Summary: Before Earth, before his change of heart and before his family, there had been a son he'd never wanted, made from Frieza's seed and born from his body. Then he was dead, and Vegeta made sure to forget he had ever been there at all. Only, he isn't dead. He is alive. Tormented and abused, but alive, and now Vegeta will do what he couldn't have done the first time. He will save him.
Warnings: Rated M for language, abuse, sexual violence, depictions of rape, mpreg, etc.
*This chapter includes depictions of violence.*
Every Eye Will See
Chapter Eight: The Truth
The third ball was their next target.
Finding the second ball had been far more unpleasant than the first. The landscape had been incredibly dry and sandy, with a horrible heat that reminded him of home. The ball had also been buried deep beneath the burning sand, and they all had to wait for several minutes while the one called D3-22746, or 'Carin'—a teenager with long, sharp claws and thick skin—dug through the dirt at rate much faster than Chill ever would have. Eventually, the teen had found the ball and they were on their way again, Chill hoping idly that they would not have to venture to environments like that one again.
It had been a bit humbling though. It seemed that Earth was not the utopian planet it had seemed to be so far. It had ugly places too.
He was still amazed by its diversity though, even more so once they reached the third location. The ground beneath his boots was soft and shifted with each step. It was odd trying to walk over it, his feet constantly sinking beneath the grainy earth and nearly slipping in their efforts. The air was clear, and yet was thick with the smell of salt and fish.
(Something told him that the fish here was not like the fish back home. Those fish were little more than mutant abominations somehow managing to survive in the sewage and waste they swam in and should only be consumed as a last-ditch effort against starvation).
There were some nice sounds here, too: the loud coos of birds, the harsh crash of waves—
"Water!" a small, feminine voice squeaked out. He heard the slapping of skin as she hurriedly covered her own mouth, though no one seemed bothered enough to reprimand her.
"The locator estimates that the dragon ball is about a mile deep in the water, sir," the guard said looking up from the device.
"Well then. 44258, 52452." The Warden regarded the girls, who snapped to attention. "It is to my knowledge that your people are natural swimmers and can hold their breath for hours at a time if need be, yes?"
"Yes sir!" the girls answered in unison, and whether their tones were laced with fear or overt anticipation was unclear.
At the Warden's command, a guard retrieved two long ropes from their vehicle. He cinched one around each girls' waist, the other ends firmly kept in his hand.
"You have fifteen minutes to find my ball," said the Warden. "If we pull you up and the ball is not within your possession, I cannot guarantee that your lives will be spared. Go now."
"Yes sir!" they exclaimed again, the fear a bit clearer this time. Still, they dove into the water obediently. The fins of their feet kicked up saltwater in their wake, sprinkling Chill in the face.
Time passed in near silence, and an odd apprehension overcame him. He picked at a loose thread on the hem of his shirt and gnawed his bottom lip with his teeth. So far, he had had many things to occupy his attention with, like the many sounds of that strange forest, or the comfortable heat of the sun, or even the rumble of the vehicle as it glided through the sky. Here though, was practically nothing. The air was certainly unique: cool and uniquely smelling, but it was hardly anything exciting. Even the sounds here betrayed him—gentle lapping of water brushing against the bank of sand, centering his mind in a way he had been desperately trying to avoid.
He did not want to think about him. Them. Anything. He did not want to think about Vegeta, or his son, or that whorish man. He did not want to think about anything.
But it was so hard not to. That very morning, he had woken up a bastard orphan, the pathetic remnant of two extinct royal lineages, the sole entity destined to atone for crimes he could never hope to redeem. That was who he had always been. And now what was he? A son? A brother to a boy who called his carrier 'father', who shared his blood, who possibly shared his features, who was probably someone deeply cherished?
That answered his question, he supposed. He was not a son or a brother or any other pretty, romantic word his delusions could think up.
Chill was young, and he was stupid, but he was not completely naive. Despite what anyone had thought, he knew that he was not the son that Frieza praised the high heavens for, the heir that he had planned and pursued, the offspring that was revered in the eyes of the Cold family.
Neeila was many things—loud, reckless, a lover of things called 'stars', and a hater of lukewarm food, to name a few—but dishonest was not one of them. When he asked her something, she always answered him, no matter how brutal the answer might be.
