A/N: Stef-chan, Blueydmnstr - Two authors who are largely responsible for my reluctant intrigue of Vegeta's character due to their amazing portrayals of the prince in their work. And much thanks goes to another wonderful author, Leia, who beta'd this first chapter for me. Bless you! And of course, cdkobasiuk, whose kinder interpretation of the prince made me think that there was more to him than the insecure spaz with a propensity for buying into his own bullshit - that I made him out to be. grin
It was finished.
His power, his destiny, his very identity... Gone.
With one twitch of Kakkarot's mighty, ascended hand, it shattered. His neck, snapped. As though he were nothing more than a winged waterfowl that needed to be put out of its misery.
No, he corrected, unable to give voice to the words, they were that painful. Not put out of its misery, but left to live by some sadistic act of savagery, surpassing the disgrace of defeat, tenfold.
He knew he couldn't hope it away as some terrifying, twisted dream. Even nightmares weren't this cruel.
A hollow wheezing sound resonated between his ears - louder than the crashing waves, yet eerily...disturbingly...emptier than silence. It took him a moment to recognize it as his own strained breaths as they struggled to pass in and out of his pinched windpipe. His vision blurred, and his face creased in a grimace of denial.
Not...like...this...!
Vegeta tried to tilt his head back to cry the injustice at the heavens, but it just lolled around uselessly on his bruised, broken neck.
Gods! Not like this!
He clenched his eyes against the only sight his paralyzed state permitted him - that of his limp, dangling body as it hung, heavy as clay, on a splintered tree stump by his shirt. The tattered material twisted around his torso like some demented, mocking noose that hadn't quite done its job.
It was neither a warrior's life nor a warrior's death, but some vile, despicable state in between.
"How could you do this to me, Kakkarot?" he choked in his own collar. "How!?
The words of his nemesis echoed on in his head in a malevolent, demeaning tone.
…paralysis. To live the rest of your days unable to wipe your own ass, because you were, as always, too weak to beat me.
He clenced his teeth against the searing memory. A throaty whimper filled his mouth and he tried to burn it away with a scream of rage, but his efforts only served to muffle it in the anguished growls of a maimed predator.
Kakkarot was stronger. He'd always been stronger. Only now Vegeta couldn't fight it with denial or training. His heart was dead. His body, impotent. The point had been driven home quite clearly.
My legacy. He'll take it, he thought in a frenzy as a new clarity surfaced from the chaos of his despair. The planet. The universe. He'll steal it all, and I'll be powerless to stop him. He could even take...
His lip curled in a snarl.
Bulma...
A quick flashback branded his awareness of the state he'd found Kakkarot and his blue-haired scientist in when he arrived at Roshi's island. They were standing in the sand, their blended forms silvered in the moonlight. As he got closer, he saw Kakkarot's arms snake around Bulma's body, his filthy face buried in her soft neck. At first, Vegeta seethed, his hand twitching to decimate them both where they stood, thinking it was a mutual embrace.
But then he saw her terrified expression; clenched teeth, weeping eyes, quivering lips...struggling hopelessly to push away from the the randy male...
Kakkarot had sensed Vegeta's presence, and dropped her. The two fighters locked stares, and the prince saw the change. He recognized it almost immediately. Kakkarot had somehow reverted back to his Saiyan self, and had been about to take Bulma against her will. It would have been a deliberate slap in Vegeta's face.
If I hadn't shown up…
He swallowed hard, left to wonder if his saliva made it past the tweak in his numb esophagus. Then the inevitable wouldn't have been put off.
His eyes burned, and his face hurt as disgusting visuals of what Kakkarot would do to Bulma plagued his mind. Perhaps he'd even do them in front of Vegeta's helpless form, if only to spit on what was left of his pride. The prince was no fool. He'd seen the look in Kakkarot's eyes.
And I can do...nothing...
In the following cancerous emotion that made him think that Hell would pale in comparison to living, he found himself wondering if this magnitude of despair was what all the sentient beings he'd massacred had felt, knowing everything they held dear - life, destinies…kin - were going to be suddenly, violently snatched from them without adornment or apology…simply because they were lower on the food chain.
He grunted and pushed that thought back as soon as it surfaced, unwilling to be swallowed in the powerful, and totally unfamiliar sentiments that such a notion promised.
It was my place to destroy them, he reaffirmed heatedly, trying desperately to retain some semblance of who he was. . It wasn't right OR wrong. It was balance. The weak exist for the strong to exploit… Any Saiyan warrior knows that.
But a certain Saiyan warrior had just undermined the heritage that not only defined who Vegeta was, but justified his tyrannous existence. And he was left doubting his past deeds...the wonder of it probing at the back of his mind like a long-buried...something.
A gust of the night's breeze cooled against his cheeks, followed by the squawk of a descending seagull. He didn't realize his eyes were leaking until he opened them to see the hazy outline of the white bird land at his feet.
