Dragon Ball/Z/GT Fan Fiction ❯ If I never see tommorow ❯ reluctant friend ( Chapter 2 )

Chapter Two

Diary Entry; The trades are being made and it's about time too, though it does seem like no more will be brought for now which is a relief and yet saddening. I didn't get a chance to go with them. I excel at my job and yet I miss out of the recognition granted to fortunate ones not even half as good as me. I'm glad there will be no more for now…the incessant crying and shouting was beginning to wear my nerves thin. Better yet it is nearly always the new ones sent off first, which deals with the crying ones, along with the troublemakers who are next, either that or they were killed if they were just too much trouble, then the remaining demand is filled with the other slaves. I know the routine by heart. It's going to take a day or so to finish this round of trading.

The degradation of a species is not really my idea of a challenge and is more than often what takes place. Thinking of these creatures as a species that actually deserves an iota of respect despite their so lowly status worries me. I wonder if that is what is holding me back? Was it known? I steel myself from this strange conscience I seemed to have developed as best I can…I shouldn't have one. I can't be expected to do my job properly with it…and I love my job and what it could be if I was given half a chance…I know I do.

Yet, I did find myself hoping 'he' wasn't amongst the ones to be sent away. For the first time I actually saw some emotion in his eyes. The yearning. He'd actually wanted to go. Not that I blame him, every one seems to want to leave but I would deprive him of it, forget my conscience. I have my ways but meanwhile what was the harm in hope if it was sufficient enough to one moving round like an actual living being and not like something already dead. The rumours in their own way add to this constant hope if one believed them…it couldn't be hidden forever.

I see what you're going through
It's an up hill climb…

As she'd expected she was given another titanic pile of sacks to carry yet again. How he'd found another huge stack of sacks was beyond her but she was willing to bet that whichever way he'd done it, his desire for her constant disparagement had been the driving force behind his triumph.

Remarkable what one could do with the proper motivation.

Yet as she got on with it she was able to overlook the aggravating guard since the focal theme of the day seemed to be the banquet proposed for today. Remarkably the conversation amongst the slaves seemed to revolve around what kind of scraps and leftovers they would be able to hoard than the reason for it in the first place. She didn't in actuality care about the raison d'être. Not really, but it was impossible not to pick up on it. Especially being on palace grounds. You were inevitably ordained to come across an assemblage of guards every now and then that couldn't help but flaunt the fact. She'd gathered that the reasons were two fold. The prince's victorious return and the fact that they had yet another planet under their belt. She cared nothing for their enemies, heck, she would pat this Freiza guy on the back right before she killed him for one enemy didn't suffer another to live. If half the things she'd heard about him was true she'd have just got the good sense to get in there before he could.

What she felt instead was anger at every time 'earth' was mentioned. She hadn't had any real ties to the place, she'd been ready to relegate it to ruins anyways but the thing was she felt deprived. It was hers and she should have the stupid world in her hands not snatched from her and to make things worse she'd been taken like some kind of possession along with the same humans she'd wanted to put the fear of god into.

It was like adding insult to injury.

She spotted the tiny girl that hurried past her and she was inexplicably drawn to her before she even realised it. She couldn't be more than seven and she looked, put delicately, terrible. She seemed to be on the brink of some illness…most likely. She couldn't quite pinpoint it she just knew…felt it. The child herself wouldn't know just yet. She was more than likely be one of the only few children slaves on planet Vegeta only here by mistake. Children were considered useless so they weren't brought except where they got in the way and ended up having to be dragged along. Schedules were important and they would not be altered because some child ended up where it wasn't supposed to be.

They were probably the lucky ones as they got left behind on earth more often than not along with the others that didn't quite meet 'standards' and not because the Saiyans shared some empathy for them but because they would be more useful fully grown and the planet ultimately belonged to them now so they might as well remain till they did. It wasn't like they could escape. The weak here were considered a plague and ultimately useless, most of which were killed on earth especially if they got in the way. Half the population had been wiped out already.

They weren't stupid…they could see the long term potentials of having people remain on earth, an almost ceaseless supply of slaves when needed…and the fact that they controlled half the planets around now including earth it meant they'd claimed one more planet to ultimately rule over, no one could touch the planet with out their say so especially since the market for human slaves seemed increasingly large. Everyone seemed to want one even though the humans were considered weak things. It was more a status thing she supposed. Being involved in tradings with the Saiyans that seemed to want for nothing was a highly prized thing. Such required much favour and with the recent defeat of Frieza and his father they'd shown again their superiority and just what would happen to planets and their rulers that were fool enough to get in their way.

