Spiral

Disclaimer: I don’t own DB/Z/GT or any of the characters found in this fic. They are the property of TOEI ANIMATION in Japan and FUNimation in the U.S.A. I am making no profit from this work of fanfiction.

Warnings: Rated R for language, blood, pain and violence. If you don’t care for that sort of thing, don’t read any more of this story. The chapters get progressively worse and more offensive.

BDSM (bondage [tied up], sadistic/masochism [I like giving pain/I like receiving pain]).

And finally yaoi lime: men having sex with men. K/V.

A/N: I have three huge thank yous to give out for this chapter.

First, to chibi vegeta. If it hadn't been for c_v 90% of chapter 4 and all of chapters 5 and 6 would not have been written.

Secondly, to Pixelgoddess for taking up the challenge of beta'ing the rest of this story.

And thirdly, to ~anz~ who struggled with me for 40+ hours over a span of three weeks to get this chapter tweaked just right.

THANK YOU, THANK YOU and THANK YOU.


Chapter 5 - Centrifugal

He did not know how to ease the other sayian into what had occurred. There was nothing simple about what he was going to admit. He had battled the erosion for years! There was no sensible way to hope the other was going to accept having played a role in his backslide in a matter of moments.

Even as he thought this, he realized there really was no better way than tell Kakarott the truth, no matter how much it offended the other. “I hypnotized you.” Vegeta stated the plain, unaltered reality. He chose to look at the boundless blue sky instead of the person he was addressing.

“What?!!!” Goku’s shock escalated. He had been hoping he had been wrong, but Vegeta’s blunt admission proved him to be correct, no matter how nightmarish the scenario was. It also explained why his dreams seemed so real; they were. He had been the one to give his friend those gruesomely painful injuries.

“Why would you hypnotize me? You shouldn’t have messed with my head! Had you even considered the consequences? What if I had killed you instead of just…taken sick pleasure in you?!” Goku wanted to throw up again at the possibility, and would have, had his stomach not already been empty.

Vegeta huffed in disappointment at the other sayian’s inability to deal with the matter at hand, and decided not to tell the other how close he actually had come to killing him. “Don’t worry your pretty little head over it Kakarott. The crisis is over. The bean has healed most of the injuries, and I got exactly what I wanted out of it.”

“You couldn’t have possibly wanted…” Goku finally lifted one of his hands, sand falling through his fingers, to gesture at Vegeta’s more than obvious bruises, and swallowed convulsively before managing to shout: “That!”

“Wanted what, Kakarott?” Vegeta asked as he shifted and faced the other coolly. He had wanted it, well, most of what had happened. There was one pivotal moment before fetish became fiasco. The sickest part was he got off on it regardless.

Goku shook his head, unsure why Vegeta was being so cavalier about this. “I raped you Vegeta. How could you have wanted that?” he asked quietly.

“I don’t regret what happened Kakarott. If you want to call it rape,” Vegeta shrugged his shoulders, “It’s just a four letter word. I guess that’s pretty close to what happened, by human standards. By sayian principles? We ‘fucked’. Does that make it easier for you to digest?” the prince explained scornfully.

“No. How would that make it easier, Vegeta?” Goku snarled in anger. “Don’t try to pass this off as some sayian thing!” Vegeta was always exploiting his naiveté because he did not know his true roots, but there was no way he was going to accept this as something sayian. His gut told him the type of punishment Vegeta had gone through was not a normal desire, even for their violent species.

“What would you know third class?” Vegeta sneered, emphasizing his lower rank. “You’ve been hiding from your true nature your entire life. Any one who thinks he can fool the world forever is an idiot! And you’re the most inane I have met…ever!”

Goku’s jaw clenched at Vegeta’s raving. The elite was always able to twist any situation into him being stupid and he did not appreciate being talked down to, particularly in conditions that made NO logical sense. “Who’s the idiot? How can you rationalize this?” Goku’s voice broke as he realized he was looking for anything that would make his actions justifiable. He was not so pathetic as to take the reasoning Vegeta was handing him on a silver platter, was he?

