He wasn't sure how many hours had passed since he had left her. Since then, he had been sitting in the darkness of the ship with his back against the wall. The chill of the metal against the back of his head should have felt soothing to his hot skin, but he felt… so over stimulated he was numb.
He had told the woman he understood.
Perhaps for a moment, he had.
Something… warm and gentle. Soft and -
Something completely foreign to him.
He tried to force it from his mind, to capture himself once again.
He needed to sleep.
But every time he closed his eyes, he could see the sunlight as it danced through the shadows of trees. When it touched the blue of her hair, it dazzled him. The smell of some variety of flower was thick in the air. The breeze was cool and wrapped around him playfully, teasing the fur of his tail which sent chills up his spine. And her fingers on his face…
Clutching his chest, he snapped his eyes open. Why is it that he felt injured? He looked down, but there was no wound. Shaking his head and feeling foolish, he dropped his hand and clenched it at his side. He knew he was uninjured. Whatever it was that gave him pain was a result of that – whatever it was the woman had done to him.
Is that why she hadn't wanted to do it? Had she known this would be the consequence?
He forced his eyes closed.
She had agreed to show him this. Whether or not she knew the consequences was irrelevant. He would forget and be better for it.
And yet….
The ache grew unbearable at the thought of forgetting.
Angry, confused, and frustrated, he threw himself on his back and tried to clear his head so he could sleep.
And his eyes popped open.
Something was wrong.
-Wrong?
He sat up and peered into the dimness. Even with his second eyelids closed, he could see nothing amiss. The only sounds were of various aliens in different stages of sleep; some were snoring, others were breathing deeply. Vegeta didn't want to rely overmuch on his sense of smell; nothing was worth taking in the stench of this crowd.
Shrugging he lay back down and shifted to rest on his side.
When that wasn't comfortable, he shifted to his other side.
After a few worthless minutes of tossing and turning with no discernable difference, he sat up once again and rubbed the back of his neck.
Without notice, he reached out with his mind.
Bulma bolted awake from a deep sleep.
"Who's there?"
She felt like a dummy peering into the blackness of the cave when she could hardly see a foot in front of her face. But… something had awoken her. She couldn't hear anyone moving around, so after a few more moments of staring at nothing, she shrugged to herself and fluffed her pillow to prepare it for her head. She had been very satisfied when she had found the bedding in one of her capsules. Sleeping against the stony floor with rocks poking into her back had gotten old fast. Too bad she hadn't brought an actual bed, but blankets were better than nothing.
As she shifted her weight to go back to sleep, she felt it again… a mental nudge.
Her eyes widened and she sat up again.
This time, she knew what she would see. She didn't bother to confirm it before addressing him.
"Vegeta? Is something wrong?"
She felt his mental jolt. Something in her question had startled him.
When her eyes found him, he was sitting in the place he usually slept when he was here. He didn't appear alarmed or angry. He seemed – wary. And maybe a little…
Melancholy?
No way.
She cocked her head at him. Melancholy was a human thing. He certainly wasn't human. Pensive then? Restless for sure.
She chewed her lip, completely at a loss for what she should do. If she didn't know any better, she'd guess he felt as uncertain about being here as she was. Well, for whatever reason – he was here. If he were human, she'd ask him if he wanted a bed time story or a glass of water.
She shrugged to herself. Go with what you know.
"Can't sleep?" She asked.
To her surprise, he nodded. And at no surprise whatsoever, that's all he did.
She sighed. She supposed convoluted, irrational emotions were her realm. That's why he had come, even if he didn't realize it. He wasn't going to go away until he could successfully understand or dismiss whatever had him unable to sleep so…. she may as well distract him else she wouldn't get any sleep. Accommodating a restless Saiyan wouldn't be the weirdest thing she had ever done.
Though kissing one was high on the list.
And…queue the blush.
Ok! Not going there! Um, um, um…
"Um.."
She had meant for something smart to come out of her mouth. Something like -
"Tell me about your planet? It was beautiful… but what was it like living there?"
