The question that had gone through her mind more times than she could count since Vegeta had shown up on her figurative doorstep to beat Goku to a pulp was, once again, replaying through her mind.
How on Earth did his logic work?
Sometimes, when she was in the shower absently shaving her legs, or nodding off, strung between those few minutes of untamed thinking and sleep, she would...how did she admit this without sounding crazy...
...make Vegeta an online dating profile in her mind's eye.
It was just something she did that she got a kick out of and it put her to sleep, okay?
There was no question of what kind of profile picture she'd choose for him. She had a handful of pictures of him, although the first few she'd had to argue with him over when he made to rip the camera out of her hands. Some of them were just his normally brooding self, to which he'd rolled his eyes after catching her taking them. While a few others she'd snapped while he was training—shirtless—in his skin tight shorts—that she secretly relished having. Oh, that butt. How she missed that butt. There were a few, however, that any normal person would blanch at her having. Oh, yes, the Embarrassing, Shameful, Unattractive Photo that everyone had. This one just happened to be Vegeta inhaling an extra large platter of takeout, lo mein dripping from his mouth while he yelled at her, a noodle-faced Cthulhu, the vein on his temple throbbing. It used to be a reward for her, the prize at the end of the fight that indicated she'd successfully gotten under his skin. He wasn't normally so ill mannered while he ate—she kinda liked that about him—but, in this case, she'd plucked a nerve. In her mind's eye, she always picked that one, and snickered.
So that picture was chosen without question. The bio, however, was the difficult part. Not the description—Short, maniacal alien with a history of fratricide—or the Interests—World domination, brutally and fiendishly murdering the man who saved my life, kissing my biceps—or Favorite Foods: Pain—but the following. The part about about what he looks for in a woman.
At this point, she wasn't even sure he swung her way. Why else would he have dropped her like she was hot, obsessing over her best guy friend? Bulma blew her bangs out of her face.
All (not so illegitimate) joking aside, what exactly had compelled him to kiss her in the first place? Not that she could blame anyone for wanting to. She was a pretty stunning genius heiress, after all, and not even churlish aliens were immune to that. But of all the seemingly castrated, one-track-minded, sickeningly-motivated men she'd met (and fallen for) in her lifetime, this one took the cake.
She remembered it like it was yesterday, her fingertips drawing across her lips in memory.
He'd just gotten out of the shower. Steam billowed through the hallway. He had a habit of taking scorchingly hot, quick showers.
She'd just gotten done folding laundry and was making her way down the hall to his room. They had a tenuous agreement about his personal space. She insisted, naturally, that he couldn't keep her out of her own house, while he demanded that she at least keep her nose out of his stuff yet make sure to keep his room tidied. It was a rule she'd been working on expanding.
As she opened his dresser drawers, placing his shorts and suits neatly into the fragrant cedar drawers before second guessing herself and deliberately tousling them with a smug smirk, she felt something—oh, who was she kidding, she always knew when it was him—behind her, and turned, lips parted.
He stood with his stupid impeccable posture, shoulders wide in the doorway. Sensing that he was the one with the upper hand, his lips curled ominously. One hand gripped the knot of the towel wrapped around his waist, dangerously perched on the edge of his hips as if at any moment he could tug it off just to spite her.
"What do we have here?" He smiled fiendishly. "Come for the show?"
She rolled her eyes. "Oh, please." She shut the drawer softly and folded her arms over her chest.
"Then get out. I've work to do."
Bulma emitted a not-so-attractive snort and looked at him with the practiced, bored amusement that usually caused him to get frustrated and hand her the win. "Yeah, working hard, I see." She crossed the room casually, but not before stopping to lean into his space, fully knowing that was the key—always the key—to disarming him. "Can't say that it's helping you get any bigger, though."
The problem with Vegeta was that he always knew how to get directly under her skin.
"You'll find your bots on your father's desk."
She froze, and then began to redden.
"I didn't even bother walking the few extra steps to throw them on your desk this time." He was nearly purring. "I demanded he work on them immediately, and afterwords your mother fed me cake and served me tea."
Her eyes grew wider as his grin grew more dark.
She lost it. "Oh, you are despicable," she snarled.
"I invented the term."