Vegeta grimaced at Goku’s question because his own embroiled thoughts on the complicated topic did not make the question simple to answer. “Rational by whose standard’s Kakarott? Yours?” Vegeta threw his head back and laughed mockingly, trying to bluff the other. The movement caused the sleeve around his throat to tighten. He reached up and ripped the material from around his neck. He had forgotten it was even there.

“What was the sleeve for?” Goku questioned.

“He used it to gag me.” Vegeta said in disgust as he tossed the material away from him. A gust of wind tumbled it for a distance along barren ground.

"He?" Goku hoped he had been mistaken, and there had been a third party responsible for the destruction he had seen wrought upon Vegeta's body.

“Kakarott.” The prince realized belatedly that was not going to make sense to the other.

“Huh?” Goku responded in predictable character. “Why would I have gagged you?”

“Not you, you moron. It pleased ‘Kakarott’ to gag me. I hypnotized you so he was left unfettered to do as he wished.” Vegeta closed his eyes, savoring the memory of pain before the panic and shivered when a bolt of pleasure ran through his body. “He realized if I had the ability of speech, I might obstruct his sport. He pushed my limits, and I reveled in it as much as he did.”

“I still don’t understand how you gained pleasure from being…raped.” Goku was able to say what had taken place, but it left him with a morbid, surreal feeling. “Why would you hypnotize me and give him the chance to hurt you?”

“I like pain Kakarott! It wasn’t all against my will. Don’t you ever crave pain?” Vegeta asked even as he perceived ‘Goku’ actually might not appreciate it.

Goku looked at Vegeta, wishing the other had not asked the question so pointedly. “Sometimes,” he admitted quietly. Then he amended, “But I can’t make the connection from enjoying pain to being raped.”

Vegeta shrugged. “So? You and I are two different people, just as you and he are two very different individuals. I don’t expect you to identify with his reasoning or mine for wanting to play rough.”

“Rough? Play? Neither of those words seems adequate. Why would you want to have sex in such a manner?” Goku asked, doggedly trying to grasp what drove Vegeta to the lengths he had gone to achieve his objective.

“I desired it. Other than that, I’d be repeating myself if I tried to explain further.” Vegeta wondered what he had been thinking. The other would never empathize no matter how many times he tried to justify his actions.

“You had better tell me!” he said, barely suppressing his urge to panic. “He’s still a part of me! How do I know I…he won’t do it to someone else?” Goku’s concerns urged him to seek solid answers to what had happened. This cockamamie bullshit Vegeta was spewing was not giving him guarantees ‘Kakarott’ was locked up.

“You are safe. As long as I don’t say the trigger word, he’s locked up inside your head.” Vegeta bitterly assured the other.

Goku shuddered. “I hate him,” he admitted, coming as close as he dared to share how close to the surface his true nature was.

“He’s more sayian than you will ever be.” Vegeta said with regret.

“Fuck you, Vegeta.” Goku was tired of Vegeta’s constant reminders of his lack in the ‘sayian’ department.

“Not likely.” The prince leaned forward and pointed. “You’re not my type.”

“YOU’RE IMPOSSIBLE!” Goku yelled in contempt. Vegeta was spending a lot of unnecessary energy trying to persuade him he how dense he was being only to cast him aside callously as some…well, third class! “Something about me must have been your ‘type’, other wise you wouldn’t have thought about hypnotizing me in the first place.”

Vegeta grit his teeth. “I knew you would never understand. That’s why I had hoped you would never find out.” ‘Goku’ was so high maintenance; it almost had not been worth this endeavor to feed his craving.