He drew a knee to his chest with his arms and peered at her. Well, maybe conversation wasn't the best method to distract him from his restlessness. But it wasn't like she had the means to make hot chocolate.
She jumped when he replied.
Not with words, but with images – as was his way when he felt words were inadequate.
He gave her a sort of montage of memory; some she knew to be his, and some she knew were the memories of others. He didn't give any chronology or order to the images he painted in her mind; they simply came and went randomly. She felt like a circus patron twirling through a hallway of mirrors, and on each pane of silvered glass was a story. She could walk past them unexplored or enter through them as though she were Alice plunging through a looking glass to another time and place.
Some were magical with rich colors, stone walls and high ceilings, large windows overlooking a violet sea, and lords and ladies in rippling frocks as they dined or danced. She sampled foods from literally hundreds of different worlds. She sat elevated above crowds of patrons and was entertained by contests and theatrics given in her honor. She participated in and was thrilled to indulge in blood and violence, always the victor, always proud and forever praised.
She saw her father smile down at her and was pleased to be a source of pride.
Her favorite memory she somehow knew to be Vegeta's. He must have been very young, but the image was pristine and perfect, undistorted by time or circumstance.
She was seated on a precipice overlooking a black sea. It was nighttime, and a dusting of stars twinkled above. On the water below was the reflection of an undulating light. She watched it sway on the surface of the waves before looking up. Low on the horizon, the light of a red, fat moon caressed her cheekbones. It pulled at her blood, and something deep within her clawed its way to the surface. The raw thrill of pain and power coursed through her as she grew in size to accommodate it.
It was.. magnificent.
Everything fell away. Nothing existed but her own strength. There was nothing she couldn't take or destroy!
She could do anything.
But –
There was something she was supposed to do. Something important. A test of some kind?
She roared to the sky in defiance. She didn't want to be anything but what she was. She was FREE.
Free? No..
And then she remembered. She could never truly be free until she embraced all of herself and learned to control it.
With colossal effort, she pulled at her consciousness. The beast fought her, but at last succumbed to sheer will. She was herself, but she was more, now.
She had conquered the oozuru. She was the youngest of her race ever to do so, and she had done it within minutes.
Now she could train for her birthright and become the golden legend of her people….
And then, nothing.
Bulma blinked a few times to clear her head. Although it was dark in the cave, she couldn't help the sensation of having double vision right after coming out of Vegeta's head.
When she felt recovered enough, she looked at Vegeta in awe, still sitting across from her. His expression hadn't changed, but now, for whatever reason, she felt the weight of his baited breath on her shoulders. What the hell could she possibly say? That it was the most awesome thing ever to have become a giant were-monkey and howl at the moon? That she was dying to know what the hell the golden legend was? Had he succeeded?
No. She couldn't be that direct. He always responded best when she acted as though the important things had no reason to be spoken of. It was like if those things were to be voiced out loud, it would take away their reverence.
So..? What the fuck was safe?
"Uh. You're kind of short for a Saiyan, aren't you?"
She almost choked on her own spit when he scowled at her.
"You are intelligent for a human," he sneered.
Her eyebrows scrunched in confusion.
"Vegeta, it's a good thing to be smart."
He raised an eyebrow arrogantly.
"Is it? When it sets you apart from those with whom you wish to relate?"
Her jaw dropped. Her intelligence actually had made her a bit of an outcast. Instead of boyfriends and Barbie dolls, she had always been with her father – or alone – with soldering irons and experimental physics formulas. It wasn't until she had met Goku that she had found a friend. And the only reason he had hung around was because he was entirely too stupid to realize she was that smart.
Well. Maybe a little because he was ridiculously sweet natured and loved everybody.
She rolled her eyes.
"Fine. You aren't that short. By human standards, you're actually kinda huge."
She was certain she saw it. A brief smirk before it disappeared.
"Then you are not that intelligent. In fact, I am acquainted with many races who could put your intellect to shame."
It was her turn to scowl.
"You're the only being in the universe that can make a compliment sound like an insult and an insult sound like a compliment, you know that?"