Keep your friends close but your enemies closer still.

She couldn't quite remember where she'd hear that phrase but did it even matter.

She absently wondered how many of these kind of children would she have destroyed like this and left having to fend for themselves. It posed the question, no matter how much she hated this race of Saiyans, how was she any better than them? She may rant and she may rave but at the end of the day wasn't she just peeved because she'd been beaten to the punch?

******

She still wasn't finished by mid afternoon and everyone had gone and returned from one of those eagerly awaited breaks of the day. Again she was left behind to finish up and she had a vague suspicion that somehow she was getting nowhere. It was almost like for every one she took two more were added and she had a niggling suspicion…no, it was more than that, rephrased more appropriately it was a whopping big conviction that that was exactly what was happening especially with the smile playing round the guards mouth every time she came back for another. She simply bent to pick the next one mistakenly knocking down another, which rolled down and landed inches from his feet. He towered over her or tried to since they were unfortunately the same height. "What did you do that for?"

She didn't answer.

"Well, what do you have to say for yourself 'slave'?" he queried.

Right now it would preferably be that he didn't speak so close to her face…his breath reeked!

She turned away to reach for the sack when his hand closed round the scruff of her shirt pulling her back to face him. She looked down at his hand then up at him almost questioning.

"Let go of me." She said calmly more worried about her shirt getting torn, after which there would be a whole lot of explaining to do and something she would preferably like to avoid.

"Or what?" he queried with an angry snarl in her face. She said nothing; the only thing that showed her patience level had just been breached was her gaze burning with a silent and perilous anger brought to life. Her deceptively unruffled expression remained generally the same.

Her hand closed round his where it was latched onto her shirt and squeezed. The smile that touched her lips held gratifying satisfaction as she heard one or two fingers snap.

The guard recoiled crying out in pain and utter disbelief. He looked at the delicate features before him and back at his crumpled hand. The boy's expression had returned to an emotionless mask. It took all of a few seconds for him to get over the impossibility factor and foolishly lift his other hand his intent to strike those delicately defiant features.

A faint smirk touched her mouth.

Some people just never learned.

Someone cleared their throat making them both turn. Juuhachi took in the intruder calmly her face registering no recognition and no care. It was just another guard to her. Every one of them were the same as the next. However the guard's hand had dropped quickly and was standing almost to rod-like attention.

"What's going on here?" The newcomer asked.

The guard retold the whole incident obviously from his own dishonest point of view which fully exonerated himself so much so that when he'd finished he came out looking lily white with a glowing halo kicked to boot. From the conversation that ensued and excluded her she came to know that the new guard was called Zahi.

"Go and get that checked and you're relieved of duty for the rest of the day, I'll handle things." He said simply. He then looked at Juuhachi as the guard left smirking. "As for you, finish the job you've been assigned." He turned to the other men who had been straining over their work to see what the hullabaloo had been about but not daring to stop working, however with the next thing Zahi said they all looked up not because they were willing but because this momentary distraction offered them a small break no matter how tiny from their back-breaking work. "I need one of you join him." He said gesturing briefly towards Juuhachi. Everyone went silent.

No one was disposed to offer, who ever was to be chosen would have to be selected by the guard himself and thus leave that unfortunate person with no other choice but definitely not because they had offered to themselves. She felt indignantly angry and turned back to her work. She didn't need any of them to 'help'.

"I'll do it." Came a familiar voice and with it came the memory of its earlier phrase of introduction from which she'd first heard it. She looked up from the sack she'd bent to pick and sure enough it was him.

"Good, both of you get that shifted immediately" He said simply. His gaze held Juuhachi's stubborn one for a moment as if searching for something before moving over to the other workers to issue a whole new set of orders. She gave a mental 'humph'. She was not going to feel grateful to him because he'd got someone to help, her opinion of the Saiyans was still not changed in the least. And that was resolutely the position she kept even when she had to admit just a tiny bit that it'd been better having help and a guard that just got on with his job instead of waging personal vendetta's.

******

Juuhachi was more than surprised when Oswald and Bisman sat down at the table she'd come to know as hers. She hadn't minded so much when Krillin had joined her. They'd come to some quiet kind of friendship during the sack lifting experience. But these people she didn't know and wasn't prepared to put up with. Well that wasn't entirely true.

