DISCLAIMER:
Rath: (Sitting in a psychologist room as she complains) Yeah, you know, people just never seem to take me seriously anymore... I mean I can't even simply declare "I don't own DBZ" anymore without someone thinking something's wrong with me. I don't even know why...
Psychologist: Ah and why is this...?
Rath: Didn't you listen to a word I just said!? I already told you I DIDN'T KNOW WHY!
Psychologist: Is this a deep hidden anger I'm sensing from you? Perhaps we will need to schedule another appointment in the near future... Well, that's all for today's session... That'll be $250.99!
Rath: (Places hand against her forehead in annoyance) Uh! I'm getting NOWHERE! (Looks towards readers) I'm not crazy... Really! I just DON'T OWN DBZ!
[Chapter edited: 7Jan2014]
.
WITHIN THE PAST WORLD:
"We've made it!" Goten exclaimed as they finally reached the top of the second stairwell. "But which way, now?"
"This way!" Goku replied as he turned to the right. "Let's go!"
"WAIT!" a voice called out.
"Who are you?" Goku asked suspiciously as he turned towards a tall brazen-skinned young man with the striking yellow eyes.
"Follow!" Sugo replied as he ran in the opposite direction. "This way!"
Goku decided to go with his instincts as they trailed closely behind Sugo.
"What is this place?" Goku questioned as they came to a stop in a large room filled with several large ships.
"You're Bulma's friends, correct?" Sugo asked.
"What do you have to do with my mom?" Trunks's eyes narrowed.
"You know, you really do look like the monkey prince when you're angry," Sugo commented. "The resemblance is astounding!"
"Why you...!" Trunks growled, but Goku glared at him to back down.
"If I didn't know any better, I'd say you were helping us," Goku stated. "But why...?"
"Bulma seems to care for you, so I figure I should do what I can," Sugo replied.
Goku's expression softened. "You care for her, don't you?" He could tell Sugo was sincere.
"There's no time for chit-chat," Sugo declared. "So let's get down to the point. These are the larger ships that had once belonged to the ambassadors of various planets before they met an early end at the hands of Frieza. You have a long journey ahead of you, so I figure you could use the larger ship. Only a trusted few know of this place."
Sugo then proceeded to explain to them the basic controls of the ship, while they waited for Vegeta to bring back Bulma.
"Seeing as there is still no sign of them, I worry that she and the little monkey might have been caught..." Sugo said after a while, visibly concerned.
"WHAT!" Goku exclaimed as he quickly raised two forefingers to his forehead and attempted to teleport to Bulma. That's when another strange wave of darkness warped around them...
"Damn it!" Goku yelled. "I can't teleport! Trunks! Goten! Wait here!"
"But, Goku...!" Trunks started to complain about being left behind, until Goku interrupted, "I SAID 'WAIT HERE'!"
"She must be in Frieza's Throne Room," Sugo said. "Hurry! I'll take you there."
.
MEANWHILE, WITHIN FRIEZA'S THRONE ROOM, WITHIN THE PAST WORLD:
Frieza laughed cruelly at Vegeta as he watched the two adult Saiyans fall in a dead heap of burning flesh.
"Good riddance!" Frieza applauded. "Don't you agree, monkey?"
Even through the intense pain Bulma was under, all she could think about was how terrible Frieza was to force a child to do such a thing.
"Now, what should I do with you?" Frieza wondered aloud as he looked to Bulma.
"Y-You're despicable!" Bulma declared angrily. "No wonder you're so hated...!"
Frieza, however, stopped her in mid-sentence by crushing the remaining bones of her hand. She uttered yet another scream of pain.
"Stop it! You said you would stop hurting her... and me... if I obeyed you!" Vegeta uttered quietly.
"Stupid monkey!" Frieza laughed as he threw Bulma hard to the floor. "Stupid STUPID little monkey! I never said that! I merely said that YOU would suffer even worse than I had originally intended if you DIDN'T! You CHOSE to end the lives of your precious comrades! And that reminds me, there's still the matter of your disobedience at hand!"
Vegeta couldn't have looked any more dejected than he did at that very moment. How could he have been so foolish...?
Frieza continued, "It would seem that you had dropped something of yours while you were busy disobeying me..." Vegeta went deathly pale as he watched Zarbon hand Frieza the long stained brown rod that he had accidentally knocked over earlier in Frieza's room...
"What? You recognize this?" Frieza asked tauntingly as he deliberately examined the punishing tool in front of Vegeta. "Here, take it!"