She was so mad she could spit. "Under 'pathetic, stupid alien' and all other related synonyms in the dictionary, you'll find your picture!"
"Mmm. I plan on spending some private time admiring that picture tonight."
"Is this getting you off?" She drew back, balling her fists.
"If I didn't have much, much more important things to do with my time, I might just spend the rest of my life making off-color jokes, even if they be beneath a Prince such as I, just to watch you squirm. It would be truly endless satisfaction." His smirk grew toothier, sinisterly hovering like a crescent moon in her field of vision.
Her teeth grit. "Oh, yeah?" This is the part where her common sense stuttered momentarily, the part where she wondered, if she had just done or said something else, would any of this have ever happened? "Well." She hooked her finger in the knot of towel at Vegeta's waist and pulled lightly, creating a crevice that she peered into, down, down past the V of his lower abdomen at the juncture of his thighs below as Vegeta's face all at once slackened and then tightened with seething, terrifying indignation.
She snapped the towel back in place and clucked her tongue, meeting his eyes again. "Can't say that I've seen smaller. At least we both agree that I would be endless satisfaction. You, on the other hand...will only be impressing your hand tonight."
How did she walk away alive from that? She asked herself that sometimes.
It was only when she was halfway down the hallway that the levity of what she'd just done came crashing down on her, and she began to feel panicked. Vegeta must have been feeling something similar, because it didn't take him any time to catch up to her.
Abruptly, he was in her face, the indigo chroma of his ki energy crackling in the dark hallway.
"You'll pay for that."
"Do you take MasterCard?" She squeaked.
Oh, younger Bulma, she chided herself in her mind's eye. Always playing with fire, weren't you?
There was something about his hair when he just stepped out of the shower. Even though it was normally a bit wild, stretching upward, thick and coarse and blackest black, it wasn't necessarily untidy. When he'd been under the spray awhile and in a cloud of steam, the tufts became a bit weighted down and disheveled in a way that wasn't entirely unattractive. Who was she kidding, it was actually really foxy. Sometimes he did things that sent a shock right to her lady parts, and she couldn't say when he grabbed her arm and pulled her close that it wasn't one of those times.
He bared his teeth down at her. Her belly flopped. Over and over, like it was trying to stop-drop-and-roll the panic spreading throughout her body.
To be fair, at this point he probably should have known that all he'd have to do is whisper "Boo" and she'd jump right out of her skin. Unfortunately for her, he wasn't exactly thinking clearly. If there were three things in his life that he could never really truly usurp, it was probably Frieza, Kakarot, and then Bulma. But especially Bulma.
And maybe that's why he kissed her.
His lips pressed against hers without warning, and her eyes widened even further, first staring at the wall behind him—Is this even real life?—before shooting to his face, where, to her total and absolute surprise, he was kissing her with his eyes closed.
Her heart hammering in her chest, Bulma, frankly, had no idea what to do. For a breathless moment, she stood dumbly, lips pressed beneath his, arms dangling at her sides, his hand burning her upper arm.
She flinched when his eyes opened.
They were not the innocent eyes of the boy next door making his first move.
Under long, dark lashes, lids lowered fractionally with—what was going on? was this...was this desire?—his jet eyes peered up at her with dark promise.
Her mouth went dry.
Open eyes, so open and full of promise and dark potential that she could run through them for days, revealing somewhere inside him where a meadow of deep blue and black flowers lingered, where she could be seen twirling, falling into their feather-soft petals and where they would catch her weight.
She normally considered herself a smart, sensual woman, but in this case, she did not.
Bulma placed her hand over her hot, hot cheek, and just...turned, striding down the hall in a daze.
"Is that all you've got?" His voice reverberated softly down the hall.
Her feet came to a stop.
Her mouth was dry, her head was empty. She was speechless. The jerk had made her speechless.
"I see. So when I compare notes with your ex-boyfriend and tell him that I've had much, much better, do you think he will agree with me?"
She looked over her shoulder, blue curls whipping around with her.
"You wouldn't dare."
He laughed, and it was throaty, and arrogant.
"I beg to differ."
Her lips curled around her teeth. "You leave him out of this."
"Why? Nothing is off limits, in my book. Nothing...not even you."
