Dragon Ball/Z/GT Fan Fiction ❯ Sing No Songs ❯ Arrivals ( Chapter 20 )

Chapter 20

 

Walking down to the prisoner’s room hadn’t become any easier. As always, Asdef stopped outside the door, bracing himself before entering. It felt like an intrusion. It was an intrusion. It was one thing to accept justice, another to keep opening the door to a condemned man and see his health each time reduced. At least it would be over soon.

 

Vegeta had reached a point where his heart and lungs were barely functional. The end would come rapidly. Asdef had been waiting for this, debating with himself when he should cut off the unending stream of visitors. At what point did they become uncalled for, an excessive cruelty even? He found that the decision came quite easily. Now. Now was the point.

 

One last visit, Asdef thought, and pulled open the door. It struck him then that he would be the last person to see Vegeta alive. What he said to Vegeta would be the last thing Vegeta would hear.

 

He entered the room. The prisoner was lying on his side facing the door, his head resting on his folded arm. His eyes were open, but he gave no sign that he knew Asdef was there. Asdef lowered himself to the floor, one knee on the cold stone.

 

“Vegeta,” he said, to announce his presence. Vegeta moved his face towards Asdef, a slow shift. Vegeta’s face was open, wholly relaxed, wholly disconcerting. Asdef didn’t see any emotion in the calm face, and not much comprehension either. Just pale and open and drifting.

 

We did this. We brought him low like this.

 

Did he use to think of Vegeta as a force, a supernova, a monster? He wasn’t. He was just a man. A stranger in a cell.

 

“Are you in pain?”

 

Silence. And then a whisper, it seemed to take an effort. “Not significant.”

 

“I… yes. I’ll leave then,” Asdef said. There was no set form for this, no words for him to use, not like the arrests. He had to make it up on his own. And he kept kneeling there on the floor, halted by that thought, that he was wholly on his own.

 

“I wanted to ask you something,” Asdef spoke slowly, fumbling all the way. “The things that you did. The destruction, the murders.” Long pause. “Do you regret it?”

 

Vegeta’s lips moved, his voice was uneven and silent like a breath. “That’s not the right question.”

 

“What’s the right question?”

 

“Would I do it again.” A pale smile.

 

Asdefswallowed. “Would you?”

 

“No.” Calm, almost dismissive.

 

“Why not?”

 

“Because I’ve learned better.”

 

It left Asdef mute.

 

It made him wonder if Vegeta would have to die at all. If he knew enough not to do it again, he was a different person from the one he had been. But that wasn’t how it worked, that someone could say “I wouldn’t do it again” and be believed. But still Asdef believed him. He nodded, but Vegeta couldn’t see him anymore. The prisoner had slumped, his gaze turning vague. Asdef could see struggle in the tightness of his face, but Vegeta didn’t seem to have enough strength to continue the conversation.

 

Asdefwaited. Vegeta didn’t move, but Asdef kept kneeling there on the floor for another long moment, oddly reluctant to leave. Like it was his duty to stay. Like his presence could somehow be helpful to Vegeta.

 

----

 

The news of the approaching ship from Earth seemed to have disrupted everything. Bra and Levi had to leave the room of the Readers. “We’ll call for you when the time comes,” Alma Tsan said. “Go, eat, rest.” And turned her back to Bra.

 

“Nothing has changed,” Reader Rok said, coming up by her side, keeping his voice low. “Remember what we agreed on. I’ll keep advocating for you.”

 

“Thanks,” Bra said. Too dry, too much hostility in her voice.

 

She had done her best when talking to the Readers not to be unreasonable. Being unreasonable was how wars got started, after all. And somehow she had ended up so guilty. Had she made herself think she was one of them?

 

Stewart Linne was summoned to escort Bra and Levi back to their room. Rumors about them had spread, judging by the wary glances they got from the few people they met in the hallways along the way. A part of Bra knew that she should try to make a connection, talk to Linne, find stuff out, but she felt too deflated, too much out of balance. Besides, Linne wouldn’t even meet her eyes.

