Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

"Am I even a challenge for you anymore..."

He heard it—although barely—from the mouth of his sparring partner during a brief moment of rest before they would undoubtedly go back to exchanging fists. Glancing over at the sound, he could tell almost immediately that it wasn't meant to be spoken out loud. The expression—the way his face scrunched and presented a snarl over apparently gritted teeth—gave away his dismay at himself and though he had heard him, he couldn't bring himself to address his question.

It wasn't to save the man his pride or anything, because Goku never really did curb his tongue in that respect. If he stopped goading him, then the man wouldn't push himself so hard; at least, that was how Goku saw it. Without being faced with falling behind constantly, he'd be so much less fun—in spite all of his anger. No, he pretended not to hear him clearly, because it was apparent that he hadn't meant to say it and if he knew one thing about Vegeta, it was that he valued his private thoughts. Though, it could be argued that the words breached the realm of private once they'd passed through his lips; but the balancing act with Vegeta was a very delicate one.

One that most people didn't realize Goku was so good at teetering on.

"You say somethin', Vegeta?" He offered, once he realized that Vegeta had caught his glance in response to his mumbling.

"No, Kakarot." He lied, face relaxing just a bit, but for the furrowed brows that were just a part of his face in general. More than once, Goku debated on just poking a finger between his eyes to see if he could unscrunch the irritated muscles of his face. But truthfully, that would make it much worse and it was highly probable that Vegeta with a softer face would be terrifying.

"Huh, okay. I was just lost in thought then. My bad," he grinned widely, noting the flicker of something that passed the other man's face—recognizing the incoming quip that he had just opened to door for.

"You tend to find your way back expectedly quickly."

While the insults he received would make anyone else take up the defense, Goku just found they made him smile wider. He couldn't deny that he was a simple person. He always has been and would probably always be. His interests were very specific and rarely left him with room for other things. Fortunately, his interests did overlap with the other Saiyan's and that was really all he cared about. That Vegeta liked to trash-talk him was more proof for him that he at least benefited from their usual routine. Otherwise, he wouldn't have bothered to stay near someone who earned his ire so much.

He was just simple, not necessarily stupid. He wasn't going to be writing any books like Gohan, but he was capable enough in what he did do. Pushing himself—and wanting to fight things stronger than him—seemed to fill some yearning void for something. He suspected Vegeta felt that too. He'd never ask, though, because he wouldn't know how to word that without ending up sounding weird about it. 'I like sparring with you, because it gives me purpose', would go over about as well as a heart attack. Simple, not stupid.

The way the man spoke to him, never really did give him a sense that Vegeta thought he was stupid...well, maybe a little, but mostly, he knew Vegeta viewed him as childish. He understood that, because he knew was childish; Chi Chi said so too, so it must be true.

Reading Vegeta was more of a refined art than someone as simple as him could really ever explain, which worked out well for him; as he would never try to explain it to begin with. Vegeta was just Vegeta and with that, came way too much thinking. Whis had said that Vegeta spent too much time thinking and Goku not nearly enough. He wasn’t wrong and Goku grinned a little to mask that he was watching Vegeta’s expression very carefully and reading the way his aura pulsed a little with distress at himself. Well, maybe not distress exactly, but frustration.

“It’s hard ta really get myself going, when you’re holdin’ back, ya know,” Goku smirked slightly, knowing the buttons to push as if he was adapted specifically to play the instrument that was Vegeta’s ego. Without even needing to feel for it, he could just detect the battle spirit flare up again at his prodding.

“Look who’s talking, Kakarot, you’re playing around like a kid who doesn’t take anything seriously,” Vegeta’s nose curled in a snarl so familiar to Goku, that he honestly suspected he knew it better than his wife’s face.

“Hey, c’mon, that doesn’t mean I’m not serious. Can’t help it if I’m havin’ fun. Since you gotta be stubborn about it, I gotta have fun for the both of us, right? Besides, you hit too hard if we get really serious,” he pouted at him, but knew with almost perfect predictability that Vegeta would snap a him for being so carefree about it. One day, Vegeta would figure out that he was being played a little bit...or maybe he already knew and just didn’t care.

“We’re here to train, goddamnit! Not play around! If you want to play around, then go back to your sons, I’m here for the purpose of improvement, not amusing your bottomless idiocy!”

