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As Loyalty Can Be	By : Kimmy Category: Dragon Ball Z > Yaoi - Male/Male Views: 6353 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 1
Disclaimer: I do not own Dragonball Z, nor any of the characters from it. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

Chapter List
- 5
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(6)

Goku coughed, tasting blood. Gee, that last blow to his chest had felt like it had dislocated something. He coughed again and felt a stabbing pain in his side. He suspected several broken ribs.

By silent agreement, he and Vegeta had taken a time out, and they hovered in the air no more than a couple of meters from each other. The air crackled and sizzled with electricity, charged, like the onset of a great thunderstorm.

Breathing heavily, Goku wiped stinging sweat out of his eyes. The hot desert wind tore at his hair and his tattered clothes. Slowly, the dust settled. Below, the ground was pitted and scarred, an empty desolate landscape as far as the eye could see.

There was no other place where he'd rather be.

The feeling of Vegeta's ki, a counterbalance to his own, made the blood sing through his veins in avid challenge. When Vegeta's hair darkened, his eyes abandoning brilliant blue for midnight black, the abrupt shift of power almost sent Goku reeling. Reluctantly he did the same, slowly letting go of his ascended form. He took a deep breath as the thunder stilled, as the world crept back on them.

In the new form he felt naked, unarmed. One minute he was radiant, a sea if power at his disposal, the next it was gone, leaving nothing but blackened ashes behind. For a moment the lack of power was all he felt, then that faded too, and things... fell back in order. He relaxed, letting his shoulders sag. Stillness, peace… there was always such calmness in his true form. With the settling, the injuries he had gained in the fighting hit him full force, the pain almost making him gasp. He ached from bruises everywhere; his knuckles were cut and bleeding, blood dripping freely from a gash in his thigh, from several cuts on his back.

When had...? Oh, it had happened when they smashed into the mountain, pieces of rock flying, grappling each other, using the broken ground itself as a weapon. In a glittering rain, Vegeta had thrown him into a wall of crystal, the razor-sharp edges cutting into his back. The pain had been exquisite, a high note so present and clear as he had drawn deeper from the well of power, triggering his body straight to the second level of transformation. The elements, the very stone that had cut him, trembled and dissolved within the force of his raging aura. He rose from his fallen position, and in the same movement, he spun, sending Vegeta a kick that threw him face first into a solid mountain wall. He felt the ground shake, his energy focusing, as Vegeta followed his example and ascended to the second level.

Shaking off the memories, Goku resisted their temptation, and instead motioned towards the ground. Time to call it a day. Vegeta nodded slightly.

Goku's feet settled on the sandy ground as he surrendered to gravity. He staggered slightly, once again feeling how much the spar had taken out of him. Vegeta couldn't be in a much better shape. He watched as the shorter man took a step forward... only to fall to his knees, slamming heavily into the ground. Ouch. Goku winced in sympathy.

Slowly Vegeta got to his feet, gritting his teeth, holding his left shoulder, the arm dangling as if it couldn't move on its own. Goku took a few steps closer, his legs wobbling absurdly when he tried to keep his footing in the soft sand.

He couldn't stop grinning. Blood was pooling in his boot and the wind felt like it was filled with tiny grains of salt, and still he couldn't stop grinning.

"Now that's what I call a good spar!"

Vegeta didn't answer at first. He kept his head down, his face in shadow, as the silence fell. With a stab of apprehension, Goku wondered if Vegeta would lash out in anger now, calling him a fool and worse. He hoped not, but he HAD seen him fall, and he knew just how little Vegeta cared for that. In anticipation of the spiteful words, Goku felt his amusement evaporate.

Vegeta raised his head, his face set and serious. He looked at Goku, seemed to hesitate, before slowly giving in to a grudging, tight-lipped smile. Tiny lines appeared at the corners of his eyes, which glittered with suppressed mirth.

"Not too shabby, all things considered."

Goku laughed, loud and clear. It burst out of him without any volition of his own, ringing out over the abused landscape. His merriment was momentarily subdued, but in no way diminished, when the wrenching pain deep inside his chest made itself reminded. For some reason, the pain only added to his hilarity.

"HAHAHA...oh, ouch, aw, aw...Bwahahaha! Oh, come ON...Hah, hah...mpfHAHAHA! Make it stop!"

He sank down till he was sitting on the hot sand, clutching his chest and virtually shaking with laughter. Vegeta sat down next to him, his legs crossed, hand still clutching his shoulder. Seeing him only made Goku laugh harder. Vegeta had a nasty cut in his forehead and blood was trickling down the side of his face. Some of the blood gathered above his eyebrow, and Vegeta closed his eyes when a large drop broke free to cover his lashes and make a red track down to the corner of his mouth. The other man was still smiling, though.

"Aw, Vegeta," Goku said, finally able to at least partially silence his laughter. "You don't look so good." He remembered how Vegeta had slammed face first into solid bedrock, the image setting off still another round of hilarity.

Vegeta looked down, letting go of his shoulder to wipe away some blood from the corner of his eye. Goku abruptly fell silent, and in the silence he clearly heard the sound of bone scraping against bone. Vegeta hissed, the last traces of mirth disappearing to be replaced by a pale look of discipline.

