T.I.T.A.N.

- 2 Quaking Body -

Vegeta donned his Saiyan battle armor the next morning. He had been summoned for The Offering, one of his rites of passage to becoming a titan. As he pulled the blue battle suit over his skin he was relieved to feel his lash wounds had healed up overnight. Still, they would leave scars, the worst of which would stay with him forever.

The moment he stepped out of his bedroom door Zarbon was there to escort him.

"Good morning, little prince. Our Lord is waiting for you in the throne room."

Zarbon fell in by his side and made snide remarks the whole way which Vegeta did his best to ignore. When they reached the throne room, Frieza was talking to one of his renowned and favored titans, Ginyu. The titan's face and hands were so heavily tattooed it was hard to tell what his skin tone had naturally once been. In the other chair sat his father, the Saiyan king looking especially serious this morning. His eyes latched onto his son's the moment Vegeta entered. He got the impression his father was trying to silently tell him something. A warning. He braced himself for what was to come, bowing his head in respect to the throne.

"Ah, so good of you to join us, Vegeta," Frieza greeted, far too pleasant for Vegeta's comfort. The commander's eyes wandered over his uniform. "Hmm. That is not the standard titan armor we issued you with."

Vegeta felt the threat in the air. "It seemed disingenuous to wear it until I was fully initiated, Lord Commander," Vegeta lied. Like hell he was going to wear another man's symbol any sooner than he had to. Frieza could take many things from him, but his pride wasn't one of them.

"I see," Frieza purred in a dangerous tone. "And here I thought it was because of your tail."

He tensed and glanced at his father, but the king gave nothing away. He wasn't sure where Frieza was going with this, but any time the commander got cryptic, heads were sure to roll.

"My tail, sir?"

"Yes. It's a rather unsightly appendage, don't you think? So much like monkeys. Vulgar. And it requires modifying your armor to accommodate it, does it not?"

"We've grown accustomed to it, Commander."

"Well I have not," Frieza responded, eyes narrowing. He leaned back in his chair, taking a moment to compose himself before idly changing the subject. "As you know, I've brought you here regarding your next rite of passage. Becoming a titan means becoming part of something greater, better than your old self. It is customary — and symbolic — to give up something of value from your old life to prepare you for entering your new one. Cutting old ties, as it were. Have you decided what that might be?"

Vegeta nodded, keeping his head down. "My father thought it wise to offer you a full battalion of our elite warriors."

"Monkeys? In my army? Oh ho ho, I think not. Besides, I hardly see the personal sacrifice in that."

Vegeta's eyes flicked to his father's, startled by the refusal. Hadn't Frieza's valet already approved the gift? "Commander… They are our best. They would have served as my personal guard and fought and died at my side in—"

Frieza waved a disinterested hand and Vegeta bit his tongue, looking down before the commander saw the outrage and confusion in his eyes. This is not what he had been lead to expect.

"No. I've come to a different decision," Frieza announced with a dark smile. "Keep your unruly muscle, I've no need for them. All I require is your tail."

Vegeta took a step back, the blood draining from his face. He glanced at his father, but the king refused to meet his eyes or speak out on his behalf. Vegeta was alone. The deal must have been brokered last night, and judging by the cruel smiles on Ginyu and Zarbon's faces, Vegeta was the last to know about it.

"My Lord, my tail is—"

"A glaring symbol of your species," Frieza interjected, his eyes shining like two blood-soaked diamonds. "I need you to understand, Vegeta, that becoming my titan means leaving your old loyalties behind. You will no longer be a Saiyan, but a weapon I may do with as I wish."

"It's not just a symbol, it's a part of me!" Vegeta spluttered. His tail cinched anxiously about his middle. "We use out tails for balance. I will be less effective without it, surely you want your titans as lethal as possible? I cannot even transform without it!"

"No great loss then," Frieza said with dripping nonchalance. "The transformation among your kind has always been unpredictable."

"I am one of the few who can control it!" Vegeta snarled back. How many times had he torn himself apart in order to master the Great Ape? And now Frieza wanted to toss it aside for what — aesthetically pleasing armor? "This is absurd!"

Ginyu took three powerful strides forward and struck Vegeta hard across the face, sending him to his knee.