Vegeta warily took it from Frieza's hands. He was confused. Usually, Frieza would have started beating him with it by now... In a way, he sort of wished Frieza would just go ahead and get it over with. It made him uneasy...
"You don't like it when I beat you, do you, monkey?" Frieza asked.
Vegeta was unsure how Frieza expected him to answer that... Was it another one of his trick questions?
"Well? Answer me, monkey!" Frieza ordered. "Do you like it when I beat you or not?"
"I hate it..." Vegeta answered insecurely. What was the point of this?
"I thought so," Frieza smirked as he then said, "So we're going to do something a little different this time..." At Vegeta's puzzled look he explained, "This time it is YOU who will do the punishment!"
"Wh-What do you mean...?" Vegeta asked nervously. Frieza had never done THIS before...
"You hate it when I beat you, right?" Frieza stated. "So I'm having YOU do the beating now! So go on! Or else I can assure you I will make it far worse than you could have ever imagined! And I will only make you suffer more everyday until you do it! So which will it be? It's up to you!"
Vegeta struggled to control his anger. He wished Frieza would just let him die! Surely death was better than THIS! He hated everything about his life! He even hated HIMSELF for not being able to stop Frieza from hurting him and humiliating him so much...But what did it even matter anymore? His life was practically worthless, now...
Vegeta slowly lifted up the dreaded rod and hit himself lightly on the back, but of course Frieza wasn't satisfied.
"Harder!" Frieza commanded as he snatched the rod from Vegeta's hands and proceeded to strike Vegeta several times with vicious force, before handing it back to Vegeta's trembling hands. "Again!"
Vegeta gritted his teeth as Frieza then made him strike himself as hard as he could and harder yet each time... And if ever Frieza wasn't satisfied (which was practically after EVERY hit he did) then he would take the rod himself and 'demonstrate' how it SHOULD be done... And Frieza was loving every moment of it...
After nearly a hundred strikes later, however, Frieza finally got bored with watching Vegeta beat himself. He ordered Vegeta to come before him, but Vegeta shook his head in refusal. What more did he have to lose? He had nothing anymore... What did it even matter what Frieza did to him?
"I SAID COME, MONKEY!" Frieza repeated. "Or are you still too stupid to understand?"
"A-And I s-said 'NO'!" Vegeta replied boldly even though he could no longer even stand up. "Or are YOU too stupid to understand!?" But before he knew what hit him, Frieza had his icy grip around wrapped tightly around his neck as he delivered a sharp blow to Vegeta's face.
"You're disobedience ends here and now, monkey," Frieza said as he took the rod from him yet again and struck Vegeta repeatedly with barely controlled force.
Vegeta was trembling feverishly from the great pain as blow after blow tore into his skin like sharp blades. His own cries of agony then seemed to grow distant as he curled himself into a ball in a futile attempt to shield his already battered form from any further abuse. It only made things worse, however, as Frieza noticed his little attempt to escape from the pain and so began to beat him with an even greater force. It wasn't until several minutes later that Vegeta's screams finally died down and he became too weak to even maintain his fetal position anymore. And all the while, Frieza would say demeaning things to him, just to make him feel even more worthless and self-loathing than he already did.
"I don't even know why I allow you to live," Frieza muttered as he laid another heavy blow to the now crumpled young form on the floor. A sickening sound of breaking bones echoed throughout the room causing Vegeta to whimper from the intense pain.
"You're such an ungrateful little monkey," Frieza continued as he laid several more bone-breaking blows upon the child, holding back just enough to keep Vegeta alive and conscious. "I treat you far better than you deserve, coming from such an insolent flea-bidden race as yours. Even your pathetic father hated you so much that he disowned you! Where would you be without ME!?" Again he emphasized his every word with several more painful lashes to Vegeta's body. "And yet here you disobey me AGAIN! When I FORBID you to do something, I expect to be OBEYED! You will do as you are told, monkey! Or else you will suffer even worse next time! That I assure you! Do I make myself clear?"
"Y-Yes M-Master..." Vegeta whispered hoarsely as Frieza paused for a moment from beating him.
"Good," Frieza replied before continuing to dish out his brutal punishment. That's when Sugo and Goku suddenly entered the room.
"Hold it right there, Frieza!" Sugo exclaimed as he entered the Throne Room. "Where's Bulma!"
"How dare you interrupt me, Sugo!" Frieza exclaimed angrily, before he noticed Goku. "Ah, I see you have brought me one of the escapees! Good work!"
