Dragon Ball/Z/GT Fan Fiction ❯ Red Window ❯ History ( Chapter 5 )

“So,” Goku smiled, excited, as the ship exited the atmosphere. “Can you put in the coordinates? For New Vegeta?”

 

Vejata paced over to the panel, observing it critically. “Yes,” she responded finally. “But I thought you were deadset on…”

“Oh, we just have to make sure we wish Vegeta back within the year! It should be plenty of time,” Goku assured her.

 

“Wish?”

 

“Like I said before, with the dragon balls! The ones on Earth can't wish someone back more than once. So we have to go to New Namek. But first,” he grinned, “I wanna meet the other Saiyajin!” He glanced toward the ceiling, daydreaming. “Maybe someday, I can try t' teach `em all how to go Super Saiyajin…”

 

As she finished entering the coordinates, Vejata turned to Goku. “I'm the strongest of them. If anyone can do it, it's me.” There was no way she would be able to resume her duties, not like this, not this much weaker than not one, but two Saiyajin, not to mention their offspring. “Teach me.”

 

“I was planning on it!” Goku gave her a hearty pat on the back, and she winced at the contact. “One day you could even be a pretty good sparring partner for Vegeta and I!”

 

She grimaced at his sheer foolishness. The moment I become a good sparring partner is the moment I kill you, she seethed to herself. I wasn't planning on it, but then, I wasn't planning on finding any Saiyajin stronger than Vegeta. It was certainly a bump in the road, but it could be remedied. Even alive, there was a chance he wouldn't be a threat—but she wasn't worried that he would make a move for power; rather, she was concerned that after seeing his power, the people might reject her. The man himself, now that he was no longer fighting, seemed more a child. He had forgotten his promise, that he would make her tell Vegeta's mate what had happened to him, in the flurry of excitement of finding there were more Saiyajin.

 

His eyes continued to glimmer as he pondered on what a great opponent he could make of her, and she experienced the distinct feeling that he was not concerned with the fact that they were Saiyajin in and of itself—but more the potential that he might find in the race. Her tail whipped around behind her, agitated, proud.

 

“Hey,” Goku suddenly snapped out of his reverie, “Vejata.” She flinched, and, gritting her teeth, turned to face him. “Vegeta was a prince, right? So are you a princess?”

 

“No,” she answered simply.

 

“Why not? I thought for sure…”

 

She held up the medallion, as if that would answer all his questions.

 

“Yeah, Vegeta didn't have that… But he was under Freeza for so long. Y'know, Freeza seemed like the kinda guy who'd take that stuff away from someone. Is it…really important?”

 

“Your insolence is sickening,” she replied curtly. “But I suppose you must be forgiven, if you did indeed suffer such brain damage.”

 

“Sorry,” Goku shrugged, “but I guess I was shipped away as a baby, right? I wouldn't know any of that culture stuff either way. Even if I didn't bump my head.” He laughed, as if this would relieve the tension so obviously controlling her body that it was emanating into the space around her.

 

“This,” she answered, quietly, holding up the medallion to show its back to Goku, and pointing to the symbol etched upon it, “is the royal seal.” Goku observed it in silence, leaning in closer. “And this,” Vejata continued, now turning the medallion over and suspending it by its beaded string, “this medallion is quite nearly sacred to the Saiyajin.”

 

“Why?”

 

“Only the ruling monarch may wear it. For Vegeta to have done so earlier was a dangerous decision. But there was nothing I could do about it, anyway,” she frowned, “at the time.”

 

“Oh…so…why couldn't he wear it?”

 

“He didn't kill me.”

 

“What?”

 

“I am the Queen of NewVegeta. The Queen of the Saiyajin.” She paused to let it sink in, but decided to continue upon the realization that it likely never would. “In order to establish himself as the ruler, he would need to kill the reigning Saiyajin.”

 

“Oh. So if I killed you…” and as he spoke, she pulled herself into a defensive stance. “I'm not going to!” he exclaimed, throwing his hands in the air. “Promise. But if I did, then would I be king?”

 

Vejata frowned. “I'm…not sure. No one from outside the Vegeta family has ever won the throne,” she turned away, apparently more interested in the brightly lit buttons of the control panel. “At least not in recorded history.” She let her fingers hover above the panel thoughtfully. “But if you were able to prove your superiority to me by killing me, likely you would win the loyalty of the Saiyajin. We are not a sentimental people.” She pulled her hand back and drew it against her as she crossed her arms. “Perhaps whoever rules may be considered the most sentimental of them all, for he wears this ancient piece of jewelry with such pride. But,” she touched it, “it is all we have.”

 

Goku sat down on a nearby chair, kicking his legs up to let them rest against the edge of the panel. “So how come Vegeta was never a king? I mean before you showed up, when we were the only Saiyajin around. He always called himself a prince.”

 

“There was no king to kill.” She adjusted her left glove carefully. “Since he believed King Vegeta to have been killed by Freeza.”