“Oh, no,” Goku shook his head. He was used to Vegeta directing conversations so people would believe what they wanted; see what they wanted to see. He usually let it slide, thinking Vegeta’s business was just that-his business. This time the prince had involved him directly – exploited an unknown vulnerability and used him. He would not let it go unresolved. “You hoped I wouldn’t find out so you could play this sick little game in the future,” Goku said bitterly. “Is this only a recess? Do you plan on…doing this again?”

“Probably not for a long time.” Vegeta started to reach for his throat before he thought better of the action and placed his hand back at his side. “I think my itch has been scratched.”

Goku was finally accepting Vegeta’s sincerity when he said he had wanted what had happened. “You really liked it?” Sick fascination with the notion egged him to asking the question yet again.

“Go to hell, Kakarott. That’s what I’ve been saying!” Vegeta yelled. “You can’t begin to understand!” He was fed up with the imbecile’s pointed questions. Yes, the pain had excited him. He had even somewhat enjoyed the fact he had lost all control of the circumstances; it brought a reality into the situation he had not been expecting. He had not been thrilled by the feeling of consciousness leaving his body-especially with a dark gateway waiting on the other side.

“No, I suppose I won’t if you don’t explain it to me,” Goku huffed.

“I’ve been trying to explain it to you,” Vegeta groaned in frustration. He wondered if Kakarott realized they were dancing in circles.

“No. You’ve been manipulating me…” Goku didn’t understand how Vegeta’s actions made him feel as though he was the one that had been ra…used. “Why did you hypnotize me? Why didn’t you just ask, Vegeta?”

“Ask you?! Would you have done this?” Vegeta shook his head. “No, you would’ve never agreed.” Vegeta wondered why he was still placating the other by listening to his questions, let alone answering them. A part of him hoped Goku would grasp what he was trying to convey, but it was now painfully obvious how unlikely that would be.

“Maybe…” Goku wanted to help…but under conditions such as these? If he pursued helping Vegeta in this…insanity, how much control would he lose? Or worse: how much of himself would vanish?

“Let me rephrase that…YOU could never help.” Vegeta said, dismissing the fool as a lost cause not worth the effort.

“Why do you say that?” Goku had never been in circumstances he could not overcome.

Vegeta lifted a hand to point at his neck. “Would you ever do this willingly, Kakarott?” he asked condescendingly as he flaunted his fractured ankle. “Or this?”

Goku flinched. “NO!” he yelled adamantly.

“You just proved my point! That sort of reaction is why I would never let you be a part of this,” Vegeta said triumphantly.

“Vegeta, I don’t understand!” Goku leaned back so his weight was on his knees. He could not fathom the paradox of character Vegeta was presenting to him. He had always thought of Vegeta as a control freak, but Vegeta would have absolutely no control while being so compromised.

Vegeta threw his hands up in disgust. “Kakarott, you don’t want to understand,” the prince concluded with conviction.

“Maybe…maybe I do…it’s the pain…” he answered hesitantly. Goku had always wondered what made Vegeta tick. He didn’t care to press his empathetic abilities on the prince often…there was just too much-it was overwhelming. Was this a portion he had misunderstood because he had never seen this side of the prince before?

Vegeta was fed-up with the other puzzling over him as though he was a challenge. “I don’t think you do.” Goku looked up at the tone of Vegeta’s voice and watched as Vegeta seemed to just…flip a switch. The smaller sayian reverted from the almost friend he had become over the years to the unstable killer he was when they first fought.

And it was all in the eyes. Every dark emotion Goku tried desperately to distance himself from his entire adult life surfaced in the other’s eyes in a millisecond. He amazed himself at how quickly he changed from a quivering mass of uselessness to wary caution in the other’s presence.

“I’ve fooled myself for too long.” Vegeta spat as he closed his eyes. Even he had been astonished at the forcefulness of his emotions. Any breach in the guards he placed around his baser passions could be unpredictable in the outcome.