"Think again!" Goku glared as he saw what cruelty Frieza was unleashing upon the child Vegeta. Then as he noticed his long-time friend, Bulma, lying unconscious on the floor, something within him snapped! He no longer cared about not altering the Past! All he could feel was extreme anger at what Frieza had done!
"You will pay for this!" Goku exclaimed.
"Ha ha!" Frieza laughed. "I'd like to see you tr-..." But Goku did not even let him finish his sentence before vanishing behind Frieza and whispering intensely, "Now, it is your turn to pay for your misdeeds, Frieza!"
"W-What...?" Frieza did not even get a chance to express his last words, before blasting Frieza to nothingness... And with one menacing glare, he sent Zarbon and Dodoria running for their lives!
"Allow me to get Bulma myself," Sugo requested as he bowed deeply to Goku, clearly respecting Goku's superior power. "She's still breathing, but this will likely be the last time I ever see her again..."
Goku agreed even though he was very worried about Bulma. Besides, if it wasn't for Sugo, Bulma might have been killed before they ever realized anything was wrong... And since he was no longer able to teleport, there was no doubt that things would have turned out disastrous...
"By the way," Sugo said, as he carefully lifted Bulma into his arms. He nodded towards Vegeta. "I know he's not much to look at, but Bulma here really seems to care for him and all... Not that I care or anything, but perhaps you could take him along with you... There's no one here for him anymore, now that Frieza's dead..." And as he saw what was left of Nappa and Raditz, he added, "Not even those two..."
As Goku looked at the bloodied child on the floor, he knew Sugo was right... What would become of Vegeta now? Based on his current state alone, he would probably not even survive the night and if he DID manage to live, it would be likely that he would just become another slave to another member of the Cold family, who might even treat him worse than Frieza had... It was with that final thought that Goku at last made up his mind...
Goku took great care to lift up the young Prince's nearly lifeless trembling body into his own powerful arms.
Vegeta flinched greatly as he whimpered from the pain.
Goku's heart clenched as he noticed the hundreds of newly formed gashes literally blanketing Vegeta's young skin.
"I'm sorry I said 'no'..." he whispered regretfully. "I just hope I'm doing the right thing..."
"Do you feel that?" Sugo suddenly exclaimed as he felt slight tremors through the floor.
"No, what?" Goku raised his eyebrows.
"The ship has become unstable...!" Sugo realized. "You must have damaged something with that blast of yours... This ship could blow at any minute!"
Nothing more needed to be said as they raced towards the escape ship.
"Goku...!" Trunks trailed off as he saw his younger father within Goku's arms. "What happened... Did Frieza do... I mean... I thought... AND WHAT HAPPENED TO MY MOTHER...!?" He hardly knew where to begin.
"I'll explain later, but we have to get out of here first," Goku explained quickly.
"Here, kid," Sugo said suddenly. "Take your mother... I can't go with you guys..."
"You'll die if you stay here," Goku said softly. "You DO know that, right?"
A long silence hung in the air until Sugo sighed, "Someone has to open the hatch... That can only be done from deep within the ship itself... Only I can do it..."
An explosion sounded from somewhere down below, along with a few cries of panic.
"You..." Goku started, but Sugo interrupted, "Don't waste your breath...Besides, I don't belong in your world... My fate is tied here..."
"And so your mind is made up," Goku nodded in understanding. "You accept death..."
As Sugo turned to walk away, he replied as he handed Bulma over to Trunks, "I accepted that a long time ago, my friend... But you better look after Bulma, or I may return to haunt you!" He half grinned. "Remember that!"
Just as Goku boarded the ship, he turned back and asked, "At least tell us who you are, so that you shall forever live on..."
"The name's Sugo," Sugo replied. He then bowed to Goku once more in respect before he ran off to face his imminent doom...
As Goku entered the ship, he noticed Trunks staring at his mother while wearing a very troubled expression on his face.
"Frieza hurt her like this, didn't he?" Trunks knew the answer before the words even left his mouth. "He just LOVES to hurt people, doesn't he!" He was very angry. "Is she even going to be alright? This is all because of me! If I had just let Frieza do as he wanted then this never would have happened... And we would be back home, like normal! But now things will never be the same..."
"Things happen for a reason, Trunks..." Goku said. "She'll be okay... I promise!"
Nevertheless, Trunks didn't look very assured as he then observed Vegeta drooping in Goku's arms.
'This is all my fault...' Trunks repeated once again in his mind. 'If it wasn't for me, Frieza probably wouldn't have punished him so much today...'