It was clear that Vegeta’s irritation was stemming from his strangely present feeling of inadequacy that Goku never could quite understand. He pushed himself to insane levels so often that any headway that Goku made, was immediately followed on. He was both really happy when Vegeta managed to bridge any gaps and impressed in his own way. This imaginary massive difference between them was really all in the shorter man’s head. He’d never tell him that, though. That would risk damaging the dynamic they had—which Vegeta would think was stupid, but Vegeta was the only person who could keep pace with him.

Even Vegeta was aware of that, judging by how pissed he tended to get if he saw any hint of Goku losing against anyone else. Even Bulma commented once to him that Vegeta spent more time with him than he even did with her, which didn’t really seem all that weird to him—given that he didn’t see Chi Chi as much as he saw Vegeta. Bulma had a phrase for that, but he forgot it not long after.

Seeing Vegeta get so angry did the exact opposite of what he assumed Vegeta hoped it would. His excited grin usually served to infuriate him more, but he couldn’t help it. He wouldn’t give Vegeta enough time to let that nagging—and frankly, unwarranted—inferiority complex peek in and make him question himself again. He didn’t like that trait on Vegeta at all, even though he knew it was ever present. He’d felt it like a bit of a lingering echo after their fusion came undone and from then got the impression that it never did go away. Maybe that was the trouble with being so smart, it came with baggage that Goku somehow lacked—despite being intelligent in his own ways.

“Alright, I’ll stop messin’ around, but that means you can’t go easy on me anymore,” he smacked his fists together, getting himself wound up before he got himself in a defensive battle position. A certain kind of joy bubbled up in him when he saw Vegeta immediately take up his own battle stance; nothing really did quite compare to the feeling of an impending face-off.

“I wouldn’t pass up an opportunity to knock you around, Kakarot,” Vegeta’s heated response pushed back the silly question that Goku had supposedly never heard. A temporary moment of frustration could be overturned with delicately practiced goading. He’d take a little pride in his power to turn him around so quickly, if he wasn’t just happy to have him back and throwing punches, instead of agonizing over imaginary woes.

“I’m ready for you, Vegeta,” he cheered loudly, letting a little of his excitement fire up in his aura. The renewed vigor that had Vegeta coming at him like a bullet forced him to bound back with ferocity that no one else could really get out of him.

‘Don’t worry ‘bout it, Vegeta, you still are,’ he answered silently to the question he feigned ignorance about.

Chapter Text

"Come train with me in the time chamber, Vegeta. You don't wanna fall behind me do you?"

His instincts to say "no" bubbled up, overwhelmingly, until he had found himself answering before he even had the chance to think on it. Kakarot had extended his offer to the Namekian first, knowing full well that he would be rejected on that invitation; then quickly turning—with the excitement of a child—to begin his needling at him. He was not an idiot; he knew full well that this seemingly harmless fool was—in fact—not harmless at all. Contrary to the evidence presented to all of this man's friends, Vegeta was more than aware that he could be scheming in his own way—clever, even, in the way he played on his competitive edge. None of those humans had a clue that Kakarot was actually a genius in the art of twisting Vegeta's arm until he relented.

Three years in the Time Chamber equated to three days outside and that sounded both daunting and effortless at the same time—for reasons he couldn't really explain. His immediate denial was in response to some part of him that still clung to his need to hate this man; but ultimately, it took a handful of words and less than a minute and a half to be convinced into changing his mind. Despite his protests, he did know that the time spent would be a benefit more than a hindrance and there would be little outside distractions to turn Kakarot's attention away from training—other than his personality quirks that made him something of a pest and occasional slacker. Unfortunately, that was built in.

Being suckered was not one of those things Vegeta particularly favored, but he at least had the benefit of pretending he wasn’t a total sucker—for once, appreciating that everyone only knew Kakarot as being not much more than a giant manchild. Everyone except his own wife, who—upon Kakarot leaving to take care of whatever he needed to before submitting himself to three years of alone time with Vegeta—rolled her chair over to him and patted his knee in that way she did when she knew something that he didn’t.

He just glanced over at her, frown etched into his face so hard that it probably looked permanent. “What?” He grunted at her, waiting for her to make her point. If he knew this woman—and unfortunately he knew this woman well enough to know she was being sly—she had something to say that would likely make him wish he never asked at all.

“Three whole years with Goku, huh?” She prodded him just a little, running circles on his knee with her finger. At some point, he’d ended up giving this woman so much lenience that she could get away with just about anything without him raising any real protest. Stubborn woman. Unfortunately, smart stubborn woman.