When he asked where he had come from, she told him that he had allegedly been found in an abandoned base, left alone in an incubator where he had spent the entirety of the first year of his life in the care of Frieza Loyalists. He had then—according to her in a tone that was undeniably disgusted—been sentenced to Tene'mareen to answer for the crimes of his father, for there was apparently 'no justice in killing a babe in its nursing capsule'.
When he had asked if his parents had been married like hers, she told him that his carrier served his sire. She told him that his parents were enemies in the end and had probably always had been.
When he had asked her if his parents had ever wanted him, she told him, in the kindest words she could, of the rumors that seemed most logical: that he was little more than a half-bred mistake.
He had not doubted the truth that Vegeta never wanted him. It had always been a fact. There was no reason why that would not change now. He was just as much of an orphan as he had always been.
Chill picked with more vigor at the hem of his shirt. He wondered just how similar he was to the tyrant that sired him. Did he look like him aside from his eyes? He did not think he acted like him that much. As long as he remembered, he never really had the desire to harm others. He killed things sometimes, like the rodents and insects he found to fight against the hunger that tore through his gut, but everyone did that; he was not special in that regard. He was quiet, never spoke unless he had too or Neeila prodded him enough. He never whined or complained, even when his muscles would tear, and his sweat would fill his mouth, and his brain hurt with the effort to continue. He obeyed every command given to him. He did everything he could to be a good boy.
Would Vegeta find some pride in that at least? That the spawn he had forcibly grown in his body was a good boy? No, he probably would not be. He was probably ashamed that his blood created such a disgraceful creature.
Still, it was a nice thought.
He snapped his head up at the loud splash of water. He could hear the two females gasping for breath as they were dragged to shore, their little bodies drenched and shivering.
"Well?" the Warden questioned.
Neither said a word, though one girl held up her hand, presenting the shimmering ball. Her arm collapsed in exhaustion once it was taken from her.
"Sir, the other party has just contacted us. They say that they've almost procured their third ball," a guard speaks up, tapping on the communication pad in his hands.
"Tell them to wait for us at the landing site and we'll meet them there once we find the last ball," the Warden answered.
"Woah, what kind of car is that?" Chill's attention snapped to the left, as did the others. Barely any distance away were three human teenagers. Two with dark skin, one that was pale, all wearing hardly any clothing at all.
"What business do you have here?" the Warden asked, and all Chill could hear in his voice was annoyance.
"I should be asking you that," one of them, a boy, said. "You know this beach is private property, right? My father will be very upset if he sees you here, so I suggest you leave."
The Warden grinned. "Do you now? And just what will this father do to me if I decide to stay?"
The boy floundered for a moment, before anger took over his face. "He'll call the police on your ass, that's what he'll do! What the hell is your problem?"
"Justin," the girl said with warning in her voice.
The Warden said nothing for a while, watching the three humans with an odd interest in his eyes. The affronted boy bristled.
"What, you think he won't really do it?!" He growled, reaching into the pocket of his shorts. His hand lifted out a small, rectangular device.
His movements were cut off by the bullet tearing into his leg.
The boy stumbled; his expression shocked before he hit the ground. His scream rang out loud through the air, the once peaceful seagulls springing into the air in a panicked frenzy.
"Justin!" his companions cried out, falling to their knees beside him.
"Oh shit, oh shit..." the other boy mumbled, transfixed by the blood that oozed from his friend's body.
The girl's eyes were frantic, her eyes desperately searching for the device the wounded boy had been pulling from his pocket. Once her gaze locked on it—tossed a few feet away—she leapt for it, her braids flying around her face like a whirlwind as she gathered the device in her hand.
Another bullet, this time going straight through the girl's hand, shattered both her bones and the device's screen.
A lot of screaming came after that, and Chill could not help but to shield his sensitive ears. A pitiful struggle ensued as the guards gathered them up, sand soaring everywhere as they kicked and fought. Then, Chill heard several cracks of weapons against skin, and more shouting, then moaning, and crying, and whimpering. Then hardly anything at all.
"Tie them up in the back," the Warden ordered.
