Dragon Ball/Z/GT Fan Fiction ❯ Wish For The Past ❯ Deadly Delays ( Chapter 11 )

Disclaimer: Yes! It's all mine! I own everything!!! MWAHAHA!!! *insane laughter*

Trunks: *sweatdrops* Ooookay... this is news to me...

Gohan: *looks at Trunks and nods* I think Brenda's been under a little too much pressure lately. There, there, Brenda, everything's gonna be okay. Now why don't you come with us to see the nice doctor?

Trunks: *looks at the readers* Er... disregard what she said. She really doesn't own everything, which includes DBZ. *leads Brenda off to a padded white room*

For about thirty seconds, everyone stared at the door the two boys and the third-class Saiya-jin had vanished through. Once it sunk into their brains what had just happened, the guards all looked to their young prince.

"Well, what are you morons all standing around staring for?!" Prince Vegeta roared. "Go after them! Bring them back to me alive!" It had momentarily slipped the prince's mind that the guards probably couldn't do anything even if they managed to find the three fugitives. They have humiliated me, the royal heir to the throne, and refused to answer my questions. I will break every bone in their bodies and flay their skin from them! They shall die screaming out the secrets they sought to hide from me! I am the Saiya-jin no Ouji and I will have my revenge! The chibi snarled wordlessly and threw a small ki blast at the floor near the guards' feet as they all hurried from the room, eager to obey their prince... and escape with their lives.

Bardock relaxed his muscles as completely as he could, letting tension run off him like water. He was surprised to note that he was actually a lot more tense than he'd thought he was. Maybe it was the stress of being in hiding, or perhaps it was a gradual build up from living the life of a warrior, always prepared to attack or defend himself. It was kind of nice to be able to let himself loosen up a bit. Of course, even in this he had a purpose.

He opened one eye and looked at Trunks and Goten. "Is it working?" he asked.

Trunks shook his head. "Keep working on it. I can still sense you, although you're not as noticeable as before."

"You gotta relax," Goten added. "Let all your energy go. Think of it as pushing it out of your body and spreading it around as far as possible."

Frowning, Bardock tried to do as the boys suggested. He imagined himself as a bowl of water with a hole in it, allowing the water, or his ki, to drain out of him. A sudden feeling of something akin to nausea came over him and he felt almost weak. Needless to say, it took him by surprise.

"That's it! You're doing it!" Trunks crowed triumphantly. He and Goten laughed and did a victory dance, grinning like idiots.

"Does it always feel like this?" Bardock grimaced. He didn't like this feeling at all.

"Yeah, but you get used to it," Goten confirmed. "It gets easier each time you do it. Trunks and me like to play hide and seek lots so we hardly have to think to do it now."

"Not that Goten thinks that much, anyway," Trunks joked.

"Hee hee, I like to let Trunks do the thinking. Which gets him in more trouble than me, usually, 'cause everyone knows he's the brains. They usually think it was his idea." The black haired chibi-Saiyan grinned and rubbed his head.

Bardock's mouth quirked upwards. After being around warriors and battles for most of his life, it was rather refreshing to spend time with these two mischievous innocents. He suddenly wondered what life on Earth must be like, to produce children such as these. Idly, he wondered how he would have turned out if he had been born there, rather than on Vegeta-sei. The smile faded from his face, replaced by a somber look. If he'd been born on Chikyuu, rather than Vegeta-sei, then he would never have known the hardships of being a soldier, wiping out planet after planet. He would never have known Toma, Celipa, Totepo, or Panboukin. He would never have known Sereri. He would never have felt the pain of losing his friends and mate.

But he would also never have known the joy of having known them. Somehow, it evened out, and Bardock was just as glad that he had been born on Vegeta-sei, and that he was who he was.

The older Saiya-jin blinked as he suddenly became aware that Goten was sitting in his lap and had his nose inches away from Bardock's. Bardock blinked again. "Huh?"

"What're you thinking about?" Goten asked curiously.

Bardock smiled sadly. "About the past," he replied. "Things I've done that I wish I hadn't, things I wish I had done, friends and family I'll never see again...." Sereri is dead. Kakarot is on Earth and Radditz is missing. My family seems to be disappearing one by one. All I have now is Goten, and soon I won't even have him. He and his friend, Trunks, will return to their time, and I will be alone again.... He shook his head as though to clear it of the images that haunted him. He smiled and tapped his grandson's nose with a finger. "But that's in the past, now. Right now we need to concentrate on surviving long enough to get off this planet. Right?"