His teeth flashed as he grinned ferally.
She sighed.
"I guess it's my turn to play show and tell."
Her eyes flicked towards the Saiyan. His demeanor remained calm; outwardly he appeared stoic and bored, as if his presence here were coincidental and he were the one tolerating her intrusion. But living in his head for months had given her an insight. She couldn't see a change, but she could feel the weight of his interest.
She blinked, suddenly nervous. He hadn't shown restraint. In fact, he had allowed her to choose which of his memories she would explore. Granted, he probably only gave a menu of benign memories from which she could choose.
She frowned. No. That wasn't right. It had somehow seemed more… intimate than that.
Bulma drew herself up and squared her shoulders. Right. Poignant memories; events that had affected her in some profound way. She could do that. Why not?
She wasn't as disciplined as Vegeta with her telepathy, and being telepathically stronger meant nothing without precision. She couldn't allow him to pick and choose as he wished as he had done for her, but she could do one better.
Smiling, she pulled him into her mind and created around them a living memory; one they could walk through and interact with on a sub-level. They couldn't change her memory, but they could see it as if they were third party witnesses. Any thoughts and feelings she may have had would still be available should Vegeta choose to experience those things, but by default, they were simply voyeurs.
She took him to all her favorite places; the mountains, valleys, deserts, and forests where she and Goku had found trouble searching for dragon balls, the pond just behind Capsule Corp's dinosaur sanctuary, Kami's lookout, her laboratories. Vegeta took particular interest in the shopping malls she used to frequent to buy items he felt were completely useless and frivolous. She noted to him, though, that if they were so useless and frivolous, why had he seemed to take such interest when they had been in the lingerie store? He hadn't bothered to answer, but she threw at him the memory of him handling her red lacy underwear when she had taken them to her room earlier that day.
That had sort of backfired when he had responded by asking her why she kept taking him to places where he could do nothing else but take notice of her undergarments. It had only gotten worse when moments later he had genuinely wondered why humans even wore undergarments.
She quickly transported them away. She hadn't really thought about where she was taking him; she had only wanted to escape the embarrassment of panties.
Immediately, though, she saw a drastic change in Vegeta. Looking around, she couldn't understand why – except that maybe he was responding to the piano music.
She had taken them to her childhood dance studio, deep in the belly of Capsule Corp. She had taken dancing lessons soon after she started walking and hadn't really stopped until she started working full time in her labs. Every so often, when she was restless, she'd return.
This must be one of those times, she surmised, because – as she followed Vegeta's gaze – she saw herself. She didn't look much different than she did now; her hair had been shorter. Maybe she had been a bit fuller, but she supposed eating rations for months could answer that. Hmm. A few months ago?
Scrunching her eyebrows, she tried to remember when this had taken place. It must have been after she had been given Radditz's scouter, because she saw it on the floor next to a towel and her ipod1290 speaker set. The memory was clearly in her brain or they couldn't be here, but for the life of her, Bulma couldn't consciously remember anything she was seeing.
Vegeta had moved ahead of her and stood watching her spectra dance. She felt a tug as the Saiyan reached through her mind to access this memory. Somehow, he expanded it; made it richer. He pulled the sensation around them both, stretching and wrapping it so that…
Even separate from her spectra, she could feel as she had felt that day.
Every twirl, every kick, leap, point, turn… every curve, hold, flex – was an outward expression of her inner being. She was angry no one had believed her. Her friends! The betrayal and loneliness bled from her pores with every drop of sweat that trickled down her brow and back. Self-doubt and despair were waves crashing against the rocks of her resolve. Where they right? Did her mind somehow – crack – when the alien had forced his thoughts to be her own?
Exhausted, she over spun and lost her balance. Catching herself on the wooden hand beam affixed to the mirror, she stared at her own reflection. She saw the weary, lost, defeated woman in front of her and started to cry.
Vegeta grew rigid, his tail behind him twitching in agitation. Behind him, the real Bulma tensed. In front of him, the specter Bulma yelled at her reflection in the mirror.
"Stop it! Stop it, stop it!"