“I am so unstable I…” he growled, the sound seeming to come from two different peoples’ vocal chords at once; warring harmonics. This part of himself had been repressed for so long, he felt as though he were bleeding himself with this concession. His need for pure violence was wakening. Spars were only survival hibernation. He had been deluding himself thinking they would be enough.

Goku shivered in both fascination and dread at the demonic sound coming from Vegeta. If this was how he had sounded it was no wonder Chichi had practically sobbed while begging him to stop such a behavior. It was not human, and could never be construed as such.

Vegeta opened his eyes at the other’s silence. The look of bewildered wonder on the other sayian’s face was priceless. “What?”

“I’ve…never heard you growl quite like that before.” Goku admitted quietly, rubbing his arms to get the goose bumps to settle. Was there more to being sayian than he had originally thought? Just the inhuman sound made Goku realize how little of Vegeta he knew.

Vegeta did not trust his eyes or ears. “Like this?” He asked before growling again while unwittingly adding a seductive undertone. He smiled at Goku’s involuntary responses.

Goku flicked his tongue over his suddenly parched lips as more goose bumps rose over his body. “Yeah,” he admitted, battling with his body’s other quick reactions to the sound.

“That’s just the tip of the iceberg. You don’t have the mind set for this.” Vegeta crossed his arms over his chest.

“And he does?” Goku challenged, wondering what it was about his baser-self Vegeta obviously craved.

“Yes, that and more. He exceeded my expectations in his ability to dole out cruelty and pain. He has an even stronger talent than you do to analyze the truth and deal with it, because he doesn’t care who gets hurt in the process.” Vegeta shrugged. Everything would have been perfect if Kakarott had left out the Freiza questions. It seemed as though he had been trying to out-do the other. Of course, he had not come close. Kakarott was in it for the short term. Freiza had known he had all the time in the universe.

“The truth? What truth?” Goku grabbed the word and held on. There was something there, something that would make most of this clear; he was sure of it.

“I don’t…” Vegeta wondered about the third class’s ability to get to the root of things, no matter how deep he thought it buried. The persistent bastard was close. Too close.

“It has to do with why you look for abuse,” Goku guessed quietly. Pain he could deal with and possibly even dish out. The rape fetish was not instinctual. Therefore, it had to have been something learned! “Freiza.” He hissed his conclusion at the same time he thought it. Vegeta’s body tensed at just the mention of the icejin’s name.

Was this why Vegeta had asked him what he had thought about his past the night before? “You don’t need that, Vegeta.” Goku stated pleadingly, hoping he had found a way out for the smaller sayian. “I could give you the pain, if you think you could…”

“He doesn’t care about me Kakarott! He likes to show his power with violence.” How dare the other tell him what he did or did not need? “Deal with it, or drop it! I am sick of rehashing this. Get it through your small brain - I wanted it!”

“Vegeta, that’s not normal!” Goku yelled. Earth’s hero found it disturbing for the prince to talk about the icejin in the present tense. As though the bastard had not died more than a decade earlier.

“Now you see why I chose to hypnotize you,” Vegeta pointed out. “It was normal to your sayian side because it was instinctual to him.”

“Why couldn’t you find someone else to do this? I know there are humans who…get off on this type of fetish.” Goku was still having a difficult time comprehending why Vegeta had chosen him for this. Well, not him exactly but….

Vegeta tensed at the idea Goku was trying to express. “I would never bow to someone I could kill in a heartbeat,” he ground out between clenched teeth.

“Huh…Oh.” Goku understood. Being unwilling to yield to someone he thought lesser than him was very ‘Vegeta’ like behavior, and the only thing that made any sense in this awful mess.

“Forget about it Kakarott, you and I both know you aren’t ready to play in this arena.” Finality tinged the prince’s voice.

“Vegeta, I’m concerned for you.” Goku could tell Vegeta was not going to reveal any more of himself.

“Don’t be.” Vegeta did not want or need the clown’s concern. He had lived this long without asking for it, why fool thought things were different now was beyond him.

