Chapter 4
“Dear god, look at the size of him,” Dr. Briefs breathed as he looked at the man laid out on the hospital bed. “He must weigh at least 400 pounds!”
Bulma shook her head. “Nope. Only 378. Still pretty good, I’d say,” she mumbled
as she tinkered with one of the health-monitoring machines.
“Do you think he’ll scar?” Mrs. Briefs asked with concern, folding her hands
and squeezing tightly. “It would be such a shame to ruin that handsome face.”
Bulma shot her mother a disapproving look. “Shouldn’t you be watching Goku?”
she reminded her parent roughly.
Mrs. Briefs giggled and put a hand to her mouth. “Oh, heavens, Bulma, Goku’s a
grown man!”
“A grown man with a history of head injuries,” Bulma muttered to herself, and
continued to probe the machine with her screwdriver.
“Dear, please make sure our young friend is comfortable,” Dr. Briefs offered.
“I’m sure Goku would like something to drink. He’s been sitting out there for a
few hours now.”
Bulma’s head shot up. “Dad, what time is it?” she asked frantically.
Dr. Briefs took his hand away from the wiring he was holding and glanced at his
watch. “It’s nearly eleven,” he replied.
“Mom!” Bulma shouted at her mother, who was leaving the room. Her mother turned
and waited, hands folded placidly at her midsection. “Remind Goku to call
ChiChi! If he left this morning at sunup she’s probably desperate to know where
he is.”
“Okay, darling,” her mother chirped, and drifted out of the room.
Dr. Briefs wiped a bit of sweat off of his brow. “Uh, Bulma,” he said with
uncertainty. “I really do think you should try to keep it down. We do have a
very seriously injured young man here, you know.”
Bulma’s eyes widened as she recalled the situation. “Oh, yeah, sorry,” she
mumbled, staring at the wounded man’s face. “Mom’s right. He wouldn’t be
half-bad looking if he wasn’t covered with burns. He might even be handsome.
Lord knows he’s got a great build,” she murmured to herself.
“I think if we put some of that new gel on him his skin should heal fine,” Dr.
Briefs commented, plunging his hands into the wiring of a different machine.
Bulma nodded and screwed on the back plate of the equipment she was working on,
carefully rolling the device over to the bedside. She snapped the plugs into
place with regard to the other machines monitoring the man’s vital signs and
stood, hands pressed into the small of her back. “We’re going to go through a
lot of gel,” she said, impressed with the sheer number of bandages the med
techs had wrapped him in.
Dr. Briefs smiled through his moustache. “I just hope he doesn’t get too much better-looking when he’s healed, otherwise I might lose your mother,” he joked.
“Dad, you couldn’t lose Mom if you tried,” Bulma replied with a laugh.
It was going to be a very long night, Vegeta decided as he was jostled and
bumped by the movements of the Arlians who handled him. His wounds were still
bleeding, although not with the faucet-like stream of before. He could hear the
soft moans of Zarbon as the Arlians carried him along as well, their captors
winding farther down into the ground. After what seemed like an eternity they
stopped, throwing Vegeta and Zarbon into a small, dank cell. Zarbon gasped in
pain as he hit the floor, and Vegeta just lay and snarled as the Arlians left
them. The footsteps faded after time, and Vegeta finally let out a breath.
“Give me a week and I’ll be ready to tear their heads off,” he growled to the
other man.
“Goody for you,” Zarbon spat angrily. “Not everyone has your bizarre Saiyan
constitution.”
Vegeta grimaced in pain and barked a laugh. “Why do you think Freeza’s family
is so afraid of us?” he said with a chuckle.
Zarbon tried to turn his head and failed, finding himself facing the ceiling.
“I don’t understand it,” he mumbled. “Just three years ago this planet was
given an A rating by the reconnaissance report. Now it’s mostly just a dustball
with little vegetation and hundreds of angry bugs with really big guns. What
happened?”
“I may be of help,” a voice from across the hall said. Vegeta was able to turn
his head just enough to see the red eyes of one of the Arlians through the bars
of the cell across the way.
“How’s that?” Vegeta grumbled, trying to scoot into a position to better see
the other prisoner.
“One year ago there was a revolt against our tyrannical king. He tried to put a
stop to it, but we rebels knew that the royal soldiers had mastered energy
techniques. We then had our best engineers and scientists create a weapon that
worked against such energy techniques, but unfortunately we had a spy, who took
our technology and sold it to the state, which is how we ended up as prisoners.