"Hai!" Goten rubbed his nose and laughed.

"Bardock-san, my tousan once told me that when he came to Earth he couldn't sense ki. Can you sense ki?" Trunks asked. The earlier mention of hide and seek had triggered a realization that it took two skills to play it the way he and Goten played. One was the ability to hide your ki. They'd just finished teaching that to Goten's grandfather, though it would take some practice before he was any good at it. The perfect way for him to practice would be to play hide and seek with him and Goten. But that would also require the second skill. The ability to sense ki.

"Nani?" Bardock scratched his head in confusion, looking for all the world like every Son looked when they didn't get something.

That gesture has got to be hereditary, Trunks concluded, a sweatdrop forming on the back of his head. "Guess I gotta teach you how to do that, too." He sighed. "Okay, here goes. Y'know how you pushed your ki out of your body? Well, sensing ki is kinda like that. Spread out your ki outside your body so that it touches everything around you. Try to spread it out as far as possible, but don't push all of your ki out. You really only need a little bit. Closing your eyes helps you concentrate 'cause you don't get confused by what your eyes see. Sometimes your eyes can play tricks on you, but your ki sense rarely lies." The purple topped Saiyan boy was wracking his brain, trying to remember these lessons from so long ago when his dad had been trying to teach him this same thing. "Every living thing has ki, no matter how small, that can be felt if your ki touches theirs, like reaching out your hand in the dark and touching someone else. You can't see it, but it's there. Now close your eyes and try to find me with your ki senses."

Bardock did as he was told. The sun slipped below the horizon as the lesson continued. Goten curled up in a corner of the cave, bored of watching as his grandfather tried to master the new techniques. It didn't take long for him to fall asleep.

About an hour after Goten had fallen asleep, Trunks and Bardock called it quits for the night. The older Saiyan had made remarkable progress, something that Trunks guessed might also be hereditary, because Goku was also a quick study when it came to learning new fighting techniques. Nonetheless, it was tiring work. Teaching and learning.

Bardock lay down on the sandy floor of the cave, shifting Goten's head so that it lay against his chest, rather than the rock his grandson had chosen as a pillow. Trunks flopped down next to him and, with Bardock's stomach as his pillow, soon followed Goten into the land of dreams. The older warrior smiled as he closed his eyes. He, too, was soon asleep.

Something woke Bardock up during the early hours of the morning. He couldn't say what it was, though. Perhaps it was due to his recent training in sensing ki, or perhaps it was because of instincts honed by years of training and fighting. Whatever it was, he knew something was wrong.

Senses alert, the warrior got up, making sure to move the two boys gently so as not to wake them. If it was a false alarm, there was no need to make them lose sleep over it, too. If it wasn't, Bardock felt sure he could handle it by himself. He might only be a third-class Saiyan, but his power was actually greater than some elites. He stealthily crept out of the cave, scanning the area with a well-trained eye. Something was not right. He was certain of it.

Taking a deep breath, Bardock extended his senses in the manner Trunks had taught him yesterday. He couldn't extend his senses very far yet, but he would welcome any advantage he could find. Wait... there was something there. On the very edge of his newly found ki senses. A sense of a powerful ki approaching. It wasn't as powerful as he was, he thought. He wasn't sure of that last because he wasn't used to comparing ki to his own. He wished he had a scouter, to make sure, but he didn't. He'd left his at his apartment when the prince had summoned him.

He decided to trust his feelings and walked towards the unknown ki, suppressing his own ki so as to fool any scouters that might be trained in his direction. The element of surprise was something Bardock had come to value over the many years of combat he'd experienced. The stars shown down on him faintly, providing all the light he needed to navigate between the trees and bushes. Any second now he should spot the source of the ki.

The stars were noticeably dimmer and the sky a shade brighter when Bardock suddenly crouched behind a clump of underbrush and scrub. His ki senses had been right. Someone was directly ahead of him. The cold air prickled his skin as he strained his eyes to make out details on the warrior he faced. The tail swaying back and forth behind him marked him as definitely Saiyan, and he was huge. He couldn't make out distinct facial characteristics, but Bardock could tell the man was also bald. As the giant cautiously stepped through the forest, Bardock noted that he was fiddling with a scouter on his face, turning his head this way and that as though looking for something.

