My Tomorrows von Nevaeh (Updated English version) ================================================================================ Kapitel 6: Bulma - 1 -------------------- Part 3 Won´t save me today   Her eyes were tired, dry and burning, rubbing them didn´t help. She turned off the monitor, time for a break, it was anyway already… half past four. With a groan she got up, stretching her stiff body. A coffee would be nice, maybe some drops for her eyes… it was still too early to go to bed. But not without something vitalizing!   The hallway was dark and empty when she left her office, unsurprisingly. She didn´t mind it, she loved the quiet atmosphere, the feeling as if the whole house was asleep and she was alone, focused, working way more efficiently than during the day. Slowly she started to walk to the kitchen, not turning on the light, too bright, thinking about her plans for the rest of the evening, maybe continuing with her latest project, but it was not so urgent, or maybe start with the evaluation of the last data she got from the analysis of the cladding material of Goku’s ship…   A tiny stream of light ripped her out of her thoughts. Someone was in the kitchen. No one was supposed to be in the kitchen in the middle of the night! No one but her! Determined, she started to walk faster, confront the intruder. The moment she grabbed the door handle, her phone started vibrating, almost giving her a heart attack.   “For fuck´s sake… what?”   “Bulma, hey, you´re still up! I had to call you, I had the worst evening ever, you won´t believe it!”   With a sigh, Bulma leaned against the wall, waiting for her heart to stop pounding. She didn´t mind Yamchu calling her and telling her the newest gossip or whatever, usually, just right now she was way too busy for his jabbering. First and foremost they were friends with benefits, it was no one´s fault all the relationship stuff  hadn´t worked out in the end, but seriously… she sometimes really didn´t have the capacity to listen to his adventures with other women he tended to fuck. Not always. Definitely not now.   “… and can you believe it, she took them off right in the restaurant! Like in a fucking movie!”   “Ah.” Bulma listened to it half-heartedly, entering the kitchen. She had almost forgotten… Vegeta was investigating the contents of the fridge. She stopped for a second, waiting for a reaction, nothing happened. Shrugging, she decided to ignore him as well.   “…but in the end she was not interested. We were already in the hotel making out, I mean, that was weird. Who does that?” “Don´t know, didn´t like what you had to offer after all, eh?”   Her fault. Yamchu had a lot of flaws, fucking wasn´t one of them. With a sly smile, she took a cup, cappuccino… and a cig. Grabbing the half empty pack in her pocket, she lit one and took a deep drag. Nothing felt quite as satisfactory as that.   “What´s with you, are you busy?”   And there we go. She blew the smoke onto the coffee machine, watching as it mingled with the steam rising from her cup. “Oh yes, I already have my hand in my pants, the thought of you half-dressed and lonely got me going real fast.”   There was silence on the other end of the line. Not in for jokes, it seems. “No seriously, I´m busy. What about tomorrow?”   “Haha. Can´t, have a game, I´ll text you.”   “Yeah, whatever. End of the week there is some conference I want to attend. ”   She hung up, putting the cigarette back in her mouth. If he didn´t have time, she could go out, find someone else… a bit of a change was always nice. From the corner of her eye she saw Vegeta standing there, watching her. Turning around, she barely missed her cup, pushing it off the counter. It broke with an unholy loud sound, spilling all over her shoes.   “Fucking shit!” She kicked some shards away, angling for a new one. Vegeta was still eyeing her, not saying anything.   “What? Some of the staff´s gonna wipe it up tomorrow.”   “Didn´t think you´d do it yourself.”    Bulma looked at him, confused. “Yeah, did you want something?”   “No.” He turned around, walking away.   That… had been weird. But Bulma was used to weird. Though…   “Hey, Vegeta, wait a second! Is something wrong? The training chamber? I mean, you could think it´s nothing, but the pressure that thing builds up… better be safe than sorry, eh?”   Vegeta stared at her, intensely. Couldn´t he just answer? It´s not as if she said something stupid and anyway, it´s not as if something would happen to him if the room exploded, but her house was right next to it. She liked it in its current state, she also liked her life, maybe they should move the room to another spot on the lawn, further away…   “One of the lights is flickering. Over the console. Seemed unimportant to me.”   He slightly raised his eyebrows, there you have it, she could almost hear it. Because she had nothing better to do anyway, right? Asshole.   She put on a nice smile, throwing the rest of her cigarette in the coffee puddle on the floor. “See, there was something after all. Let´s get a look at it, shall we?”   