She knew Bisman, just not fondly.

The last time they'd been anywhere near each other it had been the day after she'd found out Juunana was gone. He'd come up to her spouting all kinds of nonsense about how he'd known this that and the other. Utter drivel that seemed to consist primarily of the word 'evil', he irritatingly seemed to love that word and that was his rationalization for everything 'Saiyan' . She hadn't needed to be told what she'd already sensed herself and she hadn't wanted to be told what evil things lurked in the night and took people away, she had not needed his madness at that point. She especially hadn't needed him telling her about her brother's potential demise because everyone that disappeared was dead and because Saiyans were 'evil'. She'd been unhappy and irritated enough as it was and when he'd tried to snatch her lunch from her it had been the last straw. She hadn't really wanted it, true, but the way he'd just reached for it…it was the audacity of him that had made her react badly and the way he'd kept going on about 'the things Bisman has seen' his name annoyingly forming more than half of his babbling speech. It had made her snap angrily at him. What a nut case. All she'd wanted then was for him to get lost…anywhere it hadn't mattered, if he hadn't she would have probably fatally harmed him.

They however knew Krillin and just seemed to assume that since he was sitting they were invited too. Yet Oswald did seem eager to impart something.

"Have you heard what's happened?" was the first thing he said as they sat down.

She shot a glare at Bisman who once he'd sat down kept giving her death looks. "What do you mean?" Krillin asked forgetting Juuhachi for a moment and thus not noticing the glaring match going on between his newly acquired friend and Bisman.

"It's being rumoured that a slave escaped on the outside." Oswald announced in a low voice. Juuhachigou's interest was suddenly piqued. 'Escape' that was the word that registered first and she was suddenly all ears, ignoring Bisman completely. Oswald continued "…there was some sort of situation and they ran. Two slaves. But the strange thing is that they weren't ever caught and neither were the owners seen the next day. That is till people got suspicious when they didn't turn up where they were supposed to be that day and they went in search of them, the owners that is, a man and his son some say. Do you know what they found? Two bodies. They were found in the forest near their home…guess who-" he broke off suddenly resuming his annoying habit of shovelling his food down and thus stopping his narration so suddenly that Krillin felt deprived, his attention having been caught.

"What happened to them?" he asked deciding to brave Oswald talking over his food.

"Well they were found dead weren't they. Horribly mutilated…that might be an exaggeration but what ever hit them wasn't pretty and it would have had to be strong too. It's being kept under wraps but you know the old saying 'nothing's hidden under the sun'. They say they never found the slaves. They seemed to have just disappeared into…nothing. You can imagine how incensed this has made the Saiyans, it has them set them on edge. They are trying to keep it quiet so that the slaves don't get any ideas, but this isn't the first time this has happened either and there's more…it's rumoured that these slaves had help."

"Who had help?" Juuhachi asked. Oswald looked surprised a little at the fact that the blonde haired boy that had till now ignored the very existence of every other living person was asking him a direct question but before he could answer Bisman spoke up catching Juuhachi's attention just like he'd wanted to hating to have lost Juuhachi's attention in the beginning.

"The slaves." He affirmed, "…had help they did…from the black bandits."

"Shut up!" Oswald hissed horrified and inadvertedly showering Bisman.

"Will you shut your trap when you eat you oaf!" Bisman barked back angrily, almost before Oswald had finished getting the words out of his mouth.

"You know you're not supposed to say that name you fool…if the guards heard you, you would be trussed up and quartered or worse for sure. You know that!" Oswald continued his voice having dropped several octaves but acquiring a rough tone of apprehensive admonishment.

"Why?" Krillin asked suddenly intrigued.

"That's the rumoured rebels…Bisman knows a lot see. Some say it's slaves that came together afters being freed and wanting to help others get free too. Bisman hears them say that others think they've been in hiding so long their owners gave up looking, cause no one finds them. No one says anything. It makes guards angry, angry cause they know nothing, can't catch them, never caught a slave whose ran with the bandits. They disappear. If they is caught, they kill themselves before the guards take them…not one alive, not one."