The war ended two months later, but with gigantic losses to our side. Now we
are the only ones left,” the insect-like alien intoned.
“Tell, me, warrior,” Zarbon wheezed. “What is your name?”
“I am Atlia,” the Arlian declared, his hands tightening on the bars of his
cage. “Who are you and what are you doing here?”
“I am Zarbon and this is Prince Vegeta of the Saiyans. I was sent here by Lord
Freeza to destroy Vegeta and his soldiers, but your people attacked us before I
could dispose of Vegeta,” Zarbon said slowly.
“I see. Misfortune has befallen us all,” Atlia replied. “Do not fear, we will
escape soon.”
“What happens now?” Zarbon asked, trying to catch Vegeta’s eye to make sure he
was paying attention.
They heard a great sigh come from Atlia. “We are all to be kept alive until the
king sees fit to have us battle in the arena. There we fight to the death, and
how long we last is only determined by how long we can keep him entertained,”
he said grimly.
Vegeta found himself snickering at the bug-man’s words. “If you couldn’t make a
stand a year ago and last more than two months, how do you expect to fare in
the arena? I’m surprised our reconnaissance reports gave this planet an ‘A’
rating!” he chuckled from his place on the floor.
There was a restrained snort and the Arlian continued. “There were many, many
rebels captured, Saiyan,” he said quietly. “Several hundred of us have been
executed in the arena. That is why we can’t wait much longer to make another
move- our losses have been too great already.”
Vegeta sobered and raised his head a little to get a better look at the Arlian.
“So will the guards tend to our wounds?” he asked as he watched the torchlight
glint off of Atlia’s purple exoskeleton. He heard Zarbon’s grunt as the other
man looked at him in surprise.
“What are you thinking, Vegeta?” Zarbon inquired, not sure if he liked the
direction the prince was taking.
“Nothing, Zarbon. Yet,” Vegeta replied, a smile crossing his face as he returned
his gaze to the darkness above his head, thoughts gathering as he listened to
the steady dripping of fetid water in the corner.
“Yes, the guards will do enough to ensure that you don’t die of infection,”
Atlia answered.
“Quite a feat in this hell hole, I imagine,” Zarbon grumbled.
“They want healthy competitors,” Vegeta snapped. “If you keep whining I will
find a way to make sure you die!”
Zarbon tried to move his head to look at Vegeta and failed, hissing in pain.
“You seem to be feeling better,” he growled. “But I have a feeling that if I
wasn't so wounded you’d be watching your words more carefully.”
“I will never be afraid of you,” Vegeta said haughtily, even adding his
imperious snort.
“So what has prevented you from breaking free?” Zarbon asked Atlia, ignoring
Vegeta completely, which caused Vegeta to bear his teeth in anger. “You seem
larger than most of the guards I’ve seen.”
Atlia sighed again. “One of us tried to force the bars at the outset and was
killed immediately for his efforts. They have the entire structure reinforced
with the same sort of beam their weapons shoot.”
“Damn it,” Zarbon whispered, and Vegeta laughed.
“It won’t be a problem later,” Vegeta chortled.
Zarbon felt anger rise in his stomach and wished that he was in the position to
do something about it. “What in the hell do you keep talking about, Vegeta?” he
snapped. The Saiyan immediately fell silent and soon all Zarbon could hear was
his own labored breathing.