She seemed to gain momentum and after a moment, came to an abrupt halt. Breathing heavily, she continued to glare at her reflection until she calmed.
"You are not wrong. If you're the only one on this planet who thinks so, then you're the only one who can save it!"
With that, she turned from her reflection and stomped over to the towel, ipod, and scouter, mumbling to herself as she went.
"You can kill everyone you doubted you later. It would be fitting if the only person who could save the world was the only one left to live on it.."
Vegeta watched as she left the room and when she was no longer visible, his eyes flicked to the real Bulma, standing just to the left of the door the other Bulma had just exited.
His expression was a mirror of the look he had given her right after they had kissed. Like… he was expecting her to do the impossible at any moment. It was uncomfortable and she withered under his stare. When he spoke, it was with a quiet voice that seemed strangely gentle despite its lack of inflection.
"That is why he chose you," he said simply.
Confused, Bulma was about to blurt something along the lines of, 'huh?' when something in her brain clicked. Vegeta had always wondered why Radditz had given her the scouter and had raped her mind with his memories. Somehow, this memory had given him an answer. She had no idea what that answer was, but she was certainly ok not knowing. The past few minutes gave her the willies. Even after witnessing the scene and feeling everything as though reliving it, she still couldn't clearly remember the things that had happened here.
She did recall that she had started feeling better suddenly, though. She never thought to ask herself why.
Enough of this. She had to get out of here.
"Um. I had one more place I was going to take you. But we can go back to the cave if you'd like."
He blinked at her and crossed his arms. She sighed deeply and concentrated.
Moments later, they sat together on a park bench. She had wanted him to see a child's freedom as they played.
They sat quietly. She was happy to stay that way, and assumed Vegeta was as well. He was doing his lazy cat thing – lifting the tip of his tail slowly and letting it thump on the seat next to him. The sound of that thumping was hypnotic and she was falling asleep until the sound paused for a moment before continuing. It was one of Vegeta's tells; it told her he was deciding whether or not to speak.
Vegeta flicked his gaze towards her to study her out of the corner of his eye. When she turned her head towards him, he looked away to study the children. Shrugging, she turned to watch them as well. He'd speak when he was ready to. Or he wouldn't.
A moment later, he did.
"You have small humans?"
The question caught her off guard and she snorted in laughter.
"Small humans? No. I've never had any small humans."
She turned to face him, grinning.
"You have any small Saiyans?"
He turned to face her with the most incredulous, sour expression she had ever seen as if to say, 'are you that stupid?' He didn't disappoint her with his next words.
"How can one be so intelligent and so stupid?"
Bah! So she had forgotten the whole 'if I screw you, I kill you' clause. Oh. And there was the whole 'no females of the Saiyan race left' thing. But he was well traveled, right? He had access to all kinds of technology that would make conventional copulation with his own species unnecessary. He was the type to abstain from something so intimate in favor of something clinical, anyway.
Or so she had thought -?
Whatever!
"How can one be so strong and yet so sensitive?" she shot back.
His tail stopped thumping.
She just raised her eyebrow as if to tell him, 'you just proved my point.'
He scowled in acquiescence – and forced his tail to thump. Only this time, it wasn't a lazy, fat-cat in the sun kind of thump. It was more of an agitated I'm going to pounce on you and tear off your head kind of thump.
Despite her better judgment, she felt bad. He had shown genuine interest by asking her a personal question and she had shot him down. It was a defense mechanism of hers; after years of her mother and Yamcha trying to force motherhood on her, she was a bit awkward on the topic of children.
She sighed. Well, here goes.
"I'm sure you'll figure out how to get past the whole uncontrollable ki thing. And Goku had children, so you know it's possible with a female outside of your species."
He swung his head to stare at her with wide eyes.
"Are you suggesting that you and I procreate!?"
Horrified, she nearly fell off the bench.
"What! No! I wanted.. I mean –! I meant to make you feel better! Ya know? By saying.. er, suggesting – uh - "
He cocked his head and studied her like a bug for a moment - right before interrupting her as if she hadn't spoken at all.