"Sir, are you sure you want to make these humans prisoners?" a guard spoke up hesitantly. The inevitable backlash went unsaid. Taking prisoners without request from the planet that convicted them violated several laws and regulations. Taking prisoners from a planet that was not represented by any planetary organization could be cause for a prison shutdown.
(No one had to mention the key fact that this specific unaccounted-for planet was protected by at least two unfriendly saiyans.)
The Warden nodded, a blissful smile on his face. "Those who would dare ruin this wonderful mood of mine deserve no trial, don't you agree? Besides, they may come in handy later."
Nothing else was said, and Chill tried not to be disappointed that the once clean, salty air was now tainted with the scent of blood.
Shivering was an odd thing, Chill learned.
He had never experienced shivering before. Tene'mareen was an extremely hot planet. Its thick, cloudy atmosphere trapped in heat from both suns of their solar systems, and rainfall from actual water as opposed to literal acid was few and far between. There was no such thing as a "breeze"; all gusts of wind were heavy and unbearably warm, like opening an oven door right in front of your face.
He had trembled before, of course. While his body did not often feel fear, he felt stress and fatigue just like anyone else. Furthermore, he had experienced illness and fevers before. However, for his body's core temperature to drop so low that it resorted to the involuntary reflex of his skeletal muscles shaking to create warmth through expended energy to maintain homeostasis?
It was incredibly odd, to say the least.
Aside from the cold, this place was also rather loud. The wind was howling so harshly he could hear it even inside the vessel. His ears cringed at the raucous clatter of the other prisoner's teeth, and the hisses that slipped out of their blue-tinted lips. He could hear the rough scrub of skin on skin as they desperately rubbed at their arms, trying to hold in all of the little warmth they had.
They all seemed miserable.
Chill, on the other hand? well, he was feeling... something. He was cold, he would not deny that the feeling was unpleasant. He was shivering too, and had goosebumps sprinkled all over his skin but, well...
To put it bluntly, his discomfort seemed nowhere near as bad as anyone else, and that was especially odd.
Ice-jin, he thought, and felt disgusted.
"S-Sir," a guard spoke, professionalism broken by the tremble in his voice, "the locator claims that the dragon ball is up that mountain."
"Send out Chill and the winged-one!" the Warden snapped, his voice misting out in front of his very displeased face.
Chill hopped to attention the moment his name was called. He held still as they unlocked his ankle-cuffs again, and as they graced him with a thick and heavy cloak, before sliding out of the vehicle. The wind was nearly deafening without the barrier.
Oddly enough, the ground crunched under his feet, his weight dragging him down until he was ankle deep in whatever this strange substance was. Even more odd than the ground was the... things, falling onto his face, much too slowly to be raindrops. He tipped his head up to the sky, and the cold sprinkles plopped all over his face, leaving little puddles of moisture on his skin. There was something familiar about this substance, probably from a story Neeila told him, but he could not remember the word she used to describe it.
Impulsively, he stuck his tongue out. Some of the sky droplets landed on it and they tasted like water.
Suddenly, he had never been so thirsty in his life.
He resisted though (and it took every fiber of his being to do so) and took a deep breath.
Good boy... Good boy...
He could hear the Warden's voice out loud, but the instructions were not for him. He was speaking to the winged girl—Alexi, Chill thought her name might be—ordering her to fly herself and Chill up the mountain. The ball should be 600ft upwards from here, he informed, but they were to search the entire mountain, if necessary, and had half an hour to do so.
He could sense when the girl turned to him, her glare piercing him deeply. He swallowed and tipped his head down.
"Turn around!" she demanded, and he scrambled to do just that. It was then he realized that she would, in fact, have to touch him to fly him anywhere—a detail he supposed should have already been at the forefront of his mind.
He could feel her body press against his back. He felt her arms wrap tight around his waist. He suddenly felt very queasy.
He could not dwell on it though because all at once there was a whoosh and his stomach was flipping inside out and his feet were dangling and he was in the air and oh, Chill definitely did not like this.
He screamed.
He screamed and struggled, digging his black nails deep into her arms. Down, he thought, down, down, down.
