Dragon Ball/Z/GT Fan Fiction ❯ You've Got a Hold On Me ❯ Chapter Three - Minutes of Agony ( Chapter 3 )
[ X - Adult: No readers under 18. Contains Graphic Adult Themes/Extreme violence. ]
A/N: Hi all! I’m trying to pace myself here…! And to be honest, I rather feel like each chapter has so far been one day – one day in the lives of our favorite couple and what inner turmoil each must feel on a daily basis. Imagine! Not knowing how badly you want someone, but wanting them all the same. ^_^ It’s gorgeous, lol.
Thank you SO much to all the reviewers (if I haven’t gotten back to you personally, I WILL), and thank you to anyone who is following or favorited. That is much appreciated as well. ^_^ Oh! And go visit the “We’re Just Saiyan…” community on Google Plus! I’ll say it every time so you may as well do it! Hehehe!
I hope you enjoy this one… I’m already on the next, too, I feel like I’m on a marathon. In a good way. Enjoy!!!
Vegeta strode through the Capsule Corp residential compound like the ghost of Frieza was traipsing on his heels. He swiped a fist against his forehead to dispel the sweat there, and snarled at the shudder of slight soreness that radiated from his newly healed bone and up into his shoulder. Gods, it didn’t matter, as long as he could get away from that infirmary as quickly as possible – away from that evil, vicious, fucking gorgeous BITCH!
Surely, she’d cast some sort of spell on him, to have been allowed such close proximity to him, all the while spitting insults at him like she was the gods chosen empress! Most females at such a range from him would cower with apprehension, not – not openly challenge him as though she were some Saiyan woman Nappa had schooled him about as an adolescent.
Back then, Vegeta had known that only whores and fancy courtesans would do for his raging libido. No Saiyanoid female existed, then or now, who would stand up to him so brazenly and ignite a real, authentic desire in a pure-blood like him. Vegeta knew how to please those other females, and if they didn’t want him well, then they knew how to please him; that was always enough.
But this… This half-mad human bitch had almost made a fool of him in there. Almost… Imagine, speaking his own language to such an ignorant, back-water rube of a creature! What a complete and utter disgrace! It was desperation, yes that was it.
It had probably been two years since he’d slaked any lust on a female, seeing as he’d barely had time for such things since purging Arlia, trying to kill Kakarot and being murdered by the one creature in all the universe he’d wanted to be murdered by. Gods, if Frieza had killed Vegeta years ago when he’d assassinated the prince’s father and blown his home world to stardust instead of keeping him alive and… and…?
Vegeta growled and spat absently at the innocuous walls as he made his way out of the residential compound and back through the laboratory wing. He’d discovered through various interactions with Bulma’s sublimely oblivious sire that this was the quickest way back to the East Lawn, and the delicious, beautiful solace of the GSR. If he didn’t destroy something small and mechanical soon, he’d have to resort to wildlife or--something larger. But that might just land him without suitable lodgings, and the use of the GSR. This was something he could not abide, as he had already begun to feel a surge of power since beginning his training there. It was a spark, like a cable had been attached to him and had shot energy through his tired, struggling body. It was the awakening, surely… The one he had felt so weak and sleepy inside him in the dream: the one that would not oblige him, but somehow indulged his most wicked adversaries!
Becoming a Super Saiyan was not just his goal, Vegeta realized as he came to the main exit outside the Lab Wing and stepped into the rich, warm, springtime sunlight. He paused for a moment in the grass, closed his eyes and took a deep breath. No… No. Becoming a Super Saiyan was his destiny. It was his right – and by the Blood Goddess he would not let that blue-haired, brash piece of lusty human ass interfere anymore. Nononononono.
He shook his head and opened his eyes; the sun was blinding, and he still had trouble adjusting to such a pure white spectrum of light. Having spent most of his formative years in outer space, and his early childhood on a planet with a Red Giant for a sun that burned a bit more than four hundred million miles from his home, the bright color was at times an obstacle.
The breeze was a bit raucous today; not quite a wind yet but boisterous enough to sound those ridiculous things called “chimes” that the Briefs Mother had hanging near every window surrounding the East Lawn. It would be a capital crime to admit outwardly, but Vegeta found them oddly soothing, despite their seemingly pointless existence in general. The deeper ones, the ones with the long and thick pieces of metal hanging from them, they reminded him of his mother…
Those vague, blurry images of her that lay deep in his memory, the way a dozing cat may lay comfortable in the corner of a warm chair. In those days, when she was alive and he was a mere toddler, she would play melodies on Saiyan instruments that sounded – well they sounded just like those blasted chimes.
Vegeta’s brow tightened and his fist, bunched in the human shorts he’d been donning for the past several months now, clenched around a small metal object. The ends of it pricked the skin of his palm, and he felt himself snarl. Suddenly the chimes were not so soothing, and he turned on his heel back toward the GSR, where he could find real peace. That thing in his palm was the only thing left that mattered, whether he had spoken the Saiyan language to that meddling woman or not: whether those chimes reminded him of his long-dead mother or not.