“What of it?” He hissed at her just a little, sounding a bit like an undignified grunt. She took way too much joy in the fact that he spent so much time with Kakarot. She’d even asked if he wanted her to make them matching training gear—to which he yelled until she shut the door, laughing until she was gone from his sight.

“I’m glad to see you’ve finally blossomed, Vegeta,” she smiled, cupping his cheek in her soft hand, with the tenderness of someone being extremely teasing in nature. Bitch. He loved her, but. Bitch. “I’m so proud of you, finally coming to terms with it.”

“What the hell are you prattling on about?” He felt his face getting warm, from the sheer magnitude of her heckling. She made it sound significantly worse than it was and she knew that she had that power. Again. Bitch. Love her. But. Bitch.

“You’ve finally accepted that Goku is your friend and I think that’s absolutely precious,” she leaned forward and kissed the side of his face, before he managed to turn away. As if he considered Kakarot his friend... What a ludicrous thought. They were rivals. They were just the last remnants of a dead race of people, who really only had similarities in each other due to that. They fought together, only because everyone else on the miserable planet—and in their universe really—were weaker than their own teenage sons. If they didn’t maintain their game of batting power levels back and forth, who the hell would? Piccolo? Gohan? What were the names of the rest of those losers?

“He is no such thing, woman.” For some reason—some uncomfortable reason—it smelled like bullshit even to himself and the expression he gave her must have betrayed him, because her smile grew wider and the look in her eyes almost glinted with something he wanted to crumble up and toss out a window.

“Oh come on, you can’t keep acting like you hate him,” she managed to worm her way up against him—pressing herself up against his side comfortably. “You can fool them, but my bullshit radar is second to none,” she motioned with her hand like she was displaying a secret power that should be marveled. The only thing that should be marveled was her audacity, he thought.

“The hell I can’t.” He knew the moment the words left his mouth that they sounded artificial, but while he was just a Prince of Saiyans, he was an absolute King of Denial. “In no way does his presence make me anything less than incensed.”

“You’re incensed by default, you know,” she snorted a brief laugh and patted his chest a little—letting her fingers linger a little longer, because she appreciated her buff little husband. “Goku thinks highly of you, in case you were unaware.”

Vegeta bristled at the idea, but knew contesting it was pointless. Kakarot’s near constant presence was usually enough. The amount of time they spent—not to mention the stupid training they’d gone through together—really made it hard to claim her accusations were bullshit entirely. Kakarot would not needle him until he relented, unless he was content to spend three years alone with him. Three years was a lot of his personality to have to contend with. Irritating though he could be, Vegeta suspected dealing with that wouldn’t be the drama he was pretending it would be. The difficult part would be in the interim between training sessions.

Kakarot would just have to amuse himself for those brief downtimes...Or Vegeta would be subjected to the likely attempt at Kakarot making friendly conversation.

He hated friendly conversation. He hated conversation.

“Kakarot is not all that bright,” he finally mumbled back at her. “You of all people confirmed my knowledge of this, with most of the stupid anecdotes you’ve shared.” Ones he didn’t ask for, but got to listen to anyway; in those moments where Bulma had one too many fizzy drinks and he decided that silencing her was more of a battle than letting her talk until she passed out.

“He’s...different, sure, but I think he really genuinely likes spending time with you. He doesn’t have to worry about punching you and having you turn into a bloody paste. He seemed excited to see you agree.”

“He’s excited when someone is willing to throw a punch at all. He’s like...a giant child with oversized boxing mitts and not enough things to swing at. I’m sure he’d have been just as excited if the Namekian went with him,” he was not having her stupid logic pushed at him without a fight.

“You’re as stubborn as he is childish,” she sat up and turned his face toward hers—pressing a finger between his eyes to flatten the deeply furrowed brows for just a minute. “You’ll be gone for three years on your side. Try not to miss me too much,” closing the distance, she planted a harmless kiss on his mouth—taking the small victory of Vegeta relenting even a little bit. “Now, I’ve got some work to do, if you need anything before you go, you know where I’ll be.”

Patting his cheek, she stood up and left him bewildered, once again, that she had the force of will to make him as passive as he could be with her. She was a force to be reckoned with, but she wasn’t anything less than perfectly suited for a Saiyan Prince.

Bulma made it to the door, almost out of the room, before she paused and glanced back at him. The glance made him defensive almost immediately and the furrowed brows returned in preparation for the snarky comment that he could see coming even if he was on New Namek. He knew she was being too sweet—

“Be nice to your Battle Husband, Vegeta. I don’t need Chi Chi breathing down my neck about you bullying Goku,” she had the nerve to speak so cheerfully and then blow him a kiss—leaving him too stunned to reply immediately. Only when the door shut and she was gone did he have the presence to respond.

