Unbelievable idiot!
Every time he caved, this happened. He tried to keep a distance but he was less than impressed with how successful he was in the actual keeping a distance part. He rolled his eyes at the sky and sneered. At least he appeared to be successful to everyone else, so his pride was intact. Well. It appeared to be. To everyone else.
He snorted in disgust. Was he actually trying to justify his own weakness to himself? It didn't matter what everyone else believed because he knew the truth of it!
In truth, he was pathetic - unable to put more than a mile between them for any significant period of time. In moments of weakness – which were all too common - all he wanted was to see her. The need was shockingly painful. If it were mere physical pain, he'd be able to brush it aside effortlessly. Yet, it was a new kind of human pain to which he was wholly unaccustomed. So, he found himself time and again simply following her simply to be nearby. It was asinine. He got nothing from it but a feeling that he was somehow less for it – especially because he only felt closest to whole in the moments his eyes were filled with her.
What the fucking fuck? He hated her. No. Not her. He hated the hollow hunger that had taken over his sanity and forced this backward nonsense. How could he feel so weak when he knew he was the strongest he had ever been? Why was the only one he truly wished to fight himself? And which aspect of himself would win such a battle? What would he win? Did he want to know? Would he kill her and be rid of the shackles that caged him to her? Or would the cage he killed be the one that kept him away?
When had the infection of this human way of thinking polluted his mind with such worthless confusion?
As she passed, he clenched his jaw and pressed his back to a large tree that hid him from view. The breeze shifted so that he stood down wind of her. The second her scent wafted into his nose, his knees nearly buckled. He was an utterly defeated beast, incapable of turning away. He felt like an exhausted, whipped animal, incapable of defending himself. Her conquest over him was so complete; he couldn't even find the desire to fight against it. He had lost. He knew it. But he didn't have to like it.
And he certainly had no motive to let her know any of this.
He followed behind as closely as he dared while still trying to pull himself free from the invisible tether that forced him to follow her around like a lost dog. He may have lost the war, but he wasn't about to give her every battle as well!
Frustration and anger seethed within him, and knowing there was nothing he could do about it only augmented his distaste. Right now, he hated humans. ALL humans.
Including her.
She walked around a corner out of sight and his heart leapt with anxiety. Thought faded as he sped to put her again where she belonged – under his very watchful eye. In his haste, he almost missed it when she entered a structure.
Across the street from the place she had entered, standing next to an odd little creature selling frivolously colored draperies and scarves, Vegeta stood perplexed. He had done a hasty perimeter check and knew this was the only way in and out of the structure Bulma had entered. His current position allowed him stealth and a solid view and he was inclined to stay here – but the vexing creature waving cloth in his face, trilling at him in the annoying whistle-speech of the Yardracian like some sort of obnoxious bird, made staying here impossible.
Vegeta scowled. Yardrat just kept getting better and better.
Growling in the general direction of the chirping toad on principle alone, Vegeta stepped from behind his curtain cover. Bulma was inside that building and the only way to monitor her activities would be to go inside. It wasn't ideal, but neither was following her in the first place.
That thought alone halted him in his steps. He asked – for the thousandth time – what the fuck he was doing, and then corrected himself immediately. He knew what he was doing. He just didn't know why.
Why? WHYWHYWHYWHYWHY was he doing this? What the hell was WRONG WITH HIM?
His attention was snatched away by the unacceptable sensation of something pulling on his pant leg.
Something. Dared. Touch. Him.
An obscene ball of ki immediately erupted through his agitated body and formed in his fist. Turning to destroy, oh - the planet with the amount of ki he held – he thrust out his hand to strike.
And stood there.
Nothing had changed. He had every desire to disintegrate the creature tugging his clothing. Yet. He did nothing but stare down at the child with contempt. It wasn't even real contempt for the child. He knew it was self-loathing in response to a situation out of his control. In the past, that wouldn't have made a cock waffle's difference in how he responded. Anger was anger and you always approached anger with destruction. Yet outside of feeling confused and frustrated with that ridiculous human woman, he felt strangely…. Blank. Like there was no point.
Frowning more at the realization that he would not in fact blast the child, Vegeta nonetheless maintained the colossally sized ball of ki, aimed at the child's head. His's eyes flicked towards the child's assumed parent simply because the entire situation seemed awkward. What else does one do when one feels out of place but to see what everyone else is doing? The merchant responded by taking the Saiyan's acknowledgement as an opportunity to appeal to his customer. A plethora of outlandishly colored scarves and cloths were waved in front of the horrified Saiyan, each followed by more chirping and whistling.
