Dragon Ball/Z/GT Fan Fiction ❯ A Shadow in the Twilight ❯ Chapter 32 ( Chapter 32 )

Chapter 32

Adarath, Raoul, and Jenika, with baby held tightly in her arms, cautiously emerged from the infirmary a few scant moments later. Adarath silently signaled for Raoul to take Jenika and Rayne to the alcove in which they'd earlier hid. He was worried about Lluvia and how she'd made out with the two Saiya-jin guards, so he tiptoed his way towards the dead-end corridor down which he'd seen the three go. What he saw almost made him lose his composure altogether.

A nonchalant Lluvia was standing with her back to him, already in the process of re-securing the frog clasps of her top. In contrast, the unconscious and battered Saiya-jin guards were laid out facedown on the ground, both their behinds comically raised in the air. Adarath made note that their long tails had been tied together into a very complicated and painful-looking series of knots.

"Yu-vee! What the hell happened?" Lluvia looked up at the sound of Adarath's voice, and grinned over at her dance partner.

"Shee-it, darlin'! They balked at first, but once I applied a little `gentle persuasion' the two of them capitulated to my vast charms. And quite nicely, I might add!"

Adarath briefly grinned back at her, but then his face became clouded with concern. "Boss, Jen just told me about Tristan and…" Lluvia's upraised hand cut him off.

"I know all about it, Addy. Thanks to these two canaries, I not only know who's behind his abduction, but I also happen to know where Tristan is being held," she said, pulling on her recovered jacket. "Hand me my MAARCU, `cause I need to get something out of it." Adarath gave her back the device, watching as she pried open the access panel with a fingernail to retrieve another, very versatile item. After re-closing the panel, she handed the MAARCU back to Adarath and clipped the earcuff transceiver onto the cartilage of her right ear, near the pointed tip.

"What now, babe?" Adarath asked nervously, not liking the look on her face.

"Now, you and Raoul will take Jen and the baby to the transport. I, on the other hand, will head out and once again rescue Tristan from whatever he's managed to get himself into. Once he's on board Willard's ship, you will take off and get as far away from Vegeta-sei as quickly as you can."

"'You'? What do you mean `you'? Don't you mean `we'?" That dreadful knot in his stomach was making an unsolicited return engagement.

"I meant exactly what I said, Addy," she plainly re-iterated, as she reached down with both hands to pick up the insensible Saiya-jins by the collars of their battlesuits.

Her partner was momentarily dumbstruck. "Yu-vee, please, you don't mean…"

The hard, determined look on her face told him otherwise.

Sighing, Lluvia watched his brown eyes well up with bright tears. She looked deeply into his sorrowful eyes and softly said, "Addy, I need you, above everyone else, to be as strong as you can be right now. I need to know that you will do what needs to be done. I've always relied upon your strength, whenever we danced together, and whenever we needed to make tough decisions for our troupe. Please, my friend, I am in desperate need of your strength one last time, to make certain that you and everyone else I love will be safe. Can you…will you, do that for me?" Her midnight eyes had gone liquid with her emotional plea.

"For you, babe, you know I'd do anything…at all!" His choking voice whispered his heartfelt promise.

Still holding onto the two Saiya-jins, Lluvia leaned forward and placed a soft, grateful kiss on his smooth, dark cheek. "Bless you, Addy!"

"TURBO!" Lluvia yelled as she took off down the street.

Running at full tilt, Lluvia was nothing but a silvery-purple blur, zipping down the busy avenues of the capital. Puzzled Saiya-jin pedestrians were only able to detect a light, feminine fragrance carried by the sudden breeze; her faster-than-the-eye passages through the streets were practically undetectable, especially to those not wearing scouters. For those that were, a lightning-fast blip of extremely high ki was all that registered. As soon as it appeared, it was gone. Nearly all wearers attributed this unusual occurrence to a mechanical malfunction.

Lluvia's target destination was getting ever closer.

The large training domes were located in a cluster on the northwest sector of the city. The heavily fortified, geodesic constructs were engineered with materials that could readily absorb and contain the powerful ki blasts that the Saiya-jins would occasionally use during sparring sessions with each other. She knew that, in one of these edifices, was where the perpetrator of all this aggravation, a.k.a. the Prince of all Saiya-jins, could be found.

At the palace…

After he'd finished ingesting a huge breakfast, Zarbon had arrived at the Saiya-jin throne room and stood to the side, patiently waiting for his brief scheduled audience with King Vegeta. Earlier that morning, Lord Frieza had sent a message to his right-hand man, instructing him to personally relay a missive to the ruler of Vegeta-sei. The Ice-jin emperor was planning to arrive within a few weeks' time for a diplomatic visit, to discuss current affairs of state with the king; all very routine, all very boring in scope; but as long as Zarbon was already in-house…

The blue-skinned dandy batted at an emerging yawn with a freshly manicured hand. The muted hum of conversing voices echoing off the large room's walls, combined with the heat of the room, and on top of the large meal he'd just consumed, was making him extremely drowsy. He leaned his back against a marble column and allowed his amber eyes to close for a moment, recalling the events of the previous evening. Pleasant thoughts of the lilac-skinned dancer surfaced in his half-dozing state. What an amazing creature that Lluvia is turning out to be! After what he'd witnessed last night, at both the arena and at the dinner party, he'd made a vow to himself to escalate this so-called courtship phase into the next, and much more rewarding, level. Hell, he'd certainly exhibited far more than his usual amount of patience trying to win her over already! She had certainly appeared to be more interested in him last night than ever before. And I almost had her where I wanted, too…if only that low-class Saiya-jin solider hadn't shown up when he had, Zarbon thought to himself with a passing frown.