With that, she grabbed her cup and brushed past him out of the kitchen.   ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~   It was awful. Vegeta couldn´t understand why he had to go himself to get something to drink, considering the people who lived here were fucking rich! No servants, no robots, they probably didn´t want to share. He didn´t care about that too much, but… there were a lot of drinks in the cooling machine. And he had a hard time reading the labels. Cursing whoever decided that learning a language for a mission does not include being able to read, he pondered if he should take the colourless stuff or the black one, the yellow one, there was one in green, looked rather vicious…   The cool air was very welcome, the night had been uncomfortably hot, just like the last days, he was so tired from the training… he could barely keep himself from twitching when someone entered the room, talking. A short glance was enough, the obnoxious Earthling. Talking to… the one she sometimes fucked. The one that didn´t visit that often anymore. A fond little smile appeared on Vegeta´s face, having that effect just with his presence. Not that it mattered, the female Earthling just brought other males with her. He sometimes heard her, she talked a lot when she was tipsy.   Huffing, he grabbed a random bottle, black one. She was still standing on the counter. He closed the door, watching her back, lost in thought.   The Earthlings were a weird species. He tried not to care, but it was inevitable to learn a few things. The language suggested they liked to live in pairs, religiously motivated probably, and it seemed to be very strict. Not that the Earthling would care about it, frequently changing her partners. She probably didn´t give a fuck, being that rich, or maybe the language just hadn´t caught up to the change in society… He had thought about asking her. But it would come with so many inconveniences, starting with her rudeness, probably ending with her asking questions in return. A little bit of curiosity for a planet that would surely be destroyed in the upcoming fight was one thing. To be pestered with questions about his past by this intrusive Earthling was quite something else. He neither did want to think about it nor talk about it, so he didn’t.   He was ripped out of his thoughts when the cup shattered on the floor. Her reaction proved it all. Rich people were the same everywhere in the universe.   ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~   Bulma turned on the light when they left the kitchen. She never did that, it was too bright, made the whole corridor look sterile and empty instead of the quiet peace she loved so much about the dark. A frown formed on her face, she hated inconveniences, but with Vegeta there… would be weird otherwise. The moment they stepped out of the house she regretted even more that she got mad at his attitude in the first place. It was hot and damp outside, her clothes stuck to her in a second and in the diffuse light of the street lamps she saw millions of insects. But it was no time to back out now!   With a huff, she turned around. “I need to get my stuff from the workshop. Flickering light sounds like short repair, still can´t do that with bare hands.”   “Whatever.” With that, he pushed past her, trotting over the lawn back to his hideout. Fine with her!   That was something that bucked her since she had invited him over for the first time. All this blabbering and bullshitting, all of them, all the time, every fight and everything related to fighting, but now that he was living in her house, all quiet. She barely even saw him, and the best she got was some snarky comment. Even that only happened when she started talking first.   She shrugged. Not that it mattered, she doubted he wanted to have deep conversations about their lives and their views on interesting topics, so better this than threats or, that made her actually giggle, orders. He wouldn´t dare that.   Grabbing her tool belt, she made her way back outside, quickly walking over the short grass. The sweat already started trickling down her neck, it was disgusting. She wiped it away, making a mental note to cut her hair. Summer called for it.   When she entered, she saw one of the lamps slightly flickering, probably running empty. Vegeta was standing on the other side of the room, eyeing his bottle with utter disgust.   “What´s wrong, read the calories?”   He looked up, slightly confused. “It´s too sweet.”   She just stared at him. It was coke. Seriously.   ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~   The Earthling had changed the lamp. Screwed around on some panels. Pressed some buttons. The longer Vegeta watched her the more he got the impression she wasn’t as competent as she always pretended to be.   With a sigh, she pressed her hands in her hips, turning around. Looked like defeat.   “I was absolutely right.”   Vegeta´s eyes widened slightly. Or maybe not.   “A tiny error and everything could… die. So the lamp is fine, it seems there is a problem with the circuitry.”   She waited, probably for some remark. Wasn´t gonna happen.   “Anyway, I´ll try and see what I can do, but it´s gonna take a while. You can… go sleep or whatever. Train outside. This here is out of order for the moment.”   He shrugged slightly. The Earthling gave him a dirty look, he didn´t care, he wasn´t in the mood to talk. He also didn´t want to sleep already, and go outside… the Earthling had just crawled under the console. In shorts.   He leaned against the wall, shifted a bit till he got a good view. Why go outside, wasn´t bad in here as well.   ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~   “Shit!”   One of the wires was charred and had singed everything around it. Considering the flickering light, she hadn´t thought something like that could be the cause. Why did she have to ask… The insulation on some wires was black and burnt, maybe a short-circuit, she carefully poked it… with a tiny noise it ripped and everything went black.   “Fuck!” Bulma tried to keep calm, the back of her head was throbbing where she had just bumped it, she couldn´t even see her tools anymore, it was just great!   “Is this on purpose?”   Oh, he was still there! Always helpful, obviously. “Guess, asshole.” She waited, no reply. But when he was still there… “Hey, can you pull me out? `s easier than crawling back and you don´t have anything to do a…”   A warm hand grabbed her ankle, she lost balance on her hands and fell flat on the floor. At least he did it slowly, remembered that she was just human. When she was outside, she turned around slowly, a nasty look on her face. Vegeta was kneeling next to her, the red emergency light was just bright enough to see his blank expression.   “The light is off.”   “Oh wow, I hadn´t noticed! Thanks for pointing it out!”   His eyes narrowed, somehow Bulma got a little excited of the prospect of getting yelled at.   “So you´re gonna do something about that?”   Or not. Rubbing her nose, she got up. “Yes. I will. I have to look it up, then I know more. It´s still out of order, if you want to linger around any longer!”   He grinned, hauling her up on her feet. “I´m not completely stupid, Earthling. Be careful with your nose. Looks tender.”   She pushed his hand away, doing her best to walk slowly out of the room. Wouldn´t give him the satisfaction of being angry.   Back in her workshop, she started rummaging for the blueprints. She had to know what those wires were for, see if she could do something. Probably not and she was not in the mood to go into the details to do it herself to prove something. Would leave a not for the technicians in her department in the morning… a while later, she made her way back, papers in one arm to check the details, coffee in the other. A cigarette before she started was definitely called for.   ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~   Not much time had passed when Vegeta heard the Earthling trampling over the grass again. It was idiotic to stay, he could go eat something, take a shower, do something useful, but then… he was curious. He wanted to see what she would do next, since she was definitely encouraged to prove herself.   He was about to get up from the stairs when she stopped short, starting to smoke. Obviously she hadn´t noticed him, but the Earthlings hardly noticed anything anyway. The sun was just rising over the roofs of the neighboring houses and made the sky shine in a bright red. It wasn´t the first time he was still up at dawn, but it was the first time he even noticed the sunrise. It was almost like… home. As if. The sky had been red, yes, but this here was nowhere near it, the blurry red which could be seen on the sky for a few minutes before everything got back to damp blue.   He looked back at the Earthling, her profile half hidden in the shadow, framed only by red light which was disturbed every few seconds by a veil of white smoke. It was absolutely wind still. It was incomprehensible to him how the smoke could still move in constantly changing waves around her face, so dense in some spots he couldn´t even see the soft contours behind it. He couldn´t avert his eyes, the sight had something…   She looked at him, directly into his eyes before she flinched violently.   “How does it look?”   The Earthling threw the paper rolls on the floor, taking a seat next to him.   “Don´t know yet, haven´t checked, just got here as you have clearly seen.” She raised one eyebrow. “And you like what you see?” She stretched her legs, presenting herself. It was a little irritating.   “So what are you waiting for?”   She took a drag from her cigarette, looking thoughtful. “Finishing my break. The ventilation inside does not like smoke very much and we don´t want to cause even more problems, do we?”   He wanted one. About to just ask her where she got them, if she could give him a pack, he hadn’t smoked in so long, he didn´t even care if the Earthlings had good quality…   “By the way, the ventilation is working? It was all pretty rushed, are the fans working fine? Not too hot? Is the air distribution evenly?”   Rubbing his eyes, he tried to think about it. He hadn´t paid much attention, it was too exhausting.   “Temperature´s fine, oxygen is mostly on the floor. I don´t know your metric system, some arm length above the door it´s basically gone.”   “And at what g are you training?”   That question was unexpected. He didn’t know at all, he always estimated the right amount. One g was obviously the gravity of the planet…   “200.” Sounded close enough.   “Okay. It´s already dawn, I´ll get it repaired later today. You can leave.”   That sounded final. When he didn´t move from his spot in the door she finally pressed herself past him. She was again framed by light, the dim light of the emergency system, but it wasn´t nearly as beautiful as a few moments before.   Beautiful, ha. That was the word he had been looking for.   ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~   A short moment later she heard his footsteps on the stairs. Finally. Could be that he had behaved so far, but that didn´t mean she felt perfectly comfortable around him. She was sure he wouldn´t hurt her, not with what would wait for him then, but still… it´s not even a year since he tried to kill them all. She didn´t mind having him around, just… not so close.   Trying to get her thoughts back on the problem, she had an idea. He probably thought she was completely incompetent after watching her the whole evening, she should return the favour… a few clicks later she had his latest settings for the gravity.   175, 164, 162, 173, 170, 168   She grinned widely. It was close, that was to admire, and it left an opening. One she would explore mercilessly.   Later that day, Bulma´s staff had repaired the damage, a few days later the ventilation system got an upgrade and at the same time, Vegeta stumbled over some books and CDs. Learning to read for children. Bulma checked the security cams, he was grinding his teeth when he noticed what it was, still took it. One day. One day he would regret.   ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~   Bulma threw her pen on the table, staring daggers at her monitor. It was outrageous! Everything had looked so good in the beginning, and now that! With a groan, she rubbed her forehead.   The results of the analysis of the extremely durable outer shell of Goku’s spaceship had been so impressive at first! It seemed like the super light and extremely tough shell material was an alloy consisting of a few known metals in a yet unknown composition. So far so good, although Bulma was a bit disappointed they didn´t discover some new element, but then Science Fiction should only be trusted so far. Now the chemists from the research department told her that they did know the composition of the alloy but had no idea how to reproduce it,  at least not in the near future and it would take a while to find out how it was done if they didn´t get any data from the original engineers…   And from where exactly? She threw herself back in her chair, which creaked in protest. There was no one who could know that, at least not here, maybe somewhere in space and that didn´t help anyone!   To make matters even worse, she got the results of the analysis of the spaceships’ window from another work group.  A new Copolymer with to date unknown monomers, extremely durable, so unique Bulma felt a slight flutter of her heart. She already saw herself exploring a whole new market, the monopole on the interior equipment for international space travel for the Capsule Corporation and everywhere would be their logo, but no, they can´t make that as well!   But what annoyed Bulma probably the most was the fact that she couldn´t do shit about it. She was no chemist, she needed the finished materials to run tests on them, to find out their properties and to develop machines afterwards, but all the previous steps weren´t her department. She couldn´t do anything and it made her mad!   Bulma leaned forward again, staring at her monitor, hoping it would reveal its secrets if she just waited long enough. Sadly, it wasn´t very talkative. She grabbed her mug, almost empty, fate just didn´t like her that day.   And then it hit her.   ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~   Vegeta ignored the first knock against the training room door. The wind was blowing really hard or something. The second time he paused shortly and listened. The third time he stopped pretending, lowered the gravity and opened the door. The annoying Earthling. How had he just sensed that.   “Do you have a minute?”   “No, I´m busy.”   “Great, won´t take long. Look at this.”   A tablet what shoved into his face, some data on it. He waited. No explanation followed.   “What is that?”   The Earthling eyed him shortly, tapping on the display, showing some other data. “What do you say?”   Was she serious? She looked rather mad.   “Some data. What should I care?”   “Oh, right, I forgot. Here.”   A mug was shoved into his hand, some brown, hot liquid inside. It was almost impossible, but the encounter got even weirder.   “You didn´t like your coke last time, so I thought you might want something decent to drink. No problem, by the way. Now, back to the topic, I have some really nice results from the tests on Goku´s spaceship, and your expertise is what I want right now!”   He sniffed, smelled bitter. Looked weird. No way he would drink that.   “Continue.”   “We already identified the components, this alloy is amazing…” she tapped on her display, “and this copolymer is a really interesting material. I just need to know how it is made. The reaction, conditions, I would prefer if you could be precise. I want it as fast as possible.”   Somehow, he had to admire her. She definitely knew what she wanted. “Earthling, I don´t know what soldiers do on your planet. Where I come from, they fight.”   “So? I know that, what´s the point?”   He pushed the tablet away, shoving the cup back in her hand. “How the fuck should I know that stuff? I´m not a scientist!”   She squinted, still determined it seemed.   “Oh. You´re sure that it´s not the illiteracy you don´t want to admit in having that keeps you from advancing Earth´s science?”   He gave her a hard look for two seconds. Then he pushed the button to close the door. She stepped back fast enough to spill the drink all over her shirt and he got a tiny glimpse of her exaggerated face. It was priceless. As was the shouting that followed. A nice background sound for his training.   ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~   Bulma had tried it, again and again. She cornered him when he came out of his stupid gravity room, she joined him in his lunch breaks, especially bad idea, she even tried to get a hold of him after he came out of the bathroom, but he just didn´t help! He had to know something useful! She just…   He was an alien. He was from outer space, he came in a space ship, it taught him their language, not their script, that was actually pretty weird, but either way it couldn´t be that he was so oblivious to his people´s technology! It made her crazy.   To top it all off, he had shut the door in her face, again, making her stumble over the stairs and sprain her ankle. With a huff, she rubbed the sore spot, the shower had been especially painful.   From the corner of her eye, she saw a shirt lying next to the toilet. One that wasn´t hers. Not at all.   She hobbled to the other side of the room, grabbing the shirt from the floor and pulling and ripping as hard as she could, till her arms started to hurt and she felt a little better.   Maybe some strange voodoo made him feel what his shirt just felt. She threw it back on the floor and went to bed.   ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~   He knew she was coming even before she arrived at his door. He could feel her, not even her weak Ki, just that intimidating aura! It had been, what, weeks? She was constantly stalking him and no matter what he did, she just didn´t piss off. He tried to ignore her. He tried to explain it to her. He tried to scream, tried to ignore her again, for some weird reason she just didn´t leave. It was driving him mad.   Before she started knocking again (he tried to ignore that as well, one day she had enough and brought some metallic object to hit against the door. His ears were ringing for hours after that assault.) he opened the door, looking in her startled face. How much would he like to punch her unconscious, if he just could…   “Can´t you just fuck off?” There. He was defeated. He started to plead.   “Yes of course. Tell me all you know and I´ll happily never talk with you again. Asshole.”   He took a deep breath. A very deep one.   “You know what, Earthling, you got me. The whole truth.” Her eyes started to shine, a smile forming on her mouth. He hated her so much. “Long time ago, after Freeza blew up my planet and killed everyone I knew, I was just kept for amusement. And to kill people. End of story.”   And there it all fell apart, her face shifting to anger. “I don’t believe it! I don´t! It just can´t be, you come from… out there! You came here in a ship and I cannot find out how it was built, I can´t and it makes me… it´s just… how can you not know? How can you travel through space and not now? That is just unfair! I need to know!”   He had no doubt about it, not even a second. But life was not fair. He shrugged, scratching his arm.   “Deal with it. Aren´t you the smartest fucking person on this stupid planet? It´s not that hard of a concept.”   “And I didn´t even get to identify a new element or something… you even look like a human, it´s just…” With a long sigh, she pushed past him, sitting down on the stairs. Grabbed her pack of cigarettes.   “Unfair. Chance of a lifetime and gone. Want one?”   Finally. The first question she asked that he happily answered. The first time he didn’t mind her, sitting next to her and smoking, not speaking, not thinking. She probably saw it the same way, looking at him with a resigned face, shrugging. Realization was always hard, he knew.   “Hey Earthling. When you bang something hard against my door again I´m gonna kill you. No matter what.”   And then she laughed, loud and long and it was beautiful. Hosted by Animexx e.V. (http://www.animexx.de)