It seemed worthless and embarrassing to maintain a threat that was obvious to everyone he wouldn't act upon, so Vegeta absorbed the ki-ball. Growling at the merchant that no, he didn't want any of the array of hideous over-opulent rags and that he would blow up the stall if one more item was shoved in his face for review for potential purchase.
Just then, an incessant tugging at his leg nearly snapped the remainder of his odd, ill-fitting patience. Abruptly, the little monster dangled from robes, the collar of which was clutched tightly in the Saiyan's fist. The miniature toad looked shocked briefly, his enormous eyes blinking wildly for a moment, before the child grinned widely and chirped. Disgusted, Vegeta nearly tossed him, none too lightly, before a flashing glint of crystalline blue rudely caught his attention. Dangling from the child's throat was the most brilliant stone Vegeta had ever seen. It was effervescent in a ghostly way, as if it were in two planes of existence at once; the stone was translucent but had an inner soul that glowed and danced as if on fire.
Enraptured and unaware, the Saiyan lifted his fingers to touch the gem. The light leapt and arced as his flesh brushed the stone's surface. The Prince's eyes widened. It was warm and it pulsed, as if alive.
The merchant wailed as he should have when Vegeta had threatened the boy with a ki blast the size of which could destroy worlds. Confused at the Yardrat's misplaced dismay, he scowled.
"You wanted to sell me something. You will sell me this stone," he instructed flatly, shaking the wide eyed tadpole still hanging from his fist. He knew the creature would understand him; they were a species more dependent upon telepathy than even Saiyans.
The feedback from the toad's psychic reply was almost too painful to bear. Wincing and trying to pull meaning out of the utter loudness of Yardrat telepathic communication, Vegeta waved his hand in an order to stop! The beast complied, but garbled whistles and chirps continued to bubble out of his mouth in anxious babble.
Vegeta understood the stone was a fossil of sorts – it was a primordial creature so ancient nothing but ki – the essence of life - remained locked within it. It was, literally, a living crystal. And it was the only thing keeping the boy alive.
With rapt, roaming attention, Vegeta studied the boy and gingerly set him back on his feet. His darting eyes slowed and stopped on the child's chest when his ears caught the child's heart swish and skip. Vegeta lowered his eyelids thoughtfully. The Yardratians had super developed methods of ki manipulation; they had taught Kakarrot to disperse his molecules and reassemble them across the galaxy. They could slow and even bend time. They could – at least at some point in their evolution or history - preserve the essence of life within stone.
So why hadn't they healed the boy?
Without thinking, Vegeta called forth a tiny fraction of the ki he had held in the palm of his hand mere minutes ago. Instead of forming it into a destructive ball, he merely pushed it into the child. It took an epic amount of his telepathic concentration to condense the ki into the boy's lungs and heart without tearing the delicate tissues, cartilage and vessels apart. There, he controlled the ki's minute dispersion with monumental focus, forcing those same tissues, cartilage, and vessels to repair. Such was the effort, his own heart beat and breathing joined the pace and rate of the child's. Like holding the weight of an ocean and allowing only a mere drop to fall at a time, the Saiyan's will bent the most destructive force in existence and demanded that it heal instead.
He had told the woman once that ki was the essence of life, but no one could survive intimacy with him as he was unable to control it.
Now, he had mastered it.
Suddenly dizzy with effort and a shocking sense of accomplishment, Vegeta withdrew his remaining ki from the boy and stepped back. Embarrassed but not understanding why, he stood apart from the awed child and his -his? – parent thing. Refusing to make eye contact, Vegeta crossed his arms over his chest briefly before deciding that he most definitely would rather be somewhere else. Probably inside the building the woman disappeared within. But not really.
He shoved the toad and it's froglet aside, more gently than he would like to admit, and achieved two full steps before he felt something tugging on his leg.
The fucking audacity !
A roar poised to erupt from the belly of his being, he swung around to put the fear of all that was unholy into the little shit – and the volcanic inferno caught in his throat the moment his eyes landed on a piercing glint of living-blue shining in the child's upraised hand.
Thoroughly humbled and even more embarrassed for a fraction of a breath, his emotions decided to fuck it and popped in a bubble of indifference. Taking the stone from the boy, the corner of his mouth stretched in the compromise between a frown and a grin and he hmphed.