A smile soon replaced the frown as he began envisioning her in quite a few imaginatively compromising positions…

Captain Apio, head of the Saiya-jin king's palace guard and trusted advisor to the king, scanned one watchful eye over the assembled audience and kept the other trained upon the ruler himself. He took his devoted guardianship of King Vegeta with the utmost gravity and, in the last few years, had personally thwarted a couple of assassination attempts upon the royal personage. He suspected that these attacks had their origins from without Vegeta-sei, perhaps from a few disgruntled and power-hungry planetary rivals. He had managed to interdict these would-be assassins and unfortunately, given the immediacy of the situations, destroyed them before they could be thoroughly interrogated. The captain had made it a top priority not to rest until he'd found out just who was behind these conspiracies! In the meanwhile, he would continue to keep up his vigilance.

Looking out over the milling crowd, he noted the presence of Frieza's green-haired envoy leaning against a nearby pillar and nodding off, while awaiting the king's audience.

So, he thought, watching the occasional jerk and bob of Zarbon's green-braided head, as Frieza's envoy fought off his encroaching sleepiness. Looks like someone around here had a busy night...

Apio visibly flinched when the code-one emergency signal squealed into the left earpiece of his scouter. Taking a few discreet steps back from the throne, he turned his head and spoke an acknowledgement into the scouter.

"Apio, here. What is the nature of this emergency?"

A very agitated voice replaced the sound of the signal. "Captain! This is Plenthor of the Central Infirmary!"

"Report, Plenthor!" Apio snapped. An annoying pause followed. "Plenthor! You have activated the code-one emergency alert to the palace. If this is a false alarm, I promise you that it will mean your head!"

"Look, Captain, I don't know how to else to say this, but one of the alien entertainers has gone…berserk!" This, if nothing else, finally got Apio's attention.

"Details, man…I want details! What exactly to you mean by `berserk'?" The timbre of his voice had involuntarily risen and it was enough to distract King Vegeta's attention away from his current petitioner.

"A few minutes ago, the pale female dancer…you know, the one whose final performance brought everyone to their feet last night…."

Grrr. "Plenthor, will you just get on with it?" Apio was beginning to lose his temper with all this extraneous nonsense. "What about the female dancer?"

King Vegeta's sharp ears had caught the words "female dancer" and he peered back at the captain, whose body language was on full alert as he listened.

The king further twisted about in his cushioned seat in order to tune into Apio's side of the conversation, but the captain had been stunned into silence by Plenthor's tale.

"Is that all you can tell me, Plenthor?" Apio asked, listening closely. Three minutes later, he abruptly signed off. Quickly moving to the king's side, he bent down to circumspectly relay the urgent message into the sovereign's ear.

According to Plenthor, the lilac-skinned female had shocked everyone in the infirmary by suddenly kicking in the doors, while dragging two battered and unconscious Saiya-jin warriors behind her. She effortlessly threw them into a heap, one on top of the other, right in front of the nearest startled med-tech, saying, "Fire up the regen tanks for these two, honey! And, if you'd be so kind, do reserve a third, because it will soon be graced with a royal occupant!" A fearful Plenthor naturally assumed that the king was her intended target, so once she left he automatically ran to the com unit and activated the priority code-one emergency signal directly to the palace.

"Sire, you can rest assured that I and my men will go out personally to apprehend and subdue this crazed ningen female…"

Before Apio had a chance to finish, King Vegeta suddenly went rigid, instantly realizing to whom Lluvia, (for who else could this "crazed ningen female" be?) had really been referring. "Apio! Where is Prince Vegeta, right this very minute?"

The captain blinked in puzzlement at this question. "The Prince? I believe that he's at the northwest training domes running a few sparring sessions! Why do you ask, my liege?"

Zarbon's pleasant little catnap was intruded upon by the sound of elevated voices all talking at once. What the devil…? He shook off the light sleep just in time to see King Vegeta bolt from his throne and take off running down the carpeted aisle, with Captain Apio and a handful of palace guards in tow. Ordinarily, Zarbon would have stayed right where he was to await the king's return, since Saiya-jin affairs weren't his concern and tended to bore him anyway; but just as the group of Saiya-jins blew past him, he overheard one of them mutter in passing, "That ningen female…"

What "ningen female"? There were less than a handful of alien freewomen on Vegeta-sei at present of which he was aware, and all of them happened to be part of Lluvia's troupe. Could the instigator of this ruckus be none other than Lluvia herself? This was turning into too intriguing a mystery to just let slip by. He just had to find out what was going on, especially if Lluvia was somehow in the middle of it!

