Dragon Ball/Z/GT Fan Fiction ❯ The True King of Thieves ❯ In White, In Red ( Chapter 2 )

The True King of Thieves

Ryomi Hayashi

Chapter Two:

In White, In Red

Bulma followed the man through the makeshift path winding between the tents. The location was nothing more than some tents set up in a clearing, obviously temporary. Such a camp could only belong to nomads, or fugitives on the run. But was Vegeta really their leader? Who was Kyrinn?

The camp did look organized, and sufficiently run. It was buzzing with life, it seemed everyone had a job and everyone was busy doing it. She did notice sleep rings around some eyes and sloppy walks that could only indicate tiredness. It seemed likely of Vegeta to overwork his men, he probably thought there was no such thing a too much discipline.

In any case, the fact that Bulma was collecting all these notions on the camp was sort of an acquired skill from being suddenly thrown into a strange place. She was on alert mode, to say the least, and constant surveillance was a necessity, she convinced herself. Bulma didn't really know when her next meal would come, or how long she would be supplied shelter, so in a way, she was lucky to be living. Not that she was one to worry, but times like these called for pragmatic safety.

Thoughts of survival were becoming a weight on her shoulders, so she quickly dismissed them. Looking around, she tried to enjoy the new culture and people she was presented with instead of complaining to herself. The clothes and armor were fascinating, and most fascinating of all were the designs painted on the tents. So much time and work was put into detail, it seemed like this group of thieves traditionally had a lot of time on their hands. Aristocratic, Bulma speculated.

The word reminded her of Vegeta, and she turned to steal a glance at him. As she looked at Vegeta she understood why he had requested to be called "Your Highness". His walk was ruthless, his appearance rugged and untamed, his tunic lined with gold thread suggesting great wealth. If anyone were the leader, it would be him.

Suddenly, a voice sounded that was obviously aimed at this king. "Vegeta, you conniving little devil! Walking around with such a lovely woman and not introducing her to me," the voice said adding, "Trying to keep all the beautiful women to yourself, shame on you."

Bulma turned to see a tall, well-built but rather scrawny man with beautiful green eyes and dirty dark brown hair, wind-tossed and streaking across his face. He wore a tunic, assumable a peasant's one, and some armor covering only his forearms and shins. His nose seemed a bit long, and his ears strangely small. But despite his flaws, he was considerably handsome. She smiled at him cheerfully, trying to be polite.

"Hi, I'm Bulma," she said, he took her hand gently and kissed it. She saw Vegeta from the corner of her eye scowling. Then again, that was mostly all he did.

"And I am Kyrinn, your humble servant," he said while releasing her hand. Bulma still smiled, but wasn't too impressed by his charm.

"Aren't you and Vegeta competing for leadership? Kind of hard to be my 'humble servant' if you're king of whatever this is," she said with a giggle.

He smiled and his eyes never left hers. "Yes, I do suppose there is a bit of competition between us. Vegeta likes to convince himself he has the upper hand, but don't let him fool you."

"Perhaps you should consider 'convincing yourself' to bite your tongue before I punish you for treason," Vegeta started, his temper and patience exploding in flames. His mood always went afoul when Kyrinn was near, something Bulma was now becoming aware of.

Kyrinn, however, paid no heed to his threat and continued. "Bulma, you've given me the impression that our dear friend Vegeta here has not explained to you your whereabouts."

Bulma shook her head, and ignored Vegeta and his now firmly clenched jaw and death grip on his sheathed sword.

"Well, you may have already noticed that this is a thieves camp, but in any case, don't be alarmed. We only steal from the Miyana people and their allies. Because of this, however, any camp we make is temporary. Also, this is a leaderless 'tribe', as we call it, but I can guarantee it will not stay this way." He finished his explanation with a steady shifting of his eyes to an infuriated Vegeta and back to Bulma.

"But who are these Miyanans? I mean, I know they're your enemies and all, but who exactly are they?"

"Dirty, incestuous, slanderous, monarchists-"

"Please, Vegeta," Kyrinn said waiving his hand, "Stop lavishing them with praise, you're making me sick."

Bulma's eyes widened, "you consider that praise?"

"For anyone but the Miyanans I would not," Kyrinn said gravely.

"That bad, huh?" He nodded, still grim. Vegeta, by now, had stormed off in a fury of impatience. Bulma hadn't noticed.

"Our acts of thievery against the Miyanan people have been only out of mild retribution. They have kidnapped our people and tortured us only because of our bloodline. It was because of this that we fled to the forest and became thieves."