There was no more Planet Vegeta. It drifted, grave-less, in a sea of cosmic dust, with no monument to its greatness and no one to worship it in any case. Frieza had seen to that… He had seen to everything. Vegeta squeezed the small metal object in his hands and cursed himself to the depths of hell for uttering that Saiyan word to the Briefs girl and her glossy pink lips. Gods, it had just popped out as he gazed at her; proud, stupidly bold and all puffed up at him like she wanted to throw him down and fuck him right there in the infirmary. And maybe he’d believed it then, when he’d said it, looking at her Saiyan-like body and suddenly knowing what it was like to feel desire.
But that word, that feeling rather; nothing now was that beautiful. Nothing in the known universe. Except maybe the golden glow of the Legendary.
She sighed and looked back at her computer. She couldn’t have been asleep long, as the screen saver hadn’t even popped up, but the results that glared back at her were the same and they were just as infuriating as they had been when she’d dozed off. It was as she had expected: even on Capsule Corp’s extensive research systems and databases, which included special access to government resources and Defense Operations archives, there was no researchable evidence on the Saiyan race in any of those reliable sources.
Bulma tapped her finger on the hard desk beneath her hands a few times and listened to the sound echo through the empty lab. Even if she wanted to find out what Vegeta had said to her that day in the infirmary, three days past now, she would never know. Any verifiable reference on Saiyan language or culture had been eradicated from history, it seemed. But Bulma could guess how that had happened; a certain little lizard-tailed bastard had seen to the near extinction of an entire species and personally executed the genocide himself. Bulma squinted at the screen, and a fleeting sense of pity flooded her heart. Vegeta was the only creature alive who could tell her what his words meant.
No, there was no one else who could help her find out the words he’d used or the sentiment behind him. Kami, the only other pure-blooded Saiyan still alive hadn’t even known he was one until about 4 years ago. Raditz and Nappa had met their untimely ends on Earth in what seemed an eternity ago, the latter at the hands of his own prince and master.
Bulma glanced at the clock on her computer screen. Two in the morning. That mercilessly prideful master was probably asleep in the residential wing now, she reminded herself with a shiver. That is if he had turned in early from his sessions in the GSR. Rolling her eyes, Bulma stood and clutched the coffee mug resting near her mouse. Fat lot of good that had done her. She touched a forefinger to the upper right corner of her console, and it approved her request for shutdown.
The corridor outside her lab was dim with pre-programmed night-mode lights. Bulma shuffled down the quiet hallway with the unfortunate attentiveness of a drunken college student, and once she had made it to the residential wing and into the kitchen (its control panel newly repaired at expense of her valuable time) she had deteriorated to a sleepwalking mess. God, if she spent much more time harping on Vegeta’s cryptic vigor the rest of her work was going to suffer – and probably to the dismay of her father. Bulma touched the light controls on the wall, setting them dim, and hobbled to the refrigerator. Dr. Briefs was counting on her to recalculate his miniaturization calibrator; he was dead set on the idea that more could fit into the Capsules, thus yielding more profit. As if they needed it.
Bulma shook her head at her father’s obstinance, though it had gained for them more than they could ever hope for. She retrieved some cold milk and turned to place it on the counter island, where she was met with the heavy gaze of two very deep set black eyes. She gasped loudly and started, knocking over her empty coffee mug and grimacing at the cacophony of sound that accosted her tired ears.
Vegeta sat, one knee propped on the high back chair near the counter island and his arm resting on it. Bulma took a few deep breaths and felt her face fall from abject terror to sincere irritation. Besides having been head-spinning startled, her anger boiled at his quite impassive appearance. Shirtless, and glistening with sweat in the dim lights, watching her with hooded eyes, he looked like a fucking cologne campaign ad. She snarled to hide the hateful elation she felt at seeing him.
“What the shit are you doing sitting in the dark, Vegeta?” She snapped, picking up her coffee mug and righting it so she could infuse it with some milk. He continued to regard her with the same indifference, but she thought she saw the barest hint of a twitch in the furrow of his dark brow. His fist flexed into a fist, and relaxed again.
“I was thinking. Don’t you ever just sit and think, or is that too menial a task for a genius such as yourself?”
“I think all the time, Vegeta!” She growled in response. “I just don’t do it in a dark kitchen at two in the morning like some creepy villain from a horror film.”
The air in the kitchen was heavy: like soupy broth. She wondered how long he’d been sitting there. As the milk filled her glass in a sort of macabre slow motion, Bulma became aware that a strange sound was coming from across the counter. Holy shit and corruption… Vegeta was laughing. It wasn’t that low, sexy chuckle he’d gifted her with in the infirmary three days ago, nor was it that maniacal cackle she remembered from so long ago when he’d first come to Earth with galactic domination on his mind. No… Great Kami, it was a real laugh. Soft, charming, and—and—? Bulma squeezed her eyelids shut and opened them, trying to focus on something other than that sound. It was distracting, and wonderful.
“’Creepy’?” He repeated the word with a kind of beguiled amusement reserved for, well, a prince. Bulma snorted and took a sip of milk. It calmed her roiling stomach and refreshed her brain. She became aware that a kind of musky, earthy, not unpleasant smell was wafting around her.