Vegeta woke some time later and wondered idly if it were daytime. He blinked in
the smoke-filled darkness of the cell, wrinkling his nose at the smell of the
torches burning in the corridor. He groaned as pain flooded back into his
limbs, but he gritted his teeth and gathered the strength to sit up. Damn that Freeza,
damn Zarbon and Radditz, and damn those Arlians for doing this to him. He
scooted against a stone pallet sticking out from the wall, which he assumed was
supposed to serve for a bed, and leaned against it with a sigh. Turning his
head, he squinted in the dim light to better inspect his wounds. There must
have been something wrong with the calibration of the weapon that fired upon
him, for his wounds had not been cauterized with the blast. The two wounds in
his shoulders would heal cleanly enough, provided that he didn’t use his arms
too much and begin bleeding again. A glance down at his thigh showed him what
would truly be problematic: the wound was still bleeding slowly, the blood
appearing darker than normal, and he could feel a faint itching beginning
around the edges of the torn flesh. He curled his lip in frustration and
perused his surroundings, taking stock of things that may be of use. There were
two of the stone pallets, but other than that the cell was bare, save a bucket
in the corner that would serve as a chamber pot. The stones were black and
slick with dampness, and the bars were caked with foreign substances, possibly
slime. The bars themselves appeared so fragile; it would be easy to make a
mistake and be vaporized when it seemed all that he had to do was reach out and
bend them like twigs beneath his strong hands. His gaze flickered over the bars
and he realized that Zarbon was still on the floor, unconscious, by the door to
their cell. His pale blue-green cheeks were unnaturally flushed, and Vegeta
cursed under his breath as he realized that Zarbon most likely already had
infected wounds. He clenched his teeth and scooted over to the other man, using
his one good leg to move himself. Coming up alongside Zarbon, he lifted a hand
gingerly and raised the glove to his teeth, biting the fabric and using the
motion of his head to remove it. He carefully placed his fingers on the other
alien’s forehead and scowled at the heat radiating off of Zarbon. Vegeta
wrestled the glove back onto his hand and snarled in frustration once again. If
he was going to get out of here he was going to need Zarbon alive and well. The
alien apparently wanted Vegeta to stay alive or why would he have risked so
much to take care of and save Vegeta? Vegeta’s scowl deepened, but he realized
he could use that fact to his advantage. Zarbon was still stronger than he was,
although he hated to admit it, and he would need the alien’s strength to
escape. A scraping noise caught his attention and his head shot up, his body instinctively
gathering energy to defend itself. A bowl was shoved through a slot beneath the
bars by a guard who moved hastily on down the corridor, and Vegeta raised his
head a little to catch a scent of what it was. It was hard to distinguish
between odors in the dank place, but his keen Saiyan senses managed to detect a
smell he never thought he would long for so much: clean water.
“Your friend looks as if he might die,” a voice said from the cell across the
way. Vegeta pointedly did not glance in the direction of the speaker or meet
the red eyes glowing faintly in the darkness.
“You underestimate the will of a Saiyan,” Vegeta growled under his breath, too
softly for anyone else to hear. He used his good leg to shove over to the bowl,
inhaling deeply of the crisp, fresh scent of good water. His teeth flashed
white in the murky dimness and he slowly directed a hand down to pick up the
bowl. His gloves encountered the chill of rough iron, and his brow fell as he
realized that the bowl weighed too much for him to pick up without reinjuring
himself. Zarbon coughed a little in his sleep, and Vegeta glanced down at his
flushed face. Vegeta sighed and reached up with a hand to the opposite
shoulder, hooking a finger through the fabric that had torn when he sustained
his wounds and tearing the cloth the length of his arm. The sleeve came away in
his hand, and he shivered as a cold, damp wind touched his bare arm with clammy
hands. Dipping the sleeve in the water, he squeezed it out over Zarbon’s lips.
The other alien coughed and opened his mouth a little, Vegeta lowering the
cloth to make sure the moisture wetted Zarbon’s tongue. Zarbon’s amber eyes
flickered open and he looked at Vegeta, uncomprehending.
“What...” he began weakly, but Vegeta silenced him with another squeeze of the
cloth.
“Shut up,” Vegeta snapped. “I don’t ever, EVER, want to hear a single word
about this.” Zarbon smiled faintly and opened his mouth once again to receive
the moisture.
When Zarbon had his fill and Vegeta had drank some of the water for himself, he
dipped the cloth back into the fluid and dabbed gently at the wound on his leg,
holding the cloth with his tail so he didn’t have to strain his arms. There
were times when having an extra appendage came in handy. He hissed as the water
ran down into the gaping hole in his leg, but he continued to flood the wound
with the water, repeating the procedure on Zarbon’s wounds as well, and finally
ended up leaving the bloody cloth on Zarbon’s forehead, changing it every so
often for cooler water. Zarbon murmured something in his sleep and Vegeta
sighed, shoulders slumping, and waited for the water to be delivered again.
“Where did you say you found him?” Bulma asked as she stared at the alien’s sharp
features. His condition had stabilized overnight, but he was still unconscious
from his wounds, and Bulma actually preferred it that way.