Sensing an end to this conversation, Goku hesitantly asked, "Will you want this again?"

Vegeta took into account the close call he’d had. He could still feel the desire, which might override his better judgment in the future: just as it had the day before. “Perhaps...possibly.”


“Please don’t use me like that again Vegeta.” Goku was not fond of the idea of his carnal-self having full control of his strength. There was no way of knowing if ‘Kakarott’ would decide to just kill Vegeta if given a second chance.

“Hn.” Vegeta did not care for the guilt trip Goku was laying on him.

“I mean…if…if you feel the need again…maybe we can work something out?” Goku gulped as he said it, but it was a better option than the unpredictable chaos that would happen if he became the subconscious of the other.

That pissed Vegeta off. The prince did not see it as the compromise Goku meant it to be. He refused to be somebody’s charity case. With a burst of ki he was in Goku’s face. “What?” Vegeta presented his arm to the other. “Will you break it? Break it Kakarott! Break it without thought, without hesitation.”

Goku brought his hands up trying to gain some personal space. “No”

Vegeta grabbed Goku’s hair to force him to make eye contact. “See," he hissed though clenched teeth, "You will never be able to do for me what he can.”

A hint of tears formed in Goku’s stunned gaze, but the prince could not tell if it was the other being emotional again or from the grip he had in the other’s disheveled spikes. “I…I can try.” Goku whispered to him.

“I don’t want ‘try’. I Just. Fucking. WANT!” Vegeta was so frustrated with Goku he toyed with the idea of just saying the trigger word; consequences be damned.

Vegeta was distracted by Goku’s look changing from teary to determined with a blink. He did not detect the other’s movements until Goku had already reached up and broken the arm he had gripped his hair with. “You crave that?” Goku growled as Vegeta howled in shocked pleasure.

Goku quickly pulled his hands away. He had wanted to prove his point, that Vegeta could not possibly want what he was saying he coveted. The lesson hurt him more. “I didn’t want to!” he cried out.

Vegeta sucked in a breath before back handing the other. “Fuck you! I want you to want to!” The man was a fucking tease! So close one moment and completely traumatized the next. If ‘Goku’ could just get it, the prince knew he would not have to gamble with the unknown entity that was Kakarott again.

“I…I can’t.” Goku turned his face away from the other’s overbearing presence.

“Asshole! Don’t act like you might be willing and then turn away! Yes you can.” Vegeta grabbed the back of the other’s neck and shook him. “He is a part of you. Let GO!”

Goku screamed as his hair bleached blond. The sound was his only recourse to lessen the prick of Vegeta’s stinging taunts. He had been playing the stooge to society his entire life. Now this hypocritical riddle of issues calling itself a sayian prince was forcing him to acknowledge his misguided conduct, and he was not ready to be exposed. “Why’d you have to do this?” Goku mumbled as he hugged his hands to his chest.

Just because he had locked it away, did not mean it didn’t exist. He rocked himself trying to still his trembling, but with Vegeta practically sitting in his lap, the comforting movement was impossible. He needed space to think…to breathe! “Why couldn’t you leave me out of it?!” he confronted the other flinging his arms wide in his haste to rid himself of his tormentor.

“Fucking baby!” How this immature dolt had ever become as powerful as he had while denying his authentic nature still evaded Vegeta. The prince took to the air, distancing himself from the other quickly.

“Vegeta, I want to understand!” Goku barely kept from sobbing. He knew tears were the quickest way to alienate the other.

“Maybe…in another life time.” Vegeta threw the words disdainfully over his shoulder.

Goku growled and lunged at the other, managing to grab Vegeta’s uninjured ankle. “Not you. Me.” Goku snarled. He looked up at the other. “Help me understand me!” he snapped.

“Persistent bastard. Why do you even care? You have get-out-of-hell-unscathed points, use them. You’re better off not knowing.” Vegeta tried to disentangle himself from the other’s tightening grasp.

