eyes. Was this all a joke to her?
Zarbon struggled to get up with a deep groan. The extra weight from his transformation had taken its toll on his movements, for sure.
The two Saiyans snapped their gaze back to the green monster in unison.
Rosemary shot her arms back out to Zarbon to freeze him yet again, but Zarbon managed to push through her hold this time.
'What? I can't be out of energy already!' She fought back. Puzzled, she squinted further and pushed harder, to be met with a stabbing pain from the side of her head.
"Ow! Gods!" She cursed under her breath. "Why does this hurt so much?!"
She winced and leapt out of the way as Zarbon gradually stomped his way towards the two of them.
"If it hurts, go away!" Vegeta snapped. "I didn't ask for your help!"
He jumped in to fire off small bursts of punches and kicks.
Krillin and Gohan watched from the opening in the cliffs, baffled at the sight of Rosemary's technique.
Gohan shook his head in disbelief, pulling out every stop in his brain that he had to figure out the process. It all seemed so foreign and janky.
"This… This is physically impossible!" He remarked. "Not even Piccolo can lift stuff like this and he meditates and trains for days!"
"Y'know, for years, flying was, too." Krillin harmlessly defended. "Yet here we are."
Gohan huffed, admitting defeat.
Rosemary refused to retreat and kept at it. She looked over to Vegeta, barely managing a smirk, and was forced to one knee out of raw pressure.
"Vegeta! Could you please finish him off?" She asked through a tired yelp. "I'm growing weary again… I-I pushed too hard earlier, but I need to learn..."
'With pleasure.'
While Zarbon struggled to move, Vegeta shoved an open palm to his chest and fired a blast right through him. Rosemary finally let go of Zarbon and looked away - just in time to avoid the sight of Zarbon's internal organs spewing everywhere.
"Like the outside of him wasn't bad enough…" Rosemary moaned aghast and squinted an eye open. Something felt as though it could stab through her forehead.
She sat on a clean area of grass and raised a hand to massage it. She closed her eyes in hope that the pain would dissipate and leaned against her left arm to tiredly prop herself up. Quietly, she took heavy breaths and tried to distract herself by listening to the gentle swooshing of the ocean.
With Zarbon now taken care of, Gohan and Krillin emerged from the crevice and took to Rosemary's side. Gohan crouched down and inspected her with concern as she sat, slumped over with fatigue.
"A-Are you alright?" Gohan gently asked her. Her skin seemed ghostly white at that very moment. "You really don't look good."
Vegeta tossed Zarbon's body into the water at the island's edge. Rosemary couldn't help but manage a small laugh as she heard a loud splash, humoured by the irony, then coughed from the shortness of breath.
"I-I don't feel good either…" Rosemary whined. "It's because my powers do not… depend on my physical strength like yours do." She dryly coughed again. "P-Pardon me. Anyway, they rely on my mental capacity."
She continued to soothingly rub her head with some more deep breaths. "I am not physically strong at all, just ask Vegeta."
They all looked over to Vegeta, now regrouped.
He felt a sliver of guilt for her. She must have felt a need to jump in, and suffered at his expense. Seeing her hurt was an occurrence he hadn't been akin to, he was used to her tending to his every bruise and scratch after long days of training and combat missions. But now, here she was - unscathed yet in such agony - he didn't know what to do.
He took post beside her and neatly crossed his arms.
"Yes, Rosemary was always known for her speed and abundance of energy, never her strength." He confirmed solemnly. "She can run and fly with ease and great speed, but the moment she attempts to do a push-up, she just simply can't do it."
"Wait a minute..." Gohan thought out loud, thinking about all the books he had read for school. "If you can't even handle your own weight, how is it that you can control others, who are bigger than you, without even touching them?! Don't you need that to fly, too?!"
Rosemary slightly lowered her head. She could feel the tension on the back of her neck shift and was greeted with a blinding rush of blood to her brain.
"The logistics behind it is unreal, I understand." She explained uncomfortably. "But know that I come from a familial background of science." She shifted her legs around to adjust.
"Somehow I am able to convert the chemical energy from my brain, to potential energy through heavy concentration, and then even further to kinetic energy, which makes things move." She straightened up, confident that she was feeling well enough to have a normal conversation again. "I've spent many years while I was captive moving only small objects, without ever tiring at all... But moving an actual person is quite intensive. In terms of inertia, it would make sense, but it's not the same as physical strength, by any means."
Vegeta, Gohan, and Krillin all stared down in acknowledgement, but only Gohan maintained an understanding of what she was talking about.
"What doesn't make sense to me," Vegeta replied to sidetrack the conversation back to something he knew. "Is how you managed to get this power in the first place. Undoubtedly, this is new. This doesn't seem like something you've had all along, you would have shown it much sooner."
Rosemary bowed her head again. Nothing came to mind.
"I wish I had an answer to that, I really do." Rosemary answered sadly. "The only way I can explain what I know is if I tell the whole story."
