Dragon Ball/Z/GT Fan Fiction ❯ Consacra ❯ Prologue B ( Prologue )
[ Y - Young Adult: Not suitable for readers under 16 ]
By: Cantare 
18 faces life after Cell with a measure of uncertainty and concern, and finds humanity is not so easily defined or grasped.
Anime/Manga: Dragon Ball/Z/GT Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Supernatural / Psychological / Action | Type: Divergence | Uploaded On: 12.30.2006 | Pages: 14 | Words: 10.2K | Visits: 412 | Status: Work In Progress
18 faces life after Cell with a measure of uncertainty and concern, and finds humanity is not so easily defined or grasped.
Anime/Manga: Dragon Ball/Z/GT Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Supernatural / Psychological / Action | Type: Divergence | Uploaded On: 12.30.2006 | Pages: 14 | Words: 10.2K | Visits: 412 | Status: Work In Progress
Prologue B
The waves were quiet today. They approached the shore in methodical succession, slower than usual. Clouds lay across the sky like a glaze, shielding her skin from the sun. Even the cries of the gulls in the background seemed subdued.
“Beautiful day, eh?”
She did not reply as he sat down beside her in the sand. He crossed his arms over his knees, assuming the same position she had been in for the past hour.
“How can you sit like that?” he asked with a chuckle. “Just how flexible are you?”
She cast him a sidelong glance. “Flexible enough.”
He smiled, unfazed by her coolness. “Can I listen?”
She slowly withdrew her arms from her knees, wondering once again why he asked to do this every day. Stretching her legs out in front of her, she leaned back on her elbows, making sure her hair did not touch the sand. It was the most uncomfortable feeling whenever her hair brushed dirt.
She rolled her eyes as he looked at her shyly and shifted his weight gingerly so that his head rested on her belly. His awkward mannerisms had grown on her, she supposed.
“Hmm…nothing right now…oh—wait, it's kicking!”
His laugh sent an odd sensation running across her skin. “Krillin, it does that all the time.”
“I know,” he said, turning his head to look up at her. “But it's still amazing. Gosh…I'm going to be a father. I mean…we're going to be parents.”
“Stating the obvious is ever your forte.”
“Aw come on, lighten up. Let me see a smile!”
She slapped away the hand that was about to squeeze her cheek.
“Krillin, I'm not a baby. The baby is in here.”
“You'll always be my baby,” he said, winking. “Do do doop, oh, do do doop do doop da dum…”
Superb. She had started him singing. His voice was always horribly off pitch. Especially when he tried to sing tunes by female singers.
“Stop it.”
“…You'll always be a part of me, I'm part of you indefinitely…”
“Krillin.”
“Okay, okay,” he sighed. “I guess I'll have to get better at serenading so I can sing the baby to sleep.”
“You can certainly sing the baby awake.”
“Oooh, honey, that burns,” he said with a fake wince of pain.
Perhaps there was something good about having a husband who was seldom serious. Maybe it balanced out their relationship since it was impossible for her to be anything but serious.
“Hey lovebirds, it's time for dinner!” a voice called from the house behind them. A short pig in an apron waved from the doorway.
“Oolong's cooking tonight?” she grumbled.
“Hey, I heard that!”
Krillin stood and smiled, extending his hand to help her up. “Until you learn to cook, babe, gotta deal with it. Wouldn't it actually be nice to have meals as a family once the baby's here?”
“You're cooking then. I'm not doing any housework.”
“Oh ho, we'll see. We shall see,” he said as they started back up the beach together.
*****
The forest here was dense, far from any roads. She disliked the smell of damp wood after a rainfall. She floated over the ground, not wanting to muddy her shoes. The incessant sounds of animals were everywhere.
She arrived at the cabin and noticed he was already outside, leaning against one of the log walls, arms folded. He gave a nod to acknowledge her presence.
“You can stop levitating, sis. The ground ain't gonna swallow you up.”
She frowned as she lowered her feet to the ground, landing a few feet away from him.
