Vegeta had been called to appear before Lord Frieza. And that was never a good thing. Trunks could feel the stiffness in his young father's legs, the fear roiling in his gut. He could see the memory as though he were watching it on one of his mother's video screens. But every emotion Vegeta felt was Trunks's to share in. Vegeta entered the throne room, his shoulders squared, his head held high. His face betrayed nothing. Frieza was sitting on an ornately overlaid chair of gold. His servants and courtiers surrounded him. Until Vegeta came in, the lord of the universe had been twitching his tail boredly with his chin in his hand. But now Frieza's head rose with interest. Though, the expression on his face was still one of dangerous spite. Trunks's father waited to be addressed.
"Vegeta." The voice was a cold sneer.
The previously mentioned Saiyan bowed. "You summoned me, Frieza?" Trunks had heard the tales all his life of the legendary battle of Goku vs. Frieza. It was the first time Goten's dad (or any Saiyan) had ascended to the level of Super Saiyan. He had defeated the evil Frieza with a mighty Kamehameha Wave. It was a gripping, epic saga. But to Trunks it had always been just an old story. Something in the past, not real or concrete. Now all of a sudden, he remembered all the people Frieza was said to have killed, how he held the entire universe in the palm of his hand. A hand that was an iron fist. No one stood against him and lived. It was no wonder that Vegeta was sweating underneath his clothes. His heart was racing. Trunks licked his lips and continued to watch. He knew, somehow, that his father was fourteen. Barely older than Trunks himself.
"That's right, I did." Frieza gestured with his hand. His fingernails were claws, and the claws were polished cold purple. "Do you recognize the name 'Pwelc,' by any chance?"
"It's a planet," Vegeta answered stiffly.
"Indeed, it is," Frieza confirmed. "A planet to which I sent you with orders to kill all the inhabitants. Surely you remember? You came back from there barely a month ago."
"I remember," replied Vegeta. Was that a tremor in his father's voice? It couldn't be.
"Good." Frieza's eyes flashed. His impassive face was suddenly ugly with fury. "Then perhaps you can tell me why the planet's inhabitants are STILL ALIVE?!" He brought his fist down on the armrest of the throne. "Not only that, but they're reproducing and LEAVING THE PLANET!"
Vegeta took an unconscious step back. "I-impossible!" he stammered. "They were only children!" His eyes went wide—he had made a huge mistake. Frieza's eyes, too, widened.
"You knew," he realized. His voice had gone from a shout to a whisper. "I thought you had missed a few of the rats hiding in their sinkholes, but…you spared them on purpose, didn't you?" His eyes were narrow, and his mouth wide in a snarl. "Did you feel pity on them, children begging for mercy?" He leveled his pointed finger at Vegeta. "Let me tell you something, young 'prince.' Pwelcans age much faster than we beings do. A month to them is several years to us. Then, like cockroaches, they spawn and their children can infest the universe! Well, it's my universe now, and I won't have any annoying infestations spoiling my view, ruining my reign. And what I'm going to do to those cockroaches you allowed to live won't be ANYTHING compared to what I'm going to do to you." His eyes flicked to the right. "Zarbon."
A turquoise-hued alien with green hair stood at attention. "Yes, Lord Frieza."
"I don't want to dirty my hands with this monkey. You and Dodoria can take care of him."
"As you command, my Lord Frieza." Zarbon jumped high and touched down in front of a shorter, lankier Vegeta, who flinched impulsively. Trunks could feel his father's thoughts, feel the rush of embarrassment as though it were his own. How could he voluntarily betray his cowardice before these slave drivers? "Yeah, you know what's coming, kid," Zarbon noted his reaction grimly. He wrapped his arms around Vegeta in an inescapable full nelson hold. "Don't take it so hard, all right? We're just following orders."
"Like YOU should have!" roared a bubblegum-pink alien with spikes. Dodoria rushed toward them with his fist preceeding him. Vegeta shut his eyes as tightly as he could and clenched his jaw. Trunks knew it because he was doing it, too, even as he saw it happen. But his closed eyes couldn't block his vision. And the pain that filled his father's body was his to endure as the beating began. Dodoria swung his fists like a wild man, hitting Vegeta again and again. On the chin, in the nose, both his temples, even boxing his ears—any part of the boy's head he could without striking his comrade. The only reason Vegeta's head wasn't snapping back and forth was that Zarbon was stabilizing it from behind. They didn't want his neck broken. Trunks screamed harder than he ever had before, but his scream couldn't drown out Vegeta's. "Ah, enough, already!" Zarbon shouted in irritation. "You'll crack his bloody skull." Dodoria stopped, but Frieza was far from satisfied.