The merchant was wise and said nothing, but bowed his head in the appropriate amount of reverence for the gift of a healed child. It was enough, but not too much – which oddly would have irritated the Saiyan. This was a simple trade and nothing more. Vegeta hadn't done it to be kind though he recognized the gesture as a kind one. He wasn't used to being kind without purpose and he certainly hadn't ever had kindness rupture out of him without consent. He blamed the woman's humanity for causing this momentary lapse of corruption, but he wasn't upset about it. He wouldn't admit it, but it had actually helped him. He had wanted the stone and he got it. In the past he'd have simply taken it from the boy. Vegeta clutched the stone tightly in his fist.
The idea of taking it hadn't even occurred to him. Hell. He'd been about to walk away after healing the runt without the stone in hand.
What the fuck was wrong with him?
He couldn't, at that moment, admit to himself that he only wanted the shiny rock because it was the only other thing he'd ever seen that was the same impossible shade of blue…
Forcing his mind to still, Vegeta approached the door across the street. The one she had gone through. Was he really going to go inside?
Fuck. He was on a roll. Why the hell not? Maybe while he was in there he'd push her up against a wall and tickle her to death from the inside.
Sighing, he raised his hand to open the door and realized something was… strange... Not malicious, but maybe… not quite real? As though the structure existed in two places at once. It was not quite the same feeling he got from the blue crystal hidden in his fist – this feeling was monumental in comparison to the tiny rock.
Oddly unnerved but mostly curious by the surreal-ness of it all, he stepped backward to take in the building in front of him.
Most Yardracian structures where just like the creatures themselves were; squat, earthy, and ugly. This building seemed completely divorced from the typical 'toad archetype.' It was imposing, majestic, and ornate. Frankly, it was beautiful.
Pearlescent and shimmery in the soft glow of sunlight, the blocks that created the structure seemed as if they had been carved to fit into place. They were almost metallic… yet not… and various shades of translucent, blue crystal - similar to the one he still held clutched in his fist -veined the stones like marble. Also like the living stone he held, these blocks seemed to pulse with inner fire as if alive. The blocks were shaped in pillars that reminded Vegeta of one of Earth's musical instruments. What had she called it? An Ore-gain? He briefly wondered if the ore-gain would make music like the piano in Bulma's dance studio.
An overwhelming sensation of alarm pulsed through Vegeta and the Saiyan had to catch his weight on the door. He was getting used to this, though he hated to admit it no longer distressed him as it once had. It felt like he was preparing for a fight, but he wasn't. His body was merely responding to the absurd emotional reflex that woman sometimes invoked. The feelings and urge to fight would dissipate, and with it, a little pride that he had gotten excited over nothing. He lost a little less pride every time. It was almost to the point where the amount was negligible. He wasn't certain if that was something to cause celebration or despair.
Sighing, he lifted his hand to open the door. Upon touching it, he felt – not better… but less… troubled. He was still full of anguish, frustration, and hurt, but it was tempered by a sense of calm and peace.
He only noticed because the contrast between one emotional state and another was so utterly extreme it was absurd.
He snatched his hand back and stared at the door in suspicion, silently accusing it.
Nothing happened.
Wary anyway, his eyes focused on the decorative carvings. They were.. they breathed as if they lived. In awe, Vegeta once again lifted his hand and splayed his fingers to touch the beauty of the wood. The carvings were sophisticated and intricate, yet there was not a single speck of dust collected in the grooves. How could this be? It was a door on the dusty street in the middle of a merchant town. Yet the door itself was untouched by time or use. It seemed both real and unreal. It was regal and daunting, as if it offered both a warning and an invitation.
It was…
Lovely.
What fairy tale had he blundered into?
He flinched as though he had been burned. Did Bulma steal into his mind and plant one of her golden images in his head to distract him?
Without breathing and holding himself so still he could fool death, Vegeta waited. After long moments of searching his mind, he slowly decided that he was alone inside his head.
He angrily thrust aside the pinch of loneliness and disappointment and shoved resolve in their place. This whole series of events was ridiculous and he was jumping at imagined shadows. Unforgivable!
Drawing in a deep breath, Vegeta pushed at the door, half expecting the thing to refuse him entrance. He was a bit surprised when it swung open easily, and annoyed that he felt pleased that he had been allowed to enter. Why the fuck wouldn't he be allowed inside? He was the Goddamn Saiyan Prince and no door could keep him out if he wished entry!
Still, he found himself tiptoeing in the dimness of the interior, telling himself it was for stealth and not due to a feeling of reverence.
This place was.. what word did the woman use when he stared through her?