 

“You mean he wasn't?”

 

“No.”

 

Goku thought about this for a moment. “You sure?”

 

“Yes.”

 

“How do you know?”

 

She grasped the medallion once more. “Because I killed him.”

 

 

---

 

 

 

Goku yawned, stretching out and curling his toes as he did so. After Vejata had told him she was the one who had killed King Vegeta, she had refused to answer any other questions, telling him that she was going to rest. He'd decided there would be plenty of time to talk to her later, and let her be, opting for a nap himself. There was so much information to process; best to sleep on it. However, now his stomach was grumbling loudly enough that he couldn't hear his own thoughts. Goku stretched his toes out and set them to the ground, hopping up and sauntering over to a set of cabinets and drawers. He pulled out a small capsule and depressed the button on top, and before him appeared a refrigerator. Grinning at Bulma's genius, and Vegeta's tendency to always keep one spaceship well-stocked in case he felt like training in space on a whim, Goku swung the door open to reveal slabs of ham, whole turkeys, and even several sealed containers of rice, all pre-cooked.

 

As he polished off a third turkey, he noticed that the food seemed to be disappearing faster than it was going into his stomach. Glancing to the side, Goku spotted the reason: Vejata, now awake, was leaning against the counter, casually finishing off a side of beef. “Oh, hey,” Goku greeted her, mouth full. He swallowed. “Y' could've asked.”

 

“I saw no need,” she made her way back to the icebox and fished out a comparatively small piece of pork.

 

“Hey! Don't eat that one!”

 

Shrugging, she popped it into her mouth.

 

“Waah!” Goku cried out, distressed. “I was saving it! That was the best part! You jerk, you're just like Vegeta!”

 

She grinned maliciously, pacing away. “I saw that there is a sizable gravity room in this ship. I'll be waiting there.”

 

Huffing, Goku finished up his meal. “Stupid…” he grumbled.

 

 

---

 

 

“Hey,” Goku nodded to Vejata as he entered the room. As he began his warm-up stretches, he looked her over. “Y'know, I've been thinking,” he started, and when she didn't stir from her meditative concentration, he continued, “you said you were copied from Vegeta. But you're a girl, right?”

 

At this, she opened one eye. “Yes, I am female.”

 

“So, how come you're a girl if Vegeta's a guy? That's not a very good copy, if you ask me!”

 

One corner of her mouth turned down. “No, it's not, is it? I'm told I was a bit of a…compromise.” Goku raised his eyebrows in interest. “Obviously I am a…I suppose you could call me a clone of Vegeta. That is what they wanted, after all. But, there were some technological limitations…”

“`What they wanted'?” Goku repeated. “What do you mean?”

 

“Must you know everything?” she sighed.

 

“Well, we're friends, aren't we? I want to know more about you.”

She scoffed at his wording, but supposed that she had no choice. Not that it will matter, anyway, in the end, she decided. “You'll notice that I am significantly younger than Vegeta,” Vejata started. “Younger than yourself, as well. I was not created until well after the destruction of Planet Vegeta.”

 

“So you know that Freeza blew it up, right?”

 

“Yes. That is why I am here.” Goku tilted his head slightly, and leaned heavily against one leg to stretch it. “You imagine that with all the Saiyajin working under Freeza, not one of them would have caught wind of his plans? Not one of them would have overheard some conversation?” She made her way toward the controls of the gravity chamber, and dialed one knob until the display read “150G.” It had been about the top of her comfort zone, but she was pleased to note that her strength increases during her time on Earth had done away with that barrier. “Someone did—someone high enough up that King Vegeta took heed of his advice: `Leave, and take with you only those whose absence will not be noticed.'”

 

“But wouldn't someone have noticed that he was gone?” Goku scratched his head. “I mean, wouldn't everyone notice the king wasn't there? He was a big deal, right? Wouldn't Freeza notice?”

 

“You think someone whose position means that thousands yearn to kill him each day would not regularly take some precautions?” she crossed her arms. “Especially since he was a man who needed to project strength. He wasn't so powerful, in reality. He had a number of trusted doubles, to be where he could not. Some were stronger than him,” and she seemed to travel back in time, perhaps remembering something she had learned from experience. “They were content not to kill him for the pay they received, and certain privileges granted to make up for the extent to which their lives were controlled.”

 

She smirked as her body only started complaining once the gravity hit two hundred times the Earth's. “As for Freeza, it's not as if he paid special attention to the Saiyajin until they struck him as a threat.” She popped her knuckles, turning to Goku. “He wouldn't know one King Vegeta from the next. He probably didn't even know he had look-alikes. Freeza, I hear, pinned us for morons. By and large, this is true.” She tilted her neck from side to side, and it popped too. “But only the clever live long enough to rule successfully. The Vegeta clan, I guess we always trained the next in line to make sure he's got his wits about him. Of course, in an environment like that, anyone else who wants the throne gets very smart, very fast.”