She was striding right back up to his too-pleased face before she could have uttered kamehameha.
"Are you insinuating that this is some kind of game?" She hissed.
"Life is game," he murmured, cruel smile blossoming, "and anything is a chess piece. You are either the winner or the loser. And there can only be one winner."
Her finger found its place against his bare sternum, warm and hard, her fingernail pricking it lightly.
"I will not be used in your completely sociopathic, absurd game," she snarled into his face.
He captured her hand in his own larger one, and his head tilted, a cheshire smile splitting his normally hard features.
"I will always remember that about you," he grieved, eyes bright with wickedness. "What a terrible kisser you were—"
She gripped his chin and smashed her lips against his. His lips remained soft and unyielding, the warmth of his body and soap-smell wafting over her. Growling inaudibly, she pressed harder. She felt a laugh rumble up from his chest, and her eyes flicked up and met his own, smiling down at her devilishly.
Finally, his mouth parted slowly, temptingly, and gazing up at him, she traced his upper lip with her tongue.
Finally, and oh-so-dangerously she knew now with distance and clarity, the mischief in his gaze receded and was replaced by a rare depth.
"How dare you," she replied huskily into his mouth, his teeth against her lips, "you, you muscle-bound, stubborn, strapping jerk- -"
"Oh shut up," he muttered harshly before pulling her close, fisting his hand in her hair—with care—-and finally, finally, their mouths parted in tandem and there was a jolt of electricity that passed between them as their tongues met.
If she had the chance to go back in time and do things differently, would she? Well, obviously not, because she wouldn't trade Trunks for the world. Life had infinite purpose and meaningfulness now that he was keeping her on her toes, blowing up the living room with farts when she had company, drawing all the little old ladies out at the grocery store with his heartbreaker blue eyes, and giggling uncontrollably every time she playfully nipped his toes. But if Trunks weren't part of it? If he wasn't a factor? Would she?
In the soft light of her lab, peering down at Vegeta, who sat, holding a photo that she thought was only dear to her, she had to reconsider. When Vegeta had first left her, when she realized he truly wasn't coming back for the birth, but only for Goku, always Goku, she would have replied yes. Yes, she wished it had never happened. Yes, she wished the mess he'd created of her heart and the lingering stain of her distrust of herself hadn't happened, that she'd wished she'd been a stronger woman than that, that she hadn't been so driven to madness by...whatever it was between them.
But now, as her hand floated down to rest delicately on his cheek, and rather than bat it away, which he'd done dozens of times before, he leaned into it, she had to revise her answer.
Maybe her life would have been less jumbled if she hadn't given into his taunting and kissed him that day. But there wouldn't be this thrum that he made inside her body, either, that filled her up, even when he took it away.
"Vegeta," she murmured softly. "If there's something that you want, just ask for it." His eyes flicked over her with suspicion, and her conviction stuttered. Don't patronize him, for Kami's sake, don't patronize him! She screamed at herself. "I mean, if you wanted a picture of...of Trunks, if that's all you wanted, I would have been glad to accommodate you."
He growled softly and tossed the picture onto her desk, turning away from her. "I don't want the damned picture."
She bristled. "Then why have you been down here messing with my stuff the last week?"
"What is it I'm supposed to be doing?" He snapped. "What is it that I'm supposed to want?"
She stalled.
"I don't know," she said helplessly.
"I don't know either," he said snidely, standing, and in her heels, they were eye to eye. "Why am I even still here?"
She felt a quick pang somewhere in her chest. "I really don't know," she mumbled weakly.
"What am I supposed to do with myself now?" He raised his voice, but she had the feeling he was talking more out loud to himself than her. "My pride has hinged on retribution and is all that has concerned me, ever. I have eaten at the plate of revenge for so long now that without it I have nothing to sustain me. I have trained for a moment that never came. I have nothing to call my own except failure, and this feeling...what is this feeling?" He bellowed, making her jump, her mouth part with surprise. "This feeling that I have a goddamned conscience?" He was really yelling now, and her brows knit as she struggled to keep up with him.
"What's so bad about having a conscience? Okay, so you can't kill some guy that cuts you off in traffic and doesn't use his turn signal," she pointed out timidly. "That's not so bad. Should people really be punished for being foolish?"