Creepy.
He knew what it was to use his eyes, his telepathy, and his voice to inflict unease. He wouldn't say he felt uneasy, but somehow, he felt as if he were being watched.
He couldn't explain it, but he felt certain whatever belonged to those eyes stared at him only in curiosity, and meant no harm. He relaxed. He was used to being watched. He was even more used to being judged.
Ahead, he heard the echo of her voice. Again, his heart surged in what he could only understand as alarm. Though he knew she was in no danger, all remaining hesitation drained from his body as he sped towards her.
That lasted two steps before he remembered himself. Feeling like a blundering fool, the Saiyan quickly found a pillar still shadowed in darkness to hide behind. It was only when standing within the shadow of the pillar he realized that the darkness simply… stopped. There was no transition. There was shadow – and then there was a wall of brilliant light. It pored through a glass domed ceiling, flanked with carvings so real they, like those on the door outside, seemed alive and breathing. He jolted in realization. It was their eyes watching him – the statues. He moved from side to side, watching the eyes follow his movements and only just managed to stop himself before accidentally stepping from his place of darkness into the light.
Just then, the woman spoke again and his attention was snatched by the sound of her voice.
Who was she speaking to? A Yardracian, yes, but none like any he had ever seen before. This one seemed taller, slimmer, and appeared more a pale cream color rather than mud-brown with green splotches typical of all the other inhabitants. Also unlike the other Yardracians, this one did not use telepathy to communicate - it spoke out loud. It was awkward, as if the practice were new, but nonetheless, it spoke in words rather than the infuriating burrs, whistles, and tweets of the natives. Not that he could bother himself to understand what the toad was saying…
Bulma's surprised, excited inhalation caught his attention. Now her words, he'd understand even if he didn't want to. Right now, though, he most definitely wanted to.
Bulma turned from the – what would the equivalent be? An elder? Yes. Vegeta knew and understood elders. Vegetasai had them and prior to Freeza, they had been teachers and philosophers past their prime as warriors. Freeza had outlawed them immediately. He forbade instruction of the written word as well as the true history of the Saiyan culture. He did this by slaughtering every elder he found – save one. When he was young and the Saiyan empire not yet destroyed, he hadn't yet had the opportunity to learn Nappa had just been indoctrinated into the guild of elders. Had the empire survived, Nappa's charge would have been to instruct young Saiyans. Nappa had been an elite, and would therefore have rank as an elder to instruct elite Saiyan cubs.
Yet.
As an elder, Nappa would only ever teach one single student. Vegeta, Prince of Saiyans, would be the last taught in the old ways.
Absentmindedly, Vegeta rubbed at the spot where his new tattoo would be placed and continued to watch his woman wander, glowing under the soft light of the domed glass.
Someone chuckled behind him and startled, Vegeta stiffened.
"Peace, Warrior," it rasped before chuckling again. "Though I wonder. Can Warriors truly know peace? I think so, but it is an answer each Warrior must ultimately give himself."
Vegeta frowned, perturbed by the interruption, but quickly swatted the thought of the interruption from his mind. He came to make sure Bulma didn't get into trouble, as she was wont to do.
"As I see, yes."
Vegeta almost didn't hear the pest until the words registered. Hadn't he been unable to understand this beast a moment ago? The Saiyan swung around to face the intruding creature and only stopped short of caving the thing's skull as a feeling of calm blanketed him.
Blinking suspiciously – what was it about this place that dulled his anger? - Vegeta stared in defiance at the creature, who, surprisingly stared back with equal fervor. Only instead of rage and malice, the elder's liquid eyes had serenity and mirth swimming in their ancient depths.
Not to be thwarted, Vegeta hissed a reply through clenched teeth even as his anger ebbed. "You know nothing of War."
The thing smiled and raised his head, as if to point with his chin. Vegeta glanced in the direction indicated and his breath caught in his paralyzed lungs.
Bulma practically glittered. Something about this place seemed to have gotten to her as well. Whatever it was had seeped into her and she seemed… overwhelmed by joy.
"I need not know of war to know of peace, Warrior Prince," was the quiet response Vegeta barely heard. He didn't bother to reply. Something in his chest ached.
And, a moment later, his heart nearly shattered.
Raising her face to the light, Bulma stretched her arms towards the sky, tilted her face upwards so that the light caressed her cheeks, and….began to sing.
