Suggested Listening: I Prevail "Alone"

The Games We Play

When Piccolo broke Aubergine's heart she swore she'd never forgive him; in the years that followed, it never once occurred to him that she might not have meant those words.

In the years following the Cell Games she continued to stand in defense of their home; every time some malevolent power threatened their lives, she stepped up to the plate and volunteered her healing abilities. When that wasn't enough, she exhausted herself trying to defend those who couldn't defend themselves and more often than not, she took a serious beating for her efforts. She knew how to fight and she wasn't a weakling, but Piccolo knew the truth…no matter what horrors she endured she had no heart for fighting. Though she was nearly as powerful as he was, she froze up, pulled her punches, and couldn't seem to make herself hurt others even when lives were on the line.

When the Saiyan hybrid simply sat on the sidelines and healed the wounded, she emerged unscathed; when she was backed into a corner and forced to fight for the weak and wounded, she resorted to acting as a living shield and couldn't always stop to heal herself. Many battles left taunting reminders behind—scars she'd never borne before—but she refused to erase them and wore them with a bitter pride. Every scar was worn like a badge of honor, a scornful reminder to her former lover that she was not a weakling. With every new scar, Piccolo regretted his words more.

No matter how many years went by, no matter how many foes the team vanquished, no matter how many times Aubergine was wounded in the defense of the planet she'd always defended, she never spent any more time with Piccolo than necessary. He tended to find himself high on the triage list but once his wounds were healed she'd stalk away to the next patient before the black fully faded from her eyes. She never spoke to him unless he spoke first, she never subjected herself to his company unless he was broken and bleeding, and she never ever gave him another chance to hurt her again. Even if she had, though, he wouldn't have had the heart to do so.

Startled by something unseen and unheard, Aubergine's mismatched eyes tore from the blackened fish fillets to the window, darting around the landscape outside to search out the source. Piccolo wasn't sure whether to be disappointed that she'd only just noticed his chi or curious at her cautiously hopeful expression. The moment came crashing down around him when she visibly shook some sense into herself and stormed back over to the stove. In a fit of rage, she snatched the cast iron skillet off the stove stormed to the open door and heaved it out into the yard with an unintelligible screech.

The scalding metal connected with Piccolo's face, triggering a loud bellow of pain. When he finally got the worst of the charcoal and grease out of his eyes, Aubergine stood frozen in the doorway with her arm still extended from the throw and her long sharp eye teeth bared in a stunned gape. Neither spoke—neither moved—in the back of his mind Piccolo felt gritty cooking oil slither down his clenched jaw. Ignorant to the tension crackling in the air, a gaggle of free range geese and hens strutted over to pick at the charred fish only to turn up their beaks at it. Funny…even the poultry thought her cooking was shit.

"Pic…Pic..co…lo?" Aubergine stammered paling and backing away. "H…How…you're…you're…!"

"Dead?" he supplied dryly. "It didn't stick." A long tense silence stretched between them, a multitude of emotions flashing unhindered across the woman's scarred face—emotions she would never have allowed to show before he died. She'd changed, alright, and he suspected for the better. Of course, that suspicion was entirely reversed a second later when she bolted. "That's new," he grunted. He waited only long enough to shed his turban and mantle and scrub his face clean on the former, then gave chase.

As he tore through the grassy pasture after her, a predatory smirk split his lips; for the first time since the Cell Games, he really, truly felt alive.

In the years since Piccolo's death, Aubergine experienced no shortage of nightmares. Some brought him back to life only to die again in her arms; others revived him only so he could attack her, scalp and blind her like her mother had been, and leave her to die. Worst of all were the nightmares where he came back to life, saw how broken she'd become over his death, and proceeded to prove just how weak she'd really become. It wasn't a new fear at all. Saiyans, after all, were notorious for their ability to suppress any and all emotion and kick every ass around while doing so—Saiyans had no tolerance for weakness of any sort. She was only half-Saiyan, though—her other half was a half-told secret that died with her father, a race that was far too sensitive for their own good and probably deserved to die out because of that weakness.

How could Piccolo be alive again?! How could he have found her here on New Earth, much less at the very moment she found herself lost in memories of the bizarre courtship they'd lived out for so many years?! Her eyes streamed with a constant flow of tears—weak tears—blurring the landscape as she fled in disgrace.

Piccolo's steadily pounding footsteps grew closer by the minute—any moment and he'd catch her. Even as she pushed herself to her limits and ran like the very devil was after her, though, those footsteps gradually slowed and fell behind. By the time she reached a familiar sparring field—the New Earth equivalent of the field she and Piccolo once spent many an afternoon painting with blood then christening with other fluids—she could no longer hear any sign that she was being followed.

Though her instincts screamed that the silence was a trap, she staggered to a halt, bent double and panting for breath. She hadn't been pushing herself in her training since he was killed, after all; several times that oversight almost got her killed, but what did it matter? Piccolo was gone—her lover, her nemesis, her friend—he was dead but she still lived. As hurt as she was by his betrayal, losing him hurt far more. A sudden breeze whipped her hair forward; a split second later, a hard heavy body tackled her from above and pinned her to the scrub grass.

She knew it was a trap. With her mind running light years a minute, Aubergine stared in horror down at the mangled turf, wondering which of her many nightmares would come to life. The dead man who died twice? The vengeful demon out for blood? The arrogant warrior intent on putting her in her place? Her mind frantically analyzed everything around her—every sound, sight, and smell, and everything she could feel—desperately trying to find the threat before it found her first. A low, graveled chuckle near one ear, however, made it painfully obvious that she'd forgotten a nightmare.