"You will address the Lord Commander with respect, initiate!"

Cheek swelling from the blow, Vegeta spat out blood on the floor and glared balefully up into the titan's black eyes. Ginyu kicked him in the face for the trouble.

"Enough, Ginyu. I want his tail, not his teeth," Frieza chastised.

Ginyu backed off and Vegeta braced himself on the ground, taking a minute to get a handle over his rising panic, his fingers curling into the rug on the floor. This wasn't happening. What kind of twisted person asked for someone's limb?

"…Please." It was the most difficult word he had ever spoken, ground out through his teeth and tasting like ash. He bowed his head in shame, already wishing he could take it back.

"Ah hah hah, what is this? A begging monkey? Oh Vegeta, it is not my birthday. Save your words, they will not sway me. I'm merely offering you a choice. Either give me your tail and pass your trail," Frieza leaned forward in his chair, his eyes flaring with malicious delight, "or don't."

The gravitas of the statement fell with a death knell. Frieza could call it a 'choice' all he wanted, but Vegeta knew better. Refusing to comply was as good as declaring war against the empire. The Saiyans would be annihilated, and if he wasn't killed too he would soon wish that he had been. There was no choice. Comply, or be consumed. Frieza had told him as much — threatened it — on the observation deck last night. "It is the way of the universe. The strong consume the weak. Consider that when you bear the mantle of titan not just for yourself, but for your people."

Vegeta curled his hands into fists, fighting back bile that rose to his throat. He recalled the palace walls of his home, the green lakes of Vegeta-sai, the adoration of the warriors when he came home in triumph.

He sat back on his heels and let his arms go lax at his sides, head bowed. "Lord Commander. I offer you my tail." The words sounded hollow, far away, as if spoken by someone else.

Frieza smiled and signaled for a couple guards to approach. They shoved Vegeta forward and held his arms out to keep him still.

"May I have the honor, My Lord?" Zarbon asked, not even trying to hide the vicious glee in his voice.

Frieza agreed and Zarbon took a ceremonial blade from one of the guards. "Don't move, little prince," he cautioned. "I would hate for my hand to slip."

Vegeta couldn't find it within to reply, his mind whirling in circles, going round and round and getting sucked into a black inescapable hole. Detach, he told himself, trying to separate from the moment and the sickening lurch of his stomach.

"Tail," one of the guards growled.

It was still wrapped tight around his waist, the fur ruffled and — to his shame — trembling with anxiety. It was one of the hardest things he had ever done to force it to unwind. The moment it was loose, Zarbon yanked it out straight and stepped on the end to hold it down. Vegeta had long ago learned to control the pain, but he still felt it, and the indignity of it. Tails were extremely intimate parts of a Saiyan's anatomy. The fact that Zarbon would be the last to touch his — and cut it off — added all the more salt to the wound.

Zarbon brought the blade up. Vegeta steeled himself and refused to look at any of them, especially his father.

Do not scream. Do not give them that.

The blade came down. The pain was like nothing he had experienced before. Every nerve in his body was set alight and writhed with agony. The pain was fierce, paralyzing. He didn't scream. He couldn't, not outwardly. It was like being torn apart, having his flesh and rational stripped of him, his voice stolen, leaving him to roar internally, wailing and beating against the cage of his mind where the beast within him would be forever trapped.

The guards let him go without warning and he fell forward, barely catching himself on his forearms. He bowed over, curling up like a dying spider, his whole body quaking in the aftershocks.

Zarbon dropped his tail on the floor by his face, the appendage still twitching as the nerves slowly died. Experiencing it had been torture, but seeing it was an even worse psychological torture. It was traumatizing. He could still feel it at his back, yet it wasn't really there. He reached for the limb and curled his fingers around the fur. A rush of heat flushed his face, threatening to burn his eyes with tears.

"Well?" Frieza's voice cut through his misery. "I'm waiting for your offering."

He looked up and doubted he hid the burning hatred in his gaze. He was dangling on a dangerous precipice, this close from telling Frieza where he could shove his tail. Consequences be damned. But with a strength of will that impressed even himself, Vegeta swallowed back his suicidal remarks and ground his jaw just shy of breaking. He hadn't let them cut his tail only to throw his life away now.

