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A Losing Battle	By : BlazeEBlake_TD Category: Dragon Ball Z > Het - Male/Female > Vegeta/Bulma Views: 2121 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own Dragon Ball Z nor do I own any of the characters. I make no money whatsoever by writing this story.

Chapter List
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Bulma shuffled through the schematics scattered across the desk before her, making the occasional note with a quickly dulling pencil. Normally she would have had no trouble working on multiple projects at time, but today she was struggling to keep her mind fixed on any one task at all. What should have been a brief review of a few potential capsule improvements and upcoming product releases had turned into hours worth of distracted revisions and tweaking. Really, she only had herself to blame.

It had been two days since she and Vegeta had spent the night together and the emotions that passionate night had given rise to still weighed heavily on her mind. That following morning she had been unsurprised and almost relieved to find herself alone in his bed. It wasn’t that she would have minded waking in the Saiyans taut, muscular arms; on the contrary that was a large part of what burdened her, and she last thing she wanted was for him to see the distress in her eyes as they fluttered open. Laying there, naked and tangled in the sheets, she had come to the stark realization that she had been lying to herself for a long time. It had been easy before when they were both so occupied with Gero’s androids and Cell, not to mention all the time that Trunks’ care had taken up in those first few month. But now that the danger had passed and she had fallen into an easy routine with her son, her mind was nowhere near as occupied and it had become harder to brush aside her thoughts of what, if anything, lay between them. That night, as they had desperately ravaged each other, it was as though a final barrier had broken down within her and she was no longer able to deny what she had always known: she had completely fallen for Vegeta. Even now, days later, it made her eyebrows knit together with worry. Resting her head in her hand, she looked up from her work and glanced aimlessly about the small office she kept beside one of their many laboratories. If all she wanted was something physical, there would be no trouble at all. The mere thought of what he had done to her that night reddened her cheeks and brought an involuntary smile to her lips. But she knew that she would never be truly satisfied with such an arrangement. Which in turn begged the question: what could she do to get through to someone like Vegeta? Nothing readily came to mind, but giving up entirely wasn’t an option either; her emotions and intellect simply wouldn’t allow her to back down so easily.

Realizing any actual work was a lost cause, she stacked the abandoned schematics neatly, exited the office and headed up to the house. When she reached the living room, she found her mother alone on the couch, clutching a box of tissues as she watched one of her soap operas on the large T.V. before her.
“Hey mom,” Bulma said, leaning against the back of the sofa.
“Oh! Hi sweetie!” Her mother replied, eyes still fixed on the screen, “You wouldn’t believe what Rodrigo just found out about Vera! Oh it’s so sad!”
“Where’s Trunks?”
“He’s outside playing with Vegeta. The two of them are so cute together!”
“Playing?”
“Yeah, in the backyard.” Unable to take her words at face value, Bulma turned from her mother, walked through the kitchen and out the it’s rear entrance. Once outside, she rounded the far corner of the house and found Vegeta standing in the open field some distance away, their son clutched in a gentle but firm hold in the crook of his left arm. He walked the length of the yard to the tree he often rested under and set his son down at its roots. He then returned to where she had first seen him and gestured at the child stiffly. Scrunching his face up determinedly, Trunks wobbled to his feet and began toddling over to his father. It had only been a few weeks since she and her parents had seen him stand on his own and already he appeared more stable and confident in his movements. She had been skeptical about finding her son playing with his father, but she never could have imagined she would stumble upon the Saiyan teaching the boy to walk.
She suppressed a delighted giggle as Trunks reached his father and beamed up at him triumphantly. She felt a faint fluttering in her heart as Vegeta lifted the boy and held him at arm’s length, giving him a satisfied nod. The sensation was immediately replaced by one of shock and protective rage as she watch the man launch her son up into the air and out of sight.

“Trunks!” she screamed, running out on the field.
“Stop your shrieking woman,” He replied as she reached him, eyes focused upward, “He is in no danger.”
“No danger?” She exclaimed, balling her fists at her sides, “I can’t even see him! You just tossed our son into the stratosphere!”
“Hardly. And anyway, he has the blood of a saiyan elite running through his veins. There’s a good chance his instincts have kicked in and he’s already flying on his own.”
“And if they haven’t?”
“Then we continue to focus on that part of his training until they do.”
“Training? Are you serious? He’s barely a year old!”
“If he can walk he can train.”
“Listen up you jerk! If anything happens to our son I swear-” She was interrupted by a distant cry that grew closer and closer by the second. Suddenly her son appeared above their heads, plummeting towards them at a frightening speed. Bulma opened her mouth to scream just as the infant landed in his father’s arms, squealing delightedly. Vegeta turned to her with a triumphant smirk. Scowling, Bulma snatched Trunks away from him and began searching for any signs of injury.

