Stolen Hearts
Chapter 35
Vegeta squinted as his eyes fluttered open when he slipped back into consciousness.
Where was he?
What had happened?
By some form of grace or foul trickery he had been strangely transported to a place that was the polar opposite of the horrid black world he was in a moment before. This was a place of shining beauty where everything seemed to glow around the edges and radiant sparkles fell from the sky. All was light, all was airy, all was perfectly calm and full of sweetness.
But there was an aching in the back of Vegeta's head as he continued to be baffled by this place he was now in. Could he of possibly died and this was his heaven? Had he failed?
As beautiful as this place was, worry rotted in his stomach. Bulma, he could not leave her to torment, he couldn't of failed, not like this, oh Bulma where was she!?
And suddenly as if an answer to his prayer she was there.
In a gown of shining white she approached, not a blemish on her glowing skin, her soft hair wrapped elegantly about her face, a peaceful smile gracing her plump lips. It was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen. Oh god how he wanted to see her again like this, alive and gorgeous in front of him. He cared not what magic brought her here.
He could not speak, for he could hardly breathe as she kneeled beside him letting down the shining waterfall of her hair so that it framed his face. Vegeta lay happily with his head in her lap, and she began humming a soft sweet tune. Vegeta twisted his fingers through her silken fine thread and he thought of nothing else.
But still the ache remained in the back of his head and at last he listened to it.
'This is not real.'
'But I want it to be real.'
'That's why it is, but this is all a lie. False perception. Open your eyes.'
'I can't.'
'Open your eyes!'
'I don't want to.'
'Open your eyes!!'
'I'm afraid!'
'OPEN YOUR EYES!!'
With power he did not know the origin of, his eyes flew open although they already were and there was no shining world of light anymore. Reality rushed back to him. A scream escaped his strangled throat.
Roaring and unbearable heat surrounded him. Some filthy slimy tentacled creature had him wrapped in its deathly grasp. Can you imagine a stretch of land bubbling like water in a pot? For that is really the best description of the horrid condition he found himself in.
He twisted, he turned, he arched, and he strained, but nothing would free him from the tentacles powerful hold. It seemed Vegeta was still doomed to die even though he had miraculously escaped the creature's mind trap that sated its victims as it slowly digested them from the inside out.
But then the memory of Bulma filled his mind. He flowing hair, he sparkling eyes, her life; and Vegeta was filled with a passion that made you obey it, no matter how many worlds or ages lay between. His hand felt the cool touch of the handle of his mighty sword and with one great heave the blade sliced through his slime covered imprisonment and liberated him in a veil of green spray.
Vegeta stood gasping as he tried vainly to fill his lungs with fresh air. Oh how he hated this place! It was beginning to seem as though he was doomed to be tormented here for an eternity! How could he even presume to think he was going the right direction in the first place? This place seemed as endless as time itself. It was hopeless. His skin burned from the slime.
Still gasping, but now with despair, Vegeta began to lose the energy to get up and continue on. What was the point? Some other loathsome beast was likely waiting just around the corner ready to devour him, and even if he did by some miracle find Bulma what could he do to stop the burning God which held her captive?
It was awhile before he was able to perceive through his desperation the strange new sound rang in the air. It was the clank of iron singing its fiery song. Someone in the distance was building an army.
A steely calm came upon Vegeta. There was only one creature that would be doing such a thing in this place of the lost
"Gorgorath," Vegeta hissed and his heart was strong with hate as he followed his feet towards the distant sounds.
Before too long Vegeta came upon an outcropping overlooking an immense cavern that opened out into the darkness. Although it was hard to see anything outright, Vegeta could tell by the noises and the movement of the shadows that there was a massive number of beings preparing for what seemed to be the apocalypse. And right in the center off all this lunacy stood a flaming creature full of malice.
Vegeta knew he had reached his destination.
Without wasting one more second Vegeta flung himself down the cliff. It all seemed so clear now, so close. If he could just find her………..