She sighed.
"Back when I was in Frieza's captivity, they," She sneered emphatically. "Would perform tests on me. Operations, psychology tests, physiology, toxicology, the whole like. You know, to see if I had any potential as a fighter, since it's in our nature to be hungry for battle. Their goal was to try and awaken the 'Legendary Super Saiyan', as if that were possible…I suspect, since they never deployed me for missions, nothing came up. I guess they salvaged me to see if I could be some kind of weapon, and instead, I turned into the play toy of Frieza's second in command-"
"Enough! That's absurd!" Vegeta shouted, flustered with fury. His hands curled into fists, he refused to accept how Frieza's men treated her. Even for him, the way she'd lived was unspeakably cruel. "There's no way that there were no results - you carry the blood of warriors! You don't just probe around inside someone and nothing happens! It does explain why they kept you alive…" He briefly recalled Zarbon's sickening tone as he spoke to her when he arrived. "...Sort of."
"I-I don't know…" Rosemary trailed off, humiliated. She wanted nothing more than to be excited about what she could do, but Vegeta's anger made it difficult to overlook how impossible her newfound power really was. "Anyway. There was one day... I was really angry for some reason I can't remember for the life of me, so the guards put me back in my cell to calm down. I was looking right at the key cards that were hanging on the wall, I was so desperate to escape. I was absolutely livid. I wanted nothing more than to smash through the door and run away."
She shook her head, clueless. "I-I still can't explain it, but my anger seemed to be enough to shake the keys off of the hook and knock them onto the floor. Unfortunately, after that, I was so shocked that I lost my train of thought."
"T-That's nuts!" A wide-eyed Krillin remarked.
"I know, and I still can't believe it." Rosemary agreed simply, trying not to attract too much attention. "But instead of fixating on how it's possible, I've learned what I could to use these powers to my advantage, despite having a limit. It's difficult, coming from a history of knowledge and... awareness, I expect a logical answer for any and everything. And when I don't have it, I rack my brain until I do."
"And the only way to change that is to push past your limit!" Vegeta snapped, encouraging her in his own sort of way. "You must push to become stronger, it does not magically appear before you! Giving up before that does not make you more powerful."
He crossed his arms to hold his ground. It was rare that he came out with a victory in an argument against her.
"Call me cruel if you wish. You are full of energy, I'll even admit you had more of it than I did at one point. Put it to proper use." He continued enthusiastically, hoping to create a spark within her. "Your alertness was, and probably still is, an admirable trait of yours."
He turned his back to her dramatically.
"But you need to be tenacious. None of this taking a nap after a couple of good attempts."
Rosemary looked up to him, unsure as to whether he was scolding her or genuinely trying to motivate her.
"O-Of course, and thank you, I understand and agree with you entirely." Rosemary managed a smile, giving a round of looks to the group. "My mental capacity is quite large, as you could probably tell, and I was indeed gifted with a larger energy reserve than most. But, the fact of the matter is that it takes a huge amount of energy to use my powers. It isn't something I can control at the moment, and quite simply, I lack the knowledge to use it efficiently right now."
Vegeta took his leave from the group and made his way back into the crevice.
"That's enough of that." Vegeta retorted conclusively from the distance as he snagged a large orange orb from inside. "We've wasted enough time here. Let's go, I have other things I need to take care of."
"Y-yes, my prince…" Rosemary responded obediently, getting up to brush herself off and following him off of the island. She looked back over her shoulder and modestly waved back to Gohan and Krillin and a small smile.
...
"WHAT?!" Frieza boomed at his men. "How is Zarbon, my finest soldier, dead?!"
"It was the girl, sir!" One of the soldiers, a lizard-looking soldier reported obediently. "She assisted Vegeta in eradicating him!"
"Rosemary…" He snarled with a vengeance. "This blasted woman. I haven't been giving you enough credit, after all."
He folded his arms neatly while shaking his head. He was impressed with Vegeta's growth, but put off by the loss of both of his generals. Surely, Rosemary didn't do a ton to assist. "Well then, I guess I have to start taking her seriously now, don't I?"
"U-Uh, sure, if you wish, sir. Anything else, s-sir?" Another man, a bear-looking creature asked nervously from among a small group.
"Yes," Frieza replied simply, turned around in his chair swiftly, and incinerated them all with a quick energy beam. "You can die for bringing this awful news to me."
...
Vegeta led Rosemary to a deserted Namekian village that he'd cleared out some time ago. As Rosemary landed carefully after him, Vegeta walked over to a white pavilion that led into a nearby lake. Rosemary followed close behind and waited patiently for him to resurface on the shore, taking a moment to get familiar with the surroundings. The village seemed quite similar to the one she had watched get decimated herself.
Something within her didn't feel right. She was...disappointed. She wasn't sure what to expect when the two of them reunited - she almost felt like a distraction, a nuisance. Was she burdening Vegeta with dead weight? Was she frustrating him or getting in his way?