“For a so-called genius you've acted rather foolishly,” Vegeta said gruffly, “As I told you, the boy is fine.”

“Really?” Bulma shot back, looking up from her careful examination of her son, “I'm the fool? Because I think it's pretty dumb to throw a baby in the air and hope he can fly!”

“You’re just coddling the boy.”

“And I suppose you consider not wanting him to fall to his death coddling? I guess that would make sense, coming from the same guy who didn’t even care about this Trunks almost getting blown to bits until some killed the other one! ” As soon as the words left her mouth Bulma knew she had gone too far. The Saiyan prince’s lip curled into a snarl and he stalked away from her without another word. Picking up on his parents’ foul temperaments, Trunks began to wail and squirm in his mother’s arms. She knew all too well that seeing his son die had had a powerful effect on him, had left him feeling raw and even a little guilty. And what had she done? Gone right for his weak point.

“Bulma!” Her mother’s voice called from behind her, “ChiChi’s on the phone! It sounds important!”

She stared after Vegeta a moment longer, watching him lift into the air disappear before turning away.

“Way to go genius,” she mumbled to herself.

* * * * * * *

Vegeta landed roughly atop the tallest plateau of a barren plain. He had been here many times before in his attempts to ascend beyond his limits and become a Super Saiyan. Now all he sought was a means to quell the tempestuous rage churning inside of him. He paced around the rocky outcropping’s edge with his fists clenched, fingernails biting into the skin of his palms.

Who did that Earth woman think she was? He had told her he would remain on Earth, at her compound, to raise his son. Yet he hadn’t even spent an hour with the boy before she had rushed out and snatched the child away, disrupting what had barely constituted the beginning of the boy’s training. He could see it as clearly as if she were standing before him, her eyes flashing angrily, challenging him as though she were an equal. At first, he had only been mildly irked, and something not unlike admiration for her fiery, if not misplaced, bravado had crept into his awareness. He had even been able to find a measure of amusement in the confrontation when the boy had landed safely in her arms, driving home just how she wrong she was about the young half-saiyan’s durability. But then she had struck out at his weak point, one the elder Trunks and the weakling had so carelessly revealed in their detailing of his reckless assault on Cell. In that moment, her feeble jabs had culminated in a fierce coup de gras that he hadn’t thought her capable of; had he not chosen to leave when he did, portions of Capsule Corp may have been reduced to rubble.

And what of that choice? Why hadn’t he rained down destruction upon the woman and her home? How was it that since the beginning of their interactions he had allowed her to speak to him in such a manner? It certainly wasn’t that he felt anything for or toward her. No, he reasoned that she was only alive and walking about because there would be nothing gained, no glory from snuffing out the life of such a fragile and insignificant creature; that and the fact that he had taken her into his protection as mother of his child. Really, she owed him a great debt for his clemency. That said, he needed a plan going forward.

He stopped his agitated pacing and closed his eyes, crossing his arms as he began to formulate a strategy to combat her interference. He supposed he would have to treat it like any other battle, giving no quarter and showing no mercy in their verbal sparring. Should she attempt to call his methods of training his son, or anything else for that matter, into question, he would swiftly remind her of her place. And just as in times of war, there would be no fraternization with the enemy. Their physical encounters would cease indefinitely, even if she pleaded. He smirked as he settled on his resolution. Her savagery would be met in kind with his own. Kicking off of the towering flatland, he launched himself into the air and sped back toward the Capsule Corp grounds. He landed in the same yard he had departed earlier and was greeted by the woman’s nuisance of a mother, who sat at a small table out on the lawn sipping tea.

“Hey Vegeta!” she squeaked, “Bulma went off with Trunks to see ChiChi but I’m sure she’ll be back soon!” So the woman had also retreated following their heated exchange. It brought him a small measure of satisfaction knowing he hadn’t been the only in need of time to regroup.