The acoustics of the nave lifted her voice and the effect was utterly surreal. Dust particles dancing fat and lazy in the air slowed as they drifted around her and seemed to shimmer like pixie dust. The blue veins of crystal veining the walls pulsed in time with the rising and falling of her song.
Then reality stretched and seemed to fracture so that many worlds seemed to exist one on top of the other. Vegeta's vision blurred but didn't – it was as if he were watching someone powerful moving faster than he could quite detect; the effect was so that the world stood still, but things within it bent his perception to conceive something he couldn't quite understand. It seemed as though the walls truly were coming alive. Whatever life essence they held still existed apart from simple living stone – it looked like the souls of ancient Yardracians were animating the statues they inhabited, making them move. Shaking his head to dislodge the weirdness, it only got worse. Sound ruptured. Instead of hearing only her voice, he thought he could hear other voices joining hers, one by one.
The effect was beyond his comprehension. Behind him, the elder smiled broadly. "She prays," he whispered in reverence, "and the ancients respond," he added in awe. "I knew them capable, but I thought it a fable that they would do such things."
Vegeta blinked, surprised yet not surprised, thinking, "she's praying?" at the same time he thought that it must be true. Nothing he had ever known or imagined could have prepared him for what he saw. It simply had to be heavenly else it would just not be possible. If anyone could invoke something of legend – or a real God if that was her purpose - it would be her. She had a way of forcing powerful beings to not only notice her, but to respond.
"Why does she pray?" the Saiyan found himself asking without realizing he was going to speak.
The elder seemed to recover himself enough to answer in the cryptic, patient but almost patronizing tone of scholars, the zealously religious, and the very old. "For peace, of course. Is that not why you sought sanctuary here?" was the response.
Vegeta didn't deign to answer. He was about to say he had come for the woman but stopped himself. He knew the elder would only say that Bulma was the peace the Saiyan sought. He knew it had truth to it, but questioned it as well. How could she be peace when she was the reason he struggled?
The sound was sweet and tore straight through him. It resonated in his lungs and made it hard to breathe. He had always thought the human voice thin and expressionless. Though he knew her voice better than he knew his own, he realized most of their interactions had been telepathic. The voice in his head had been a mental projection she thrust outwards from her own self-perception. Apparently, she didn't quite know with any basis of reality how she truly sounded, and apparently, he hadn't been listening to those times when she had been using her actual voice. Granted, she spoke to him in Saiyago and that in itself was an enormous distractor. The things she said….! He could excuse any male who failed to see past the unintended sexual innuendo.
But now. Now all he could do was stand there while her voice completely shattered him from the inside out. Strange as it wasn't actually inside his head this time. He was listening with ears and somehow it was more intimate. He was eavesdropping on a moment she had no awareness he was sharing. It was unguarded, unplanned, and a true representation of who she was inside without any kind of agenda. She was alone and had no reason for pretense.
Rather…
He listened harder, even held his breath. Carefully… oh so gently, he brushed against her mind. The meaning of her words – something called Latin - flooded through him. In fact, she was asking someone for something, but it wasn't for herself.
His eyes shot open in shock.
She really was here to ask God for peace – but not for herself.
Painfully humbled, Vegeta watched her, bathed in golden light. Somehow it seemed an insult. What was beautiful before was now simply not enough.
Without hesitation, he lifted his hand and splayed his fingers. A wash of ki radiated from his fingertips to dance about her like the halo of the aurora borealis of her planet. As she sang and her voice rose to the apex of the dome, the effect was magnificent. Rows and rows of Yardracian statues had joined her in song, each of them glowing in the haze of ki like figures made of stars, borne in the soft reds, greens, and blues of a glorious nebula. They were a choir accompaniment that was so powerful, the foundations of the real and unreal rocked beneath his feet and vibrated within his bones.
It was long minutes before he realized she had finished and was no longer singing because the reverberation of the voices had taken time to fade. Vegeta thought again of the earth instrument with pipes and thought his assessment while outside of the structure was accurate. The whole building was an instrument, meant to focus – prayers? - across dimensions, life, and death. Strange, then, that the elder caretaker here hadn't known this to have ever happened before. Surely others had tried this before?
Perhaps it was the sound in Bulma's voice that had moved the ancients. Compared to the chirping Yardracians, her voice was exquisite. Or perhaps it was her selfless request.
No matter.
He was beginning to understand that perhaps he had judged her too harshly. He knew her intent wasn't to show a lack of faith in him. Maybe he needed to see it the way she truly intended. She hadn't betrayed him or taken away his choices. She had saved him when he could not save himself. She had saved them both.