“Bitch!”

Chapter Text

"I said before, he is not my friend," the grunted voice caught his ears just as he materialized at Capsule Corp. Seeking out Vegeta's ki always gave him the exact location of him—even when Vegeta thought he was hiding it well enough. One of the consequences of their fusion was acute awareness of each other and for once, Goku lamented it a little bit. For some reason he felt he knew who Vegeta was talking about—standing there talking with Bulma, who was heckling him about something or other as she tended to do. He'd thought he'd given him enough time to get ready, but Vegeta always seemed to be at the mercy of his wife's attention.

Unfortunately, he couldn't simply step back out and pretend he wasn't there; Vegeta noticed him almost immediately, turning with his arms folded and a look on his face that Goku couldn't really put an accurate description on. For the most part, he really felt he could pick apart Vegeta's moods and make sense of his posture and expressions; but occasionally, he ran into these moments where the silent exchange seemed to be done over an invisible wall. The delicate balancing act of Vegeta tipped enough that his clear sight of him was obscured.

"Hey Vegeta," he waved, cheerfully to the point of being annoying about it from Vegeta's perspective. Despite his personality constantly irritating the other Saiyan, Goku continued with his painfully joyful behavior—even despite being marginally bothered by words he probably wasn't meant to hear anyway. Most things bounced off him and rarely did he have a second thought about it; or at least he appeared to shrug it off and even play stupid to some degree. Some things were just not worth agonizing over for longer than the moment—that was more of a thing Vegeta did, and Goku was content to let him be the stressed out one all the time.

And yet, he almost dropped his wide grin at the thought that Vegeta was still against being at least socially amicable toward him. For all these years—and especially recently—they'd been at least in each other presence and often enough working together...for as much as Vegeta would work with him. Though everything was a competition—chalking that up to Vegeta's nature needing intense rivalry even more so than Goku—it hadn't felt like an antagonistic one in a long time. They'd even gone competitively toe-to-toe in one of Trunks' video games; though sadly both smoked by the teen with unfair ease. The idea that Vegeta didn't think of these scenes as...friendly at all, made his cheery demeanor slip even just a little, noticed by Bulma almost instantly.

"Hey Goku, everything alright? Chi Chi didn't give you a hard time, did she?" Bulma's question was well meaning, but extraordinarily off mark; however, he wasn't going to correct her. Something about telling her that her husband's lack of camaraderie toward him made him feel a little dejected, seemed weird even to him. He didn't pick up all the social cues, but he was acutely aware of ones that had even a chance of setting Vegeta off. Of course, when he didn't want to set him off—because sometimes he did enjoy needling the uptight fighter.

"Huh? Oh nah, she just told me to come home for dinner when I was done. And something or other about Goten, but I forgot." He gave her a cheesy smile and she shook her head incredulously at him. He knew Chi Chi would remind him anyway, so he never put much time into really tucking away everything in his mind. If he did that, he'd end up like Vegeta—grouchy all the time. His reliance on Chi Chi to maintain the family order was probably so obvious it could be seen from space, but anyone who knew Goku, knew that was probably for the better.

Chi Chi's appearance of an overbearing wife and mother was largely due to his misadventures and constantly worrying her; really, she should be given an award for being such a Saint. Even Goku knew that and he even knew he had a certain obliviousness to things around him. Her tenderness and concern was one of those things he really did love about her, though. She just wanted the best for the family and he was not exactly always on board with the same dedicated enthusiasm, but she tolerated and cared for him despite that.

Thinking of his relatively smooth conversation made him grin a little more earnestly, managing to overshadow Vegeta’s sour remark just a little bit. However, it didn't take him long to remember what he was coming for in the first place and remembering to turn his attention back on the other Saiyan again. His nature had him easily letting go of most things, except sometimes where Vegeta was involved. He always thought Vegeta was amazing—determined and hardy in a way he'd never seen in anyone else—but only once did he really feel that the stubborn man may have had a least a little passing respect in return.

He showed up to bring Vegeta to the lookout with him by teleportation; but in a rare moment of stepping back, he decided to change the purpose of his arrival just slightly.

“I just popped in to say I'm heading up there now. Don't take too long, or I'll just leave ya behind,” he chuckled, waving and watching Vegeta’s reaction for a brief moment, “see ya later, Bulma!”