“I wonder what ChiChi wanted,” Mrs. Briefs continued, “She sounded upset… Oh my, I forgot my manners! Would you like some tea?”

Vegeta ignored her attempt at small talk and headed to the Gravity Room. After a few hours of rigorous training he shut down the machine and went to his room to clean up. By the time he had showered and changed the woman had still not returned. He lay back on his bed, hands laced behind his head. He could still smell her on the pillow beside him, the provocative essence hanging just beneath the scent of fresh linens. With a grunt he tossed the offending cushion to the floor; he would not be so easily swayed from his course.

He heard a door open and shut gently beneath him, and then a soft but hurried approach of footsteps on the stairs.
“Sorry Trunks,” he heard her whisper as she passed his closed door, “Mommy didn’t mean to keep you up for so long. Let’s get you down for a nap sleepy boy.” Vegeta remained still, listening closely as she presumably laid the child down in his crib. After a few moments, her footfalls approached once more and paused just outside of his room. His gaze shifted to the door as he waited for a hesitant knock or the sound of her voice, but neither came. Instead he heard her pad away from him and back down the stairs. He rolled his eyes back up to the ceiling with a short, forceful exhale. Just as well that she hadn’t attempted to disturb him. Perhaps she was learning her place after all.

Suddenly his stomach growled thunderously. Between this morning’s confrontation and his training, he had hardly eaten anything all day. He got up just as his stomach gave another voracious rumble. exited his room and made his way to the kitchen. When he reached the bottom of the stairs, he found the woman lying across the living room couch, absentmindedly flipping through a brightly colored magazine. He breezed past her wordlessly and, upon entering the kitchen, immediately began rummaging through the refrigerator. The large ice-chest was nearly empty, only a few of the infant’s bottles and a half full container of juice remaining. With a dissatisfied grumble he grabbed the juice, downed the rest of it in one gulp and slammed the refrigerator door shut.

“Try slamming it harder,” the woman called from the other room, “It’s not like there’s a sleeping baby upstairs.” He pressed his lips into a thin line and remained silent, instead choosing to toss the now empty container aside and explore the room’s various shelves and cabinets for sustenance. He was having little luck finding anything worthwhile when he heard her step into the room.

“Our grocery order is due in tomorrow,” she said, leaning against the refrigerator, “If you want, I could order some pizzas. What do you think? Will 3 dozen be enough for you?” He remained silent, refusing to give in to her feeble attempt at friendly discourse.
“Nothing to say huh?” she asked, “I guess I deserve that. Vegeta, I… I’m sorry about earlier. I shouldn’t have said what I said, no matter how upset I was. I overreacted and I didn’t mean to hurt your feelings. ChiChi and I talked-”

“Hurt my feelings?” he said wryly, “As if your pathetic insults could harm someone like me. I’d just had enough of your screeching. And as for Kakarot’s widow, you would do well to keep my affairs out of your tea-time gossip.”

“Will you knock it off with the macho act tough guy? I’m trying to apologize.”
“And I’m telling you it’s unnecessary because your words meant nothing.” He heard her sigh and turned to face her triumphantly.
“Look Vegeta,” she said, “I can’t stop you from training our son, but could you at least not start off so rough? For his and my sake?”

“Tch. I will train him in a manner befitting his race and heritage. Nothing less.”

“Alright then, how about we make a deal? I won’t get involved in Trunks’ training and in return you’ll do something for me.”
“Trying to negotiate eh? I don’t think so. As I said, I will train the boy. Period. You have nothing left to bargain with.”
“Oh no?” She pushed away from the refrigerator and walked over to him. Standing on her tiptoes, she leaned into him and brought her mouth to his ear.
“I’m told I can be very persuasive,” she said in a near whisper, hot breath tickling his neck. He felt her left hand wrap around his back and begin to creep toward the base of his spine, her right hand resting delicately on his chest. He let out a short chuckle and grabbed her wrist, drawing a surprised gasp from her as she rocked back onto her heels. He pulled her wandering hands off of him and slid past her toward the living room.

“You’ll have to do better than that,” he warned confidently, “I won’t be giving into your vulgar distractions. I hope those pizzas get here quickly. My patience for your antics does not improve with hunger.” With that he proceeded back to his room, leaving her to stare after him, dumbstruck.
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A Losing Battle