"The genetic match is not abhorrent. With your intelligence and my strength the progeny would be –"
"What! Now you're suggesting we -!"
He cut her off again, waving to the air in dismissal.
"It is of no matter. Even should I wish such a thing, it is not possible."
She frowned.
"What do you mean if you wished? Wouldn't that be a decision we're both - ?"
Realizing what she was saying, she cut herself off. Vegeta seemed to have forgotten the conversation and was watching the clouds. Even his tail had started its lazy thumping again. How could he do that? Just… dismiss things and not secretly obsess about it as she did? Pssh. It wasn't fair.
She flopped back into her seat next to him and watched the clouds for a while. After a few uneventful moments, she spoke.
"We should go to sleep – the planet you're going to destroy tomorrow is probably the most important planet in Freeza's empire. I need to be at the top of my game if I'm going to exploit all the intelligence before you turn everything into dust."
She couldn't help but adding, "If I were some of the races you are acquainted with who could put my intelligence to shame, maybe I wouldn't need the rest. But alas. I'm not that smart."
She didn't wait for his response as she pulled them from her memory to the cave. Sometimes he needed to be cut off before getting the last word – if for no other reason than sometimes she deserved the right to piss him off.
She let her weight fall onto the blanket and refused to emit any auditory evidence of pain when her elbow hit a rock. Still, she waited for a remark that would prove he had noticed her clumsiness. When it didn't come, she opened her eyes. Maybe he had left to go back to his ship already? She didn't see him so she returned to her blankets and pillows.
But… the feeling in the back of her head that hummed when he was around hadn't left her. He was still here. Blinking in the darkness, her curiosity buzzed. They'd spent a lot of time sharing the same brain space and she assumed he'd be only too happy to get away from her. So… what the hey, yo?
She waited. And waited some more. Still, he stayed on the edges of her mind.
Would he say something? Do something? What was he waiting for?
"It is too quiet," came his soft whisper. "In the ship," he clarified.
She turned her head to look at him, but he was no longer sitting where he had been. He was balancing on the balls of his feet just next to her, looking down. She didn't reply – what was she supposed to say?
Yet as he continued to stare down at her, looking lost and confused, she made an intuitive leap.
From the day they had met, they had been forced companions. More than that, they had become the voices in each other's heads. If they weren't physically two feet from one another, they were literally a thought away. For her, it was far better than being alone in this cave. Had it become like that for him? She had travelled with him, spoken with him, played music for – or at – him, and had sang to him incessantly when he tried to ignore her. She pissed him off, yelled at him, laughed at him, and told him when he was wrong. Could it be that she was starting to change him as he had been changing her?
Seeing him squatting there, everything clicked.
Something was missing… for the first time, she wasn't in his head –
And he was unsettled by it.
Did he even realize?
Probably not, she decided. He was just following instinct. She was used to inexplicable human emotions and he had an emotion he couldn't crush or dismiss. Like a child with a skinned knee, he was looking for comfort in the only place he knew to look.
She nodded to herself and shifted a few feet so he could squeeze between her and the stone wall. He paused for a moment and then seemed to move without thought, though he was careful not to touch her as he came to rest next to her.
She was almost asleep when she felt his tail curl around her hip.
She had been wrong – she had kissed him again. And somehow, she ended up in the same exact place: sleeping next to a monster, his tail wound around her – smiling in the dark.
AN: I lied. The NEXT chapter will have a choice for Vegeta and a Sacrifice for Bulma. I sort of got carried away with this chapter. I was going to leave it out... but decided that was obnoxiously stupid.
I appreciate all the favorites I'm getting - but that's like listening to a street artist play music and not leaving a tip! That starving artists works hard for those tips! Sure - I write for me, but there's quite a warm and fuzzy that comes with getting encouraging reviews. If you can hit a button to add a favorite, you can hit a few more in a string of letters and words that says, "wsprs, you freakin rock." Or some such nonsense.
Much better than blowing fishes in the mirror to wake up in the morning.
Just sayin.