 

And then they were captured. There was no other word for it. She could still open the door, but when she did there were guards outside and a flustered Linne who asked if they wanted food, drink, anything. All but pushing her back inside.

 

It was just as well, she’d rather curl up in the dark alone for awhile. Of course there was Levi, and the silence from his direction was sullen and jagged. He sat with his back to her, curled up in a big armchair, his shoulder a shield between them.

 

“Levi?”

 

She got a glare, narrow and baleful. Mad at her, sure.

 

“Fine,” she said. “We’ll talk later.”

 

She threw herself on her bed, her arm covering her eyes. Yes, she’d talk to him but not now, no. Because... because if he were to call her a traitor she wasn’t sure what her answer would be. She needed a good reason for what she had just done. She had gone along with her father’s jailers. His executioners. Why? Was there even the tiniest possibility they would let Vegeta go? After all he had done, that long long list of crimes? They would never. Almost certainly never. And yet she had gone along with them.

 

She had looked out over the lights of Node City Dania and understood what she would do.

 

She wouldn’t show herself as unwilling to compromise. That’s how wars got started. And when it all came down to it she could see their side all too clearly. They thought themselves justified. Their laws were not insane, not selfish. That was the thing. There had to be laws and semblance of justice, and if her father didn’t deserve…

 

No.

 

Her palms were clammy with sweat, her heart beating too fast, but she had to think the thought through. She had seen the list compiled against him, read some of it until she had to stop altogether. Had to navigate the ship, play board games with Levi, learn a whole new language.

 

Did her father deserved to die?

 

The question cut paths in her brain that was completely unused. As if all her life she had shaped herself to avoid that question. No one deserved to die. It was such a fundamental thing, built into the core of her. In fact, the word deserve made no sense, not in this. Nor justice, and definitely not punishment.

 

Bra was a good actor, she knew that about herself. Many years ago she had done some real acting, on a stage in front of an audience, and she could easily have made a career out of it. That job as a TV-reporter, she had just fallen into it, borrowing words and making them her own. She could assume a role and be that. Be herself as that person. And she was very aware that she was doing it all the time, always being… always being who she made herself be.

 

Did no one under any circumstances ever deserve to die? What about someone who killed and killed, killed indiscriminately, a callous butchery year after year?

 

Well. That person should be stopped, but should he be killed?

 

The train of her thoughts broke off then, because this was her father. Her father, and she had known him all her life, had put her arms around his neck so many times the memory could be summoned just like that. Just thinking about her father was like holding him in her arms.

 

She might have started sobbing if she had been alone. Instead she found herself stubbornly turning to hope. There was still a chance, she knew it. At first she wasn’t sure why. It wasn’t hopeless because…? Because it might once have been right to lock her father up, even kill him if there was no other way. But it wasn’t right anymore. It was that easy. It really was.

 

That was it. Some sort of silent unobtrusive breakthrough.

 

There was hope. Not the hope for mercy, because the word mercy too was a foreign language to her. It was the twin to punishment and thus neither good nor helpful. But protection. Protection. That made sense. That had substance.

 

And wasn’t that what the Galaxy was supposed to be about?

 

They hadn’t dismissed her out of hand. They hadn’t scoffed when she had mentioned Vegeta stopping Buu, when she had talked about the years of peace and the sacrifice he had made when making himself a willing prisoner rather than fighting back. If protection was paramount, then those things had to count, and it seemed that they did.

 

She felt free. She had said it in front of everyone, but too much of it had been an act. She hadn’t really been sure, hadn’t really understood it, only said what seemed to fit. Not now. She had found her footing, it wouldn’t be an act anymore. Had father shouldn’t be killed. It wasn’t just something she said because he was her father. She believed it for good reasons too.

 

---

 

Several long hours later, Linne and the guards opened their door and escorted them to the roof of the Node. It was a platform as large as a mountain, high and windy among the clouds. About a hundred people had gathered there, the Readers and others, some milling about, gathering in small intense conversations. Around the crowd stood guards in brown and gold. She didn’t see weapons, but she was sure they were there. Beneath them was the city. It looked light and cheerful in the sunlight.