Vegeta moved almost as silently as the dead who floated by in ever growing numbers. Vegeta was truly glad he was invisible to them now, for these dead wore much more menacing appearances then the people he had seen before. It would have been immposibe to reach the center of the mass where Gorgoroth stood proudly, but as it was he flew along with ease.
As Vegeta neared the center of the great black cathedral he crept ever quieter for he knew not what Gorgorath could see. Bulma had to be near him though, if she was truly the key to his power he would surely not let her go from his side.
And then there she was.
Vegeta's heart jumped with hope, but then fell again as he looked into her blank black eyes. She looked strange; her flesh looked like bone, as if it had been placed in a solution that had leeched all the life away. She was shrouded in black; even her hair had turned gray. Oh god, was he too late?
Then Vegeta's eyes wandered to the grimly creature next to her, standing high with its upper lip writhed back in a snarl. Black, flaming, and bloody. Its eyes gleamed with a gruesome light. It was Gorgoroth and he was terrible in his wicked grandeur. He was the shepherd of evil, the guardian of crime, with a heart as dark as the rain that the heavens weep. The hardest and sharpest iron could not scratch his skin, that sin-stained demon.
But luckily Vegeta did not have a sword made of iron. With a defiant ring Vegeta pulled Iphis from its sheath, sharpened and gleaming, as if ready for blood. It would seem to any onlooker that it was as pointless to fight Gorgorath, as it would be to fight lightening or an earthquake, but Vegeta had not come all this way to be quelled by a force of nature.
His heart was firm, his hands were calm. He meant to stand, not run from the fearful shooting flames, until fate decided which of them would win. His heart had been one of the few touched with true love and there is noting more powerful and mad then that, enough to challenge the impossible.
And so Vegeta fought, with fate and odds against him, but his heart was full of one thing, Bulma, and his undying love for her.
"Free her of your evil Gorgorath or face the oldestone blade of Ihpis!!" Vegeta said with a voice of great finality.
As sickening laugh answered him that echoed emptily in the vastness that surrounded them.
"Oh what a senseless mortal you are! To even assume to challenge me is folly, not to mention insulting! I am surprised you have made it this far, you little incessant insect, those persistent Gods will stop at nothing. No matter, they shouldn't have been so foolish as to put their hopes in such a pathetic attempt as you. Ha ha ha. I have already beaten you once insect! It seems you leave me no choice but to do it again!"
At that Vegeta wasted no time in beginning his attack with as much surprise as he could muster. He was a ball or fury, somehow making himself appear larger, almost godlike, and Gorgorath, though he would never admit, felt a brief stab of fear in his emotionless heart.
Gorgorath's large blackened blade collided with Vegeta's with a blow that rang through history as one of the fiercest contest of strength to be seen. Vegeta did his best to match Gorgorath blow for blow, but try as he might he was a mortal, and mortals do not contest with gods. At least in a physical battle, which in his blind fury was all Vegeta concentrated on.
The way to beat Gorgorath lay not in a blade, but in the heart, or more specifically, in Bulma's.
It was not long before Vegeta's strength was faltering greatly. He began to realize he was fighting a losing battle and he became desperate, so much so he could not think straight, and when his concentration wandered he was overcome. First Gorgorath's mighty sword slashed through his calf sending him falling to the icy, hard, un-welcoming stone floor.
With a grunt that turned into a harsh choke, Vegeta rolled himself over and realized the severity of his wound. He could not stand. This was it. He had failed.
Vegeta's glossy eyes rose to a familiar blank face.
"Bulma, I'm sorry," he whispered but gained no recognition from her black depths.
Vegeta felt his heart breaking all over again as he realized there was nothing left of Bulma in that shell of a body. She did not even focus on his face as he spoke to her, she just continued to stare blankly ahead.
"Oh god, please don't tell me I've actually lost you, Bulma remember! Remember me! I know you are there, lost inside the prison that monster trapped you in, Bulma it's me, listen to me, wake up!"