“Tell me again why you're living out here?”
He shrugged. “Tell me again why you're living with a bald ex-monk, a perverted old man, and talking animals?”
“Shut up.”
“One of which you've fallen in love with,” he continued. “My memory's not too good—was it the bald guy or the pig?”
“Hey.”
“Sorry, couldn't help it. Wanna come inside?”
The interior of the cabin was considerably more comfortable, dry and clean. She had to admit to herself again that he had done quite well for himself alone. They sat by the fireplace in chairs he had fashioned after he had built the cabin.
“So what's been growing on your mind this time? Or should I say what's been growing in your belly?”
“You knew about it the last time I visited.”
“Yeah, but it sure as hell wasn't that big. You're looking a bit like our old pal 19 at the moment.”
“Ugh, please!” she said in disgust. “Do NOT compare me to that thing.”
“Yeah so tell me sis, what's today's occasion?” he said, ignoring her insulted look. “Need me to play nursemaid when the baby pops out? Or has baldy been getting on your nerves lately?”
“Why do I need a reason to visit you? You're my brother.”
“There are reasons for everything we do, 18. In case you haven't noticed.”
“I don't buy that.”
“Come on, don't tell me that little mind of yours isn't whirring with causalities and probabilities right now.”
“…”
“Okay, I think I know the reason you've come by, even if you don't realize it yourself,” he said nonchalantly. “A little bewildered by the choices you've made? Looking for affirmation that your choices are right? That there are good reasons for them all?”
“17.”
“Yes?”
“Stop being a bastard.”
“Okay, bastard switch is off.” He smirked, resting his chin on one hand. “What's on your mind, really?”
“It's…” She fumbled for words. A rarity. “The baby's coming soon, and I…I'm not sure…I don't really know.”
“Don't really know what? It's a child. You give birth to it, you raise it for a little less than two decades, and then it goes off and repeats the cycle. Not that complicated.”
“According to everyone else, it is very complicated.”
“`Everyone else' as in incompetent humans.”
“It means a lot to Krillin.”
“What did I just say?”
She frowned. “17, stop belittling him. He's my husband.”
“I didn't think it was possible to belittle the guy any further than his current height.”
“Would you stop it? Can you be serious for once?”
“Okay, I'm sorry. But this concern of yours isn't registering with me.”
“I'm going to be a mother. And I know it's much more than just feeding and clothing a child. There's a lot more that I don't understand. Things that seem very important.”
“Like what?”
“I don't know…I've heard about Son Goku's mannerisms toward his children. It seemed he was more like a child than they were when he entertained them. Is that what a parent is supposed to do?”
“Maybe it's what the father has to do,” 17 shrugged. “It seems Krillin is more than capable of providing that attention.”
It was not an insult this time, just the truth. “I know. But I don't know what I'm supposed to do. Who I'm supposed to be.”
“You can't put it that way. It's not about who you're `supposed to be.' It's about who you are. That doesn't change, 18.”
She was silent for a few seconds, staring into an empty fireplace. “Then who am I, 17? Who are we?”
“You know who we are,” he said, his voice tenser now.
“No. Neither of us do,” she said. His cold blue eyes met her own. “We only know what we are. Not who.”
“Don't bring this up again…”
“It's important to me,” she said. “I want to know.”
“Well, all power to ya, sis. Have a fun time trying to find out,” he said coldly.
“Why don't you want to know, 17? Doesn't the question ever come to your mind?”
“Sometimes. But it doesn't matter. There's no reason to find out. So why care?”
“I care now because of this,” she said, placing her hand on her swollen belly. “I'm going to have to be responsible for something other than myself.”
“Really? Do you really feel concern for that…the baby?” he asked, gesturing at her stomach. “Or are you just trying to convince yourself that you do?”
She was silent.
“Like I said before,” he said. “We don't change. You're not going to change.”
“17, I do care. This is my child. My creation.”