For once, she genuinely couldn't tell what the Saiyan Prince was thinking.
Vegeta poked his head above the surface and looked up at her.
"Stay here." He sternly commanded.
Rosemary gave him an obedient nod, then he dipped back under.
He scanned the bottom of the lake for a few seconds, then spotted the Four-Starred Dragon Ball. He may have gotten distracted by saving a valuable friend, but his objective to collect all of the Dragon Balls was still going.
He smirked as he swam down further. The odds were only getting better for him with every high ranked Frieza Force soldier that got lost in battle.
'Ah, there it is, good.' He thought, placing his newly acquired ball beside the other one. He was finally in a decent mood.
Finished, Vegeta swam back up to the surface.
Rosemary lounged in the grass at the edge of the pavilion, ignoring that Vegeta had come back up from the lake.
He climbed onto the bright white stone and shook himself off. He looked up to the grassy ledge where she sat and joined her, watching her hair ripple with light as the sun's rays danced across the water.
Rosemary showed no sign of acknowledgement. The fight with Zarbon left her exhausted, but also upset that she couldn't be of more use to him.
Vegeta could sense her fatigue - her power, as insignificant as it was, dropped even more. He sighed in disappointment and crossed his arms again. He wasn't well equipped to be comforting or supportive.
"Rosemary, you need to rest." Vegeta told her bluntly.
Surprised at how stern he'd sounded, he blinked hard, and bit his tongue.
"I know I do." She replied to him dully, drained. She didn't bother to face him. "I… I just want to be something other than a weakling to you."
She paused to yawn inconspicuously.
"If I rest, I'm weak, and if I don't rest, I'll faint. I can't win in this current state, Vegeta."
Vegeta exhaled heavily. All this talk of powers and fighting didn't leave a good taste in her mouth, it seemed. He could just table the discussion for later and reconnect, but the situation was too dire for small talk.
"I'm still trying to accept that you're... real." He told her simply. "I thought you've been dead for quite some time, until now."
Rosemary didn't want to believe him at first - the way he'd said it seemed somewhat childish and defensive.
"Well… Here I am." She calmly responded. "I'm trying to figure out if I'm really alive as well. I've been in captivity for more than half of my life, I haven't had the opportunity to sit down and discover myself as I would have liked. I assure you that I haven't been successful thus far."
She got up to face him, looking to him with an agonizing stare that he couldn't bring himself to look away from. "Aside from myself, of course, you've changed, too, Vegeta. Everything is new to me again, all the way down to just flying around of my own accord."
'Damn it, not this look.' He thought woefully, awestruck by her matured but familiar, intense glare.
"Time does that, unfortunately." He countered mindlessly.
She nodded quietly in agreement and walked away from him.
'Yes, indeed it does.'
Vegeta followed clumsily. He wasn't sure how much more of this tension he could take with her. If it were anyone else, he would have been fine.
"Rose…" He tried to gain her interest again miserably.
'Shit.'
"I understand, Vegeta." She told him through tired breaths. "It's been a while. The thing is, with my new powers, I thought that you might approve of me more. I thought they would be new and exciting, I thought that you might be happy for me."
She stopped at the doorway of a Namekian hut closeby.
"But, I will still rest. Because you are still the prince, and because you told me to."
Once she concluded her short speech to him, she stopped out front of the first village home she came to, and peered inside. Almost immediately, she spotted a cushioned bed-like platform atop a stone base, walked inside, then crawled into it. Sleep came immediately.
Vegeta stayed outside and went back to the grassy ledge, alone with only his thoughts and frustration. He sat down and slumped over to lament over the day's turn of events.
The words he'd wanted to come out simply hadn't - it wasn't often that he needed to think about what he said beforehand. He couldn't count enough times to fill a hand where she had been sad, truly low-spirited, but during the times that she was, it took a toll on him as well, and this seemed to be no different. She was anxious, oh yes, all the time, but he always knew the root of her distress and was able to nip it before it got the best of her.
He let out a heavy sigh as he stared down at the clear water below. Why couldn't he be dealing with that instead? It certainly would have been a better way to get reacquainted.
'I've become resilient to most things that are thrown at me.' He gloomily mulled over. 'But I can't live in the past. Regardless of the fact that she's here - Gods, she's alive, for heaven's sake…'
He planted a hand to his face. Was he really torn up over this?
'No, I have things to do here and I can't let her distract me - it could cost us our lives if I'm not careful.'
He gazed down at the reflection the water had given him for a moment, then looked back at the structure that Rosemary had taken to. He could barely sense her at all, concluding that she was already asleep.
'She won't sleep for long.' He went on. He needed to plan his next move. 'So if I leave her here, she can watch over the Dragon Balls.'
Without another thought, Vegeta took to the sky to continue his search for the remaining Dragon Balls, leaving Rosemary to snooze undisturbed.