 

The mood was… fearful, excited. They had to be aware of time running out. Just like her they were counting down the minutes to the point – soon? – when the poison would run its course and all the struggles would seem inconsequential. Sidelong glances, very few of them showing any sympathy, darted her way.

 

The spokesperson, majestic in thick blue robes, was standing by an empty space adorned with a large symbol, white on the black roof. It looked like a cluster of planets all connected like a net. The Galaxy. Bra joined her there, Levi trailing along.

 

Bra had to lean her head back to meet the blue eyes of Alma Tsan. She spoke without thinking. “Tell me how he’s doing.”

 

There was no answer, but something in the old woman’s face made Bra close her eyes. “That bad, huh,” she whispered.

 

“Don’t lose hope,” the old woman said. “Your plan was a good one. Time for reflection is what we need. Right now a fleet of ship is surrounding your Earth. Wait. Let your words sink in. You might have saved us all.”

 

Everyone except Vegeta, Bra was about to say. But the spokesperson became distracted, lifting a hand to her earpiece, just like she had done in the hall of the Readers. She glanced down at Bra with eyes that gave nothing away.

 

“Not now,” she said. “Your friends are here.”

 

She laid her large hand on Bra’s back and walked her to the middle of the empty space like Bra was a child. Only when she came to a stop was Bra able to turn around and see that Levi hadn’t followed her. He was standing among the circle of onlookers that had formed around the edges of the symbol, a pale, familiar face among the crown of strangers. He crossed his arms and shook his head, a decisive no. It shouldn’t have stunned her, but it did. She made a move to go to him, but Alma Tsan’s hand on her back turned her around. All talk, all whispers fell silent as she and everyone else was staring at the image taking shape in the air.

 

She saw the curved console and rounded walls of the capsule ship, projected and pale in the sunlight, not two meters away from her. Exactly like the ship she and Levi had traveled. A transparent figure came into view, walking and stopping as if deliberately standing in front of a camera. Standing in front of her. She gaped, startled. It wasn’t Pan, it wasn’t Goten. It was Trunks.

 

She could tell the moment he saw her. His eyes flickered from her to Alma Tsan, guarded but somewhat pleased.

 

This was… maybe good. She couldn’t tell. Here was her brother. No one that was looking could miss their similarities, the kinship of them.

 

“Bra, are you ok? And Levi?” Trunks asked, leaning forward, frowning, all ready to do something about it if they weren't.

 

She nodded. Levi came to her, stepping unto the empty space with no hesitation, his young face lit up with wondering surprise. He took his place next to her and stared back at his father, his head held high.

 

“Levi,” Trunks said, and smiled. It was a brief smile, but it left Trunks looking visibly relaxed, as if most of his worries had been eased.

 

Had he come for Vegeta, Bra wondered. Or for Levi?

 

She saw Trunks settle as his attention turned to the tall woman to her right. His official face, grave and thoughtful. He did have an air of authority, her brother. He had always been better than her at such things, at politics, at meeting powerful people. Right now he looked every bit the CEO of one of the biggest corporations on Earth.

 

“Welcome to Node City Dania,” the spokesperson said. She cleared her throat, an unobtrusive “uhm” that Bra was pretty sure she was the only one who heard, and added, “A place of peace.”

 

Trunks nodded, but he held up a hand, palm out. Wait, his gesture said. He glanced to the side, outside the field of the camera. “I didn’t come alone.” Trunks’ image was joined by another man, tall, with a wide grave face. He looked somewhat familiar, but it took her a few unbalanced seconds to figure out who he was, and then all she felt was sadness and irritation. Weren’t things complicated enough already? Time was very short, and this would only make it shorter.

 

“Let me introduce Grahman Ziegert,” Trunks said. “The president of Earth.”