“It's the result of a biological process I'm sure you're familiar with. You didn't create anything.”
“Stop telling me that I can't be a mother!” she said, anger rising in her voice.
“When did I say that?”
“Everything you say tells me that!” she fumed. “I came here hoping you'd…support me or something, I don't know. I thought you'd help me understand things more clearly. I thought you might know what I'm feeling.”
“I know what you feel,” he said matter-of-factly. “You feel nothing. And that's the problem.”
“I…”
“Am I right?” he pressed. “Don't lie to yourself.”
She was silent.
“What's that cliché humans love to use? `People don't change.' We don't change, either,” he said. “Sorry if that hurts, sis, but it shouldn't.”
The cabin was quiet. He had done a thorough job of sealing the walls so that very little outside noise filtered in. It felt strange to be in such an absence of sound.
“So are you going to the hospital to deliver?” he asked. His voice was no gentler, but he was consciously changing the topic.
“No,” she said. “Why would I?”
“What if something goes wrong?”
“Things went wrong last time I was on an operating table.”
His lips tightened into a line. “Don't bring that up…”
“Okay, I won't. Thanks for the talk, 17,” she said curtly.
Krillin was as close to angry as she had ever seen him when she returned to the island. He actually raised his voice to her, demanding to know why she had been away for so long and flying around when the baby was due soon.
“Stop patronizing me, Krillin,” she said coolly. “I can take care of myself.”
“It's not just you I'm worried about,” he protested. “Think about the baby!”
“I can take care of it too.”
“18…we're in this together, right? We're both going to take care of our child. I just want you both to be safe.”
“Okay, okay, look at me, I'm fine. No damage done,” she said with a tinge of frustration.
He sighed, sitting down on their bed. “I love you. You know that, right?”
“I have a mental tally of how many times you've said it.”
He chuckled softly. “Wish I had such a memory.”
No, you don't.
It still confused her sometimes that those words seemed so important. That it seemed like his urgent duty to say them to her constantly. What weight did they really carry?
His tense expression melted away into a smile as he looked at her sitting beside him. She allowed him to touch her face.
“You're beautiful. You know that, right?”
Another set of words he constantly repeated to her. Sometimes she wondered which of his sayings meant more. Which one was more real.
From what she had heard, to be attracted to beauty alone was shallow. He always told her she was beautiful. He had been smitten with her from the beginning, even when she was sent to kill his best friend. And she was sure it couldn't have been anything else but her appearance that had attracted him, even leading him to save her life at the risk of everyone else's.
Was it flattering? According to her knowledge, it was not. But perhaps his love was based on other things now that they had interacted much more. She wondered why he loved her.
There are reasons for everything.
Her brother was probably right.
*****
It was windier today. The sun burned bright, its rays seeming to ride the wind whipping against her skin. Her hair swirled about her face, irritating her. She sat and watched the waves.
Sometimes Krillin asked her if these long periods of inactivity were boring. He still didn't understand. Boredom was not a concept to her.
Every detail in her field of vision was captured and noted each second her eyes were open. She could count the bubbles of foam on the cresting waves and knew the intervals between the cries of each particular seagull. The tiny piece of the world within her view was almost endlessly intricate. And it changed every moment.
Perhaps it was boring to most people to simply sit and observe. She still wasn't sure what qualified as boredom.
You feel nothing. And that's the problem.
She rested her cheek against her knees. At least she knew there was a problem. It was better than not being conscious of it.
Or was it really? Would it be better if she were unaware of the gap between what she felt at the moment and what she was supposed to feel? What was she supposed to feel anyway?
There was no foreseeable solution to this strange inner conflict, at least not yet. It didn't even register as a conflict to the logical part of her brain.
She recalled something Krillin had once said to her. You have all the time in the world to explore that world now that you're free. Just take life one day at a time.
Seeing that there was nothing she could do about the weird nagging feeling in her mind, she supposed she would have to follow his advice. Maybe a few weeks from now, everything would be clearer, and she'd have a plan.
