/ ❯ Power Struggle ❯ Chapter 8 ( Chapter 8 )

Pazru broke out of his endlessly circling thoughts as a sharp spike of pain rippled through his scalp. The baby, a lock of Pazru's long green hair tightly clasped in one fist, giggled and tugged harder. Grimacing in pain, the young man smoothed his fingers down the captured piece of hair until he reached the baby's hand. He slid his fingers firmly down the silky strands and pushed away the tiny grasping fingers. An absent-minded look on his face, he moved quickly and set the child on the floor. Walking away to lean against the nearest countertop, he let his mind drift back again to the run-in he had had with Bardock three days before.

The child stared at his lanky caretaker in mingled anger and confusion. He cocked his head to the side and studied the glazed-eyed face of the tall young man standing on the opposite side of the room from him. The tip of his tail curled into a tight spiral and then released, curled again, released. The Orange Man (as he liked to think of him) was different today, quieter; the child knew this, but was too young to understand exactly what the difference was. He wasn't fun like usual, throwing him up into the air and catching him, tickling his sides. It made him angry to be ignored by the Orange Man. The infant growled and whipped his tail back and forth behind him in agitation. He was angry because the Orange Man's behavior was making him feel like he had felt before, with the other person, the Bad Man. The Bad Man had hurt him and eventually had begun to ignore him, and that had made him feel insignificant and weak. His tail stopped its movements and settled about his waist in one single, fluid motion. A look of fear crossed briefly over his face and he popped one of his thumbs into his mouth and began to suck at it thoughtfully.

The Orange Man wouldn't hurt him, would he? He wouldn't stop bringing food like the Bad Man had, would he? He shuddered as flashes of the Bad Man zapping him with the little box he always carried and then striking him entered his mind. He hunched over his knees into a tight little ball and began to rock slowly from side to side, the motion comforting him. Tears pricked at his eyes, but he refused to let them fall. The Orange Man had yelled at him plenty of times, but never had he struck him. He didn't think that his gentle caretaker had the capacity for violence that the Bad Man had, but the vacant look that was on the Orange Man's face right now wasn't very reassuring.

Bright light and a jumble of images suddenly flashed before his eyes and he clasped his head in his hands. The vision didn't relent but attacked his mind again. A large red sphere on a plain of white bursting into tiny pieces and the weakly smiling, blood-streaked face of a dying man superimposed themselves onto his vision. Grimacing in pain, the child shook his head violently to clear it of the disturbing pictures.

Not again. The images were coming again. They were always the same. The exploding crimson ball and the dying man. The child buried his hands in his thick hair and pushed against his skull with all the strength he could muster. The visions intensified for a moment, the colors sharpening and the images becoming frighteningly real for a moment before blending back together and fading away quickly. Cold sweat popped up all over his body and the child heaved in a breath, gulping the air as eagerly as he would the food the Orange Man always brought with him. His body began to shudder uncontrollably and he popped his thumb back in his mouth in an attempt to calm himself and dispel the shakes.

He didn't like to see these things. They scared him and made his head hurt. To him, the visions seemed to have been coming on and off for what seemed like an eternity, but in reality they had only just started a little less than a day ago. He didn't understand what these scary pictures meant, and that thought frightened him even more. Hot tears trembled in his eyes and spilled over onto his cheeks. The child whimpered quietly and began to rock even more frantically.

He knew that his brother was seeing the exact same images because he could sense the connection between them--the hazy presence in the back of his mind that had grown less and less as the time he and his twin had spent apart had increased--become stronger when the visions came. And he sensed that there was another person, an adult, someone who he had never met before but held a strong connection to nonetheless, that was also having in these strange visions. In fact, they originated from him.

Threads of anger pulsed dully in his mind and down his spine, spiking up the fur on his tail. The child hated the man for causing him and his brother so much pain. Another emotion that he couldn't place tightened itself in a cold uneasy knot in his belly. For some reason, he felt bad that he hated the man who had sent him the frightening images.

Confused with these conflicting emotions and cold now that the sweat had begun to dry on his small body, the child threw back his head and began to wail loudly. Startled by the noise, Pazru jumped and glanced frantically about the room for the source. He immediately darted over to the other side of the room and scooped the screaming child up into his arms. The infant Saiyan buried his head in the young man's tunic and sobbed inconsolably, his chest hitching with the force of each breath. A troubled look passed over Pazru's face as he stared down at the bawling child in his arms. He gently rubbed the infant's bare back and cooed tenderly at him.

He didn't like this recent development in the child one bit. It bothered him to see the normally active (to say pleasant and good-natured would be a stretch) baby in such a pitiful state. He had been unusually sulky and listless as of late; if this had been any other Saiyan baby in the nursery, Pazru would have taken one look at the child and concluded that he was suffering from the effects of hunger. However, he knew for a fact that this was not the case. He went to such lengths as to make several return visits to the mess hall for extra food to confirm that the child was well nourished.