"Stop it!" she shouted, and he tried his very best to do so, but his heart had never pounded so hard, and he could feel tears budding and oh, he really did not like this, not at all. This was nothing like climbing, because no matter how high he got, he could trust in himself and the rock he clung to and even when he fell before it had happened too suddenly for him to be afraid. Here there was nothing. Nothing but him, a girl who hated him, and a fall that would certainly kill him.
He was breathing so hard and yet he could not catch his breath. His chest felt heavy. He was dizzy. He was lightheaded. His palms were sweaty. His cheeks were hot. His legs, his arms, his hands were trembling. His heart was racing. He was terrified.
I'm going to die, he thought. I'm going to die. I'm going to die. I'm going to die. I'm going to die. I'm going to—
"Calm down! I'm not going to drop you, dammit!"
—die. I'm going to die. I'm going to die. I'm going to die. I'm—
And then, his feet were on the ground.
His knees failed him. The powder was cold on his face and arms, but his body was too heavy to move. He cradled himself there, shaking and moaning.
He tried to breath, and suddenly threw up.
He was not sure how much time had passed since then.
Eventually, he was on his feet again, weak, but capable. He had swallowed the clean powder to help clear the foul taste from his mouth, and once he was through with that, they walked on.
Alexi had not spoken to him once in all that time. She was small, his footprints even managing to dwarf hers. He still shied away from the anger he felt radiating from her tiny form. She was eerily quiet, but he could guess just what she wanted to scream at him. Probably something like you nearly killed us both! Or perhaps something regarding all time he had wasted with his little episode.
He was embarrassed enough—another emotion he did not often feel—and tried his best not to provoke her. He was feeling other things as well, like confusion, and perhaps even a bit of concern for himself.
He tried not to dwell on the fearhe was also feeling. He did not know just whatexactly happened to him, but whatever it was, it was scary, and he never wanted to go through that again.
He wondered just how imperative it was that they flew back down.
She stopped and he did too. He imagined that she was squinting her eyes, trying to more clearly see whatever it was that had caught her attention.
"I see it," she said. He said nothing and followed the sound of her steps when they started up again.
The cacophony of the wind lessened when he stepped into the large, cave-like structure she led him into. It was much quieter in here, and he found that the thick powder beneath his feet gave away to solid rock.
He stopped beside her as she stooped over. He could hear the tiny scrap the ball made as she picked it up from the ground.
He turned to head back the way they had come. He was stepping towards the mouth of the cave, his nerves worrying over the returning flight that he knew he could not avoid, when he noticed that she was not following him. He quirked his brow at her, but still she did not move, her eyes contemplating the ball clenched tightly in her hand.
What are you doing? he wanted to ask. He did not, but the question burned alongside the flaming impatience and apprehension in his gut. He was not sure how much more time they had to waste here. They could have already gone over the allotted time given, and Chill did not want to know what the punishment for such a misgiving would be.
His already agitated nerves practically erupted at the loud crack that ricocheted around the cave walls. He felt the weight of his body shift into a defensive position.
Crack! Crack!
A growl brewed in his throat. What was that noise? Was something about to attack him? Was it big enough to kill him?
Crack! Crack! Crack!
And then he realized—the girl!
Crack! Crack! Came from where she was smashing the ball against the locator locked around her ankle.
She couldn't be...
She was. It seemed that she, like Chill, knew that the promise of gifted freedom was a lie.
Still, Chill was a good boy, and could not let her do this. He rushed towards her, protest sitting in his throat, but it was too late. He could hear the final crack before the metal crumpled uselessly to the ground.
He also felt the sharp pain when she gunned the ball at him, nailing him square in one of his covered eyes.
He cried out, his hands covering his throbbing eye as his body fell back. He made one last ditch effort to stop her, holding out his hand in hopes that he would trip her. She only stomped on it though—ouch—and sprinted right past him.
He grabbed the ball, leaped to his feet, and dashed from the cave. He did not bother chasing her, but rather turned back the way they had come. He followed the depressions in the powder made by their footsteps as far as they led, skidding to halt when they ended, where the smell of his vomit still tainted the cold air.