His course of action decided, Zarbon immediately dashed after the departing Saiya-jins and, once he'd cleared the outer perimeter to the palace, he took to the sky in pursuit of the king's high-flying entourage.

Frowning in annoyance, Captain Apio glanced over his shoulder to see an airborne Zarbon tailing them towards the city and the training domes therein. What does he want? Apio thought. He could think of no good reason for Frieza's lackey to be following them, and banked slightly to position himself next to the king in order to alert him about their uninvited shadow. The Saiya-jin captain shouted the suggestion that one of his men could drop back and wave Zarbon off from following them.

"Forget about him, Apio!" King Vegeta brusquely shouted his dismissal swallowed up by the onrushing air. Zarbon's presence, as unwelcome as it usually was, was the last thing taking up space in his worried thoughts.

As he jetted to the forefront of their chevron formation, the Saiya-jin king scowled deeper, inwardly fretting about what he would witness once they all arrived.

Damn it, Vegeta! he silently raged at his pig-headed son. I told you to leave that female alone! Why did you go against my direct orders and defy me? If it wasn't for that damnable Ice-jin bastard Frieza and the ideas he's been planting into my son's head…

A somewhat nervous Apio gave King Vegeta a sideways glance, noting the angry furrows deepening on the Saiya-jin king's wide brow, as they rapidly soared over the ground towards their destination.

Out in space…

Bardock's spacepod was just passing the gravitation field for the outmost-lying nebula formation in Vegeta-sei's solar system. All indicators were glowing in ready status as a robotic, female-sounding voice inquired in an impersonal, but polite tone:

**Commander Bardock, all systems are 'go'…Are you ready to initiate cryo-sleep?**

"Acknowledged. I am ready. You may begin the countdown," he replied to the pod's control unit. His eyes closed briefly in pleasurable remembrance of Lluvia's delicate scent, carried towards him by the swirling breezes circulating around the launch pad. A niggling sense of unease kept poking in the back of his mind as he recalled their farewells to each other.

Kami! He was missing his baka onna like a fury already! One last planet-purge with his crew on Meat-sei, then he would return home to resign his commission. Once that was done, he would meet up with her on Theta Seven and they could begin their new lives together.

He, Bardock, the ultimate Saiya-jin warrior, had suffered a sea change when he soul-bonded with Lluvia. Once, he would've looked forward to the mission and its promise of a challenge, but not anymore - never again. He shuddered as the chilling memory of his and Lluvia's first encounter scurried up his spine.

I still can't believe that I came thisclose to killing her outright when she was but a child, he thought to himself. I would have destroyed her, and my own future, without blinking an eye! My own beautiful bondmate! Something or someone beyond this mortal plain stayed my hand on that crucial day, I'm sure of it…

**Commencing release of cryo-sleep gases in 10…9…8…***

Just as he was comfortably settling himself back into the tufted padding, a cold sweat came upon him, drenching him with its suddenness. The present came to a slamming halt, as a new, frightening vision materialized before his disbelieving eyes. A huge, mushroom-shaped cloud, signaling the aftermath of a devastating explosion, filled the crimson sky over Vegeta-sei. As his vision spiraled downward through the dust and smoke, he saw Lluvia's broken and bleeding body, covered with a film of gray dust and lying on top of a pile of rubble.

**…7…6…5…4…**

NO! his mind screamed, struggling against the immobilizing affects of the vision. Grunting and sweating with concentrated effort, he fought to lean his body forward, while stretching out his hand until it tremulously hovered over the pod's control panel.

Kami, give me the strength to avert what I've just seen! I can't let this vision come true! A painful blaze of confusion burned into his soul. Just the night before, he had a promised vision of Lluvia holding their mutual child…what could have happened since then? What had changed? He had to get back to her, now!

**…3…2…1…**

Bardock's hand audibly slapped downward, making contact with the manual override controls. Shaking his head to clear it and gulping in several breaths, he fell back trembling against the backrest.

**…Manual override has been activated…process aborted…Repeat, process aborted…Do you wish to continue, Commander Bardock?** asked the efficient and unemotional metallic voice.

"REVERSE TRAJECTORY, NOW!" he yelled into the control unit.

**If you reverse trajectory, Commander, you will be significantly delaying your scheduled arrival on the planet Meat-sei and…**

"JUST DO IT !" Damn these contrary machines! They're almost as annoying as bureaucrats!

**Override engaged…trajectory to Meat-sei aborted…reversing course to Vegeta-sei…**

Bardock hardly felt the pod slow down, stop, and turn around. He was too busy sending out his feverish thoughts to sense his lifemate's ki. What scant vibrations he subsequently picked up from Lluvia made his heart begin to hammer with a dread-filled cadence.