The lover who forgot he broke her heart. Shit. That was one of her least favorite nightmares! "G—UH!—Gi'off!" she growled at him, her blind eye unknowingly meeting one of his. "Go back to Hell, a—!" A clawed fingertip gingerly traced the scar bisecting her cloudy eye; she shuddered and struggled anew.

No matter how hard she struggled, she never expected him to actually release her—back when they'd played this sick game as lovers—before he betrayed her, before he died—he'd never have released her until she surrendered herself to him. Some might have found it odd that the normally stoic Namekian had a playful side—granted, it was more sadistic than playful, but who's counting? Aubergine was sure his comrades, his friends, would never have recognized the man he became when they were alone…of course, most of his friends didn't even recognize her until the fifth or sixth healing, so they probably weren't the best judges of character.

"Aubrey." The long-awaited nickname against her neck stilled her, but his suddenly slack arms ground her thought processes to a dead halt. She remained face-down in the grass as his weight vanished from her back; while she still struggled to process the unexpected occurrence, familiar arms—corded with lean muscle and rough with scaled patches—gathered her from the grass and pulled her upright and against an equally familiar cloth-draped chest.

This, she realized in complete and utter befuddlement, was not among the many nightmares that plagued her for years. Angry Piccolo she could handle—violent Piccolo, whatever—Piccolo crawling into her arms and dying all over again, she might even be able to handle that. This Piccolo, though? This warrior who seemed content to simply breathe her in, as though he'd missed her more than the very blood in his veins? This Piccolo made no sense—this one made her worried, afraid, angry, sad, hurt, and happy, all at the same time, all the stupid worthless emotions her father's race had disdained.

One moment Piccolo was simply holding his estranged companion, simply breathing in the charred green smell of her and marveling at the chance he was given. Next thing he knew, he found himself flat on his back in the grass and Aubergine kneeling over his midsection with her rough hands clamped around his neck. Both her eyes had turned solid black just as they did when she healed, but no white aura accompanied the venomous snarl on her lips.

"Who are you?!" she demanded sharply. "Answer me!"

"You know who I am," he reasoned trying to puzzle out her change of heart. There was no point in fighting to break loose—she wasn't strong enough to keep him restrained. "I—"

"Wrong…answer." As her fingers tightened around his neck a strangely familiar feeling overtook him—the feeling of his chi being sapped away. He'd had his strength drained before, first by the Androids and again by Cell, but Aubergine had only ever given him strength; it seemed in the time since their separation began, she also learned how to take that strength away. Now she stood a chance against him. "Try again—Who are you?!" His answer—barely the first syllable of his name—was cut off by the grip on his neck tightening, yanking, and slamming his skull back against the turf. "Liar! He's dead!—Piccolo's dead, you can't be him! You can't!"

As her anger eroded into despair the drain on his strength weakened to a trickle then faded entirely, and at the same time, the black faded from eyes spilling over with tears. The hands wrapped around his throat weakened and fell away, and Aubergine slumped back on her ankles, her entire body shaking. "You can't be him," she insisted hoarsely. "I can't lose…can't lose him again…"

"It's true," he swore sitting up. "I'm back—I live—" A punch to his jaw cut him off.

"If that's true," she spat, "Why now?! I called the dragon for you—tried to have you brought back—you refused! Why have you come now, Demon?!" His tone gruff, he gave her the answers she demanded—told her that the Black Star Dragon Balls would have returned with him, that King Yemma found a way around it, and lastly, that he was given another chance at life if only to fulfill an important mission—he had to protect the last Hīrā-jin in their galaxy. The name of her mother's race only earned him a blank look; did she even know what she was? When the story was wrapped up she was finally looking more like herself: her eyes were hard and her brows were pinched and drawn down, her lips were a sour flat line, and her nostrils flared in annoyance.

"No." With that one word, she lunged to her feet and stalked off in the direction of her cabin. Wait…what? It took a moment for Piccolo to process the strange occurrence, then he stood and gave chase.

"No?" he asked walking alongside her.

"No," she confirmed emotionlessly.

"I don't follow you." Dark violet eyes rolled to the heavens and she shook her head.

"Go back to Hell, Namek," she ordered without emphasis. "I don't need protecting—I can take care of myself." By the time he figured out how to answer that, how to argue that she did, in fact, need protecting, they'd reached her cabin and she'd shut the door in his face. A jiggle of the handle told him it was locked, and examination of the door frame and woven mud mat revealed the absence of a spare key. The back door, likewise, was locked and key-less. Granted, he could gain entry into the cabin without effort—a well-placed masenko would demolish the lock and the door—but he knew better. He made that mistake once and found himself out in the cold eating raw fish and humble pie for an entire month; she didn't burn a single meal that month, probably to spite him.

Of all the ways he'd anticipated their reunion going, this was not among them. She swore years ago that she hated him and would never forgive him, but the state of her home and life had given him hope that she simply lashed out. Perhaps, he considered solemnly as she began slamming things around in the kitchen in another attempt to cook lunch, those hopes were entirely unfounded. It changed nothing. He vowed to protect her—vowed to keep her safe—and that vow still held whether she hated him or not.

Hours later, a soft click from the back side of the house drew him from the tree he'd been meditating under. For the first time in years, a covered dish of food waited on the stoop for him.

…it was even more awful than he remembered.

UP NEXT: Piccolo gets a wake-up call - "Scars are Proof we will Survive"