If this was where they first landed, then the Warden and the guards were most likely at the bottom. He had no way of knowing if they could see him, so he made no effort in getting their attention. Instead, he locked his hands behind his neck, draped his arms over his temples and forehead, curled his body, and threw himself down the cliff.
He was idly thankful that the hill was covered completely in powder and not rock. The descent was just as jarring and brutal, but at least he would probably be spared from any worrying injuries.
He heard shouting when he reached the bottom, his body rolling a few feet more until the flat plane bade him to stop. He heard the crunch of snow under boots growing nearer and he quickly held up the ball. Hopefully, its presence would prevent them from punishing him before he could inform them of the defector.
The ball was snatched from his grip. "Where is the other?" the Warden's voice boomed over him.
Chill could not sense her lifeforce from here, but he did know that she had turned left when she retreated from the cave earlier. He pointed in that direction.
He wondered what the guards saw when they looked. She must have taken to the sky by now, under the impression that her cover was clear. She was small, especially from this distance, but her wings were like midnight drapes against the pure powder. Chill did not know this, but she could be seen if you knew exactly where to look.
Chill figures that the Warden found her because he could hear the clang of his long-nosed gun unhooking from his waist. A moment later, there was a shot, and a moment after that, there was a scream. She was still screaming even when she hit the ground, so Chill figured that the shot was not meant to kill. He doubted they intended to kill her at all.
"Good boy, Chill," the Warden told him with a pat on his head as the guards rushed towards where the girl was desperately trying to flap her wings through the pain of her dislocated shoulder and broken legs. Elation bloomed in his chest and he ducked his head to hide his smile. The Warden stepped away from him, and the girl started pleading through her sobs.
As her wails rang throughout the frozen tundra, Chill remembered that Neeila had called this watery powder snow.
"Vegeta!" Bulma's voice called as she suddenly rounded the corner.
Vegeta stood to his feet, immediately uneased by the urgency in her tone. It had not been long since the Tenas had left their home. He had seen on Bulma's face that even she could sense the offness of Ziloh when he had followed Vegeta inside, though she remained perfectly polite as she compiled a list of herbs and the coordinates of where they could be found for the man.
Bulma had taken one look at both his and Kakarot's faces when they returned, and thankfully had not pressed, despite the questions he knew she had. She had not said anything about Ziloh and the Tenas at all, yet he knew instantly that whatever had distressed her, it involved them.
"What?" he demanded.
She held out the radar for him to see. "The balls are all in one place and are leaving the planet!"
He regards the radar, before snatching it from her. He throws open the window behind him and kicks off so hard that the sill cracks.
Damn it, Vegeta thought, burning rage fueling him as he cut through the air like a scalpel through flesh. Damn it. Damn it. Damn it!
He senses Kakarot following him, but he pays him no mind, too busy wondering how he could have been such an idiot.
How dare they lie to him? How dare they make a fool of him? Kakarot's morality be damned, he would kill every last one of them for daring to cross him!
He could see them now, their ship already in the air but still not safe from him. He was nearly there now, so close he could see every terrified expression staring back through the glass, and he would snuff out each and every one of them, from the Warden to each guard to every damned prisoner. Even that one with the blindfold, who was facing the window like all the others, but his hand was reaching up, and his bony fingers were pulling the blindfold upward and—
Vegeta saw red eyes, and everything stopped.
"It is dead."
"My, my, Vegeta. Don't you think a father has a right to hold his own child?"
Gone... Gone...
The exhaust from the ship was suddenly consuming him. He was coughing and he was falling. Kakarot was catching him.
"Vegeta?" he thought he heard Kakarot say, but it was so quiet against everything else.
He's mine... He's mine...
"It is dead."
He shivered and turned away as Frieza's blood red eyes looked up at him.
He saw the ship growing smaller and smaller into the sky. He saw a tiny, pale tail wrapped around his wrist. He saw Kakarot's dark, worried eyes. He saw blood red eyes.
"Vegeta? Vegeta!" he heard. He saw the ship disappear, and then he saw nothing at all.
TBC
All Tene'mareen character names are spelled with five letters, except for Neeila, whose name has six letters. If you ask your local English teacher, they will tell you it is symbolic of her importance. I will do my authorly duty, and make sure I never actually confirm that I simply liked her name being spelled that way.