MEANWHILE, ELSEWHERE ABOARD FRIEZA'S SHIP, WITHIN THE PAST WORLD:
Sugo hurried towards the Central Control Room. Everyone around him seemed to be in a panic as the ship seemed to slowly come apart sending sparks flying everywhere.
Sugo knew there couldn't be very much time left as he began to enter the complex sequence into the computer.
"(#HKJDH#&(&EOIUOSIDF(&(SDOIUOIUO&(UOIUOIUSD(&F(&&(W)))))08979&(7t(&E%%$W&(W&A()(&())))7(E&W%%Q%..." Sugo typed rapidly.
"Ah, this should do it!" he said as he clicked on 'ESCAPE HATCH', but his relief was short-lived as the computer suddenly flashed red: "ERROR! ERROR!"
"What!" Sugo exclaimed in frustration as he tried once again.
'"ERROR! ERROR!" the computer repeated. "SYSTEM DOWN! ERROR!"
Sugo growled in frustration as he then attempted to reroute the connection through the backup systems.
"?L&K:LK())(IEOJDSLJF)OIUOIUE((&EO(W()))(W))WKJLDSGSIUY$($W(&(W(()W()%(WE(&%$&%$OL{}}W%($%))" Sugo entered a second set of codes. "KDIOUE(&%(#$&OIUIUORIUO)))(DOIUOIU&R(S)))(OISOIUFIY-IU YY&R&Y IUY&UIIF IUY&&#&%&!(&(YIYIY&(&#)..."
"ERROR! ERROR!" the computer screeched yet again.
"DAMN!" Sugo shouted as he banged his fist angrily against the counter. "Of all times to F$%-ing screw up! Damn it! The only choice is to do it manually..."
He rushed down to the next lowest level, where he entered an even smaller control room. Smoke hung thick in the air as flames seemed to rise out of nowhere. Nevertheless, Sugo made his way to the large set of levers on the far wall deep within. He then entered his special code key and one last code sequence before flipping the first, third and seventh switches downwards.
"Only one more!" Sugo said to himself as he prepared to flip the at last switch to release the escape hatch in the Ambassador Ship Room, but before he could do it, something exploded, sending a sharp metal fragment into his neck... He gasped with pain as he fell to his knees. The world seemed to spin around him as he mustered one last show of strength, managing to pull down the fouth and final lever... With one final breath, he wished for Bulma's safe journey before collapsing motionlessly to the floor... He only hoped it would be enough...
The escape hatch of the Ambassador Ship Room opened slowly as the final sparks flew throughout the corridors of Frieza's ship, allowing one lone ship to pass through the midst of the turmoil within... Several sparks of electricity flared throughout one of the engine rooms of Frieza's ship causing yet another explosion to spread through the halls until at last the metal of the ship was finally worn past its capacity... Silence reigned on throughout space as Frieza's ship was no more...
.
Rath: Yay! They've finally escaped from Frieza's ship! And it looks like they have one extra passenger along for the ride! But what lies ahead may change all that...
Vetyga: Hey! What do you mean by that?! You never told ME about any of the future chapters!
Rath: Ahhhhh! (Makes mocking puppy dog face) Poor whittle Vetyga has NO IDEA what's in store for our favorite Z Warriors, does she! How sad! Oh well!
Vetyga: Hey! I'm your assistant! You're supposed to tell me EVERYTHING! That's messed up! Well, I'll find out on my OWN then! Ha ha haaaa! (runs off to make plans to discover Rath's secret plot twist...)
Rath: (Raises fists up in triumph) Ah haa haaa! I'll NEVER tell! Ha ha haaaaaaaaaa! (Sweatdrops as she notices potential reviewers stare at her like she's lost it before they run away in fear of their very lives!) Uhh hmmm! Anyways...
To Shasti: Don't worry! There WILL be much more stuff concerning Trunks in the near future! Believe me! Besides, he's one of the main characters!- Well, him AND Vegeta...
To Elvewin Darkdragon and PunkOnna: I'm really glad you guys like it so far!
To bigi: You are right on track!
To Trugeta: No it was just Nappa and Raditz who Vegeta killed...Not Bulma...! But nevertheless I am happy that you are interested in this plot! I think you might enjoy my next major plot twist I have planned for the future, but Until Then...!
To Erica: Hmmm... Perhaps I'll think of something...!
To all reviewers: Thank you all SO MUCH for taking you're time to review this story! It really really really means a lot!
Until Next Time... Sawatdee!