“Creepy.” She said again, miffed. “Weird. Scary. Nasty. Words you might be familiar with.”
“I know ‘scary’, and ‘nasty’.” He replied, the smile on his lips deteriorating into something else. “You think I’m ‘nasty’?”
Bulma squinted at him in the dim light. Was that – on his voice? Was that, provocation? Oh, two could play that game, she thought delightedly. No one beat Bulma Briefs at provocation and manipulation: no one. She quirked an eyebrow at him and took another sip of her drink.
“You can be.” She told him over the rim of her mug.
His barely-there smile fell, and Bulma was momentarily disappointed. Her bravado wavered between them like a thin sheet of glass; one tap from him and it would shatter. She already knew that. She could call out the reinforcements though, couldn’t she?
“Speaking of new words, Vegeta, you could teach me some.”
There was a moment of silence before Vegeta shifted in his chair. His knee lowered and he leaned forward on the counter, his eyes slits of unreadable emotion. That soupy feeling came back, and the earthy scent grew stronger. He did not respond, and the intensity of his gaze suddenly seemed to emanate heat. But Bulma was not one to be discouraged by such a play of irritated ignorance. He knew exactly what she meant.
“You know,” she continued slowly, pouring some more milk into her mug. “Like what you said to me the other day, after I stitched you up. I like to know what people say to me, Vegeta. It keeps me informed. I like to be informed--?”
“You interrupted my thinking, and I think we are done speaking now.” Vegeta interrupted her with all the deadly intent of a predator. He had not stopped watching her.
Bulma watched with dismay as the imaginary thin sheet of her glass bravado shattered all over the counter and onto the kitchen floor like a rain of failure. Damn him… He was the only one who could do it, DAMN him! She clenched her teeth against the overflow of respect this small victory gained for him. But no, no, she could still gain some ground.
“You could try being a bit more open about yourself, Vegeta.” She told him. Her voice was muted in the soupy air. “It’s how people become accustomed to a new life and are able to live it comfortably. Doesn’t that mean anything to you?”
Bulma gulped some of her milk, and before any other reaction was possible, Vegeta had left his chair, shoved it to the side with a vicious scrape, and was in front of her in an instant. Her back slammed against the closed refrigerator, and her coffee mug dropped unceremoniously to the floor. The ceramic floor cracked and broke the mug, and it joined the shards of her courage that already lay there. She could hear the faint trickle of the milk as it pooled at their feet.
Vegeta’s arms braced against the refrigerator, effectively trapping her. It was in that moment that she realized; that earthy, musky scent was coming from him, and it was altogether invigorating. It was like a breath of fresh air, a gulp of rushing wind. She gulped and looked into his black glare, his dilated pupils focused right on her face like darts pointed at a target. And she was swallowed whole by his presence.
“What is it with you?” He hissed. She could feel his breath on her face, as she had in the infirmary before. But his question was lost on her reeling mind.
“Wh-what the hell are you talking about? Back up, Vegeta, you’re in my space!”
The fridge creaked behind her, and she realized he had pressed up against it further. He was not about to back away. Her heart thrummed in her chest and his proximity made the hair on her arms stand on end. His aura was a bit flared up, wasn’t it?
“I said, ‘what is it with you’?” He asked again, emphasizing the words with pointed aggression. “You invite me here; give me shelter, clothing, food… You even give me a place to train and yet, if I’m not mistaken, I’m responsible for the deaths of several of your friends. You heal me, you stand up straight in front of me and you don’t back down. You ask me to let you help me, like you think I know what that even means.
“So; what the fuck is it with you?”
Bulma watched as his façade began to burn right in front of her. She was entranced, completely mesmerized by the sight until he shook his head and doused it. The scowl was back on his face, which still hovered mere inches from hers.
“Y-you…?” God dammit she would not stutter. Not now. “You can’t just live the rest of your life so totally alone.”
The fridge creaked louder, and if it were possible, he leaned in closer.
“I’ve done a pretty damn good job of it until now, Bulma.”
Had he ever actually said her name, before? With a gulp, Bulma breathed against his mouth. She’d no choice really, and her bid to remain in control of herself was waning. She could back down now, right? She could slink to the floor against the poor, abused kitchen appliance behind her and just beg him to leave her alone. She could sit in that pool of milk until he left and then weep into it with relief at his exit. But that was unacceptable. Completely, utterly, unacceptable. Bulma sucked in her breath; she sucked in the air around her that smelled, tasted, of him.
“What the fuck is it with you?” She insisted with full voice and tenor. “I offered you all of those things to give you a second chance, so you could prove who you really are, and since you can’t wrap that around your twisted little mind you think you can intimidate me? Scare me every time I try to offer you friendship--?”
“Is that what you’re offering me?” Vegeta growled, pressing the tip of his nose against hers. Something had changed about his candor this time, Bulma thought. He was suspicious, calculating.
“Great Kami, Vegeta,” she seethed quietly. “What the hell else would it be? You can hardly even accept something as gracious as that!”