Lashing out with his foot at Goku’s unprotected head, Vegeta sneered. “You are useless to me. There is no common ground. We are worlds, ages and classes apart. You’ll never be more than a pet monkey…a wannabe, too broken to achieve what you were meant to become. I wish your brother had killed you. At least he was first class. A true sayian. We'd have crushed this pathetic mudball, and…”

Goku jerked Vegeta’s leg down, and grabbed hold of the other’s torso before he could take flight again. He growled into Vegeta’s neck while sliding one of his hands down Vegeta’s broken arm. He spoke when he had a hold of Vegeta’s hand. “Useless? Crushed?” he squeezed enough to re-break parts of it. “Like you?” Goku hissed as Vegeta howled.

“He wouldn’t have to ask.” Vegeta panted into Goku’s chest. Close, the other was so close. His insults had managed to draw the younger out from his façade.

“Why?” Goku asked shakily. He did not know if he had the fortitude to go through with this, but he was going to try.

“He would just know.” Vegeta hoped Goku was going to pursue this.

Goku slowly twisted Vegeta's broken arm behind the prince's back, even as he gradually released ideals that kept him chained to humanity. He held his breath, warily trying to discern if this was what Vegeta desired without asking. Vegeta said he wanted to be hurt…and right now, Goku wanted him to hurt, as much as the prince had hurt him by forcing Goku to do things he normally would not.

Vegeta grunted, but held still. Goku’s grip was exquisite in both its pain and the intensity the younger sayian used to place it behind his back. The prince did not know how to respond to it. It was painful, it was forceful, but it was different from things he had experienced in the past. He realized he was trying to make both Kakarotts wear Frieza’s mantle. Variations were to be expected, he would have to adjust.

Goku closed his eyes as his ragged breathing brought the older warrior’s arousal to his attention. He hugged the prince’s body tighter to him even as he stepped on Vegeta’s bare foot and crushed his instep. The hold he had on the royal was the only thing that kept the elite from dropping to the ground, as both of his feet were now useless.

Vegeta bit at Goku’s bare chest in an attempt to muffle his scream, even as he gripped the stronger man’s hip with his good hand. Reason told him he should be fighting what was happening, and maybe, later, once Goku knew for certain this was not an act, he would. Now was the time for proving his resolution to the other.

Goku’s head snapped up from the prince’s neck shocked at the searing bite. He reached for the hand groping his hip and took hold of Vegeta’s pinky. “Look at me,” he demanded.

Vegeta brought his face up to look at the other questioningly; blood from Goku’s wound smearing his chin and lips. Goku looked at him curiously before snapping the lowest bone in the finger he had a grip on. Vegeta closed his eyes and grunted as his body jerked into Goku’s rather than away.

The taller sayian’s gaze followed the smear of blood from Vegeta’s chin to his still bruised neck. He took a moment to fully realize he had done that. Consciously or not, that had been him marking the other’s body. He wished he’d had a choice in the matter. “Open your eyes,” Goku said, anger tingeing his voice. He wasn't sure who he was angrier at - the prince or himself - but Vegeta would be the one to suffer the effects of his rage. He moved his fingers to entrap Vegeta’s ring finger. “Keep them open this time.” He ordered just before he snapped its lowest phalange also.

Vegeta’s breath hitched at the pain, even though he expected it. Goku searched Vegeta’s eyes for his true reaction. And it was just as sick as he had feared it would be. He saw nothing but desire and hollow acceptance for what was occurring. He wished he could accept what had happened to him as easily.

He growled warningly at this…stranger. This was not the prince he knew. Where had the taciturn sayian been hiding this broken part of himself all of these years? Or had he just not known what to look for? He hadn’t even detected it during their fusion.

Vegeta started to look away from the other’s intense gaze. “No” he heard the other say just before his middle finger was treated the same as the two before it had been.