“Yo, aren't you cold?” Yamucha called, his voice carrying on the wind. She turned and saw him leaning out a window, waving.
“I'm fine,” she replied.
“Why don't you come inside? We've got some hot tea brewing. And I'm teaching the guys a new card trick.”
She rolled her eyes. There wasn't much else to do.
Halfway to her feet, something happened. She felt the difference immediately. Looking down, she saw her sand-covered stockings darkening with liquid, and it wasn't seawater.
Something inside felt different, too. Her head suddenly hurt. She staggered to one side, clutching her head in her hands and gritting her teeth. There was a new string of information processing rapidly in her brain.
“18?” Yamucha called. “You okay?”
She didn't answer. Something was happening inside her, and she did not yet know exactly what. The baby would come soon, that was obvious. But something else was going on at the same time. Turning toward the house, she began walking unevenly up the shore.
“18! Hold on, I'm coming.” Yamucha disappeared from the window and was by her side in an instant. He took one look at the liquid dripping down her legs and drew in a sharp breath. “Oh boy. Okay. I did this with Bulma. I can do it again. You okay, 18?”
“I'm fine,” she gritted through her teeth. “Get me to the house.”
“You need to go to a hospital—”
“Get me to the house,” she said harshly.
Hesitantly, he put an arm around her waist and floated off the ground, moving them toward the door. No sooner did they reach it when Krillin raced down the stairs, looking both excited and terribly anxious.
“18, my gosh, it's finally coming!” he exclaimed, supporting her as Yamucha let go. “Okay, the nearest hospital's just a few minutes away if I fly quickly. I'll—”
“I'm not going to a hospital,” she said. “Get me into our room.”
“What? What do you mean you're not going?” he said worriedly. “We have to—”
“Krillin, I'm not leaving this house. Get me to the bed, now,” she said tensely.
“I don't understand. The doctors will help you. They'll—”
His face jerked to the side as she slapped him hard.
“Whoa, easy, 18,” Master Roshi said nervously, standing beside Yamucha. He and Oolong had approached cautiously from the kitchen. She ignored him and glared directly at her husband.
“There's no way in hell you're making me walk into a hospital and let anyone touch me. I don't want to see any doctors. Do you understand me, Krillin?”
His eyes flickered with the realization of her plea thinly veiled by the form of a demand. “Okay, honey. We'll do this together, here.”
She lay on the bed, gripping the edges, her face harsh and blank. She stared straight ahead at the unchanging appearance of this sparsely decorated room. The rigid lines of the wooden floorboards struck a stark contrast with the crumpled, stained sheets around her legs.
“Okay. How are we going to do this,” Krillin mumbled to himself, fear etched on his face. “Do you feel it coming out?”
“Let Yamucha in here,” she said, the pain of the first contraction beginning to seize her senses.
He hesitated, casting a glance at the parts of her body not covered by the sheets.
“Krillin, now is not the time to be worried about that!” she hissed. “Let him in, now!”
“I'm here, 18.” Yamucha had been hovering outside the door, and now he brushed past Krillin to kneel by her side. “It's okay. All right, start taking deep breaths.”
“Did…Bulma…go through it…like this?” she asked, breath hitching in her throat.
“Something like this,” he said nervously. “I was with her when Trunks came, but there were doctors and nurses there too.”
She turned her face away from him, shutting her eyes in pain. But it was bearable. She was built to sustain much worse than this.
“Then…do…what you saw…them doing…”
“I…I don't have any equipment or medicine, 18. I don't have any medical knowledge, either,” he said helplessly.
Krillin moved to her other side and grasped her hand firmly. “We'll get through this, babe. Just breathe. Stay calm…”
“I am calm,” she said, frustrated. “You're the one who needs to be calm!”
“18,” Yamucha intervened. “Look at me. Okay, push. This is just the beginning, but we'll get a good start.”
Puar handed him a glass of water, hovering anxiously behind his shoulder. “18, you'll be all right!” she chirped.