Bardock smirked. Apparently the scouters were being successfully fooled. Here he stood, no more than then paces away from a guard, and he still hadn't been noticed. Bardock blessed his two young friends for teaching him how to hide his ki.

With a start, the warrior suddenly realized that the large man was looking in the direction of the cave. Bardock's keen sense of hearing caught a faint beeping sound and his blood ran cold. He extended his senses back in the direction of the cave and found that he could sense the ki of one of the two boys, which one he couldn't tell. He swore inwardly, using words he'd never repeat in front of either Trunks or Goten. Or most people he even liked remotely, for that matter.

They'd been discovered. There was only one thing left to do.

Faster than the weaker warrior could possible hope to track, Bardock sped out of hiding and did two things at once. One fist slammed into the larger man's gut. The other reached up and grabbed the scouter off of the guard's face. No need to let him report his discovery. Caught off guard, the enemy doubled over and gagged, a few flecks of blood flying out of his open mouth.

Bardock was no longer hiding his ki. He still had the advantage, though, because he could sense ki while his opponent obviously could not. He could only pray to whatever gods might be listening that there were no other Saiya-jin nearby whose scouters would pick up the elevated energy signatures.

Not wasting any time, Bardock leapt back and launched a roundhouse punch to the other man's face. The other man's ugly face, he noted with disgust. The over-large, mustachioed face was the kind that even a mother would find hard to love. It looked like a bad rock sculptor had chiseled out a rough map of the face he wanted, and then forgot to smooth the details. Said face became even uglier, if that was possible, as it snarled wordlessly. His opponent blocked the punch with an upraised arm, and countered with a knee aimed for Bardock's gut.

Dodging to his left, Bardock's leg lashed out and caught the other Saiyan in the ribs. The taller man winced and shrugged off the pain, answering with another punch, this one aimed at Bardock's own stomach. Bardock grabbed the other's wrist and shoved it to one side, his other hand hastily blocking another punch directed towards his face. As though by mutual agreement, the two disengaged and stood a few paces from each other, breathing slightly harder. In the sky, the sun was just peaking up over the horizon. Only a few stars were left to be seen.

"Tell me," Bardock said, grinning. "Who are you? I'd like to know who I'm about to send to Hell."

"I am Nappa!" the giant boomed out, making Bardock wince. He seriously doubted this man had the ability to speak quietly. "I am the Prince's personal bodyguard and," he added with a smirk, "soon to be your executioner." Nappa didn't bother mentioning that he was supposed to bring Bardock and the two chibis in alive. His quarry didn't need to know that particular detail.

If Nappa was hoping to scare Bardock with his statement, he was sorely disappointed. Bardock only smirked and launched a rather potent ki blast at him which he hastily dodged. The ball of energy sailed on behind him until it nailed a tree and exploded. Nothing was left of the tree except smoking cinders and the blackened remains of a stump.

"Big talk from a man with a brain too small to find with a microscope," he mocked. "Let's see if you can back up your words with your fists!"

Nappa roared in rage and launched another flurry of attacks, peppered occasionally by ki blasts, and so the fight continued.

Goten yawned and stretched lazily, looking around him as he sat up. His brow furrowed. Where was Bardock? To one side lay Trunks, still asleep, a trickle of drool dangling from the corner of his mouth, but Bardock was nowhere to be seen.

The eight year old boy leaned over and shook his friend. "Trunks. Trunks! Wake up!" he yelled urgently. Trunks groaned as he rolled over and looked at his friend. "Trunks, grandpa's gone!"

That woke Trunks up the rest of the way. He shot upright and looked around. His eyes lost focus as he extended his ki senses, looking for the distinct power that was Bardock. He gasped as he became aware of the ferocious battle that was occurring only a few minutes away from them. "I sense him, Goten! He's fighting someone over there!" He pointed towards the walls of one of the caves, in the direction that he felt Bardock's ki coming from. Goten's gaze followed his and his eyes, too, lost focus.

"Do you think he's in trouble?" Goten asked worriedly. He stood up and started towards the cave entrance.

"Nah," Trunks reassured his friend. "That power he's fighting isn't as strong as him. C'mon! Let's go watch! I haven't gotten to see how your grandpa fights yet. This should be fun!" He got up and followed the younger boy out of the cave. The two started dashing towards where the conflict was still going strong.

