Dragon Ball/Z/GT Fan Fiction ❯ The Hardest Lesson ❯ Chapter One ( Prologue )

Disclaimer: I don't own Vegeta, or any other DBZ characters, I do happen to own Chibi-Dacra, or Dacra, and any other characters I choose to put forth in this particular fic that aren't part of any anime series related DBZ.

Author's Notes: There will be a picture posted to this fic, it has to do with the first paragraph in this chapter…deal with it. This is an Alternate Reality story, there is no Bulma in here, and there never will be a Bulma in here. I'm sorry to all of the B/V fans but that's the way this story works. Bulma is not Dacra's mother although I'm sure it would be interesting to see what he would have looked like with purple hair or blue hair and eyes. I mean really, couldn't you see a purple headed Veggie? Anyway, I thought I should explain this to you nice people out there before you started reading this particular fic. After I finish writing the story of my muse I will not be writing any more stories because I will be pushing myself to make it through college classes. Hopefully, for everyone who likes my stories, I will have finally finished all of them. Unfortunately, I doubt Popular, Soft Hearted Killers, and On A Thin Line, will ever be finished…I am sorry.

Chapter One: My life until now…

I could hear him crying from the kitchen, barely audible over his father's rumbling voice when the man attempted to soothe his hurting son. Leaning tiredly back against a counter, I bowed my head down and started to cry as well.

I've known Dacra for nearly as long as he could remember and pretty much raised him as my own child while his parents where away doing their business. I'd met him when he was two and thought he was already a grown up who could tell me NO when it was time for his bath. At the time I had started babysitting him, I was about sixteen and thought I knew everything as well…but that all changed when he turned five. That was when he started having nightmares about his daddy getting killed or his mommy abandoning him…if I had known back then what I knew today, I wouldn't have convinced him that his parents where going to stay together forever. When he started going to school, I was starting college part-time and earning money by watching him, although I never would have asked his parents for the money…I loved being with the spunky child. Maybe that's why he called me first when he had a nightmare or lost his first tooth…I was there for him, no matter what was going on, he was my first priority.

I remember the first time I ever met his mother…I had been driving home from school and this insanely beautiful woman flagged me down from her mailbox. Curious, as I always was about new people, I stopped to find out what she wanted. She'd been polite and asked me if I did any babysitting for people then smiled when I had told her that I had watched several other people's children. Then she told me that she needed someone to watch her son while she was off on a business trip. When I'd asked her why her husband didn't watch him, she frowned and shook her head, saying that he didn't have the time to watch him either. One thing about our entire conversation that had struck me as odd was the fact that she told me I wouldn't cause too much of a distraction. Being the gangly, pimple dotted teen that I was I had thought that she was talking about having guys stay over while I was watching her son. Lord knows how wrong I was about that…and other things. When I turned eighteen, she insisted that I start taking Dacra over to my house for sitting since I had some how…as she put it…blossomed into a very attractive girl. Sitting here now, listening to Dacra crying in the living room, I finally realized what it was she had been afraid of during all this time. I'm twenty-six, single, and attractive, without any children to tie me down and, I distracted her male co-workers away from her when they came over to work with her. Although I do laugh about it when I'm at home late at night, I was naïve to actually believe that they were really just working. Of course, they were "working" in the loosest sense of the term, just not on what they were supposed to be doing. Apparently she wasn't happy with her life as it was, although I never could see what was so wrong with how she lived.

I was nineteen, I think, when I first met his father and had my very first crush that got squashed in fifteen seconds. He only said three words to me and I left their house that night, crying, wondering what I had done wrong. I'll leave what he said to your imagination but I will tell you that it made me look at hot men in a different way. A few days after I met him, Dacra's mother called me up and asked me why I hadn't shown up to watch her son. Unable to come up with an excuse that wouldn't make her angry with me as well, I said that I had been sick and didn't want her son to catch my cold. Obviously she bought the sad lie and I started working for them again. On my twenty-third birthday, Dacra and I were busy cleaning up his toys when his father came home and surprised the both of us when he slammed the door. Instead of running to his father, Dacra clung to my waist and peered at the man from around me, his tail twitching back and forth nervously. This time he didn't say anything rude to me and just told me I could leave and disappeared into another room. When I came back the next day, Dacra had a black eye and a few broken fingers, although he was grinning like the Cheshire cat. That was when I started to think that his father was beating him. Again his father came home early and sent me home, which I did, although reluctantly, before disappearing into that same room. This continued for about a week before I finally found out what was really going on. While he was beating his son, it wasn't in a fit of anger…they were sparring together everyday so his son could enter in some tournament I had just heard about over the radio. I was kind of embarrassed for yelling at his father for training him so harshly, especially when the man lifted one eyebrow…something I've never seen him do during the times that he spoke to me…and laughed. He had laughed at me then rolled up his shirt to display a set of hideous bruises marring his back and right side. I believe I prayed to the porcelain god several times that night, especially when Dacra revealed a jagged cut right above his knee. It was about that time that I decided never to question their fighting again.

During the next three years, I actually got used to watching the two of them sparring together…it seemed so natural when they were fighting, like it was a part of them. Of course, with Dacra's father coming home earlier, his mother came home later, and later, and later, until she just stayed away from home for several days at a time. It never occurred to me that Dacra and his father knew what was going on…even though I knew, I could never make myself tell Dacra. So I was shocked when, during dinner, he came right out and asked his father when his mother was going to move in with her fuck buddy. I think I turned thirty different shades of red and purple, especially hearing an eleven-year-old boy say such a profane word. If I had said something like that to one of my parents, I would have been beaten until I couldn't see straight and then I would have been grounded until I turned fifty. His father had just shrugged, in typical Vegeta fashion, and continued eating without a single hesitation. That particular incident had occurred a few months ago. On Dacra's twelfth birthday, I was surprised to find that his mother wasn't there to celebrate with him like she had been every other year…I think that Dacra wasn't bothered by it though, he didn't seem bothered by much after that fateful dinner conversation. He was; however, very angry that I had a date a few days after his birthday and wasn't going to watch him that day so I could get ready for it. If I hadn't seen his father throw a royal tantrum about their training room being trashed, then I would have been scared out of my mind when he threw his own. Apparently, I wasn't allowed to date anyone that wasn't approved by Dacra first. So I gained his father's permission to bring my date over before we went out, and let him meet the guy.

Dacra hated him…and the feeling was mutual. Every other word that came out of Dacra's mouth was about how my date stank of another woman and how he stood, and what a wimp he was, and on and on and on…I never thought I would be so happy to hear him quiet. Of course, my date wasn't much better, calling Dacra a spoiled rich kid and a mommy's boy. He was very shocked to see that "mommy's boy" laugh at him before falling to the ground, clutching his sides. Anyway, to make a long story about my date short, I ended up calling it a night when he started making out with another woman at the bar he took me to. Gosh…I wonder if he ever did find out who slashed his tires?

Anyway, during this last week, I finally realized that Dacra's mother was staying at home a lot, even though she asked me to watch her son while she slept, or ate, or did aerobics. One night, something she planned had backfired and her husband refused to sleep with her…I got the brunt of her anger…then apologized to…and finally asked, by a tear-streaked woman, if I would go home.

True, although Dacra wasn't surprised that his mother was cheating on his father, he still loved her very much, and was very attached to her despite all the times she had left him alone. So, when this morning finally arrived, I wasn't prepared for emotional outburst that came with the aftermath of his parent's final argument.