In a moment, he had slammed his palms up against the fridge and turned from her with a growl that settled on the edges of a snarl. The poor fridge tilted slightly on its feet and noisily resumed its balance behind her. A few magnets scattered around her feet and dipped into the pool of milk there. Bulma watched with wide, glassy eyes as Vegeta clenched his fists and pressed both of them onto the counter island, his bare back to her.
The dim lights of the kitchen shone against his skin, marred as she remembered from the first time she had seen it. Bulma wondered at those scars for a moment; where had each one come from? Who had given them to him? Was it a weapon, a ki blast, a mere finger? Despite that he was silent now, and his back was heaving up and down with laden breaths, she stepped forward. Her hair, still pushed back by her headband, yet precariously so, stuck to the back of her neck. Kami, could it really be so hot in here? Or perhaps it was the aura of the seething warrior who still stood with his back to her; the counter creaked under the pressure of his thick hands, just as the refrigerator had.
With a jarring clarity, Bulma could sense that so far she had not failed as miserably in her personal quest as she had thought. Yamcha’s words came back to her in the silent, full air of the kitchen. You can’t flirt with a maniac alien… He’d said. No, maybe not, she reasoned. But if she could only, just—just a little bit more!
Her fingers were spreading before she could stop them, and she reached out for his bare skin. The desire to touch him again tingled in the tips of those digits like pins and needles. His whole body seemed to glow with magnetism; by the Holy Dragon, it was almost as though he was asking to be touched. But that could not be true, Bulma reasoned. Not Vegeta.
The beat of her heart resounded in her ears until her skin touched his. Surely only seconds had passed, but it felt like minutes – minutes of agony until that glorious heat flushed through her fingers and up her arm, into her throat. Vegeta’s body was like a flame in the depths of winter, and she a fluttering moth. Her full palm was against his back, in the hollow between his shoulder blades, before he spun around and clamped her wrist in his fist so tightly that she gasped and bent over from the pain.
Just before she squinted, she saw that his face had gone slack at her gasp. His grip loosened, and she stood straight to look at him again. She was so close that she could feel his energy, as well as she remembered that of Son kun. But he did not let go, and he did not look away. Bulma saw in his eyes the same wild, contemptuous fear he had shown her in the hallway when she came close to him. And then she knew what she had to do.
“Vegeta…” She said, catching her breath on the words. “Kami, I’m not trying to hurt you!”
“Then what are you doing?” His voice was steady, clear, and unafraid. His fingers tightened again, and he tugged on her wrist. Bulma sucked in a breath and held it there; it was hot, searing air.
“Shit, Vegeta,” she said through clenched teeth. “It’s called ‘comfort’.”
He shifted on his feet and faced her head on. His nose touched hers again, and all she could see was the black of his eyes – like the darkest and most insidious night. Bulma could not look away from that multiple vehicle car wreck anymore than she could the first time she’d seen him. Vegeta cocked his chin to the side, though it seemed his muscles could barely stand the movement.
“That is not what touching is for.”
Bulma gaped at him, at the candor of his voice, and the deadly accuracy with which he held her gaze. She swallowed; maybe he could feel the movement, she thought. His fist still gripped her wrist, though not so tightly.
“It is for us,” she said finally.
She stood, spine straight and locked into his gaze. Vaguely, she realized that a heat greater than the kind he was giving off had begun to gather in her center. It traveled slowly up her chest and down to her womb, where it settled and was left to a heavy, smoldering ember. Oh, shit… She wanted him. Badly. Shitshitshit, he could probably smell it! Bulma gathered her wits and willed the fire in her to die; this went way beyond her personal challenge. Too far, too far… And then, Kami help her, his grip tightened on her wrist and he pressed his lips together.
“Beautiful.” He said; the word was simple and clear.
“What?” She gasped, mortified by the desperate whisper in her voice. Oh, fuck this would not end well.
“Beautiful.” He said again. “In the infirmary. I said, ‘beautiful’.”
There was no time even to blink as he released her wrist and exited the kitchen with a gust of wind so brisk that Bulma’s knees nearly buckled. She glanced around the kitchen as though perhaps he may still be hiding there somewhere, ready to pounce on her and end her simple existence with one crack of the neck. But he was gone, the milky footprints his boots had made trailed to the door where one was cut in half by the doorframe. The musky, earthy scent still hung heavy in the air and in her nose.
By the bloody Kaio-shin and all the guardians of the galaxy. Beautiful. Who would know the Saiyan language could harbor such terms? No one but Vegeta.
Bulma righted herself and bent down to begin cleanup of the metaphorical mess on the floor. She gazed into the dim, brown/orange lights of the kitchen as she picked up the pieces of her coffee mug, her eyes glassy and far away. She thought of Vegeta when he had first come to Earth; let herself imagine who he had been before that, and the life he had known. Yes, for Vegeta his words were true as any she had said, and no one had ever touched him because they’d wanted to comfort him. Had anyone touched him with anything but malice in all his years? Even in lust, in passion?
As she crouched there, the heat still gathered and pulsing inside her more powerfully than she had felt in a long while, Bulma was resolute. Even if she couldn’t learn how to speak his language… He would learn hers.