"More!" he snarled with clenched fists. The pink alien was happy to obey. His face a feral smile, he bent over and slammed merciless punches into Vegeta's abdomen. Trunks couldn't bear it. His ribs were steadily breaking. The organs beneath were being crushed. Soon he and Vegeta would die. But Dodoria ceased just short of killing the teenager. Frieza wanted him alive even more than he wanted him tractable. Zarbon let the boy's head fall forward. Without breaking the hold, he held Vegeta at arm's length with distaste. The Saiyan adolescent was coughing up blood. Then he vomited through his groans of pain. How was his stomach still intact after an attack like that? "Take him to the infirmary," Frieza ordered him. "And get someone to clean up the floor. It's revolting."
"Yes, my lord." Zarbon left the throne room with Vegeta in tow. Trunks's father's boots were dragging along the floor.
"I know your secret," Vegeta choked out. How could he even talk after all that? "I saw you transform on Planet Zet."
"Yes, the little prince needed my help to take down all those giant Zettians." Zarbon spoke with idle condescension, but Vegeta was hardly listening to him. Or perhaps he couldn't hear. Both of his ears were bleeding.
"You try so hard to look handsome and elegant," Vegeta went on. "But you're nothing but a monster. A beast." Zarbon's lip curled: Vegeta had touched a nerve. He gripped the boy's collar and held him up so that they could face each other.
"I'll thank you to keep a more respectful tongue in your head when you speak to me," he growled.
"Yes, 'sir.'" Vegeta's answer, weak as it was, was still sarcastic. Trunks couldn't believe his father's audacity. Wasn't he afraid of the consequences of his actions? Trunks was most definitely afraid of them.
Zarbon reached behind Vegeta, who then started to scream pitifully. The blue alien's hand was squeezing Vegeta's furry tail. "I'll bet that hurts, eh?" he sneered. "It's like crushing your spine in my hand, I'd imagine."
"Please stop!" wailed Vegeta. In reply, Zarbon closed his hand more tightly over the tail tip. Vegeta thrashed back and forth, his mouth and Trunks's opened in howls of pain. "I'm SORRY!" he finally sobbed. Zarbon released his hold, and Vegeta dangled from his hand like one of those noodles Goten liked so much. Finally, all the rebellion had been wrung out of him. "Forgive me, sir." This time the respectful address was sincere. "It won't happen again." Tears of pain and humiliation dripped down his face onto Zarbon's hand. His nose was running, too.
The elegant alien smiled. "There, see? That wasn't so hard." He carried Vegeta to a room filled with advanced machinery. Robed aliens came running to meet him.
"The prince has been injured again?" asked a scrawny green lizard-alien. They took the Saiyan from Zarbon's arms and began scanning him with what looked like price guns from the store.
"Yes, Vegeta needs a few days in the tank," Zarbon informed them.
"A few days? With injuries like these, it might be a few weeks before he's back to full strength," the chief medic said. He was recording his voice onto a little tape-deck thing now. "Multiple head injuries, possible concussion. Sensory damage possible; tests will have to be run. Bruising, bleeding, broken ribs, possibly sternum. Multiple injuries of the abdominopelvic cavity…" As he was rattling all this off, more medics were undressing Vegeta, supporting his limp body. They stripped his clothes and armor off while Zarbon watched. The young Saiyan brought his tail between his legs to conceal his nakedness from his hated superior officer. Wires were attached to his stomach and bruised temples. A breathing mask was fastened over his face. Zarbon put his hands under Vegeta's armpits and lifted him not unlike an infant. He flew up to lower the boy into a tank full of bright blue water.
"In you go." He watched in satisfaction as young Vegeta collapsed into the healing bath.
"Was this Master Frieza's doing?" the medical chief presumed. He sighed. "With respect, Lord Zarbon, one of these days he's not going to survive this so-called 'punishment' of yours. This is the worst I've ever seen him."
"Oh, don't worry; he'll live." Zarbon was confident. "And I do believe he'll be a good boy from now on…"