Bulma nodded sympathetically.

"Tell me something, though," she started, "you don't seem to be at all surprised that I don't know about this camp or the Miyanans. Is that normal around here?"

"We have our fair share of tourists and visitors who aren't familiar with our tribe. You are a foreigner, are you not? I don't mean to sound rude, but I did notice your accent-"

"Yes," she interrupted, "I'm not from around here. I didn't think many outsiders came here, so I asked you."

"Well then, I hope my answer sufficed."

"Yes, but I still have more questions to ask. How big is this camp? I can't really tell from the time I've been here."

"Perhaps I should show you around, then," Kyrinn said, offering his arm, "seeing as Vegeta has not done the like." Bulma took it and smiled.

"Thanks, you're such a gentlemen," she said. He waved his hand as a modest gesture, and began to walk.

Kyrinn then led her around, showing her the organization system of the tents. He had picked up that she possessed a questioning mind, and consequently familiarized her with the more intellectual aspects of the camp. The tent organization was sort of a mini hierarchy, with classes and stages, most of which people were born into. Some were for warrior-thieves, other for more advanced thieves, more yet for mercenaries, and the last few for archers and cooks. There were a few tents for the women, the servants, and any miscellaneous (mostly refugees), but they were so far down the social ladder that Bulma had to ask before he mentioned it.

Kyrinn also showed her to a few of his thief friends, all of which Bulma disliked. As much as she hated this part of the "tour", it proved to be quite entertaining to reflect back on later. She was able to meet three of his friends, who coincidently summed up the variety of the camp, as well as the vulgarity. Something Bulma should've come to expect from a group of forest thieves with such an aggressive man as their semi-leader.

One was missing an eye, but kept the other one on her chest during the introduction. The other one was more classy and civilized, as though he had been court trained. The end of their brief conversation convinced her that "court training" didn't bother to include manners, because he was even ruder than Vegeta and twice as annoying. The last was too busy with his archery to pay them heed and thus, also rude. In any case, all three friends proved to be very comic indeed, something she failed to appreciate at the time.

In summery, what stuck with her most about this short excursion, more than annoying friends and strange class systems, was one thing. During this tour, Kyrinn casually accepted her compliments and beamed with false happiness. Once he was done showing her around she was supremely assured of this one thing. He didn't really like her.

She couldn't expect anything more from a womanizer, but her mild crush on the chauvinistic power-hungry thief had left her heart stinging with rejection. I like him but he doesn't like me, how typical, Bulma thought to herself. She did, however, doubt she would miss his friends.

Finally, Kyrinn completed the tour by leading her to the tent she would sleep in. The tent was near the warrior-archer tents, as to not offend her by placing her in a low-ranking tent, even if it were a woman's. It was simple and plain save for a design painted on the side, one Kyrinn had explained marked it as a Kagarian thief tent. This tent was also not very different from the one she had woken up in; it was made out of the same course material and not dyed as some of the other tents had been.

"Should you need anything, call on Warren. He'll be your attendant for the time being; unfortunately we're short on women. He's close enough," he said with a wink. She laughed. "Pleasant dreams," he added, and left without much hesitation. Bulma shrugged it off and crawled into the tent, eager to see what it looked like inside.

Her tent was nothing but blankets and some candle wax on the ground with a small pit dug around it to prevent fires. There were also some men's nightclothes laid out for her, most likely the only nightclothes in the entire camp. Most of the men slept naked, she was previously informed by the one-eyed man.

Bulma stood there, her gaze lingering on the nightclothes and the blanket underneath them and she took a moment to reflect on what had just happened. When moments like these came and so many events flooded in at once, it felt normal to stand back, take a break, and realize what was going on.

She had met more people, something that had an impact on her almost as much as being thrown into a strange new setting. These people were different from people in her world, so much here was. But what was interesting was that, like the people from her home, the thieves there had personalities they masked and covered no matter who they were. They dressed their souls up in red and in white to mask who they were, playing roles and inhibiting feelings. Everyone in her world did this, it was something so normal she often forgot about it until she was betrayed or deceived.

The purpose of this social disguise that everyone wore was to hide from the feeling of vulnerability. To hide from the feeling of feeling raw, or exposed. Bulma came to consider all this because that was exactly how she felt this strange place. She was fragile, clinging to life in a new habitat with fear it would vanish so easily.

In other words, she felt as anyone else would.