“Have fun, Goku,” she waved back and Goku managed to catch the brief glance she turned on Vegeta before he made his escape via Instant Transmission. What was that look she gave her husband about? He wasn't going to go back and ask; ultimately, he'd forget about it entirely. Let Vegeta be the one to deal with people’s nuances.

The ability to teleport benefited him significantly at that particular moment, because he knew the weight of his words when he left, and the fact that Vegeta would take off in a hurry to catch up. The time difference between the Time Room and outside was enough that, if he didn't hurry, then Goku could be in there for days to his minutes. There was no way Vegeta would linger about at home, when Goku put a friendly threat against him. Maybe that was Goku’s way of stirring the pot and keeping him invested, or maybe he actually wanted a couple hours alone in there to work out a few weird feelings before he would greet Vegeta with some of that overbearing cheer he seemed to scowl about so much.

Are we really not friends?

He furrowed his brows the moment he was alone in the time chamber—going through auto piloted greetings and reminders about the Chamber. He would have to leave a little earlier than Vegeta by stepping in first, but Vegeta would never allow there to be a significant gap. He was just not going to let himself trail any real measure behind Goku. Was that really all of his motivation? Just to keep up with him? Was there no actual enjoyment in the training at all?

Why even go through all the self punishment if he didn't even enjoy himself? Nah. He had to.

Goku sat on the step looking into into a big wall of nothing. He barely felt the pressure or thickness in the air from the distortion of time. The only thing that hung over him now was the waiting game. Vegeta would not let a second go wasted; and while he lingered around for a handful or two of minutes before stepping in, he knew that Vegeta had some distance to cover that would leave him alone for hours.

Hours he really didn't think through in his sudden prickling need to goad Vegeta. The low hanging fruit of strength could make Vegeta come running without fail—whether the stubborn man knew it or not. If he did know, would he still fall for it?

Or did he silently just come to terms with Goku being as close to a friend as he'd probably ever get? Who else did Vegeta even acknowledge; let alone like…? If he didn't like Goku at least somewhat, then what would his feelings towards the others even be called?

He went from sitting to lying back and stretching out—groaning a little from too much thinking. Waiting for Vegeta to come in, raging mad at the threat of being left behind, was as boring as it was exciting—in a paradoxical kind of way. The anticipation of him coming in all fired up and ready to swap blows was as intense as the oppressing air of the silent ‘room’ and he found himself lacking the real desire to do anything in the meantime. If it were Vegeta, he’d probably start training himself right away, but Goku found he didn’t have the motivation to go at it alone at the moment. Maybe he was just playing fair on Vegeta’s behalf, or maybe he just couldn’t let go of the nagging thought that Vegeta didn’t really even like him.

He frowned, pouting at nothing while staring up into a white void. It wasn’t like him to dwell on anything or be petty, but Vegeta was so stubborn. Then again, if he suddenly became less bullheaded and was friendly and pleasant with him, Goku probably wouldn’t like that either.

But, not at least friends a little?

Closing his eyes, he laid an arm over his face—shadowing the whiteout surrounding from his vision and giving himself some darkness behind closed eyelids. He wasn’t a meditative sort and lying there just thinking just led to him drifting. Despite the gravity of the room, he was comfortable enough to find himself sleepy. He had plenty of time to doze a while and he didn’t bother to get up and rouse himself. It would take Vegeta at least five minutes to get to the temple and to the room and that equated to a day or something in the Chamber’s distorted time, right?

Maybe not.

He woke suddenly to a foot stomping by his head and loud echoing in the emptiness.

“KAKAROT.” Easily identified as Vegeta—for many obvious reasons—but yet Goku still jumped and nearly fell off the steps. He scooted across the white marble and looked up with a sheepish grin.

“Hey Vegeta, you really hurried didn’t ya?” Or did he sleep much longer than he thought?

“I come in and you are goddamn snoring,” his loud tone was so accusing that Goku just rubbed the back of his neck with a guilty chuckle. “If I’d known you were playing around—” he hissed, but stopped and Goku realized he had really no thought to add after it. If he had known Goku was playing around—or rather loafing around—he still would have hurried just the same.

“It was just a little catnap, besides, it’s not like I got much done. You should be happy,” he proceeded to needle him just a little bit—relishing in his one power to light the fire within him. “I didn’t leave you in the dust quite yet.”

“Kakarot, get the hell up and let’s go.” As usual, Vegeta was always ready to throw down. “I’ll be damned if I allow this slacking in my presence.”