 

---

 

Levi watched the white ship drop out of the sky, down and down like a falling marble. It came to a full stop just before it would have collided with the roof. Insect-like legs shot out, and the ship lowered itself on the smooth surface of the roof, bouncing lightly as its weight settled. A ship with the familiar words of Capsule Corporation on the side. It was still and waiting, a fair bit away from the gathered crowd.

 

The door opened and Levi's father was the first to come out. The Earth president was right behind him, he had to bow his head to fit through the door. Trunks waited for the president to reach the bottom of the short stairs so they could walk together, side by side. Alma Tsan’s robes fluttered as she went to greet them. All eyes were on the tall woman and the president as they walked across the roof towards each other.

 

Levi didn’t care, he was watching his father, who in turn appeared to be looking for him. When Trunks saw him he immediately left the president’s side and set a straight path towards Levi. They stopped right in front of each other. Trunks took one step closer and Levi backed away without thinking. Only when he saw Trunk’s arms fall did he realize Trunks had been reaching out to hug him.

 

“Father, I…” he said. Tripping over apology.

 

“I’m glad you’re alright.” Abrupt, almost combative. His father’s face was built for strength, Levi thought inconsequentially. Like a hero out of a story.

 

And then Bra was there, grabbing Trunks arm and pressing her face to his shoulder. It was obvious she was glad to see him, but she put it aside for haste, holding Trunks arm in an insistent grip as she summarized the situation, the collar, the visit, the glass, the Galaxy, the meeting with the Readers, a vote to win time. Talking at breakneck speed and Trunks somehow managed to keep up, nodding with her all the way.

 

“I thought you were Pan and Goten,” she whispered. “I promised they wouldn’t fight, but I didn’t know. It’s all mixed up. We really should have talked this through.”

 

Four brown-clad guards had moved to surround them, standing at a discreet distance, half facing away in a way that made it unclear exactly if they were being guarded or just kept under guard.

 

“Pan and Goten won’t be here for another day,” Trunks whispered. Bra nodded. Levi was sure he could see unspoken relief in both of their faces.

 

“The spokesperson seems kind of sensible anyway,” Bra whispered.

 

They looked over to where the spokesperson was talking to the president, a seemingly amiable conversation, sometimes exchanging nods and small bows. Levi could tell when the subject turned to them, as the president gestured in their direction, looking earnest and reassuring. More than one person was looking at them, their little family group.

 

“He knows everything,” Trunks whispered. “But don’t count on him to speak on father’s behalf. All he cares about right now is making sure Earth is safe.”

 

“Obviously,” Bra said. There was a long silence during which she and Trunks just looked at each other. Levi felt left out. “I hate this,” Bra finally said, soft as a sigh. Trunks nodded, his mouth a tight line.

 

“But you’re going to do something, right?” Levi glanced between them. His voice was a harsh whisper. “You have to make them do something.”

 

None of them looked reassuring.

 

“Yes. Well…” Bra said. “Alma Tsan was probably right. A vote right now… but yes. Let’s go over there, get them to hurry it up.”

 

Just then the spokesperson raised her hand, gesturing for them to come over. Trunks and Bra immediately complied. Levi was left alone before he followed, quite a lot slower.

 

---

 

Levi looked at the sun. It was low in the sky, and his father was still talking. He was saying a lot of things that Bra had already said. The president had showed himself willing to speak for Vegeta after all. Seemed Trunks had explained all the reasons he had to be grateful to Saiyans and the president was saying things like “in the interest of future relations” and “good will” and also “give yourselves time” and Levi knew it was useless. He could tell because Alma Tsan looked regretful. He could tell by the mood of the people around them, he could just tell.

 

“To truly get rid of Frieza,” Bra said. “You should free my father. You could let go of the last of vengeance by letting go of him. Don’t let the vengeance continue.” She sounded forceful, but also annoyingly diplomatic.

 

“Is that a threat, Bra Monique?” The spokesperson’s voice was soft.

 

“No!” Bra said. “I was just saying it's a really simple solution. If you would just…”

 

Levi stopped listening. No one was looking at him, or even attempting to ask his opinion. He turned around and left them there, still talking.