Thinking these thoughts gave her a sudden shiver for a reason she didn't understand. Bulma realized it was dark and cold in the tent, and blamed it on that. She looked down and saw her stub of a candle and reached down to pick it up. On her tour of the thieves' camp, Bulma saw a blazing fire in the center of the clearing. Kyrinn had explained that it was where the thieves of the camp came to light their candles instead of going to the trouble of lighting it themselves. When they were introduced to a new camp, the fire was the first thing to go up. A sort of a ceremony.

With this in mind, Bulma took her candle and left her tent via the flap all the other tents also shared. She ventured outside to the fire in the middle of the camp, hugging her self tightly as a pathetic attempt to warm herself from the cold. The wind had picked up and she could see the candles in the open tents flicker and the shadows that the light portrayed against the canvas falter slightly. Looking around, she wondered if many of her days would feature mostly tents, candles, and rude thieves, and if so, how long she could stand it.

Unbeknownst to her, a man spotted her trembling figure and crept up to her. He took off the black cloak he had slung over his shoulder, and debated on whether or not he should put it on her. Deciding her favor was worth more than a slight lowering of pride, he flung the heavy garment over her shoulders.

Bulma jumped a little at the surprise and her head turned to the side quickly to see what had happened. She saw the cloak before she saw the man, but from it she could tell whom it was. "Vegeta," she said, turning around to face him completely, yellow firelight flickering on her face. He scoffed.

"I don't need such a crutch," he said, referring of course to the cloak, "besides, it covers up your ugliness." She laughed and thanked him anyway, now wrapping it around herself.

"Vegeta, can I ask you a question?"

"What is it?" he asked, suspiciously, not sure if he wanted to have to hear more of her questions that led to confusing answers.

"Why is Kyrinn so bent on becoming leader?" she asked, and noticed him cringe when she said Kyrinn's name.

"He's trying pathetically to mask his need for our protection. The idiot doesn't realize his insane patriotism to our tribe is leading the thieves into suspicion. In any case, he has no chance of winning with me in the race."

Bulma ignored the snide, final comment. "But why does he need your protection?"

"Other than him being a pathetically poor swordsman and weak fighter, he is also a Miyanan refugee. Do you know what torture it is being a safety blanket for that lowly idiot?"

She laughed again and turned to look for a place to sit down, thinking that this conversation would be long enough to take a seat. Bulma saw a rock that didn't look comfortable, so she sat on the forest floor with her dirty dress and lifted the cloak so it wouldn't touch the dirt. Vegeta continued to stand but leaned against a tree, one of the few trees that were scattered about in the clearing where the camp was temporarily.

Meanwhile, his head was swimming with contradictions. Vegeta liked that she took the time to converse with him (though of course he felt he deserved it) but her interest in Kyrinn was like a dagger in his heart. To think, his woman falling in love with none other than his arch nemeses. Sure, he hadn't known her long enough to call her his woman, but wasn't love enough? He decided to warn her of Kyrinn before he poisoned her with his "charm".

"Why do you hate him so much anyway?" she said, interrupting his plans, "I mean, what exactly did he do to make you have such a negative impression of him?"

"He's been nothing but a nuisance, ruining my improvements on our tribe, forcing himself onto any woman that strays onto the camp-"

"What?!" she exclaimed. He smirked internally. He had her just where he wanted her.

"Don't tell me you expected better of him. Rape's his only source of gratification; most of the men here don't even realize it. I'm starting to believe his insanity is contagious."

"Oh my god, that's horrible," she said, placing a hand over her mouth. She met him, liked him, and found out he was a rapist all in a matter of hours. I have such horrible taste in men, she thought to herself.

He glared at her venomously. "I can assure you, woman, there are far more reasons to hate him than just his dirty hobbies. Stay away from him if you value your life."

Vegeta's plan had been carried out brilliantly, and yet he wasn't satisfied. He could tell she really liked the man, and that he wouldn't soon coax her into a relationship. It wasn't surprising, though, Kyrinn had seduced his fair share of women. Vegeta, on the other hand, did a brilliant job of scaring off any women that wanted to commit, so he was usually stuck with whores and bored noblewomen. The rest found him impossible to have a relationship with.

Looking down at Bulma, he felt the conversation was not worth continuing. Especially considering the topic was Kyrinn, something he would without a doubt rather avoid. Feeling assured he should leave, he abruptly turned and walked away from Bulma. He didn't bother to say goodbye and left without a second thought, progressing deeper into the cold of the night and away from the fire. As he walked, hope for her loving him became as distant as he was from her.

But, as the wise say, nothing in life is for certain.