Thank you SO much to all the reviewers (if I haven’t gotten back to you personally, I WILL), and thank you to anyone who is following or favorited. That is much appreciated as well. ^_^ Oh! And go visit the “We’re Just Saiyan…” community on Google Plus! I’ll say it every time so you may as well do it! Hehehe!
I hope you enjoy this one… I’m already on the next, too, I feel like I’m on a marathon. In a good way. Enjoy!!!
Chapter Three – Minutes of Agony
Damnherdamnherdamnher, damn her evil, bitch soul to the fiery depths of Hell, where his father and countless other traitor Saiyans surely awaited Vegeta’s arrival already! Damn her and her sickly sweet scent, her pursed and trembling mouth and her curiously arched eyebrows as she analyzed his anatomy with the mind of some soul-cracked Old Empire scientist!Vegeta strode through the Capsule Corp residential compound like the ghost of Frieza was traipsing on his heels. He swiped a fist against his forehead to dispel the sweat there, and snarled at the shudder of slight soreness that radiated from his newly healed bone and up into his shoulder. Gods, it didn’t matter, as long as he could get away from that infirmary as quickly as possible – away from that evil, vicious, fucking gorgeous BITCH!
Surely, she’d cast some sort of spell on him, to have been allowed such close proximity to him, all the while spitting insults at him like she was the gods chosen empress! Most females at such a range from him would cower with apprehension, not – not openly challenge him as though she were some Saiyan woman Nappa had schooled him about as an adolescent.
Back then, Vegeta had known that only whores and fancy courtesans would do for his raging libido. No Saiyanoid female existed, then or now, who would stand up to him so brazenly and ignite a real, authentic desire in a pure-blood like him. Vegeta knew how to please those other females, and if they didn’t want him well, then they knew how to please him; that was always enough.
But this… This half-mad human bitch had almost made a fool of him in there. Almost… Imagine, speaking his own language to such an ignorant, back-water rube of a creature! What a complete and utter disgrace! It was desperation, yes that was it.
It had probably been two years since he’d slaked any lust on a female, seeing as he’d barely had time for such things since purging Arlia, trying to kill Kakarot and being murdered by the one creature in all the universe he’d wanted to be murdered by. Gods, if Frieza had killed Vegeta years ago when he’d assassinated the prince’s father and blown his home world to stardust instead of keeping him alive and… and…?
Vegeta growled and spat absently at the innocuous walls as he made his way out of the residential compound and back through the laboratory wing. He’d discovered through various interactions with Bulma’s sublimely oblivious sire that this was the quickest way back to the East Lawn, and the delicious, beautiful solace of the GSR. If he didn’t destroy something small and mechanical soon, he’d have to resort to wildlife or--something larger. But that might just land him without suitable lodgings, and the use of the GSR. This was something he could not abide, as he had already begun to feel a surge of power since beginning his training there. It was a spark, like a cable had been attached to him and had shot energy through his tired, struggling body. It was the awakening, surely… The one he had felt so weak and sleepy inside him in the dream: the one that would not oblige him, but somehow indulged his most wicked adversaries!
Becoming a Super Saiyan was not just his goal, Vegeta realized as he came to the main exit outside the Lab Wing and stepped into the rich, warm, springtime sunlight. He paused for a moment in the grass, closed his eyes and took a deep breath. No… No. Becoming a Super Saiyan was his destiny. It was his right – and by the Blood Goddess he would not let that blue-haired, brash piece of lusty human ass interfere anymore. Nononononono.
He shook his head and opened his eyes; the sun was blinding, and he still had trouble adjusting to such a pure white spectrum of light. Having spent most of his formative years in outer space, and his early childhood on a planet with a Red Giant for a sun that burned a bit more than four hundred million miles from his home, the bright color was at times an obstacle.
The breeze was a bit raucous today; not quite a wind yet but boisterous enough to sound those ridiculous things called “chimes” that the Briefs Mother had hanging near every window surrounding the East Lawn. It would be a capital crime to admit outwardly, but Vegeta found them oddly soothing, despite their seemingly pointless existence in general. The deeper ones, the ones with the long and thick pieces of metal hanging from them, they reminded him of his mother…
Those vague, blurry images of her that lay deep in his memory, the way a dozing cat may lay comfortable in the corner of a warm chair. In those days, when she was alive and he was a mere toddler, she would play melodies on Saiyan instruments that sounded – well they sounded just like those blasted chimes.
Vegeta’s brow tightened and his fist, bunched in the human shorts he’d been donning for the past several months now, clenched around a small metal object. The ends of it pricked the skin of his palm, and he felt himself snarl. Suddenly the chimes were not so soothing, and he turned on his heel back toward the GSR, where he could find real peace. That thing in his palm was the only thing left that mattered, whether he had spoken the Saiyan language to that meddling woman or not: whether those chimes reminded him of his long-dead mother or not.
There was no more Planet Vegeta. It drifted, grave-less, in a sea of cosmic dust, with no monument to its greatness and no one to worship it in any case. Frieza had seen to that… He had seen to everything. Vegeta squeezed the small metal object in his hands and cursed himself to the depths of hell for uttering that Saiyan word to the Briefs girl and her glossy pink lips. Gods, it had just popped out as he gazed at her; proud, stupidly bold and all puffed up at him like she wanted to throw him down and fuck him right there in the infirmary. And maybe he’d believed it then, when he’d said it, looking at her Saiyan-like body and suddenly knowing what it was like to feel desire.
