Although Vegeta had spent a few moments resting, his heart rate would not seem to slow. It became more and more noticeable as the pleasant languor that followed his orgasm wore off. He knew the phenomenon well enough; his heart raced inexplicably from time to time, some episodes lasting longer than others. It happened every few weeks; now that he thought about it, more time than usual had passed before it happened again. He could not decide if resting a few more moments or escaping the strange guestroom and the woman's presence would serve to soothe him better. Indecision kept him still.

"Is everything okay, or are you just tired?" Bulma asked, pressing up against his back.

He did not need her touching him right now; her touches were unpredictable. He sat up and took a few deep breaths, settling himself, before going to fetch his clothes from atop the dresser.

"You seem a bit on edge."

Without saying anything, he shuffled into his undergarments.

"You going to take a shower?"

Mixed with the sound of blood pulsing in his ears, her voice felt shrill and grating.

"Do you feel bad about what happened or something? It's okay—really. I promise. And I don't mind if you go and take a shower. It's what you like doing before going to bed. I'll be in my—"

"Quiet! Leave me alone!" He slipped out of the room, slamming the door behind him.

Bulma, however, opened it right back up and called out after him before he could disappear into the bathroom. "Hey! What's wrong? Calm down—everything is okay. Vegeta?"

Grinding his teeth together, he buried something between a whimper and a scream in the back of his throat. His hands, which had begun trembling, fumbled with the doorknob. The intensity of his desire to open the door only made the process more difficult. All the while, Bulma had kept up with her barrage of prying questions. Once Vegeta shut himself inside the bathroom, he paced in front of the sink, expecting that Bulma might come in after him at any second, regardless of whether or not he had locked the door. This anticipation did not help to compose him in the slightest. He still couldn't catch his breath, and he had to sit down. Mid-step, he dropped to the floor and tried to take in air deliberately and placidly.

It did not make sense for his body to react this way. However petty, it would make more sense for him to feel embarrassed or ashamed, as the woman had supposed. But afraid? No, it made no sense for him to feel afraid. Nothing remotely terrifying had happened unless he considered a brief loss of control over himself terrifying. Perhaps he did not actually feel afraid; fear did not register in his mind. His body might be providing his mind with physical signals of fear, but the two—his mind and his body—remained dissociated, communicating as separate entities rather than feeling and being as one. Perhaps the sensation of fear came from this dissociation rather than anything that had actually happened.

Vegeta could not tolerate losing hold on any part of himself; he feared it. He could not rationalize his current physical distress, and his failure to rationalize it spread that distress to his mind. Unless he wanted to let it overpower him completely, he would have to accept the experience and calmly wait for it to pass. He did not always succeed in doing this; he knew that, and that knowledge would often unsettle him further in such situations. This time, at least, he seemed lucid enough to detach himself from the experience to think about it objectively.

Vegeta still remembered well the first time it had happened. He had been a young man at the time, and he had never experienced anything like it before. It had happened during one of his and his comrades' most extensive purge missions to date. He and Raditz had just subdued a civilization center, and the two of them surveyed the area for survivors while they awaited word from Nappa, whom Vegeta had sent to scout out any smaller occupied zones the three of them might have missed.

At first, Vegeta thought he was dying. A strange chill had gripped bones; he shivered in a thin sweat, and his heart raced uncontrollably. He could not catch his breath, and the harder and faster he drew in air, the tighter his throat collapsed in on itself. Someone must have injured him, although he could not remember when or how. Gore soiled his suit and armor. If Vegeta bled, his blood had mixed with and disguised itself as that of his victims; a cursory scan of his body did not help him locate whatever wound ailed him. He fell to the ground, still heaving, his hands barely breaking his fall. His lungs ached; the planet's dry air bit them with cold.

"Raditz!" he cried. He heard the older Saiyan's bitter laugh above him after a few seconds' passing. Vegeta reached out and grasped his ankle. "Scum! Don't just"—choking, he wheezed fitfully—"stand there!"

"What the fuck is going on, Prince?" Raditz spat, annoyed. Unsuccessfully, he tried to help Vegeta to his feet.

"Contact Nappa at once!"

Raditz rolled Vegeta over and began checking him for injuries."I don't see a damn thing. What's this about? What the hell do you want me to tell Nappa?"

Vegeta had barely made sense of Raditz's words. Terror had overtaken him so suddenly and with such intensity that the young prince had not even realized that nothing hurt him physically apart from his overworked throat and diaphragm. He heard the beep of Raditz's scouter.

"Where are you? How soon can you get here with the pods?" A pause. "What's wrong? Hell if I know! I just turned around and Vegeta was on the ground screaming. I thought he was injured, but I couldn't find anything. Possibly something internal. I didn't see anyone touch him, though. Fucking weird. He just kind of lost his shit and pretty much everyone was gone after a couple minutes. Told me to stay back. Didn't want to mess with him. You know how he gets. He was doing that thing where he laughs to himself. Went a bit overboard. Definitely brought the price of the planet down, the little fucker." Another pause. "What's he doing now? He's still on the ground. Oh, goddammit—I think he's crying. He seems okay, though." Raditz sighed as he listened to Nappa's reply. "Fine. I'll check him over one more time." A beep ended the transmission.

Vegeta felt Raditz's hands reach under his armor and pat his chest and abdomen for any tender areas. The Prince was too beside himself to care that the third-class touched him without authorization. "There's nothing here. What the fuck is wrong with you? I guess you finally just snapped." Raditz chuckled as he lifted Vegeta off of the ground and threw him over his shoulder. "Haven't I been telling you to loosen up for years? Should've fucking listened. But no—I'm just the third-class, and I couldn't possibly know better. Little prick. I knew you were going to just lose it eventually—either that or blast your own head off."