"I brought some senzu," Goku said hurriedly, fumbling at his side. Holding the small cloth bag, he faltered when Vegeta gave him a disapproving stare. "I..." Stubbornly he picked out a couple of beans, rolling them across his palm. He quite understood. In a way he wished that the beans didn't exist. Their power to heal all wounds down to the smallest of bruises... it cheapened it somehow. It made a game out of fighting, a mockery of death even, when it could be cheated so easily.

He did find something to say, though, as he offered Vegeta one of the small beans. "I've been thinking. The way that Saiyans get stronger after healing from injuries... Perhaps that works even better if the body does the healing, instead of the magic. What do you say about leaving the beans at home next time?" He was rewarded with another smile, tight and wolfish, a glimpse of white teeth, as Vegeta reached out, his fingers lightly bruising against Goku's palm as he took the bean.

Fascinated, Goku watched how all of Vegeta's visible cuts sealed themselves up, closing before his very eyes. When Vegeta lifted his shoulder, testing it, Goku was suddenly reminded of his own injuries. Bringing his hand up to his mouth, he bit down, the familiar bland taste filling his mouth. The healing was painless, but it felt... odd. Like a glitch in time, a shift of reality. The decision to try to get by without the beans was probably a good one, he thought to himself. Simple as they appeared to be, the beans were not to be relied upon lightly. Besides, he found that the idea of walking around with the marks that he had got while sparring with Vegeta... really appealed to him.

---

Vegeta was amazed at himself. Here he was, sitting in the sand, sharing a light-hearted moment with Kakarott! Surely there must be several reasons why he should hate this.

He did not have to search for long. Reasons paraded through his mind, virtually crowding each other in an attempt to make themselves heard. Kakarott had no pride. Kakarott had no respect for the Saiyan heritage, no respect for HIS position as Saiyan royalty. Kakarott was a fool, a traitor, a soft-spoken weakling.

Vegeta frowned. These thoughts were like a tangled web – start pulling at one thread and much more would follow. He wasn't even sure what his own opinion was and what was debris from... somewhere else. The realization from the GR made itself reminded and he felt a slight chill, despite the hot air and the scalding sand underneath his hands. It all came down to one thing: Kakarott was stronger then him.

Well, wasn't that a thing to be resented? Vegeta glanced at the other man, who had a contented, faraway expression on his face. As Vegeta watched, Goku lay down in the sand, flat on his back, clearly enjoying the warmth. Vegeta snorted. Would you look at that? The strongest fighter in the universe, no followers, no worshipers, no throne to call his own, looking for all the world like he had gotten the better end of the deal. Looking like he knew it too.

"Ah, Vegeta," Goku said with at loud sigh. "I feel so much better now. Lately I've been kinda restless... I had to keep stopping myself from smashing stuff to pieces!"

"Really?" Vegeta was intrigued. He had been experiencing something similar actually, since he had stopped spending all days in the Gravity Room. Everything had felt tight and confining, uncomfortable, like one of the human suits that Bulma had once tried to get him to wear. "Saiyans are creatures of strife and challenge," he said gruffly. "Periods spent without battle is bound to make us tense and restless." Thinking about it, he found an explanation for their previous outburst of mirth. It was merely a product of the freedom that used to accompany a release from just that kind of tension.

"Is that all?" Goku said, getting up in a sitting position. He almost sounded sad.

"Is WHAT all?" Vegeta's mood dropped like a stone. He could hear the total lack of patience that had entered his own voice, noted the wave of irritation that washed over him. Defensive, he thought; or simply scared. It truly was pathetic.

"Isn't there anything more than fighting to being a Saiyan?"

"That..." Vegeta discovered that he had trouble meeting Goku's wide questioning eyes. How should I know, he suddenly felt like screaming. Unlike you, battle is all I ever got to know. The enclosure of the ship, the coldness of space and the heat of burning... Don't ask me anything else!

"Are you alright?" Full of concern. Damn him.

"You shut your mouth, Kakarott." There was no force behind the words. 'How should I know?' Such a childish complaint, he thought to himself. He stood up, brushing sand from his hands, noticing that the wind had already dried the blood on his face, making it feel taunt and sticky. "Well, I'm out of here."

Vegeta made the mistake of glancing at Kakarott. The large Saiyan had crossed his arms over his chest and was glowering at him with a mixture of hurt and resentment. Ehr. Vegeta blinked. Funny thing was, he couldn't take off with Kakarott staring at him like that. Not without saying something... what? Something nice? He ransacked his mind, trying to come up with something that would ease his earlier harshness.

He opened his mouth, closed it again. "You need a shower." Okay. That would have to do.

With a quizzical frown, Goku looked down at his ruined clothes, at his sooty knees and bloodstained hands. He grinned, as if seeing all this for the first time. "That I do!" He bounced to his feet, briefly scanning his surroundings, getting a sense of his directions, before giving Vegeta a small wave. "Bye, thanks for the spar." With a whoosh and a cloud of dust, he was gone.

Waving his hand in front of his face to keep the dust away, Vegeta scowled at Goku's quickly disappearing ki signature. "Hmpf," he finally muttered to himself. "That’s what I should have said."
- 5
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- 7
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As Loyalty Can Be