Dragon Ball/Z/GT Fan Fiction ❯ A Lost Love ❯ Flight ( Chapter 7 )

A Lost Love

 

By Karete-chan

 

Chapter 6:

 

I was terrified. So terrified, that I didn't even wait until I was out of sight before I took to the air. Didn't think or even realise that he might have been able to tell. Didn't think that someone else may have seen me and reported it, leading him to me.

My house was dark when I landed in the backyard. I could hear the television blaring from the house next door. Normalcy. It wasn't comforting. The grass was already coated with dew and crunched loudly beneath my feet as I made my way towards my back porch. I jumped as the back security light switched on and nearly fell down the two steps I had just climbed.

Steadying myself against the wooden rail I managed to get myself inside the house as quietly as my trembling hands would allow. And anyone who has tried to use keys quietly with trembling hands will know what I mean.

My parents were obviously asleep and I planned very much on keeping it that way. Climbing the stairs and remembering to skip the one that creaked I made my way to my room, opened my cupboard and pulled out my duffle bag. For half an hour after that I sat on my bed and stared at it, trying to come to terms with what I was planning to do and whether or not it was the right thing or just panic making me overreact.

At the end of the half hour I began to pack.

I knew what I was doing would hurt my parents. I also knew that if I stayed in West City I would run into Vegeta and if that happened I wouldn't live very long.

That was the prince of the Saiya-jins. I want you to stay away from him. If he ever found out about you, he would want to kill you. Saiya-jins don't approve of crossbreeds. They believe that their blood should always remain pure. If he should ever see your tail, he would know that it is a Saiya-jin tail. If he found out that I was your father, he would hate you even more.

My father's words echoed dully in my head. How I wish he were here now. My eyes drifted sideways to the loose panel in my wall and before I knew it I was holding the photo of myself in my hands.

Not until that moment had I realised just how much my father's memory had faded from my mind. My own picture brought back to me how he had really been, for in my mind he had begun to look just like everyone else on this backwards little planet.

I cried for the first time in a long while that night. Sobbed silently so that I wouldn't wake my adoptive parents, sobbed until I was gasping for breath, sobbed because I knew that once again I was going to have to leave everything I knew behind.

When my tears had stopped flowing I turned my attention back to the duffle bag that lay looking pathetic and half empty on my bed. I pulled the remaining items from the space in the wall and threw them on top of what clothes I was taking. When I had finished stripping my room the duffle bag still looked forlorn and misused. I had not taken a thing that I hadn't paid for myself and I was surprised at how little I actually owned. I went to zip the bag up and paused as the phone began to ring shrilly downstairs.

For the second time that night my heart jumped into my throat. He has found me! I heard my mother curse as she stubbed her toe on the dresser as she always did when she got up in the dark, then her bedroom door opened with its familiar creak and her comforting pad of footsteps faded down the hall and onto the stairs. I opened my door a fraction so that her conversation would reach my ears clearly.

“Hello?” she asked groggily, not bothering with phone courtesy as she normally would. “Do you have any idea what time it is?”

There was a pause.

“She what? No. No. I can't believe that… It isn't midnight yet, they are old enough… Had I thought that was the case I wouldn't have let her go,” her voice had turned indignant. “Are you implying that I…” she sighed. “No. No she isn't, I would have heard her come in…Yes, I'm sure, but surely Frame is a sensible enough girl to…look is she alright? Well then I will bring Zena around in the morning and we will sort this out then. Yes. Yes. Goodnight.” The phone went back into its cradle with a click.

I shut my door silently. Hearing that had not hardened my heart towards what I was going to do. My mother's footsteps sounded on the stairs.

I hurriedly pulled he zip closed on the bag and went to the window. In retrospect it had not been one of my finest ideas when I dropped the duffle bag into the garden beds below. Not only did it make short work of the plants that had stood there undamaged under my mother's care for years as it fell through them and out of sight but it also made a noise loud enough to catch her ear. I froze at the knock on my door.

“Zena? Are you home?”

My mother stepped into the room. It was a moment before she realised what she saw. Then she rushed to the window and saw the destruction of her plants. Finally she turned away, running back into the house and screaming for my adoptive father.

I lay flat on the roof above my room having chosen to hoist myself up there rather than do something so cliché as to climb down a drain pipe. I stood silently wondering at the chances of standing on two roofs in one night and quietly made my way down the branches of an over hanging tree to the ground where I ran to collect my bag. I would have flown or moved faster but by that time I had realised that Vegeta might have been looking for me and any energy I used would be picked up by even the most basic of scouters.