But that word, that feeling rather; nothing now was that beautiful. Nothing in the known universe. Except maybe the golden glow of the Legendary.
#
Bulma awoke with a start, snuffing in a breath and momentarily disoriented. The glow of the room around her was bright and uninviting; she groaned out a protest as the harsh lighting burned her eyes. Kami… She’d fallen asleep at her desk again. The lab glowed, empty of all other life but her own. She glanced about, noting that the assembly tables were empty; Vegeta had managed a full day without decimating one of the ki bots, had he? Bulma ignored the distant disappointment at this realization. She sighed and looked back at her computer. She couldn’t have been asleep long, as the screen saver hadn’t even popped up, but the results that glared back at her were the same and they were just as infuriating as they had been when she’d dozed off. It was as she had expected: even on Capsule Corp’s extensive research systems and databases, which included special access to government resources and Defense Operations archives, there was no researchable evidence on the Saiyan race in any of those reliable sources.
Bulma tapped her finger on the hard desk beneath her hands a few times and listened to the sound echo through the empty lab. Even if she wanted to find out what Vegeta had said to her that day in the infirmary, three days past now, she would never know. Any verifiable reference on Saiyan language or culture had been eradicated from history, it seemed. But Bulma could guess how that had happened; a certain little lizard-tailed bastard had seen to the near extinction of an entire species and personally executed the genocide himself. Bulma squinted at the screen, and a fleeting sense of pity flooded her heart. Vegeta was the only creature alive who could tell her what his words meant.
No, there was no one else who could help her find out the words he’d used or the sentiment behind him. Kami, the only other pure-blooded Saiyan still alive hadn’t even known he was one until about 4 years ago. Raditz and Nappa had met their untimely ends on Earth in what seemed an eternity ago, the latter at the hands of his own prince and master.
Bulma glanced at the clock on her computer screen. Two in the morning. That mercilessly prideful master was probably asleep in the residential wing now, she reminded herself with a shiver. That is if he had turned in early from his sessions in the GSR. Rolling her eyes, Bulma stood and clutched the coffee mug resting near her mouse. Fat lot of good that had done her. She touched a forefinger to the upper right corner of her console, and it approved her request for shutdown.
The corridor outside her lab was dim with pre-programmed night-mode lights. Bulma shuffled down the quiet hallway with the unfortunate attentiveness of a drunken college student, and once she had made it to the residential wing and into the kitchen (its control panel newly repaired at expense of her valuable time) she had deteriorated to a sleepwalking mess. God, if she spent much more time harping on Vegeta’s cryptic vigor the rest of her work was going to suffer – and probably to the dismay of her father. Bulma touched the light controls on the wall, setting them dim, and hobbled to the refrigerator. Dr. Briefs was counting on her to recalculate his miniaturization calibrator; he was dead set on the idea that more could fit into the Capsules, thus yielding more profit. As if they needed it.
Bulma shook her head at her father’s obstinance, though it had gained for them more than they could ever hope for. She retrieved some cold milk and turned to place it on the counter island, where she was met with the heavy gaze of two very deep set black eyes. She gasped loudly and started, knocking over her empty coffee mug and grimacing at the cacophony of sound that accosted her tired ears.
Vegeta sat, one knee propped on the high back chair near the counter island and his arm resting on it. Bulma took a few deep breaths and felt her face fall from abject terror to sincere irritation. Besides having been head-spinning startled, her anger boiled at his quite impassive appearance. Shirtless, and glistening with sweat in the dim lights, watching her with hooded eyes, he looked like a fucking cologne campaign ad. She snarled to hide the hateful elation she felt at seeing him.
“What the shit are you doing sitting in the dark, Vegeta?” She snapped, picking up her coffee mug and righting it so she could infuse it with some milk. He continued to regard her with the same indifference, but she thought she saw the barest hint of a twitch in the furrow of his dark brow. His fist flexed into a fist, and relaxed again.
“I was thinking. Don’t you ever just sit and think, or is that too menial a task for a genius such as yourself?”
“I think all the time, Vegeta!” She growled in response. “I just don’t do it in a dark kitchen at two in the morning like some creepy villain from a horror film.”
The air in the kitchen was heavy: like soupy broth. She wondered how long he’d been sitting there. As the milk filled her glass in a sort of macabre slow motion, Bulma became aware that a strange sound was coming from across the counter. Holy shit and corruption… Vegeta was laughing. It wasn’t that low, sexy chuckle he’d gifted her with in the infirmary three days ago, nor was it that maniacal cackle she remembered from so long ago when he’d first come to Earth with galactic domination on his mind. No… Great Kami, it was a real laugh. Soft, charming, and—and—? Bulma squeezed her eyelids shut and opened them, trying to focus on something other than that sound. It was distracting, and wonderful.
“’Creepy’?” He repeated the word with a kind of beguiled amusement reserved for, well, a prince. Bulma snorted and took a sip of milk. It calmed her roiling stomach and refreshed her brain. She became aware that a kind of musky, earthy, not unpleasant smell was wafting around her.