Yamucha set the glass on the lampstand without glancing at it. He gripped her hand harder. “Okay, this is it. Push.”
“I…I can't.”
“Yes you can, honey! You can do it. I'm here for you,” Krillin said with urgency.
“No, Krillin,” she said. She felt fluid from her eyes rolling down the side of her face onto the pillow. “I can't.”
It was now clear what was happening inside her. Her body broadcast the facts quite starkly into her mind.
“What?” he said, confused. He didn't have a clue.
Her body was rejecting the baby.
Rejecting it as a hostile object.
“No…” she said quietly.
We only know what we are. Not who.
Now it seemed that even there she had been wrong. She hadn't known what she was. What her body was, how it had been built. Or rebuilt, rather—into a finely calibrated, brutally efficient machine.
“18? What's the matter? Come on, push!” Krillin exclaimed, his face hovering inches above hers. She shut her eyes to the sight of his worried, terribly hopeful expression.
“No…”
More facts. Reality registered like a million connecting dots every second in her brain. She could not push. She could not use force. Her body wanted her to react that way. It expected her, in a survival maneuver, to push with all her unnatural might. Her internal systems had judged the simplest and most efficient way to solve the problem of the invasive entity was to terminate it while it was still inside, utilizing the natural instincts of a birthing mother as part of the process.
If she pushed…
Her body was poised to harness the resulting pressure and direct it back upward against the force she was applying downward.
She did not open her eyes or speak as the men at her side implored her to do something, to talk to them.
She could wait. But for what? The mechanics was set and inalterable. One move, and it would be over.
And the other option? To let Krillin and Yamucha bring her to the hospital, where humans clad in crisp white robes and armed with a vast array of invasive instruments would see to her. She would lie on an operating table again. She would be cut open again.
Sterile gloved hands would touch her and say everything would be better when it was over. That it wouldn't hurt at all.
That she was doing something good by offering her body on that table, that altar.
“No…”
It wasn't the same this time, she reasoned. Perhaps the baby would live if she let them operate on her.
But then what? How could she live after that? They would see inside her and know what she was, that she was not human. That she was a marvelous work of science, albeit a sacrifice of humanity. And she would be made into an experiment, a test subject, all over again.
“No…”
“18, stay with me! Yamucha, give her some water!”
“I've got it. Here, 18, drink.”
She shook her head slightly, still silent.
“18, I love you,” Krillin said, his voice cracking with emotion. “Don't give up now. We've come so far! You'll be holding our baby—our creation—in your arms soon. Please listen to me…you have to push!”
It's the result of a biological process…
You didn't create anything.
She opened her eyes and looked at her husband. She wasn't sure if her eyes conveyed something from inside, but he froze under her gaze.
“I'm sorry, Krillin.”
*****
The lake was calm. Sunlight shimmered lazily over still water, rimmed by trees. On the other side there were birds gliding across the surface, wings spread to slow their descent.
He came, as expected.
She stared ahead, not standing or turning, and he stood at a respectful distance. She waited.
“I'll be back at the cabin,” he said simply. “Come in if you want.”
Time passed around her. It grew dark and the song of insects awakening to the night began. It did not matter whether she left this place or not. She did not need to go. She did not need to stay.
Her eyes traced the movements of dozens of small flickering lights across the water. Brightening, dimming, floating without direction. Some drifted close around her. She could reach out and crush one if she wanted. She could also do nothing.
She liked the ocean better. There was less to see, no trees, grass, or animals. But there was also vastly more to see, beyond even the range of her refined vision. And there were no insects, only birds.
Someone else was standing behind her.
As expected. She did not move.
“Hey.” The voice was soft. She could sense its unease. She did not answer.
“18…I think it's time to go home.”
“Leave,” she said.
He paused, awkwardly hesitating. He wanted to move toward her but did not. She knew what he would say next.
“I'm sorry, 18…”
“You do not owe me an apology. Leave.”