"It is no use you pathetic fool! She is mine, and as soon as you are gone I will suck the power and life out of her until she is nothing more then a soulless wraith, and with what I take from her I will reign over all! Maybe when you are dead I will make you part of my army, does that sound nice?" he laughed wickedly again, "Oh the irony!"
Vegeta ignored him, for he was beginning to remember his mother's words.
""You must find her before the joining and draw her from the black trance she is consumed with. What you have given her she will retain Vegeta, for love is immortal, and eternal, and will not wither in the endless depths of death or this sleep his has drawn over her spirit. She will know you, she will feel you, and she will be liberated, and when she is, we will all be safe once again.""
And then he remembered something else he had heard in the mists of a dream.
"Open your eyes Bulma," Vegeta said his voice suddenly firm and resolved.
"Open your eyes."
"You really are incorrigible aren't you?" Gorgorath hissed.
"Open your eyes!" Vegeta cried again with increased intensity.
"Pest!"
"OPEN YOUR EYES!"
Bulma's expression twitched, she now looked sad and wistful, even strained, like she was trying to comply. Her eyes began to become cloudy.
"What are you doing? Stop now!" Gorgorath barked, uncertainty slipping in that only fueled Vegeta.
Somehow Vegeta managed to lurch his body to his feet and grasped Bulma by her shoulders.
Gorgorath began charging toward him for the kill, and time slowed down.
'Come on Bulma this is IT,' Vegeta thought desperately as he pressed his lips to hers letting his love flow through them.
'open your eyes………..'
A brilliant light shone suddenly as brilliantly as heavens candle. Vegeta was consumed by it and every drop of blood in his body tingled and seared, not in pain but in pleasure.
Vegeta heard a distant anguished roar like no other and glanced behind him to see a vision of horror; Gorgorath twisted in pain, bleeding and burning to nothing. The light pierced through him like it was acid and his skin pealed away from the muscle and soon the muscle fell away from the his bones and the bones turned into nothing more then dust.
To a deeper hell he would go, swept screaming and helpless to the waiting hands of still worse fiends. His strength was destroyed, his power was gone, he would plague the world no longer.
Vegeta turned back at the touch of warmth on his shoulder and looked to something so beautiful his eyes stung with tears. Bulma's face, smiling, ALIVE, shrouded in the brilliant glow, reaching out for him.
When he was in her arms Vegeta felt a rush of air, and although he could see nothing other then the light he realized they were shooting upwards. The air came up warmer and sweeter every moment, so sweet and so missed it almost made you laugh out to the world in joy.
Vegeta felt ground beneath his feet and slowly the brilliant light dimmed. Vegeta's eyes adjusted to the pale glow of morning and he looked around in disbelief. He was back in the mortal realm on a quiet forest floor. The homely earth noises filled his ears again. The chatter of the river on its stony bed, the creaking of the trees in the light wind, and the refreshing smell or the earth, grass, and flowers.
But more then all of this combined was the beauty of the woman in his arms; the woman he was convinced was lost to him forever. His eyes sparkled almost as brightly as frost crystals in white winter sunlight. His blood raced with happiness as he pulled her as close as he could and gently brushed his lips on her forehead.
"My god Vegeta, pull yourself together," Bulma said pulling back with a smile, "You are acting as if I had died or something."
Vegeta pulled her back to him passionately for a kiss he had no intention of ever ending. A crack of vermilion boldly broke through the black sky. The glory spread loudly; announcing the end of a dark era of war and the beginning of a new one of peace.
The world was moved to sing at such intense beauty and freedom. They were all at once in music and laughter, some joyful, some triumphant, some in sentiment and glee. The world was so dazzling and moving and twinkling as to make one blink ones eyes.
The two lovers finally pulled away from their endless kiss to behold one another, unaware and uncaring of the world around them, more grateful and happy then any words could say to finally be safe in each others arms. To finally be done fighting.
They had taken on the heavens and rearranged the sky to create a kingdom of their own, a kingdom where they could finally live in peace together.
Now they were home.
THE END
AN: Liked it? There will be an epilogue following. Please review!