Laughter from somewhere unseen to her right.

It was so like the hollow mockery she had heard chasing her in many of her dreams. But when the being belonging to that laughter spoke, she had to endure a painful wave of goose bumps and press her tongue to the roof of her mouth to swallow her gag reflex. It sounded like he was speaking out of a throat coated in mucus.

Inspiration borne of desperation grabbed her attention. The device was still in her hands, and it could translate. Once she had decoded the basis of how it worked, she had easily been able to program the thing to learn new language patterns after a few minutes of exposure. It was far from perfect, but once it knew a language, it could translate it to any other language it had stored. It could even decipher the difference between colloquial language, slang, and words that had more than one meaning. Whereas before it could translate a single language into one other language at a time, now the thing could translate dozens of languages into dozens of other languages simultaneously. It could store everything that was said to be replayed later, and even distinguish and recognize voice patterns and differentiate accents.

And what she was most proud of – even if it couldn't annotate the written words of languages unless it knew the alphabet of that language, it would translate and display the written characters of languages it did know. Its spelling left something to be desired, but when all you had was phonetic sounds, it was really quite brilliant. If someone spoke, the device would translate the meaning of the words and display words as they sounded; 'come here' would be displayed as, 'kum heer.'

There were many languages and alphabets programmed into the thing, already. Maybe the language Mr Mucus was speaking was pre-programmed. Pressing one of the side buttons, the device blinked to life. She nearly wet herself when it beeped, praying to every God she could think of in a wild plea that "Boots" hadn't heard it. The boots didn't make any move towards her, but she squeezed her eyes tightly and willed the frost in her heart to thaw. She had a sick feeling whoever was wearing those boots had heard the beep.

She couldn't think of that now. It was out of her control.

But she could control herself. She needed information. So when the laughing one – Cackle, she decided to call him - spoke again, she greedily read the words on the glass eyepiece, clutched inches from her nose in shaking fingers. After so much practice reading phonetically spelled English, she didn't notice the odd misspellings or the periodic out of place word.

"…Did you not hear my question, Monkey? What are you doing so far away from your cage?"

Bulma heard a low, menacing growl from Boots, and was amazed as the sound physically prickled every nerve in her body and made the hairs on her arms stand straight up. But when he spoke, her liver nearly exploded with the sudden rush of boiling blood flooding to her internal organs. Never before now had she truly understood how physical and visceral fear could be. The sensation was terrifying.

But as she lay, hiding from an inevitable death, fear became pointless – so it fell away. In its wake, something even more terrifying filled the void left behind. Her body hummed, more alive than it had ever been. It was… thrilling.

Realizing she hadn't been paying attention to the view screen, she looked down to see what Boots had said. "Stretching my legs. And who is to stop me? Certainly not you.."

"There is no one to stop me, you mean. I've always hated you, so I intend to take advantage," Cackle said in a rheumy voice. Bulma could practically feel his slimy tongue trailing a path of phlegm over wormy lips.

But then it was Boot's turn to respond. If she had thought his voice was thrilling, his laughter seared her synapses. Who is he..? It made no logical sense that the sounds of vibrating vocal chords could have that much of an effect. Her eyes glazed and her thoughts turned inwards, as if searching for… and there is was.

Ice filled her veins. A strange, alien presence flickered like undulating flames on the edge of her consciousness, licking at her defenses almost sensually – softly seducing the barrier between her mind and his –telling her to trust, to submit. It was not unlike her experience with Radditz, whose thoughts - more like images and impressions - were purposely focused and targeted her specifically. But this… this was different. Like a wide spectrum broadcast, low and unnoticeable, it snuck through mental resistance with such languid tranquility, conscious control was not needed. It bided its time, stalking its prey, until it touched upon a hidden weakness in the enemy mind – then awoke to full fury and wrought havoc. It was so casual, Bulma wasn't sure if it was even done on purpose. She suspected this alien – this Saiyan – was so practiced and precise with his telepathy that he wielded it as a weapon without notice.

Her breath caught in her throat. Radditz had purposefully set out to violate her mind, fill her with fear. The breach had lasted moments before she had closed herself to his influence. Yet, she knew she had allowed his mind to touch her own. She had unfolded the foreign consciousness, curious to see what it held. But this Saiyan's mental discipline was phenomenal. What could he do? Whatever it was, would she be forced to welcome it? Or would she be so drunk on sensations she would willingly open her mind and beg for his entry?

Suddenly afraid again, but this time for entirely different reasons, Bulma's hands trembled on the device. Despite her anxiousness, she couldn't help but wish to know what they were saying. She bit her lip to keep it from quivering, and blinked the tears from her eyes.

'Boots' was quickly renamed to the more fitting 'Purr,' when the creature's laughing tapered off to a sound that could be compared to nothing else. She resisted the sudden rush of warmth throughout her body, and fortified her mental defenses. She didn't like to be told how to react, even if it was a subconscious demand from a delusional alien who didn't even know she was there. Probably doesn't know I'm here, she amended. She scowled at the device, still incensed that it had beeped so loudly.

"Come, Dodoria then. As you will; but know that killing you would hardly take more effort than killing one of the locals. But I admit, it will be much, much more fun." As he spoke, the boots filling her vision shifted with the weight of the one wearing them. He was crouching now; Bulma knew from watching her fighter friends that he was positioned at the ready, likely preparing to launch an attack.

And, so fast she couldn't follow, the boots were gone.

Once they were out of the line of her sight, she was tempted to run. She thought better of it; she could still hear them somewhere flying above her. She covered her ears as sonic boom after sonic boom assaulted her senses. She just wanted it to end. With one of them dead, and the other possibly injured, she maybe had a chance to sneak away unnoticed. She just had to wait until the fight was over.

Suddenly, there was silence.

Her heart hammered in her chest with such force, her whole body pulsed with every beat. She wasn't sure if the sound drowned out everything else or if it truly was a quiet that was so heavy, it was suffocating. Was it over? Where they gone?

She counted to one thousand, and then counted again. When nothing happened, she made the decision to crawl out. She shifted her weight off of her legs, painful with pricks and needles from loss of blood flow. Being stuck, unmoving, in a single position for – however long it had been – did little more than make it difficult to move.

But the precise moment she did move, boxes exploded around her.

Like a cat hunting a mouse, one of them had been waiting for her to move. And she had fallen into the trap.