 

“Okay,” Goku nodded, his eyes glazed over as he tried to process it all, put it in context. “So…so…King Vegeta got away then.”

 

“And some of his men, as well. Someone had the brilliant foresight to bring along samples of Vegeta's—Prince Vegeta's—blood, skin, hair, whatever they had. They knew they would have no way to get him back, under Freeza's care. They also knew that he was one of the strongest Saiyajin to be born in the last millennium. The legendary Super Saiyajin, no doubt,” she grew bitter with the irony—here before her must be the alleged legendary Super Saiyajin, if there ever was one. A month before, she would have sworn it to be herself. “They were worried that King Vegeta wouldn't be able to recreate him, so to speak,” Vejata continued. “He had had other…less successful offspring.”

 

“Oh,” Goku nodded slowly, and summarized, “they wanted a copy of Vegeta `cause they thought he was gonna be the legendary Super Saiyajin. All right. And I guess they figured Freeza would kill the real one eventually, right?”

 

“Well, he did, didn't he?”

 

“Yeah…so, you still haven't answered my question, though. Why are you a girl?”

 

“Patience. Do you want to know the story or not?”

 

Goku nodded. “Yeah,” he answered quietly, a tinge of guilt apparent in his voice.

 

“It's not as if the Saiyajin are geared toward creating technology,” she continued. “So they had no way of copying Vegeta themselves. After some years of travel, though, the group who survived Freeza's attack found themselves in just the right place: a planet they had been planning on simply using for resources turned out to house bizarre life-forms. Its inhabitants were, well, an inhabitant. Many cell units, all conscious of one another—they could modify their type and purpose to suit the will of the organism.”

 

Goku cocked one eyebrow. “O-kay…?”

 

She frowned. “Think of…think of the humans. They are all different, aren't they? All separate from one another?”

 

“Well, of course!”

 

“But, if they all decide something has to be done, or say, some sort of governing power decides something has to be done—the people do it, don't they?”

 

“Er, mostly, I guess,” Goku nodded.

 

“This is a lot like that—but if you could rely on each person to do his duty every time it's asked of him.”

 

“Oh. All right…”

 

Sighing, she continued. “Physically weak, it had come to use ingenuity and technology to defend itself. If enough of it was destroyed, its ability to function could be compromised—it became very intelligent, very capable of creating what was needed for its defense. But it was under attack by a stronger force than it had ever encountered. And then the Saiyajin came.”

 

Goku tilted his head toward her slightly, to indicate that he was listening carefully as the story seemed to come to a head.

 

“They struck a bargain: that this being find a way to copy their legendary Super Saiyajin, in return for its protection. As you would imagine, it complied. However, its understanding of the genetics of such beings as Saiyajin was limited.” She glanced down at herself, flexing her hands. “Not fully comprehending the differences between the two sex-determining chromosomes, it was only able to produce females without potentially extensive further research.”

 

“All right,” Goku nodded. “I think I get it. They didn't care if Vegeta came out a girl anyway, so they just went with that.”

 

“Not quite,” she frowned. “There was concern that with King Vegeta's increasing age, a power vacuum was becoming ever more likely. They needed an heir, fast. If the female was at least similar to Vegeta in power, she would be able to kill King Vegeta before someone too weak to deserve the throne did. They dared not risk the wait.”

 

“Oh.”

 

“I was one of three that survived the gestation period. But I was far stronger than they, and they did not make it to a year's age.” Vejata paused. “Happy? Does that explain it well enough?”

 

“Yeah,” Goku nodded. “Wow. What happened to that weird alien?”

 

“The Saiyajin killed off the race that was attacking it. Then, they left with me, confident that I would survive. The Saiyajin only kept up their end of the bargain as long as they needed to,” and she seemed pleased with this. “Eventually, they found a planet suitable for inhabitance, and New Vegeta was founded. One may assume that the being that produced the clones was eventually attacked and destroyed by another, even more powerful race, confirmed to live not so far away.” She chuckled. “The limited communications the Saiyajin had with it from New Vegeta came to an abrupt and…inexplicable…halt.” Vejata grinned, perhaps imagining the violence suffered by the being that had brought her into existence; the strong living on, the weak perishing as it should.

 

“So that other race was really strong?” Goku's excitement seemed to grow again.

 

“Nothing in comparison to a group of Oozaru,” her eyes gleamed, “but for a glorified slime mold? Yes.”

 

“Oh.” Goku seemed disappointed, perhaps partly because of the death of an interesting organism, but likely more because he'd been hoping for another challenge. “Oh well.”

 

“Have you had enough of a history lesson?”

 

Goku grinned. “Yeah.”

 

“How long do you think it will take you—to teach me to ascend?”

 

“Longer every minute you stand here talking,” Goku laughed, teasing, and then answered more seriously, with brows drawn together as he smirked, “I guess it just depends on how much you want it.”

 

Vejata grinned back. More than you could know.

 

“Let's see what you can do,” Goku bent his legs and drew up his arms. “Come at me!”