“I…” Vegeta gasped out before he could stop himself.

“Yes? You?” Goku prompted as he stared at the other’s flushed features.

Vegeta licked his lips, returning his focus to Goku’s eyes. “More,” Vegeta coached. The prince’s mind teemed with excitement. The third class was going to do this!

Goku felt himself slipping further toward someplace abysmal with every intentional injury he gave the other. He smirked wickedly just before he broke the lowest bone in Vegeta’s pointer finger.

“Kami, you’re a sick freak,” Goku said as Vegeta panted and rubbed his erection against Goku’s clothed thigh.

“Yesssss,” The prince acknowledged.

Goku let go of all the holds he had on Vegeta’s body at once. For an agonizing moment, Vegeta stood on his broken feet before dropping to the ground. “You could use ki to levitate,” Goku taunted.

When Vegeta looked up and shook his head Goku shoved him in the face, knocking the prince off his knees to lie on his back. He then lowered himself to straddle Vegeta’s hips. “You can fight this! Fight me,” he begged the other. Goku wanted some sort of negative reaction out of the other, anything that would tell him it was time to stop. Again, Vegeta shook his head even as he strained his groin up against any part of Goku he could reach.

The distraught sayian backhanded him and Vegeta groaned in delirious response. This really was his third class behaving this way, not something he had managed to conjure. He found it very erotic.

The fact the injured sayian’s actions were turning him on made Goku angrier. The notion this may well be a part of his alien heritage offended him at the same time he was unable to deny it. He grabbed one of Vegeta’s broken hands and shattered the wrist eliciting a cry of agony from the other.

Vegeta whimpered, his open eyes silently coercing the other for more, just one more! He was so close to the edge that was all it would take. His sick dream was happening so fast. Gods he could not help himself.

Goku growled in disgust, the vibrations running through his body. He reached for Vegeta’s other hand, jerking it broken arm and all, and snapped that wrist also. Vegeta’s body tensed beneath him and Goku thought for a moment he had gone too far.

Vegeta bit his lower lip as he came, wanting to be silent about his pleasure. Goku reached down and pried Vegeta’s lower jaw loose with his thumb when he realized what was occurring.

He shuddered at the untainted delight in Vegeta’s yell as he admitted to himself that there might come a time when he would crave this without the mix of anger. His head dropped in confusion; he was not who he thought he was. He did not know if he should feel regret or relief.

Vegeta lay panting beneath the other. He was sure more punishment would come for having let go too soon. Instead the other’s solid, quaking warmth suddenly covered his body. Tiny, hitched breaths against his neck raised goose bumps over his skin.

Goku punched the ground at Vegeta’s sides desperately trying not to cry. With a growl at his display of weakness he shifted his weight off of Vegeta. He grabbed the prince by his hair and lifted the other into a sitting position as he raised two trembling fingers to his forehead.

“What are you doing?!” Vegeta demanded, seeing the other’s arm movement out of the corner of his eye.

“Going to help,” Goku said tersely. He did not want to argue with Vegeta about this.


~o0o~


Dende came running from the main building on The Lookout at Mr. Popo’s announcement that Vegeta needed healing. The young Guardian skidded to a halt as he took in the shocking appearance of the arrogant alien prince. “What happened?” He asked, hoping some new foe had not come to Earth.

Goku gripped Vegeta’s hair tighter and pulled back. “Training.”

That was the only answer Dende needed before he placed hands glowing with healing ki over Vegeta’s body.

Once Dende healed the prince, Vegeta shoved Goku’s hands away from him. Dende held his breath as he observed an intense battle of wills between the two. Vegeta’s eyes squinted just a tad before he stalked past Goku, heading for the edge of the tower and taking off without a word said.

Goku looked on until the prince’s ki trail was nothing but a memory. He turned a grateful smile to Dende before he left. The conflicted sayian paid a brief visit to Korin before he headed home.


~o0o~~o0o~