Goku look at her blankly. “In a crater,” he answered, black eyes studying the
alien as well.
Bulma sighed. “You know what I meant. How did he get in the crater?”
Goku shot her a glance. “Oh. He was in a little pod-type thing. I had to force
it open to get him out,” he replied, returning his gaze to the large man on the
bed.
“A pod?” Bulma’s eyes blinked several times in astonishment. “Like a space pod
or something?”
Goku looked at her, his face full of exasperation. “Of course a space pod,” he
said, voice tired, and she felt as if it were someone else looking out of his
eyes at her. “He’s gotta be an alien.”
Bulma’s mouth dropped open. “But he has a tail, Goku. You used to have a tail,
too. So if he’s an alien, then you’d have to be one as well.”
Goku gave her another oddly long-suffering look. “That surprises you? You told
me all the time when we were kids that I couldn’t be human.”
Bulma sobered and glanced at the ground. “I was always sorta kidding,” she
mumbled. “I honestly figured you were some sort of mutant, especially when
nothing bad happened when you lost your tail for good. I supposed that you were
just genetically deviant in that regard. Humans are said to evolve from apes,
after all.”
Goku sighed. “You’re right, Bulma,” he said, sounding more like his old self.
“But I’ve always felt different.”
Bulma smiled and walked over to him, reaching up to put a hand on his shoulder.
“The only way you’re different than the rest of us, Goku, is that you haven’t
been corrupted by the way our society runs,” she said softly. “That will always
be true, no matter where you end up being from.”
Goku beamed back at her, satisfied. “So, do you want to see it?” he blurted,
turning and taking both of her hands in his.
It was Bulma’s turn to look at him blankly. “See what?”
“The pod!” Goku crowed, and towed her out of the room.
The moment they had left the eyelids of the bedridden man fluttered open. That
voice...it sounded so much like his father. He opened his eyes a little wider,
the burned skin around them pulling painfully taut. The bright lights of the
room seared his damaged eyes, and he hastily shut them again, careful not to
squeeze. Where was he? Had he made it? He felt gray fuzz accumulate at the edge
of his thoughts as his control of consciousness slipped away, dissolving his
current surroundings and forming into something else altogether.
“What?” Radditz said, peering into the darkness as his hand pressed the
scouter’s speaker to his head. “How can that be?”
“You’re reacting well, soldier,” Nappa’s voice said. “Freeza has assured us
that now our homeworld has been destroyed we can consider his empire our new
home.”
Radditz blinked, not seeing the dozens of bodies piled in front of him, still
smoking from receiving ki blasts. Visions of his father danced in his mind,
like when he had seen the man for the first time, when they fought together to
clear a planet, or one of the rare, quiet times where they just sat and talked
in the quarters that they shared in the barracks. Although only the son of a
third-class warrior, Radditz had shown great potential from birth to make it
into the top ranks of his caste, and his father had taken pride in that, taking
the boy under his wing and training him himself, a rarity among the Saiyans.
Then Radditz turned six, old enough to go out and clear planets on his own.
Now, while clearing a particularly difficult planet successfully, Nappa had
radioed him, telling him of his father’s demise and the destruction of their
planet. “How many survived?” the boy asked his commander, quickly running
calculations through his brain.
“Three,” came Nappa’s terse reply.
Radditz gasped. “Only three?” he yelped. “What about my brother? He was
scheduled for launch today!”
“I don’t know. The launching records were lost with the planet.”
“My father?”
“Presumably destroyed,” Nappa said coldly.
“But the prince is all right?” Radditz asked urgently, having been told by his
father that their primary concern was always for the king, who would take care
of his people in turn.
“Yes, Vegeta is fine. He was clearing his own planet when it happened,” Nappa
answered, voice sounding tired and bored. “Will that be all?”
Radditz lowered his head, feeling his cheeks burn with blood. “Yes, sir.
Reporting the planet cleared, by the way, sir,” he mumbled.
“Very good. Lord Freeza will be happy to hear it,” Nappa rumbled, and signed
off.
Radditz disconnected his scouter from his head and set it on the ground next to
him as he doubled over in pain. Moisture threatened to fall from his eyes, but
he refused to allow such a thing, squeezing them tight once again. His father,
his people were gone. He was a boy, alone in the universe.