“Creepy.” She said again, miffed. “Weird. Scary. Nasty. Words you might be familiar with.”
“I know ‘scary’, and ‘nasty’.” He replied, the smile on his lips deteriorating into something else. “You think I’m ‘nasty’?”
Bulma squinted at him in the dim light. Was that – on his voice? Was that, provocation? Oh, two could play that game, she thought delightedly. No one beat Bulma Briefs at provocation and manipulation: no one. She quirked an eyebrow at him and took another sip of her drink.
“You can be.” She told him over the rim of her mug.
His barely-there smile fell, and Bulma was momentarily disappointed. Her bravado wavered between them like a thin sheet of glass; one tap from him and it would shatter. She already knew that. She could call out the reinforcements though, couldn’t she?
“Speaking of new words, Vegeta, you could teach me some.”
There was a moment of silence before Vegeta shifted in his chair. His knee lowered and he leaned forward on the counter, his eyes slits of unreadable emotion. That soupy feeling came back, and the earthy scent grew stronger. He did not respond, and the intensity of his gaze suddenly seemed to emanate heat. But Bulma was not one to be discouraged by such a play of irritated ignorance. He knew exactly what she meant.
“You know,” she continued slowly, pouring some more milk into her mug. “Like what you said to me the other day, after I stitched you up. I like to know what people say to me, Vegeta. It keeps me informed. I like to be informed--?”
“You interrupted my thinking, and I think we are done speaking now.” Vegeta interrupted her with all the deadly intent of a predator. He had not stopped watching her.
Bulma watched with dismay as the imaginary thin sheet of her glass bravado shattered all over the counter and onto the kitchen floor like a rain of failure. Damn him… He was the only one who could do it, DAMN him! She clenched her teeth against the overflow of respect this small victory gained for him. But no, no, she could still gain some ground.
“You could try being a bit more open about yourself, Vegeta.” She told him. Her voice was muted in the soupy air. “It’s how people become accustomed to a new life and are able to live it comfortably. Doesn’t that mean anything to you?”
Bulma gulped some of her milk, and before any other reaction was possible, Vegeta had left his chair, shoved it to the side with a vicious scrape, and was in front of her in an instant. Her back slammed against the closed refrigerator, and her coffee mug dropped unceremoniously to the floor. The ceramic floor cracked and broke the mug, and it joined the shards of her courage that already lay there. She could hear the faint trickle of the milk as it pooled at their feet.
Vegeta’s arms braced against the refrigerator, effectively trapping her. It was in that moment that she realized; that earthy, musky scent was coming from him, and it was altogether invigorating. It was like a breath of fresh air, a gulp of rushing wind. She gulped and looked into his black glare, his dilated pupils focused right on her face like darts pointed at a target. And she was swallowed whole by his presence.
“What is it with you?” He hissed. She could feel his breath on her face, as she had in the infirmary before. But his question was lost on her reeling mind.
“Wh-what the hell are you talking about? Back up, Vegeta, you’re in my space!”
The fridge creaked behind her, and she realized he had pressed up against it further. He was not about to back away. Her heart thrummed in her chest and his proximity made the hair on her arms stand on end. His aura was a bit flared up, wasn’t it?
“I said, ‘what is it with you’?” He asked again, emphasizing the words with pointed aggression. “You invite me here; give me shelter, clothing, food… You even give me a place to train and yet, if I’m not mistaken, I’m responsible for the deaths of several of your friends. You heal me, you stand up straight in front of me and you don’t back down. You ask me to let you help me, like you think I know what that even means.
“So; what the fuck is it with you?”
Bulma watched as his façade began to burn right in front of her. She was entranced, completely mesmerized by the sight until he shook his head and doused it. The scowl was back on his face, which still hovered mere inches from hers.
“Y-you…?” God dammit she would not stutter. Not now. “You can’t just live the rest of your life so totally alone.”
The fridge creaked louder, and if it were possible, he leaned in closer.
“I’ve done a pretty damn good job of it until now, Bulma.”
Had he ever actually said her name, before? With a gulp, Bulma breathed against his mouth. She’d no choice really, and her bid to remain in control of herself was waning. She could back down now, right? She could slink to the floor against the poor, abused kitchen appliance behind her and just beg him to leave her alone. She could sit in that pool of milk until he left and then weep into it with relief at his exit. But that was unacceptable. Completely, utterly, unacceptable. Bulma sucked in her breath; she sucked in the air around her that smelled, tasted, of him.
“What the fuck is it with you?” She insisted with full voice and tenor. “I offered you all of those things to give you a second chance, so you could prove who you really are, and since you can’t wrap that around your twisted little mind you think you can intimidate me? Scare me every time I try to offer you friendship--?”
“Is that what you’re offering me?” Vegeta growled, pressing the tip of his nose against hers. Something had changed about his candor this time, Bulma thought. He was suspicious, calculating.
“Great Kami, Vegeta,” she seethed quietly. “What the hell else would it be? You can hardly even accept something as gracious as that!”