Nappa was strong, he had to give him that, but Bardock was stronger, as well as faster. He formed a ball of energy in each hand, then zanzokened behind his enemy. He swung his arms together with Nappa's head directly in between where the two ki balls would meet. The ensuing explosion, as well as Nappa's scream of anger and pain, could be heard for miles around.

It wasn't until Bardock was doubled over in pain that he realized he'd gotten cocky and had let his guard down. Nappa had taken advantage of his opponent's weakness and sent an elbow backwards, ramming into Bardock's gut with all the power he could muster. The guard smiled as he noted flecks of blood mixed with saliva fly past his face.

"Prepare to die, third-class scum," Nappa grated out, smirking in triumph.

"I wouldn't count on it, baka," Bardock spat out, grinning harshly. He'd noticed something that Nappa hadn't. Two things, really. The first was that Trunks and Goten had just shown up and were now sitting in a tree at the edge of the clearing where the fight was taking place. The second was even more important, in Bardock's mind. Nappa, in his confidence that he had seriously injured Bardock and would soon win, had just stepped underneath a limb where a lopsided spherical object was hanging. Bardock knew what it was and willing to take advantage of it. Smirking, he lifted a finger and sent a small, pea-sized ki blast at the thin connection between the branch and the papery object.

Nappa saw the blast coming and laughed. Did Bardock really expect to hurt him with that puny blast? Not only that, but it was poorly aimed, as well! He wouldn't even need to move in order to avoid it.

In reality, the ki was aimed exactly where Bardock wanted it to go. It seared through stem that held the ball up, which promptly fell and landed on Nappa's head. The smaller warrior smirked.

On Vegeta-sei, there exists a small, stingered insect, rather like the bees of Chikyuu. The only differences between the two is that the taper wasps have a limited intelligence and a mild venom in their stingers, as well as the ability to sting their foe multiple times without losing their stinger. The venom was really only a nuisance to a Saiyan, though a rather distracting one, as was the actual sting. The true problem lay within the wasps' intelligence. When their nest was disturbed, they immediately attacked the nearest target and nothing else. In this case, that was Nappa.

Bardock noticed the two boys laughing hysterically in the background and he threw a grin their way. Meanwhile, Nappa was yelling and swatting at the taper wasps, throwing ki blasts randomly, and all in all looking like the idiot he was. Time to end this, Bardock thought to himself. While Nappa was distracted with the pain of the wasps' stings and venom, the spiky haired Saiya-jin powered up a lethal ki blast. He aimed carefully, then threw the sphere of light and energy straight into Nappa's chest.

He never even had a chance. Half-mad with the venom of thousands of wasp stings, Nappa never even saw it coming. When the light of the explosion faded, the only thing left behind was a smoking crater and the charred remains of what had once been the loyal bodyguard of the young Prince Vegeta.

Inhaling deeply, Bardock turned away from the grisly scene and looked at the two boys. Trunks looked disturbed and Goten... Goten looked like he was going to be sick. As much as the two boys loved to fight and had been fighting most of their lives, this was the first time they had actually witnessed something like this. Majin Buu was one thing. He was a monster who looked like a wad of bubblegum shaped into the semblance of being. This was different. They had just seen a man, human enough in appearance, burnt to a crisp, the sickly sweet smell of burning flesh permeating the air. Goten gagged, his stomach trying to heave up anything that remained of last night's dinner, which wasn't much. Trunks was pale and trembling, though he looked better than Goten.

Bardock walked up to the two boys and knelt before them. He pulled both of them against his chest and patted their backs. "I'm sorry you had to see that," he murmured. Neither boy responded as they clung to him. Bardock held them for a few more moments before he released them. "We need to find another place to hide," he said, trying to draw their minds away from the events of the morning. "I don't know if anyone else is nearby, but if there is, then their scouters probably picked up the energy from my fight." He hurriedly suppressed his ki once more and stood up. "We can't use that ship of yours, Trunks, if there are a bunch of Saiya-jin hanging around." He ruffled the hair on both boys' heads as he started off in another direction. "You kids didn't leave anything in the cave, did you?"

"N-no," Trunks shook his head. "I have all my capsules and everything with me."

"And I didn't have anything besides what I'm wearing," Goten added.

Bardock nodded. "All right, then, let's get moving. I think I know of another place we can hide in until things settle down a bit."

Your feedback is important. I DO care. So if you could please review.... *grins*