Pazru shifted his weight to his other hip and adjusted the still shaking, but much quieter bundle in his arms. He stroked the soft black hair and hummed quietly as he thought. This seemingly odd behavior couldn't actually be part of normal Saiyan development, could it? Pazru frowned and bit his lip. He didn't think so, but then again, he had never been around a Saiyan child this age since most were sent to other planets about a week after birth.

His lips suddenly curved into a small smile. Probably the only people who knew anything about Saiyan development after that first week or two would be the unfortunate inhabitants of the planet the baby was scheduled to clear, and Pazru sincerely doubted that any would survive to tell the tale. He smiled grimly. "Maybe you'll be the one to write the book on it. That is, if you manage to make it through this alive." It was a dark and gloomy thought, but would probably end up to be true in the end.

He glanced down at the whimpering child in his arms. Pazru didn't think that the baby would try to kill him. True, Saiyans were unpredictable, but their loyalties to companions and kin were typically very strong. He had been caring for this child since he was born and knew without a doubt that the child trusted him. The way he was clinging to his tunic right now was almost irrefutable proof of that point. Loyal or not, Pazru was going to do whatever he could to make sure this child survived.

A sudden thought crossed his mind. It was a brief memory, an image of Bardock standing with his face pressed against the viewing window of the nursery staring in on Kakarot. Pazru's brow furrowed in concentration. Something inside of him told him that this memory held the explanation to this odd behavior. "Let me see," he thought to himself. "Kakarot was sound asleep…until or shortly before Bardock arrived. Then I went out to talk to Bardock, which was absolutely pointless," he frowned in remembrance and rubbed idly at his bruised elbow. "Bardock fell into some sort of trance-like state while I was trying to talk to him. If I can remember correctly, Kakarot …. Kakarot's cries actually intensified when Bardock zoned out. Hmmm," Pazru looked off to the side, his brow wrinkling in deep concentration. "What is the connection though? As far as I know, that was the first time Bardock and his son had ever met, so Kakarot shouldn't have had any lingering negative feelings against him. Could it be that whatever is affecting Bardock since he has awakened is affecting his son also?" Realization dawned on Pazru's face and he glanced down at the sniffling baby huddled against his chest. "Make that both sons; Kakarot hasn't been the only baby of the two who has been suffering from fits of inconsolable crying lately."

"But what exactlyis wrong with Bardock?"Pazru thought, frustrated. The Saiyan had been staring vacantly off into space, almost as if he was in another place or world. For those few seconds he had taken his twin sons with him. Judging from the way the two babies had reacted to the experience, whatever they had seen or felt hadn't been too pleasant.

The infant in his arms turned his tear-streaked face up and stared at Pazru. The young man met his dark, troubled eyes, smiled warmly, and chucked his chin with one hand. "What did you see that bothered you so much, little guy?" he asked gently. The child's face suddenly lightened and he stretched grasping hands towards Pazru's face. Pazru, an amused expression on his face, bent his head forward and let the child touch his face. Tiny fingers moved over and down his cheeks lightly. They tightened around his chin, pulling his face down so that the two of them were nearly nose-to-nose. The child shut his eyes, his brow furrowing in concentration. He pulled Pazru's head closer to his own so that their foreheads just barely touched.

The young man nearly reared backward in shock as the room disappeared around him, replaced by a blinding, red-tinged light. Random, scattered images appeared, became distinct, then merged back with the bloody background. The images slowed briefly, enough for him to pick out a few from the disturbing kaleidoscope swirling before his eyes. He could see a man, a Saiyan from the spiky black hair and hard, feral eyes. Blood ran in dark rivulets down the sides of his face; he was dying. The Saiyan's lips moved, but Pazru was able to discern no sound coming from them. Then that image was replaced by another, this one of a large, red ball (a planet perhaps?)swirling in space. The planet suddenly exploded into a million tiny pieces. Pazru jerked backwards, trying to avoid the flying hunks of rock as they passed by him.

His movements broke the connection and the room suddenly reappeared around him. Sweat was running down the sides of his face in streams and he was shaking with the intensity of the visions. A breathless cry issued from his lips and he pressed his eyes shut and shook his reeling head to clear it. Still gasping, he opened his eyes. Only inches away, the child was staring at him with a sad, yet relieved, expression on his face. A single tear ran down his cheek. He patted Pazru's face gently and began to speak to him in gibberish.

"Da da eee ee? Buh da oo?" he jabbered, a serious expression on his face.

Pazru nodded. He didn't need words to understand what the child was trying to ask him. "Yes, I see." He smoothed an errant strand of hair from the child's face and smiled tenderly at him. "I may not understand what those things mean, but I see them." A rare smile crossed the child's features and he snuggled into Pazru's chest, his arms wrapped around his neck and his tail around his wrist. Pazru, having recovered slightly from the deluge of images, returned his smile, hugged him close, and buried his face in the soft spiky hair on the child's head.