In a moment, he had slammed his palms up against the fridge and turned from her with a growl that settled on the edges of a snarl. The poor fridge tilted slightly on its feet and noisily resumed its balance behind her. A few magnets scattered around her feet and dipped into the pool of milk there. Bulma watched with wide, glassy eyes as Vegeta clenched his fists and pressed both of them onto the counter island, his bare back to her.
The dim lights of the kitchen shone against his skin, marred as she remembered from the first time she had seen it. Bulma wondered at those scars for a moment; where had each one come from? Who had given them to him? Was it a weapon, a ki blast, a mere finger? Despite that he was silent now, and his back was heaving up and down with laden breaths, she stepped forward. Her hair, still pushed back by her headband, yet precariously so, stuck to the back of her neck. Kami, could it really be so hot in here? Or perhaps it was the aura of the seething warrior who still stood with his back to her; the counter creaked under the pressure of his thick hands, just as the refrigerator had.
With a jarring clarity, Bulma could sense that so far she had not failed as miserably in her personal quest as she had thought. Yamcha’s words came back to her in the silent, full air of the kitchen. You can’t flirt with a maniac alien… He’d said. No, maybe not, she reasoned. But if she could only, just—just a little bit more!
Her fingers were spreading before she could stop them, and she reached out for his bare skin. The desire to touch him again tingled in the tips of those digits like pins and needles. His whole body seemed to glow with magnetism; by the Holy Dragon, it was almost as though he was asking to be touched. But that could not be true, Bulma reasoned. Not Vegeta.
The beat of her heart resounded in her ears until her skin touched his. Surely only seconds had passed, but it felt like minutes – minutes of agony until that glorious heat flushed through her fingers and up her arm, into her throat. Vegeta’s body was like a flame in the depths of winter, and she a fluttering moth. Her full palm was against his back, in the hollow between his shoulder blades, before he spun around and clamped her wrist in his fist so tightly that she gasped and bent over from the pain.
Just before she squinted, she saw that his face had gone slack at her gasp. His grip loosened, and she stood straight to look at him again. She was so close that she could feel his energy, as well as she remembered that of Son kun. But he did not let go, and he did not look away. Bulma saw in his eyes the same wild, contemptuous fear he had shown her in the hallway when she came close to him. And then she knew what she had to do.
“Vegeta…” She said, catching her breath on the words. “Kami, I’m not trying to hurt you!”
“Then what are you doing?” His voice was steady, clear, and unafraid. His fingers tightened again, and he tugged on her wrist. Bulma sucked in a breath and held it there; it was hot, searing air.
“Shit, Vegeta,” she said through clenched teeth. “It’s called ‘comfort’.”
He shifted on his feet and faced her head on. His nose touched hers again, and all she could see was the black of his eyes – like the darkest and most insidious night. Bulma could not look away from that multiple vehicle car wreck anymore than she could the first time she’d seen him. Vegeta cocked his chin to the side, though it seemed his muscles could barely stand the movement.
“That is not what touching is for.”
Bulma gaped at him, at the candor of his voice, and the deadly accuracy with which he held her gaze. She swallowed; maybe he could feel the movement, she thought. His fist still gripped her wrist, though not so tightly.
“It is for us,” she said finally.
She stood, spine straight and locked into his gaze. Vaguely, she realized that a heat greater than the kind he was giving off had begun to gather in her center. It traveled slowly up her chest and down to her womb, where it settled and was left to a heavy, smoldering ember. Oh, shit… She wanted him. Badly. Shitshitshit, he could probably smell it! Bulma gathered her wits and willed the fire in her to die; this went way beyond her personal challenge. Too far, too far… And then, Kami help her, his grip tightened on her wrist and he pressed his lips together.
“Beautiful.” He said; the word was simple and clear.
“What?” She gasped, mortified by the desperate whisper in her voice. Oh, fuck this would not end well.
“Beautiful.” He said again. “In the infirmary. I said, ‘beautiful’.”
There was no time even to blink as he released her wrist and exited the kitchen with a gust of wind so brisk that Bulma’s knees nearly buckled. She glanced around the kitchen as though perhaps he may still be hiding there somewhere, ready to pounce on her and end her simple existence with one crack of the neck. But he was gone, the milky footprints his boots had made trailed to the door where one was cut in half by the doorframe. The musky, earthy scent still hung heavy in the air and in her nose.
By the bloody Kaio-shin and all the guardians of the galaxy. Beautiful. Who would know the Saiyan language could harbor such terms? No one but Vegeta.
Bulma righted herself and bent down to begin cleanup of the metaphorical mess on the floor. She gazed into the dim, brown/orange lights of the kitchen as she picked up the pieces of her coffee mug, her eyes glassy and far away. She thought of Vegeta when he had first come to Earth; let herself imagine who he had been before that, and the life he had known. Yes, for Vegeta his words were true as any she had said, and no one had ever touched him because they’d wanted to comfort him. Had anyone touched him with anything but malice in all his years? Even in lust, in passion?
As she crouched there, the heat still gathered and pulsing inside her more powerfully than she had felt in a long while, Bulma was resolute. Even if she couldn’t learn how to speak his language… He would learn hers.
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