Dragon Ball/Z/GT Fan Fiction ❯ Changing Seasons ❯ The Phone Call ( Chapter 6 )

"H-hello?" She choked into the reciever, shivering from more than just the cold as she closed the payphone's doors and enclosed herself within the upright glass casket. Her bare arms and legs were nearly turning blue with chill and her feet hurt from running barefoot down the sidewalk. She thought maybe she'd stepped in glass from something because the sole of her left foot stung when she placed her weight on it. She should never have gone with Gohan, She thought, tears stinging her eyes, Never! Look at what a mess she was in?

Stranded, alone, half-naked in an unfamilair city. Alaura could have screamed if that would have made a difference. After all, she had only herself to scream at. It was no one's fault but her own. She dreaded having to explain this to Tae, who was on the other end of the phone on the cell he'd taken to carrying with him while on tour, the connection fuzzy, much less to Piccolo. Her face paled at the the thought and made a quick, emotion-driven decision. If she could help it, he'd find out later rather than sooner. She did not like keeping things from him, but she also did not want to lose him, either. Sighing, Alaura hated herself worse than anyone ever could and heaped insults silently upon herself that she felt she was only worthy of.

"Mother, is that you?" The namek on the other end of the phone asked, his voice sounding far away, as if it were coming from over several round, grassy hills. Alaura, for the first time, flinched when she heard her honorary title and said; "Tae, honey, I'm in a bind. I'm stuck in a strange city…I need to get home but I have no way to…"

"Just a minute, Mother." Tae said and was silent for a while, finally he said, "I can pick up your faint energry from here. Your not really that far from me. I'll follow the trace I can feel from you until I reach you."

Alaura nodded, forgetting that she was on a phone and the gesture meant nothing; "Please, hurry, Tae."

"Are you okay?" He asked, concern easy in his tone, "Nothing's happened, has it?"

If only you knew! She thought, finding his words eerily perceptive, yet she must allow him to know…not a single thing! She must bury what happened between her and Gohan deep down inside her where nothing could draw it up into the light. She prayed for the strength to do just that. "I'm…fine, Tae." She forced a smile and calmness into her voice, making it drip almost honey-sweet, "Really, I just…got lost…Come get me, please?"

Tae hung up the phone, flipped the top of the cell over and tucked it back into his pocket. He had just been finishing up some routine bends and jumps in the space her shared with three others of his dance troupe when his phone had gone off. Wiping the droplets of sweat from his brow, Tae felt that everything was not okay with Alaura. He could sence it in her tone of voice. She was lying to him and he meant to find out, what, exactly, was going on with her. He grabbed his jacket, an old bomber jacket he'd picked up at a used clothing sale he'd walked past one day, and headed out the door, pausing to ask one of his room-mates, Eve, to please keep her conventional music to a mininum this night.

"Sure thing, Green Bean." She laughed, enjoying the moniker she'd stuck him with upon first meeting him. He narrowed his eyes, but did not ask that she stop calling him that, after all, if she knew how much it bothered him she'd just do it all the more. "When are you coming back, so I don't accidently lock ya out?"

He stopped with his hand on the doorknob, turning back to consider the lithe, raven-haired female with too much eye makeup and blouses that were cut too low and showed off far too much of her overly ample cleavage. She'd thrust those gaint mounds into his face more than once, not seeming to get it through her thick skull that he wasn't interested in her that way. To Eve Sinclair, there was no such thing as anyone not being sexually attracted to her and Tae knew that it struck her pride to be shot down, so that she had to keep trying with him even though the results would always be the same.

"Maybe when you get back we can rent a movie and cuddle on the sofa." She said, in her husky voice, her ruby red lips pouty in what she considered her sexy look. To Tae, she just looked desperate and that was more than a complete turn off in and of itself. He shook his head and left, not wanting to stay and play her little games at the moment. He really should demand that he get his own room while on tour, it's not like it would cost all that much extra, he was, after all, from a wealthy family where Alaura was concerned.

He took to the skies and reached out, mentally, until he could feel the faint glimmer that was Alaura's ki, weak as newborn kitten, but still there. He followed it like a beacon until he came to the exact neighborhood she was in and narrowed it down to the street and finally, flew down to land in front of the phone booth she'd used to place the call to him.

Tae could still feel trace residual enegry from around the booth, but it was fading swiftly, and Alaura was nowhere to be found. As his eyes drifted downward of their own accord he gasped at the sight of the ripped and discared short robe laying on the ground outside the phone booth and the droplets of crimson which could only be one thing, staining the material.

He had known that it would take him a few hours to reach her, he should have told her that and had her go find shelter somewhere safe rather than waiting outside in the dark, in a strange place, for him to get there. Now, she may be hurt…or worse! He did not wish to dwell on what could be worse, but knew that a far many things could have happened to her, none of which was filling his mind with images of pleasure. Not when there was blood upon her obviously torn by force clothing…