Even so I was across the street and hiding in the darkness of the local park before my parents realised I may be nearby outside somewhere. They emerged from the front door of our house and began shouting for me. Lights went on in a house down the street. It was probably the nosy old woman who always asked me far too personal questions when I passed her on my way home from school. She was one of those people who seemed to think that if they water for long enough their concrete driveways may begin to grow.

My parents were in the street now, looking for any clue that might tell them where I was. It did not matter if they searched. Even without the use of my powers I still had ample time to become suitably `lost'. The police would require me to be `missing' for at least a day before they began to search and I planned to be a long way from any place anyone knew I had ever been before then.

My mother had suddenly glanced in my direction. “Goodbye,” I said softly, knowing she could not hear or see me.

And then, for the second time in my life, I walked away.

 

 

As I had thought it would be, hiding was a simple matter. I had made my way carefully north and had found work in a small city situated on a small island south west of North City.

I was extremely bored in my newfound profession. Though it was for a fairly prestigious law firm, I was a lowly temp and as such did nothing more all day than sit and type away at a computer console. Occasionally someone would demand I make them a cup of tea of coffee. It took very little time indeed for the high priced lawyers and their assistants to become aware that I made the very worst cup of tea or coffee they had ever been forced to sample.

Making those awful beverages, which of course I did deliberately, were the only entertainment I allowed myself. I had made no friends at the firm, something which my overseer endlessly nagged me about, often ending with, “How do you expect to move up in the world?” I didn't: I was waiting until I had enough money to anonymously commission a ship from Capsule Corporation and then I was leaving for good.

As I arrived back at my very small and sparse apartment that night my landlord was sitting on his patio. He sighed as I passed which after my four weeks of being there told me he wanted to start a conversation.

“Good evening Mr. Jun, have you collected any back rent today?” I asked knowing that there was a couple on the top floor who always paid at least three weeks late.

He pulled his pipe out his mouth and the foul smelling smoke wafted over me. “Nope, didn't have the heart; too much depressing news around.”

“Oh? What has happened?”

He shook his head. “Nothing specific really but seeing you just reminded me, that girl that disappeared down in West City, she was on the news again today.” He sighed again. “Poor little thing. They've called off the search, even after Capsule Corp. threw in with them. Did you know that she had known the Briefs boy?”

“No, no I did not,” I answered slowly. “Why have they stopped looking?”

“Oh not all of them have, just the cops. Apparently Capsule Corp. is supporting the parents and even providing counselling for the students at her school.”

I couldn't stop the snort that escaped my nose at that. Mr. Jun glared at me.

“Well you may think like that, but people can be close in big cities too. Course it's not like it is here. Were content not be part of the mainland here. Lower crime rate.”

I nodded, as if agreeing with him. “Well, Mr. Jun, I must be going, my shopping will spoil if I stay out in this sunlight for much longer.”

He nodded to me as I took my leave and continued up to my apartment.

I turned my small television on as soon as I was in and listened to the news as I prepared my dinner. It didn't take long for the report about me to come on. I listened with half an ear. It was the same old story. Even Floss made her regular appearance, getting all dramatic over how she had lost such a fine friend. When I had first heard her say that I had been drinking milk and until then had not known that I possessed the ability to make it come out my nose. Mr. Jun had billed me for the price of the carpet cleaners.

Bulma was on the screen talking now. I frowned at her. Knowing that Capsule Corporation had been helping the police search made me double my efforts to stay away from them. For all appearances I no longer looked like the young girl whose photo now showed on the screen. My parents had managed to find of the few in which I was actually smiling, which was a bad choice in itself was because I rarely did so anyway but I had since dyed my hair the most common shade of brown I could find and had brown contacts made for my eyes. I dressed only as a professional outside the apartment and I wore enough make-up so that I appeared a few years older. My official I.D claimed that I was 19 and it had cost me a fair sum of money, so much so I almost did not have enough left to cover the bond and rent; another thing my parents had not known about, the substantial of money I had saved from all the babysitting and odd jobs I had done over the years. I was thankful that I had been lucky enough to find a permanent job so quickly.

I turned the television to another channel and sat down on my cheap futon, which was my only excuse for a chair and ate my measly dinner. It had only been a sandwich and that night, like every night I went to sleep hungry but I reminded myself of my goal and made myself believe that it would all be worth it in the end.

 

 

Author's note:

Gak! I did it; yet another chapter. Slowly getting there slowly…*sigh* I'm sorry for the lengthy wait in between these chapters but I suffer from writers block during the semester and only seem to be able to write when I'm supposed to be studying for m exams. Oh well. Enjoy!