Juuhachi was completely enraptured. It was possible to escape…there was a way off this planet. She didn't go as far as believing in some made up 'black bandits' that the fevered minds of the slaves had created. Their need was simply to create something to believe in, a symbol of some hope no matter how ridiculous, to merely keep their sanity. The name in itself was unbelievable. If any such 'black bandits' existed they would've been sure to rid themselves of such a name as that if they had any iota of sense and good taste. It sounded like something out of those derelict washed up old movies humans found so entertaining. For all Gero's intelligence he'd found such things amusing too…more was the pity. No, what she was most interested in was that it was possible to escape. There was a way as others had escaped before.

"You mean they actually escape…where do they go?" Krillin asked mirroring somewhat exactly what she was wondering.

Bisman was about to speak when Oswald silenced him with a well-placed jab. "What Bisman neglected to add is more often than not they turn up dead and no one knows where those who don't get caught go…sometimes people begin to wonder if they actually existed in the first place. Remember these are just rumours."

"But the dead bodies in the forest of the owners-" Krillin began

"Just rumours," Oswald insisted "We haven't seen them have we? If you see the dead body then you can say what you will." Oswald suddenly leaned in closely looking into far off blue eyes. "Forget about it Juuhachi…" Juuhachi looked surprised suddenly snapping out of the tiny world she had receded into.

"What?"

"I know what you're thinking. I saw it in the eyes of another slave I knew…Bisman knew him too." Oswald said shooting an accusing glance at Bisman "He died trying to escape…no one has ever escaped from within the palace but he tried to, it became something of an obsession with him and it ended up killing him…don't go down the same road."

Juuhachi was angry…angry at him presuming he could tell her what to do and what not to do and for trying to snatch away the only means of escape possible and worse still for even daring to say her name like some how a few minutes of talking made them close enough for him to presume to give her his advice. She rose "When I need your advice I won't ask for it!" she said.

"It would be a good thing if you did become obsessed…go mad just like Bisman and die escaping. Save us lots of trouble it would, stupid boy!" Bisman hissed unable to keep from butting in quite maliciously. Juuhachi took a deep, deep breath and practically ground the words out through her teeth "One day you will push me too far." She left angrily.

Krillin rose to go after Juuhachi's retreating figure but Oswald stopped him. "He is sensible, leave him be."

Krillin resumed his seat. For a guy that shoveled down food and had the worst table manners he'd had the misfortune to meet there was more to Oswald that met the eye.

"Juuhachi is stupid!" Bisman reaffirmed. "Stupid, stupid boy….Bisman hates him, You shouldn't have told him Oz, should've let him go and die!" Bisman said grabbing his plate like he was terrified someone would pilfer the half finished contents and left the table in an angry huff. Oswald shrugged giving a small smile of reassurance to Krillin who looked quite troubled and perplexed.

"He'll get over it." He said simply.

**************

Juuhachi placed herself down onto the nearby stone. A chance for escape, which wasn't. It was there but it wasn't. She hated having to sneak around to do things and she hated the idea of 'escaping' so covertly but if that was the only way she could get off the planet without being stopped so be it. It did not mean she had to like it. She didn't believe in fate, but if it did exist it had sure made a mess of her life and it was having a damn good time in the process. Blasting her way through things would have been the natural answer to obstacles in her way but it would achieve nothing right now. Something else was required and she wasn't sure she knew what…or if she even had it. She'd waited long enough and she was not going to spend the rest of her existence her. She would not! She wished he were here. If only to tell her they would get of this planet…and even if there wasn't a chance in hell, he would make it possible to believe because his egotism and over-confidence was big enough for two.

He shouldn't have left.

He should have tried harder to stay.

How hard could it have been?

She knew this line of thought was unreasonable but she didn't care. She felt like she had been wronged. How could he not let her know, how could he have just let her remain here. When she caught up with that no good-

"Hey, are you okay?"

The voice made her look up. It wasn't one she recognised. A pair of blue eyes looked back at her slight concern hovering in their depths. Wisps of aquamarine poked out from under the material tied round her head framing her face.

"Yes." She found herself saying.

The girl nodded in acceptance. "It's just that you seemed pretty down."

"I'm fine." Juuhachi reaffirmed almost waspishly but then sighed and mumbled a barely audible apology. It was strange, not long before everyone had left her alone now all of a sudden she couldn't get far enough away from them and have a moments peace.

"It's okay, everyone loses it here."

"I have not 'lost' it!" Juuhachi said indignantly her mind suddenly conjuring up the image of Bisman. Now he had lost it. She hadn't.

