Bulma was relieved to finally be back home. She was dead tired, from all of the driving and hunting she had done, over the course of the past few weeks. Still, she felt accomplished. She'd learned much more than she ever anticipated. There was still work to be done, but she felt good enough to take a breather, for now.

It was a shame that her body had other ideas.

She couldn't go out and enjoy herself when she couldn't bare get out of bed in the morning. If she took two steps outside of her bedroom door, she immediately felt lightheaded, needing to lie down. For days, she had to have everything brought to her bed. She didn't know what had come over her. Maybe she was just sick. She tried to shrug it off as her getting acclimated to Earth germs, again, but that usually didn't hit her like this. Even as it began to pass, she was still feeling weak and fatigued. She couldn't eat much food without feeling as if she was going to hurl. It was miserable.

To make it worse, if she wasn't relaxing and taking it easy as she wanted to, it felt like wasted time. She could be going out doing more research, but she was lying in bed all day. She couldn't even use this as an excuse to take it easy. She just wanted to go out and learn more. Her breakthrough could be right around the corner, but she couldn't go get it. If there was one thing that drove her nuts, it was being held down like this. All she could manage was reading the same text she's read a million times looking for something new. The frustration made her head hurt.

There was a knock at the door. Bulma sighed, pushing her laptop off of her, and sat up. "It's open."

Her mother came in, holding a tray of food. "Feeling any better, sweetie?" She laid the tray down on her lap.

Bulma sighed, taking sips of the drink. "Not really."

She put her hand on her forehead, then down to her cheeks. "You're not warm. Is it just sleep?"

"You wouldn't think that, given how long I've been chained to this room. I thought it might have been a bug, but it should have passed, by now."

Her mother took a seat on the edge of the bed. "Is there anything else wrong? Are you having trouble eating?"

"Kind of. It feels like I'm seconds away from hurling, if I eat anything solid. Can't even remember the last solid meal I had. Why?" She slowly started chewing on her food.

"Dear, are you and Vegeta sexually active?"

Bulma nearly spit out her food, but quickly swallowed it, in surprise. She looked at her mother, dumfounded, but she looked as if she was expecting an answer. She sighed. "Yeah, we are." Her cheeks flushed, in embarrassment. Why was her mother so open with talking about sex?

"When was the last time you remember being with him?"

"A couple days before we left. Mom, can we change the subject?"

"Were you at least careful?"

She narrowed her eyes. "Careful?"

"You know – condoms, birth control, anything?"

Sometimes they were, but that time in the cave, they weren't. Damn Vegeta and his spontaneity. She never did figure out how effective the pill was with interspecies intercourse, though, so who knew if the efforts even mattered.

She sat there silently for a few moments before her eyes went wide. "Mom, are you saying I'm pregnant?!"

"I was the exact same way, when I had you girls – tired and sick as a dog. Go ask your father how bad it was for both of us. It wouldn't surprise me, at all. You know how accurate a mother's intuition is."

Bulma didn't reply. She leaned forward, putting her hand on her forehead. She never even considered that. They'd been intimate so many times that she assumed maybe they weren't that compatible. As she thought about it, she realized it had been a while since her last period. She needed an answer to this now, and she needed it to be definitive. "Mom, can you have a bot run out and grab a couple dozen pregnancy tests?"

"Of course, dear!"

She sat on the bathroom floor, staring at the twenty plastic tubes. She hoped that one of them would give her a different answer. They weren't always accurate. There were other reasonable explanations that would give her a less-than-accurate result. Surely, if she kept trying, one of them would give her the signs she wanted.

Yet, all in a row, the tests read the exact same thing – positive.

She wanted to deny it, but she knew that the most obvious answer was the right one.

Bulma put her face in her hands. She didn't bawl or cry out, but she sat there silently. Why did it happen now, of all times? She was far away from her home and her boyfriend, there was a killer on the loose, and so much was at stake. She and Vegeta had discussed their future once or twice, but kids never came into the conversation. Kids meant commitment, and it forced her to confront the inevitable – that she would one day have to marry into the royal family and become queen. And that thought still terrified her.

Vegeta had been more than accommodating to her fears. He knew that was a big step, and he understood what it felt like to be forced into such a hefty responsibility. The ambassador job had been his idea to acclimate her to royal life and duties. But an ambassador was still a job. A queen meant something completely different. It had power and respect. She was not ready to have any of that.

She touched her stomach. Even if this wasn't planned, she couldn't bear to think about being rid of it. This was still her baby. She always loved kids, and a part of her still dreamed of the day that she could help raise one of her own. It wasn't from a one-night stand, but from the man she loved. They never talked about kids, but their entire relationship was built on taking things one day at a time. She wasn't a mother, quite yet. She still had time, if she wasn't ready to become queen. Vegeta understood: he wouldn't get upset. Her confidence grew a little, as she thought more about this. She still wished that it had waited until later, but what was done was done.

"Giving your mother trouble already, aren't you," she said, with a sigh. "You better make this up to me, when you're older." She let out a small laugh, and shook her head.

Even with her anxiety, she could convince herself that it was going to work out fine.

It always did, after all.

When the clock hit 2, Bulma opened the communicator on her computer. She typed in the codes, and waited for the other line to pick up. She pressed her hands together. She was just going to come out and say it to Vegeta. If she wasted time with explaining everything, she'd lose her nerve. She just needed to tell him. Then, everything would be all right. It was only a few words.

The screen flashed, and a guard sat on the other end. He didn't even say hello, when he saw Bulma. He immediately stood up and left the room, to find Vegeta. Bulma giggled. Some of the Saiyans knew her so well.

The door opened, once more, but Vegeta wasn't there. It was the same guard, as before. He sat down, again. "I'm sorry, Bulma, but the prince isn't able to speak, right now."

Her eyebrows furrowed. "Why? Where is he? Did something happen?"

He sighed. "He's out with the king, somewhere in the city. There's been another murder, and he wanted to be there, personally. If you have something important, I'll make sure someone gets it to him, but this is rather important."

She felt like all of the wind was knocked out of her. She dared to ask. "Do you know how many more have happened?"

"I dunno," he shrugged. "A few. Maybe four or five. We've been getting more in the past couple weeks. Now, do you have anything you want to leave for the prince?"

After a moment of hesitation, she shook her head. "Thank you for telling me, though." The soldier hung up the call, without another word.

Bulma slowly closed the laptop. She held her arms. During her investigation, a growing body count had never come to mind. All those people were dying, and she still hadn't found anything to make it stop. The Saiyans must have felt so much dread, and she had been completely oblivious, these past couple of months. She hadn't felt this way since she first saw the Saiyans camped out in the tunnels, hiding from Frieza.

She couldn't even begin to imagine how Vegeta was feeling. He might have been a Super Saiyan, but the murders were still happening. He had pushed himself so hard to overcome his limits, never thinking he was good enough. What kind of self-loathing and pain must have he been feeling?

Did he deserve to have another burden? Another thing to worry about, on top of everything else?

There was a time and a place for everything. When this whole thing was over, she'd tell him then and there. For now, there were more important things to worry about. The baby wasn't going away anytime soon, after all. In a few months, she could tell Vegeta everything. He'd understand. She wasn't keeping it a secret from him forever: just holding off until things were calm, again. It was for the best – it gave her time to think about everything and it wasn't a burden. It was only temporary.

And it made her more determined to solve these murders once and for all.