One of the guards had the gall to reach down and try to lift him to his feet. Vegeta shoved them aside and stood on his own, swaying for a moment. His center of gravity was off, and the shock from his armor rubbing against the raw nerves of his tail-stump was excruciating. He fought through it and approached the base of Frieza's throne. He offered up his tail with both hands.

Frieza didn't even look at it, staring him dead in the eye. The commander's smile was as sharp as a the blade that had cut him. "I accept this humble offering. Leave it on the floor. That's where garbage goes after all."

Vegeta suppressed a tremor of rage and forced his hands to drop his tail at Frieza's feet. It landed with a heavy thump, blood dripping out. Frieza eyed it for a moment before grimacing. "Disgusting. Ginyu, won't you see that's properly disposed of? Oh, and make sure Vegeta is sent a full wardrobe of titan attire. He won't be needing his monkey clothing anymore."

"Yes, my Lord!"

Vegeta burst through the exit the second he was dismissed. He didn't get far before a hand fell on his shoulder. He whirled around and saw his father.

"Son, I—"

"Do not speak to me," Vegeta hissed, wrenching his shoulder out from the old man's grip. He thumped his hand against the king's chest, backing him up. "None of this would have happened if you weren't so weak!"

The king looked down, saying nothing in his defense. That pissed Vegeta off even more. This was not the proud man he remembered from his childhood speaking of legendary warriors and his bright future as king. Seeing the man broken was almost as sickening as the loss of his tail.

"You're bleeding," the king pointed out to the blood on the ground.

Vegeta turned and walked off. "It'll pass, much as my respect for you has."

~xox~

Bulma was half buried inside a wall fixing the circuitry. Well, 'fixing' wasn't quite the right word. 'Improving' was more accurate. Sure, she wasn't technically responsible for this vessel anymore, but she sure as hell hadn't signed off on a project only for it to arrive at its destination with crew complaining that the doors didn't open as responsively as they could have.

Just as she finished re-routing the wiring and was thinking about doing a test run, said-door whisked open and a pair of muscular legs stalked through. It scared the crap out of her. Barely anyone came to the aft of the ship, a shame in her opinion because the view out the stern window was nearly as pretty as that on the observation deck — if you liked looking at three massive n'qwin engines blasting unimaginable horse-power into the vastness of space. Which she did.

The newcomer either didn't notice her or didn't care about her presence and kept walking. She adopted the same attitude and finished putting all the paneling back into place before packing up her portable tool-belt. She was about to make a stealthy retreat when she noticed the blood on the ground.

That wasn't good. Her head turned and followed the trail just as an almighty BANG echoed from the end of the corridor. It came again and again. Alarmed, she ran towards it until the aft window came into view, glittering with stars and the rippling exhaust of the engines. Standing against it was the dark-haired man from the deck, only he was not in such a contemplative mood. He was livid, screaming and throwing anything he could at the window. He picked up a bench (that had been bolted to the floor) and smashed it to pieces against the glass with a ferocious roar.

Holy shit.

Not yet satisfied with his destruction, he started throwing himself against the window, over and over, snarling and screaming with a rage akin to a wild animal.

Bulma watched — horrified, mesmerized — from the corridor, hesitating to interrupt lest he turn his ire on her. The window shuddered with each attack, the sound of his strikes echoing in the large open room like a terrible gong, but thankfully the glass held. Finally, with a last tormented cry of fury, the man exhausted himself and slid down the glass, dropping his head onto his knees. He was breathing hard. Bulma wondered if he was crying.

She hesitated over what to do. None of this was her business, but between the blood on the ground and the sound of his harsh breathing, she didn't find him very threatening. In fact, she felt sorry for him. What could have happened to cause him to act in this way? She approached carefully. The moment he noticed her his whole body tensed and she froze in place, waiting. When he didn't tell her to get lost, she tried to find something to say to break the ice.

"If you're trying to break the glass, it's going to take more than you can throw at it."

A long silence. Just as she wondered if he was going to ignore her until she left, he spoke. "…If it was my intention to break it, it would be broken already."

Oh, sassy. She could do sassy. His voice was surprisingly pleasant, deep and gravelly and with no indication of tears. She closed the distance between them and took a seat by his side, sliding down the window to mirror his pose.