Then a thought came to him: he had a brother. Kakarott, who he had just seen
the day before. Their father was too busy with missions to really bother with
the new infant, but Radditz had visited the baby by himself, wondering what
newborns looked like. Radditz also wondered what his mother looked like, but he
had heard rumors that she was of higher rank than Bardock, and so the two were
not often seen together, although he knew men had been killed by his father for
making comments on his mother’s choice. Sometimes he had wondered if his
parents had bonded, but it hadn’t mattered to him then. Radditz put a hand on
the glass encasing the baby boy, watching in disapproval as the baby screamed
his brains out. Words drifted to his ears from the rejuvenator room, which was
next door to the nursery. “Who wants to bother with the son of a low-class
soldier?” he heard his father’s voice say bitterly, and he understood then the
real reason behind his father’s neglect of his children. Bardock knew his sons
had no real future in the Saiyan military, no matter how strong they got, and
that gnawed at him. Bardock had been a smart man, but the simple distinctions
of class had prevented him from moving up in the ranks himself. After hearing
his father’s words he had left the nursery and gone to prepare for his own
off-planet mission.
He had envied the prince, as a boy. The king was near his son whenever
circumstances allowed, looking down at the boy with undisguised pride as the
prince’s sour face has surveyed his surroundings. He had even seen the king
place a hand on the prince’s shoulder once, smiling as his son snapped at one
of his father’s advisors. The king obviously wanted his son, and Radditz wished
that his own father had felt the same way. The prince had everything; a father,
a future, and power beyond belief. Then Freeza had destroyed everything, he
found out later, and the envy Radditz had held for Vegeta had turned into a
light sadness, for no matter what his station in life, Radditz still had the
possibility of a brother.
“Kakarott,” he wheezed as the past dissolved and the bright lights of the room
filled his eyes once again.
“Wow,” Bulma breathed as she ran her hands over the pod’s surface. Goku had
completely blown the top off the thing, but other than that it was in wonderful
condition. “What sort of material is this?” she murmured to herself as she
poked and prodded. Goku stood to the side, sighing as he watched Bulma flit
around the spacecraft. Bulma scrambled through the hole blown in the top of the
pod and plopped down in the padded seat, scowling as she felt the wetness of
blood staining her clothes. She pushed a random button, hoping that it wasn’t
the one that launched the ship into outer space. Something whirred to life and
she braced herself, but all that happened was the crackle of static, then the
recording of a voice began to play. The words were completely foreign to her,
spoken in a guttural language that seemed more like growling than actual
speech. She only caught one word clearly: Vegeta. “What’s Vegeta?” she wondered
out loud, looking up at the sky through the hole. She planted her feet in order
to get out of the pod and her shoe tapped something gently. Looking down, she
realized that a strange device was on the floor of the ship, comprised of a
piece of green glass and a part that seemed like it would fit on an ear quite
nicely. “What’s this?” she wondered, and picked it up, fitting it over her ear.
She tapped the button on the side and the thing began to beep, showing
characters she couldn’t read, but with arrows pointing to her left. She turned
her head and the device blipped steadily when she was facing in the right
direction. Standing up, she hoisted herself out of the pod and looked in the
direction the device was indicating, her mouth falling open as she realized the
thing was targeting Goku. “It must read power!” she gasped, taking the thing
off and examining it between her fingers.
“So now what?” Goku asked impatiently. “Do you think he’s better yet?”
Bulma looked at him blankly, her thoughts interrupted. “I don’t know about
him,” Bulma said, “But I’m calling home and having my dad send a crew to pick
this thing up.” She pocketed the energy-reading device and faced Goku again.
“This could revolutionize space travel, Goku,” she explained, and he gave her
that vacant grin of his.
“That’s great, Bulma. Can I take you back now?” he said cheerfully, extending
his hand.
“Geez, you’re itching to get out of here,” she said as she pulled out her cellular
phone. “Hi, Dad?” she greeted, and listened for a few moments to what her
father had to say as Goku stood by impatiently. “Yeah. Can I have you send a
crew here?” she asked, gaze flickering over to the pod. “Pickup. Follow the
coordinates of this call. Heck, come yourself if you want to, you might just
find it worth your time,” she said with a smile, her eyes roving over the shiny
silver surface of the spacecraft once again. “This could change all of our
lives forever.”
*~*~*~*~*