He did not leave. Unexpectedly, he sat down beside her, knees curled up to his chest in the same position she had assumed.
“Krillin's really worried about you, you know.”
Time passed around them as neither moved or spoke after that. She could go to her brother's house. Or she could stay here. She did not care what the man beside her decided to do.
It was night, and there was no moon. The fireflies seemed more numerous than before. Their reflections glowed softly in the water.
“Beautiful, isn't it?”
She turned her head toward him for the first time. The scars on his face were faintly visible in the dark.
“Why do you ask me?”
“I…I dunno. Just asking your opinion,” he said, unsure what to think of her response.
“How do you know I have an opinion?”
His eyes wavered as he searched her blank expression for any hint of what she was thinking.
“It was just a comment to fill the silence. Sorry,” he said, slightly defensive.
“You didn't answer my question,” she said, tone still neutral.
“I don't think I understand what you were asking.”
She turned back to the water. “Neither do I understand what you were asking.”
“Uh…about what—”
“The first question,” she snapped. “The one that was supposed to `fill the silence.'”
“Hey, it doesn't mean anything, I was just saying it's a beautiful night…”
“No,” she said curtly, her gaze riveted on the fireflies. “You were asking me whether it was beautiful. And you know what? I don't know.”
His puzzlement was growing into concern, she could sense it festering inside him. Slowness and stupidity were finally giving way to clarity.
“18…”
“I don't know what beauty is, Yamucha,” she said. “I don't know what it is and I don't know why it matters so much to you humans.”
He was silent for a moment, thinking. “It matters because it's true. Even if you can't sense it concretely, it's real.”
“Why does it matter if I can't sense it? It holds no meaning for me.”
“Krillin must have told you you're beautiful. Doesn't that hold any meaning?”
She looked at him, blue eyes cool and unblinking. “No. It never has.”
She stood, looking down at his bewildered expression. “I am not like you. I do not understand you and all the things that matter to you. I don't know what beauty is because all I see are intricate plots of color, texture, and movement shifting every second in the lens of my eyes. I don't know what boredom is, or loneliness. I don't know what love is. I am not like you. I am not human.”
He stood as well, hand extending toward her. She backed away a step in warning. “Don't touch me. Do not follow me. Leave and do not try to find me again.”
“18, I'm so sorry…”
“Stop apologizing. It's a waste of breath.”
“Please. Come back. Krillin needs you.”
“He does not require me. I don't understand anything about him, and I can't ever understand. Just go home.”
“I'm not leaving unless you come with me,” he said, more firmly than before.
“Or else what?” she said.
“18, nothing is going to get better if you just avoid him. He still loves you and doesn't think badly of you for what happened.”
“That doesn't matter. I realized what I am after what happened. So I can't live with him anymore. I am not what you all believe me to be. And I can't change.”
“You're just as much of a person as me or him,” Yamucha insisted. “Nothing can change that.”
Like I said before…We don't change. You're not going to change.
“I am not human, Yamucha,” she said tensely. “My humanity was deconstructed long ago and reconstructed into a machine. A machine with very low tolerance for human beings, as you observed on the day I killed one.”
“No…” he said. His voice was full of agony. “Goddammit, 18, that wasn't your fault! Stop beating yourself up over it!”
“I'm not. Really,” she said. “I don't feel any guilt. There's something else, though.”
A second of silence passed, filled only by the glow of fireflies around them.
“Relief.”
Her gaze was unfaltering as he struggled to meet her eyes without glancing away. He finally turned his head to the side, lips set in a tight line. Perhaps finally realizing he was helpless to do anything in this situation.
“Go home, Yamucha.” Perhaps her voice sounded gentle this time. “Tell Krillin not to worry about me.”
She arrived at the cabin without much difficulty, knowing where it was even in the dark. The door to the cabin was slightly ajar, its edges brightly lined by the glow of the fireplace. She entered wordlessly and sat down in the empty chair beside the crackling flames.