"Okay, I'm sorry." She said with a smile "Me and my mouth huh…I talk before I think sometimes-" They both looked up as a name was called. It had come from a dark haired girl a few feet away. She had the same kind of material wrapped round her head so tightly that the only indication of her hair colour was the long raven black braid that casually reclined against her shoulder pooling in the folded cradle of her arms. She also had a slight frown on her face but it was most probably due to the fact that she had been left alone her tightly folded arms being one sure sign of discomfort and fear.

'Bulma' that had been the name called.

The aquamarine haired girl waved a succinct motion that requested a bit more patience. "I'll be there in a minute 'Chi." She turned back to Juuhachi "I'll no doubt be seeing you round." Another bright smile "I hope you sort out what ever it is that's bothering you." She virtually sang as she left. She could only watch the girl leave dumbfounded. 'Strange' was what she was. She rose and walked off least anyone else pop up out of nowhere.

***********

And she did see her again, during the feast, but as at that point Bulma hadn't seen her. Chances of keeping to the shadows however were dashed when she got highly glamorous job of constantly replenishing goblets. The guard who'd got his fingers broken earlier was looking for payback though and with the glares being sent her way it had never been more assured. Silence had fallen not long before and Krillin had promptly informed her that it was the King and his son Vegeta. Juuhachi wasn't really eavesdropping, she just happened to hear them as they walked by too engrossed in what they were saying to see her. They were both dressed rather plainly just like almost every other female slave there was and still had those clothes tied round their heads. She figured they weren't in the harem or more of an effort would have been made on them. You instantly knew the harem if you did even get to see them because they were dressed in finer materials…just not much of it.

"It's not so bad you know." The dark haired one that had been called 'Chi' said.

"Not so bad!?…What planet do you live on?" there was a pause as Bulma realised what she had just said "No, don't answer that." There was some sort of scuffle and then Bulma's voice again a low angry hush; "No"

"Will you just do it Bulma!" came the dark haired girl's adamant voice.

"This is degrading!"

"Do you have any other way of getting through this? We are here, make the best of it!"

"I refuse to 'make the best of it' because there is no 'best of it' on this damn planet Chi-chi!"

Then the voices trailed off into nothing. Only then did Juuhachi turn to watch them as they continued on. She gave an imperceptible shrug of nonchalance and then went back to her own thoughts not seeing the look Krillin sent her way.

It held worry.

Because to him the blonde haired boy had been strangely quiet ever since the incident at the table earlier. He seemed to have regressed into a world of his own but before he could say anything the boy walked off with a single word 'refills' slightly indicating the jug he held. Krillin shrugged almost imperceptibly.

**************

When Juuhachi hadn't come back minutes later Krillin began to wonder. It didn't take long to get more wine…not this long anyway. Maybe he was having problems or something. Krillin looked round at the dwindling supply of red liquid.

It was a pity he couldn't sense him he could probably then have had an idea of where he was and if he was okay. He seemed to be excellent in keeping his ki masked so much so it was done every hour of the day…he just could not feel anything. He had felt a slight energy rise when they'd been working together but apart from that the boy was still as much a mystery as he had been when they had met.

He simply could not pry anything out of him either and it wasn't for the want of not trying for Juuhachi seemed to smoothly avoid them half the time without even realising it. He might have attained some kind of friendship with him but that was entirely on the boy's terms so far. He waited a bit longer but when Juuhachi wasn't forth coming and waiting any longer would properly cause a whole lot of palaver, he looked round for the guard a thought having suddenly popped into his head. He remembered the way the guard had kept an almost vigilant watch on Juuhachi all evening. Almost like he'd been waiting for a chance to strike…and now he was nowhere to be seen and neither was Juuhachi.

It just might be possible that…

Authors note**Sorry I took so long to bring this part but--no, no, there is no excuse, chuck those tomatoes! If you're wondering the owner of the diary will be revealed soon enough…don't worry, you'll most probably be able to guess before then. I know there isn't much happening yet but don't worry so much, it starts getting interesting from round about the third chapter...

I will try and update as soon as I can. Later days then, I'll be seeing you. ^_^. As for you reviewers, I know I haven't said thanks yet but I'm talking too much right now. Look out for my message to you in the next chapter cause I do appreciate you. Oh and yes, I did realise I use chunky paragraphs…Argh! The scourge of my existence the bane upon my writing. Will I never be free?!

Have fun guessing what will happen next! oh and I promise you that you will find out why I choose that really corny name 'black bandits' it will explain itself in time and you will hit your head and say 'of course'. ^_^