It seemed as though Gokuu had just woken up as he stared out of the round window. As far as he knew, the rest of the party was still in the control room, probably having fun and talking without him. He didn’t mind. He didn’t exactly feel like socializing anyway. It was almost like he had just been slapped in the face --- everything stung and there was so much shame there that he could barely look at his own hands.
For the longest time, he had been so wrapped up in his eternal optimism that he had never noticed things certain things before. He had never realized how absolutely simple his life had been. If he thought about it, really thought about it, he was amazed that he had made it through life as far as he did being so oblivious. He ate, he slept, he trained. It seemed as though that was everything his life consisted of as he looked back on it. What kind of life was that? There was no fulfillment in that at all! And now that he realized just how wrong he had been all of his life, it was too late. Everything had already been destroyed, or changed. Even himself.
He was never really quick to anger. He had always been a particularly easygoing guy, but Vejiita’s remark earlier had nearly made him go berserk. Vejiita was just being Vejiita, of course, but there was something about what he had said that made Gokuu absolutely irate.
ChiChi was just a joke to everyone. She was a nag, an overprotective mother, and yes, she was a bitch. Or so everyone thought. He felt like screaming at all of them, letting them all know that ChiChi wasn’t what they thought she was. She wasn’t always a nag, and she wasn’t always brutally mean to him. They were only seeing one side of her --- the bad side. Of course, that side of her wasn’t all that bad either. He had grown so accustomed to her personality that the yelling didn’t even bother him anymore. It was something familiar, like one of his gi’s, or the scent of rice cooking, or the way his muscles snapped to life when he went to fight. If ChiChi suddenly started acting differently, he would feel like he didn’t know her. As her husband, he should know ChiChi better than anyone. Wasn’t that a good husband’s job? To know his wife like he knew himself?
Gokuu let out a frustrated sigh. Do I even know myself? Lately, it really seems as if I don’t. I always thought I was a good father, but Goten doesn’t seem to think so….And I always thought I was a good husband too, but now my wife gone because I wasn’t there to protect her. He shut his dark eyes tightly. It felt like the world was falling down around him and was trying to hold everything up and keep everything in place, but it just kept coming down.
“Sulking?” A voice questioned.
Gokuu didn’t even have to turn around. He knew that if he did, Vejiita would be standing behind him with his arms crossed, probably leaning against the wall with one eyebrow quirked up in arrogance. If there was one thing he knew front and back, it was the Saiya-jin prince. It was kind of comforting actually. In contrast to everything else around him, Vejiita never changed. He was always a jealous bastard. Always. Even on nice, sunny days when everyone else was smiling and laughing and having a good time, Vejiita still stood there in arrogance --- in annoyance, with his muscular arms crossed and his eyebrow’s drawn together in a scowl. Gokuu briefly entertained the idea of seeing Vejiita grin from ear to ear. It was so absurd that Gokuu felt laughter bubbling up inside him, but he pushed it back down. This wasn’t exactly the time for laughing.
“Thinking.” Gokuu corrected him.
“That’s something new for you.” Vejiita scoffed. Gokuu knew without a doubt that Vejiita was deliberately trying to make him angry --- like a test of some sort. He did that often, but usually Gokuu just brushed it off and smiled. His display in the control room before had probably caught Vejiita off guard. Maybe Vejiita counted on Gokuu to remain the same, just as he counted on Vejiita to always be Vejiita.
Is Vejiita afraid of change too? He wondered. He thought about the possibility of Bulma being taken away from Earth instead of ChiChi. Gokuu honestly couldn’t imagine if Vejiita would actually go after Bulma like Gokuu was going after ChiChi. On one hand, Vejiita had his pride and his ego to protect, but on the other….If someone took something that was Vejiita’s, Gokuu was sure there would be hell to pay. There was no harm in asking though.
“Vejiita?” He blurted out. “What would you have done if it were Bulma instead of ChiChi that was taken by the Saiya-jins?”
There was a very long pause, and for a second, Gokuu thought Vejiita might have left the room. He turned around and saw Vejiita staring at him with an expressionless face, his arms crossed tightly over his chest. “It doesn’t matter. There are no Saiya-jins left. You and I and our brats are the only ones.”
He had avoided his question. Of course. Vejiita would never answer something like that. Gokuu wondered silently if Vejiita even cared about Bulma at all. Trunks and Bra were proof that they had at least some kind of relationship, but how good of relationship was it? Bulma wasn't exactly forthright with her personal life either, so that left him little to no chance of finding out about it. The best thing to do with Vejiita was just not to mention Bulma. It only complicated things.
Still though, the fact that Vejiita kept denying the Saiya-jins existence was confusing. Piccolo had explained the kidnappers as dark haired beings with tails --- Saiya-jin. And although the Namek wasn’t exactly that friendly to any of them, he still wasn’t prone to lying. Especially if it were something as important as this.
“But Piccolo said----” Gokuu began to argue.
“I don’t give a damn what Piccolo said. He’s wrong.” Vejiita spat out. “Planet Vejiita exploded. No one could have survived that. No one!”
“How do you explain it then?” Gokuu asked, a puzzled look on his face. “The tails? I thought only Saiya-jins had tails.”
“Piccolo was mistaken. There are no Saiya-jins left!” Vejiita insisted, his eyes growing to near slits.
Vejiita seemed so adamant about it that Gokuu almost believed him. He wanted to. He wanted to believe that ChiChi really hadn’t been kidnapped, that she was actually safe at home, or out grocery shopping, oblivious to the fact that they were searching for her. He wanted to believe this was all a dream, or that Piccolo had been mistaken, or that he really had been lying. He wanted to believe that so badly that it hurt. But he couldn’t.
He felt it in his soul that ChiChi was in danger.
“The only reason I came along was in the hope of a good fight.” Vejiita went on. “And if I can’t find it with these so called “Saiya-jins”, I’ll find it with you. You can go ahead and dream about this ridiculous planet full of Saiya-jins, but when everything is discovered, just remember that I was right.”
Gokuu chose not to reply him and merely turned away, listening to Vejiita’s footsteps as they disappeared down the hall. He sighed, and gripped the edge of the window with his hands. It wasn’t supposed to be this way. After Buu….It was supposed to be normal. We were supposed to have our lives back….I promised her that we would. I promised her there would be no more tears and no more worrying and no more death. I promised her, and I let her down.
Distant stars and specks of light shot past them as they hurdled through the liquid darkness of space, and it hurt his eyes to stare for so long. It was startlingly gorgeous. Had ChiChi seen this too after they had taken her away? Had she noticed the absolute beauty of space as she was carried off to Sukuashi? Gokuu hoped that she had, that at least something could have made her happy when she was feeling so scared.
He could picture her face if he thought hard enough, but he couldn’t see her smiling. All he could see were tears streaming down her smooth cheeks, sparkling against her skin. Gokuu knew that she was out there somewhere, and it made his heart ache. She was probably cold and hungry, but most of all, she was probably wondering why her husband hadn’t been there for her when she needed him the most.
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