It looked up at him curiously, and hopped over to peck jerkily at his shoe with its beak.
He felt his lip twitch. A phantom sensation of his arm reaching to blast the creature tickled his consciousness. But the bird remained, as unmolested and heedful of his presence as a scavenger would be of a carcass. And somehow, that felt worse than all the beatings of Kakkarot combined.
"I'm not dead, you...stupid...beast!" he grated through his rapidly constricting throat.
The bird startled and flew off...taunting him with its flight because he couldn't kill it. He couldn't even kill himself.
But then again, if he had the power to kill himself, he'd probably just end up using it against Kakkarot anyhow. A humorless smile tweaked his lips at his still defiant nature, but it was quickly replaced by the frowning grimace of the real sentiment he felt. One so poignantly disturbing, he couldn't even describe it.
Damn you to hell, Kakkarot!
As though on some twisted cue, he sensed a displacement in the air around him. A massive pair of legs with a glowing golden mane for a backdrop materialized in his line of view. With it came a power level he respected, despised, and envied all at once. He sucked in a breath and spat at his enemy's shoes. If he could just make him mad enough...
"Finish it, you...bastard!"
The thrice-ascended Saiyan stiffened. "Vegeta." He sounded sick. "I...I'm so sorry."
Vegeta blinked. What...?!
His view spun as two powerful arms lifted his limp body off its undignified post, until it settled on the face of the being who had done more damage to Vegeta's soul than years of employ under Frieza.
And it was creased in the most pained apology he'd ever seen.
"Vegeta, I...I would have never..." Kakkarot paused mid-sentence, and sucked his bottom lip in between his teeth, his eyes shimmering with regret. "I didn't mean what I said."
No sarcasm. No harsness to his tone. The earth-raised warrior who had out-Saiyaned the prince in raw power, skill and cold-heartedness; whose capacity for malevolence made Vegeta look like a damned do-gooder...
Had snapped out of it.
And his pathetic apology was more humiliating than leaving him paralyzed in the first place. "You don't...apologize," he hissed through clenched teeth. "Like it was an...ACCIDENT!"
Kakkarot swallowed, his visage scrunching unbearably. "I wasn't myself--"
"You mock me with your...pity," he choked, pushing through the emotion in his voice. "YOU MOCK OUR ENTIRE RACE!"
Kakkarot's mouth hung open, then closed, confusion tainting the anguish in his eyes. Vegeta wanted to scream.
You are a Saiyan warrior, you imbecile! You don't apologize for being so powerful. You don't show compassion to those weaker. You don't disgrace me further by showing guilt! But most of his words couldn't make it past the lump in his throat, and all that came out were the two most significant ones.
"YOU...WON!"
Kakkarot's eyes widened, as though he'd just seen something in Vegeta's face that made him understand to a small degree. "That means nothing--"
"It means everything!" Vegeta's voice hitched and he looked away.
An awkward silence passed between them, until Kakkarot broke it with another foolish attempt at consolation. "There is more to live for than fighting, Vegeta," he said, his voice low. Serious. "I never thought myself a better person because I was stronger."
"Sp-spare me, Kakkarot."
Another pause, and then Vegeta felt the breath of Kakkarot's heavy sigh on his face.
A split second later, they were at the Lookout.
His ears were abruptly filled with howling, baritone screams. The noises were so torturous, they made Frieza's interrogation victims sound like they'd been having a good time.
It momentarily distracted him. Still draped over Kakkarot's arms like a wet towel, he tilted his head enough to see Dende stand away from… Good hell…
The namek…
In that moment, he was grateful he didn't have the nerves to feel nauseated, for what he saw would have made even his inoculated stomach feel queasy. Piccolo…or rather, what was left of Piccolo, was laying on the tiles in palpable agony. His limbs were completely gone…severed at the top, his torso flopping sickly in a pool of indigo blood like a fish in a puddle.
It was so gruesome, Vegeta almost failed to notice Gohan standing there, three times his usual size with great golden hair cascading down to his ankles.
He's...he's just as powerful as his sire... Vegeta felt the last of his defiance ebb away like a fading mirage. Did I ever...have a chance?!
"Why isn't it working?!" Gohan cried over Piccolo's screams at Dende, who looked for all the world like he was about to cry. "All you did was restore his nerve endings!"
"He has to regenerate himself," the teenage guardian responded, his wide, moist eyes not leaving Piccolo's body. "I could only give him the strength to do it."
Piccolo roared and snapped on the ground, veins bulging in a pain that no warrior could withstand. Vegeta didn't know the namek could look so blindly feral.
"Piccolo," Gohan uttered as he knelt by his dismembered mentor. "Come on, old friend. I can't take you back to mom like this."
As though in response, a wet sloshing sound carried across the tile as a green limb sprouted from the warrior's thigh stump. It was followed by a thunderous growl as his other leg popped out. Each exhale was a gravelly pant, the air hissing in and out of the namek's fanged teeth, until finally his last two limbs grew anew from the carnage.