He stared at her, searing.
"Ohhhhhkay, maybe you think so. But there are other ways to solve problems, besides, you know, murder."
He was really starting to lose her, so she switched angles.
"Look," she huffed. "I'm not going to lecture you on ethics anymore. I'm no philosopher, anyway. Let's just agree to disagree. What I do know, is that you don't need to feel so terrible about all of this. You're putting so much weight on yourself for things that are out of your control. Focus on something else, Vegeta—"
He snorted unkindly.
"—because obviously what you've been doing with your time is not working." She finished with her teeth grit.
"What else is worth my time?" He scoffed.
"Uh, what about your son?" She was really losing her temper.
Once again, he snorted with contempt, but before she exploded on him, something in his dark eyes—something which was connecting the dots—caused her to stall.
"Shit, Vegeta!" She exclaimed, gesturing dramatically at the door. No one could say she wasn't trying to hold it together. "You've got a son just a few doors down from you that could use a guy like you in his life." It was like she was watching gears move behind his eyes, the blockhead, and she...she was the one who was putting the puzzle together for him. It lit a fire underneath her. "Your son, who has all this potential, who could use your guidance." Maybe that was going a little too far.
"I am so tired of you telling me what to do," he snarled, but it truly seemed half hearted.
"I'm not telling you to do anything! I'm just trying to point out the obvious, which isn't that obvious evidently because you seem completely blind to anything but yourself!"
"Why would I care more about someone more than myself?" He hollered back in a tone that was as genuinely baffled as it was disparaging.
This was an argument they'd had before. Often. Why should he care about someone more than himself, when he was the only one who could protect himself? The only one he could trust to make the right decision? They would never be able to build a bridge between their opposite upbringings, but if she could have empathy towards his, damnet, he could do the same for her.
"Because what's the point of life without other people? What's the point," her hands waved around her head as her eyes rolled, "where is the enjoyment in a life totally closed off from friends and family? It winds up with you isolated, alienated, and lacking purpose. Live a little. Jeez. I never thought the Prince of all Saiyans would be so scared of living a little!"
He snarled not unlike a wild animal, and not for the first time, she questioned the sanity of the company she kept.
"Oh, quit acting like someone is keeping you here!" She finally shrieked. "Like the big, bad Prince of all Saiyans is being held hostage on Earth! You're not! You live with Earth's inventors of space travel. And yet you're still here!"
He got in her face. "You always forget your place!" They were nearly touching noses now, baring their teeth at one another.
She suddenly didn't feel like arguing anymore. "Maybe I just think the only thing you've failed at as a prince and a warrior is your failure to adjust," she said bitterly. "You strut around like you can impose your worldview on everything. Here, our soldiers are taught that adaptability means everything in war. Why not bend the rules a little bit, Vegeta?" Her voice grew tired. "Why not try something new? You don't have to give up who you are just to experience something different every once in awhile. Maybe a new method of attack would enrich your goals."
He took a step back, folded his arms around his thick chest, gaze drifting across the staring hard at the floor. "Nothing comes without a price."
"Maybe that price is worth it," she quipped, shrugging. "I don't know. I just follow where my happiness leads me. I'm no philosopher. I don't know if it's the right thing to do." She stood, and placed her hand supportively on Vegeta's shoulder. He tightened.
"I'm not asking you to love me," she whispered, eyes roaming over his face. "I just think all three of us would benefit by your presence. I'm not asking you to change. Just...just to consider staying. Not just for us. But for yourself."
She wished she would have realized sooner that when he admitted that day in his room that he would do things beneath himself for her, that there was something there, between them, that was more than just now-uncaged lust, and without anyone watching it, would just grow and grow and grow, until it was out of their control.
"I want to train him," he admitted gruffly, eyes swinging sideways to meet her own.
"I'll allow it." She smiled wanly. "All I ask is that you don't teach him to kill, or teach him to hate. Those are things that are better left to circumstance, am I right?"
The black eyes of destruction incarnate looked into hers, and shut with a sigh.
"Don't push me, woman."
She slid past him with a quiet smile.
"I'd never think of it."