"Says you. This is quadruple-paned glass, buddy. The outer layer is a special acrylic blend that I helped design, and is reinforced by the energy shield. It's built to withstand a meteoroid strike."

The man snorted into his knees. "I eat meteoroid's for breakfast."

"Is that so?" She considered him. He was all compact muscle, like a mountain lion. 100% built for the extreme. She reached over and poked his bicep with her index finger. "Mm, not bad. Pretty tough, but a mite-shy of meteoroid status."

The man lifted his head just enough to glare at her with one dark, incredulous eye. "Do you have a death wish?"

She dazzled him with her brightest smile. "You're not the first to ask me that. But with all due respect, buddy, I'm not the one who just tried to throw himself out the window."

He lifted his head all the way, glowering at her, but it was more annoyed than hostile. Her first assessment on the deck had been right: he was very good-looking. "I told you already, if it was my plan to shatter the window, we'd be dead already."

"Well that's a relief because I'm still keen on living. Besides, if you want to throw yourself into the cold vacuum of space, there's a perfectly good air lock over there." She hitched a thumb at the corner of the room to the large service doors.

He regarded them with a neutral expression. "I don't have the code."

"Hah, easy. I can get that for you, but you'll have to owe me one."

"Yes, I'll get right on that after killing myself."

"Pfft, well obviously you'd have to return the favor before turning yourself into a floating space-popsicle."

"Obviously."

"Obviously. I wasn't born yesterday."

They looked at each other and she smiled. He turned and let his head drop back against the glass with a thunk and stared up at the ceiling, the shadow of a smile crossing his lips.

It was the most bizarre conversation she'd ever had, talking so casually about his death as if they were chatting about the weather. But it seemed to be having a calming effect on him.

She took the opportunity to examine the couple of titan-tattoos he had about his eyes. "You don't look like any titan I've seen before."

"I'm not. Yet." His eyes slid to the side, regarding her critically. "You don't look like any authorized service crew I've seen before."

Bulma felt heat rise to her cheeks. Busted. "…What gave it away?"

"Frieza doesn't usually employ female mammalians on long voyages. He doesn't want to risk one going into heat and causing a frenzy." When he saw the outraged look on her face, he gave a nonchalant shrug. "His words, not mine."

"He would be so lucky to have me as part of his crew!" she snorted with indignation. "This ship wouldn't exist without me, and let me tell you, his stupid engineers did their best to sabotage its success at every turn. Hull integrity? Escape pods? What does any of that matter when you can have more SIZE and POWER? But hey I'm only a stupid female, what would I know?" She huffed, glad to finally get that out of her system.

It took a few seconds to notice his raised brow. "You'll get yourself killed with a tongue like that," he told her.

"This tongue is capable of many things but so far hasn't gotten me killed."

"Tch. Vulgar."

"It's Bulma, actually."

He eyed her speculatively, trying to decide if she was worthy of an introduction. "Prince V—" he winced, then amended, "Initiate Vegeta."

Initiate? Is that why he still mostly looked human, er, untitan-esque? "Nice to meet you, Prince Vegeta."

His brow furrowed, the title stirring up conflicting emotions. "Not for much longer."

There was a story there she wasn't privy to. Whatever the details, even an idiot could tell he wasn't keen on becoming a titan. "…Can't you refuse?"

He looked down at his gloved hands, his expression grim. Then he stood up. "You should leave this area before you're implicated," he warned, indicating the mess of broken furniture and blood.

Right, the blood!

"Hey wait, you're hurt!" she scrambled to her feet even as he started walking off. "I have a first aid kit—"

"It's none of your concern. I've had worse."

His sharp words brokered no room for argument. He stormed away, the soft whoosh of the door opening and closing telling her that he had left. She sighed and glanced out the window. The galaxy suddenly made her feel very small and alone, the scenery not as comforting as it usually was. She looked back at the mess and figured she should clean it up before anyone discovered it and thought to check the security cameras for the culprit. Vegeta looked like he was having a bad enough day as it was without getting in trouble for property damage.

~xoXox~

AN: My birthday present to myself is indulging in my favorite pastime: absolutely destroying Vegeta. Ha-ppy bir-thday, to me… *insert Frieza laugh*