Vegeta finally managed to say something. "Don't report this to Frieza! The scouters! Watching!" With clumsy, quavering hands, he unfastened his scouter from his ear, crushed it, then let the pieces fall to the earth. Afterward, he began clawing at Raditz's scouter.

The older Saiyan jerked his head away and grabbed Vegeta's wrist. "You little shit! I need that. The damn things are expensive, entitled brat! If you're afraid of Frieza, don't wreck the fucking scouters!"

"If Frieza sees me like this..." Vegeta sobbed desperately.

"Nappa's tracking our location. If I turn off my goddamn scouter, he won't be able to find us. You want that? Just relax, princey. We're way ahead of schedule. We'll be done here early, and that might put Frieza in a good mood." Raditz chuckled darkly before he continued. "And it's not like you did anything as fucked up as last time. Remember that woman? She was fucking gorgeous—I don't blame you. Besides, Frieza rewarded us nicely for that purge. He's in to that shit. I don't know what's got your tail in a knot."

Vegeta gagged on his own breath. He felt like retching.

"Relax, princey."

"I—I—can't! Sh—Shut up!" Vegeta wished he could relax. He had tried to regain his usual composure before, but had not succeeded. Failing had only exacerbated his nervous condition, and any hope of calming himself faded with each new futile attempt.

"There's Nappa," Raditz announced. "I don't see the point, but he's set on getting you to the border station. Probably just as afraid of getting his ass handed to him by Frieza as you are. No telling what he'd do if he found out something happened to his favorite pet Saiyan prince. It's good to be the third-class sometimes, Vegeta. It means Frieza doesn't give a shit about me. Makes life easier, and that's worth a lot in this shitty-ass universe."

"I'm not myself. I—I lost control. I'm losing my mind. He wants that. So he tells me to control myself—mocks me. He'll—he'll torture me! And he'll tell me to control myself while he does it. And he'll—speak softly. Softly!" Vegeta had begun with a piteous whine, but now he was practically shrieking.

"Yeah, he's been like this the whole time," Raditz scoffed. Vegeta had not heard the other Saiyan's scouter; Nappa had arrived, apparently, and Raditz was speaking to him.

Vegeta kept shrieking. "Then—then—then when I scream... knock me out. Fuck with my head. Fuck with my body too. Wake up—not me. But I won't know. I—I—I can't compose... my heart's going crazy. Make it stop! Don't tell him!" The young prince tried to catch his breath.

"What the hell did he do?" Nappa asked, taking Vegeta's trembling, limp body from Raditz.

"I already told you," Raditz replied. "He just got a bit excessive blowing stuff up. Nothing like last time. He didn't lose it until afterward. Wrecked his scouter again, by the way, the little shit. He'll probably make me pay for his new one just because he can."

Vegeta felt Nappa lay him in his pod. "Prince Vegeta," he said firmly, steadying the young man by resting one hand on his shoulder, "I'm going to tell the computer to put you into a brief stasis once we take off. We'll arrive at the station in six hours, and we'll get you to the infirmary immediately."

"Is this really necessary?" Raditz complained. "There's nothing wrong with him. Don't be an idiot. He's just insane. You should've seen the way he treated that whore back on Frieza's station. Do you even pay attention to the shit he does?"

"We're ahead of schedule. Only a couple blips showed up on my scanner. I'll send you the coordinates and their tracking numbers. You can finish up here then meet us at the station."

Raditz sighed loudly. "You hear that, Vegeta? Frieza will never know about this because I'm doing your dirty work and saving your royal ass."

"Don't provoke him."

"Goddammit, Nappa. He's too out of it to care."

"I wouldn't bring it up with him later, either."

"I know when to keep quiet."

When Vegeta awoke in the infirmary hours later, he found himself cleaned off and considerably calmer. The medic informed him and Nappa that he had suffered no physical injuries aside from a few minor burns, likely from the aftershock of a blast. Vegeta spent a couple hours in a healing chamber for good measure, however. Resting had soothed him well enough for him to take up a regular training regimen while he and his comrades awaited a new assignment. Although he seemed to have recovered to everyone, including himself, he nevertheless went about his affairs with a newly-reinforced purposeful caution. He noticed that, when he curled up to sleep, he would more often than not monitor his heart, counting each beat reflexively until he lost consciousness.

Over the years, Vegeta had learned that sitting down and controlling his breathing, as he did now, could keep any sudden onset of distress manageable. Nothing, though, warded off stress and unpredictability better than abiding by a fixed routine. He could sleep soundly tonight if he could get up off of the floor and get himself into the shower. He found that he could.

The very instant he got to his feet, he heard a light rapping on the bathroom door.

"Vegeta?" The woman's tone was meek.

He should have known. He exhaled slowly. At least her voice did not upset him as he might have anticipated. It had nearly the opposite effect, in fact—distracting and disarming.

"Are you okay? You've been in there a while."

He did not need or want to lose his temper, so he replied as calmly as he could. "Yes. Leave me."

She sighed loud enough for him to hear her through the door. "Okay, good. I'll let you be. See you later."

Author's Note: Sorry for the delay in posting this chapter, my dear readers. I had been feeling a bit discouraged, but I'm getting over myself, thankfully. Additionally, it's that time of year when school has resumed. Don't worry, though! I plan on keeping up with this story, and I hope to post once or twice every other week. Hold me to it!