Everyone visibly relaxed, including Piccolo who let his head fall heavily back on the floor, his chest heaving in great shuddering breaths. He closed his eyes, and Vegeta, for a brief moment, was grateful that he wasn't the one who had stolen Chi Chi during the Saiyan's absence.
Kakkarot had wreaked havoc indeed.
Vegeta's view shifted as his carrier flexed his grip, obviously struggling with a colossal surge of guilt.
A sudden effeminate gasp made Vegeta flinch, and he heard the quick patter of bare feet on tile coming towards them. He knew who it was before she even said his name.
"Vegeta!" Bulma appeared in his line of view, her worried hands wringing under her chin. She was still dressed in a night shirt, looking more frazzled than composed. He hated that she saw him like this, but for reasons he didn't care to identify, he had to see that she was untouched.
Her hair was dissheveled, and her complexion, pale. But she seemed composed, and he quickly looked away, unable to meet her concerned stare. Ever the proactive one, Bulma cried for the healer.
"Dende!"
The cool tile pressed against his head as Kakkarot laid him down, and the young guardian scuttled over. He put his hands on him without hesitating, and Vegeta cringed inside.
You look almost identical to your brothers, he thought soberly, recalling without warning the namekian tenderlings that he'd slaughtered back on Namek.
The same doubting feeling he pushed back earlier swamped his senses anew, and he recoiled from it. There are billions of lifeforms who would applaud at my demise, namekian. You should be one of them, dammit. Where the hell are your loyalties?
"Don't heal me, brat," he said in a whisper. "Don't you dare."
The guardian blinked and leaned back.
"Ignore him, Dende," Bulma said heatedly. "Heal him."
Unable to stop them, Vegeta closed his eyes as the power surged through him via those trembling green hands, giving life to one who took it, reconnecting ripped nerves and tendons. The healing. The crutch. The cheat. And it surprised him that he could despise his failure even more when it was complete.
And it also surprised him that despite a healthy, regenerated form, he still felt terminally ill inside. And he morbidly wondered how long a body could live when its soul was dead.
"Gohan, I can take you both back," Kakkarot said with more emotion in his voice than any Saiyan should ever have. It directed Vegeta's withdrawn attention briefly to the namek. Gohan had hoisted himself up under Piccolo's large frame, the later leaning weakly on the powerful hybrid for support. He lifted his emerald face to look at Kakkarot with weary exasperation, and shook his head, 'no'.
Gohan pursed his lips, and locked stares with his sire. "I can take him, dad. Don't worry."
A strained silence passed as Gohan levitated them both up into the air. Kakkarot shifted uneasily.
"Piccolo, I'm--"
The namek held a hand up to silence the guilt-ridden Saiyan, and before more apologies could be made, they shot off the edge of the Lookout.
Suddenly, all the attention was back on Vegeta, and he found himself shrinking from it. From their pity. From their accursed compassion. Bulma knelt beside him and he pushed her aside and stood to his feet. His body was healed, his strength returned, but the sickening self-deprecation that hunched his shoulders and sucked the straightness from his spine still made him feel paralyzed.
Kakkarot put a restraining hand on his arm. "Vegeta, I never intended--"
"Be quiet, Goku," Bulma said reproachfully. The scientist. She could see it. Vegeta knew she could, so he averted his eyes to keep from giving her a keyhole view of the tempest raging inside his head.
Then, feeling what was left of his sanity start to slip, he pushed through them and lunged off the Lookout. They wouldn't follow him. That, at least, he was sure of.
It was the only thing he was sure of.
The wind ripped at his face, and tugged at his hair as he sliced through the air friction. It unexpectedly hurt, like a tangible reminder that flesh and bone were nothing without a will to guide them. Without passion. Without a sense of self.
As he flew, the recollection of Kakkarot's sneering face blinded his vision, laughing at him as though he'd been an utter fool to buy so completely into his own superiority. Vegeta reflexively defied his insecurities with his mantra.
But I am a prince!
On cue, the blood roared in his ears. But for the first time, the rage failed to course through his veins. His words were drowned out by a sick, defeaning crack. The sound of his downfall. The move that had left him as motionless as a corpse. The moment he'd been indisputably defeated...ruined...dethroned.
By a third class Saiyan.
"Nngh..!" He stopped abruptly, mid flight, and hovered in the air with his head in his hands.
What's left for me?! The question burned in his chest, making it hard to breathe. Where's my place in this wretched existence of lesser beings?
The answer came - clear as a lightning strike...fragile as a snowflake in a sandstorm...
Not here.
Saiyan instincts were all he had left, and those told him that Kakkarot was the dominant male. That this was his planet. For now.
It was the only rationale he could trust in the aftermath of this cataclysmic upheaval of his identity. So he latched onto it, letting it guide him like a candle in the dark.
And the candle dictated that Vegeta leave the earth.
So he did.