“Aww, you do care,” he grinned widely, actually feeling a little of it earnestly. The look on the man’s face was nothing short of irritable, but there was also a resignation that Goku could almost identify. One that accepted that, if given the opportunity to surpass him by leaps and bounds by letting Goku slack, he wouldn’t allow for it.

“Shut up and let’s go,” he grunted again, but didn’t actually counter his teasing jabs.

Goku popped up, stretching himself out and waking up his sleeping limbs. He had been dozing for a while if he felt that stiff, but it didn’t take long to limber back up and get the excitement flowing. Something about exchanging blows with Vegeta in particular got him really going. He found it fun. The key difference between anytime Goku challenged anyone else and challenging Vegeta, was easily that he wanted to test himself against others to see where he stood. With Vegeta, he knew where he stood—and he felt that if they fought all out, they’d both lose. They’d fight until they both blacked out and that’s what made it fun for him.

It took the better part of a week within the time chamber—and endless rounds of dodging kicks and throwing fists—to catch the hint of a smirk from his sparring partner.

Maybe he didn’t think they were friends. But it looked like he was having fun, and that was enough for Goku.

Chapter Text

After what equated to four months within the chamber, the obsessive use of every minute for training eventually waned enough to include downtime that Kakarot had convinced him that they needed. Unfortunately, the stupid oaf was not incorrect and the occasional day of recovery did serve beneficial. However, it also presented the problem of Kakarot’s lack of any other activities to keep his attention during these downtimes. When he wasn't snoring loudly or eating or doing casual pushups and situps, he was lingering closer to Vegeta than the Saiyan Prince would like.

Their accommodations were more than adequate; however, they were not the spacious area he was accustomed to一and having Kakarot as close as he was, made Vegeta acutely aware of every little thing he did. When he was being noisy, surprisingly, he was more tolerable. His loud snoring or the paced huffing of his breath when he was counting pushups at least told him that Kakarot was occupied with something and he could just continue to do his own thing in peace.

Unfortunately, there were times like these, where Kakarot was not doing any of those things and he was quiet. Quiet usually meant that he was doing exactly what Vegeta suspected he was doing一looking up to find him sitting backwards in a chair and leaning on the backrest. His head was propped on his arms and he was staring at him一though not very intently, but just enough that he seemed to be interested enough in it.

“What, Kakarot?” He barked at him and his blank expression turned hard in an instant. Being watched unsettled him and Kakarot could surely find something better to do with his goddamn time.

“You’re reading.”

What…?

“What?” He repeated, only externally on the second thought. It was such an obvious statement that it seemed almost idiotic in a Kakarot kind of way. Well, no shit… “Yes, and what about it?”

“...I dunno...I guess I just never really thought you were much of a reader,” he shrugged in response, but it seemed like he had more to comment on, so Vegeta waited and eventually he kept going. “I mean...I never seen you readin’ before...or I guess doin’ much else.”

Vegeta turned a corner in the book Bulma gave him to bring into the chamber. He had a few of them with him in his belongings and一though he didn’t actually think he would need them一they proved to keep him occupied when they were too drained to trade punches and needed rest. “You were dead for a while and training with your loser friends was hardly an option.”

“They’re not losers…”

“Fine, your weak friends. But that’s hardly the point, Kakarot. Not that I give a shit about your culture on this planet, but reading is a quick way to learn it in the event I had any need for it.” It was mostly an excuse to mask that reading was simply easy and didn’t require that he function outside of his home. Being around all the humans made him uncomfortable and sour and none of them seemed to have the same amount of common sense that the gods gave a goddamn chicken. Reading served to strengthen his grasp on their written language and to clue him in to the stupid human nuances that he seemed to not quite catch and often made Bulma mad in public when he offended someone of importance. If she didn’t go places with so many potentially dangerous people一toward her anyway一then he wouldn’t need to accompany her in the first place. But he was essentially her bodyguard at those times.

Fortunately Bulma liked tinkering in her workshop more than being a company social princess.

Excuses aside, he occasionally found that humans could write interesting stories. Not that he would tell Kakarot that. He hadn’t really had access to these sorts of literature when he was younger一as warriors didn’t really need to be entertained and Frieza didn’t care if they all died of boredom in their space pods. He slept most of the time, but perhaps he would have been a little less miserable if he had had a distraction that stimulated his mind a little. Kakarot was a battle hungry dunce who would likely not quite get it, but hopefully he would accept the answer, and just shut the fuck u一

He did not.

“Huh? But you seem to do alright. I mean, you fit in pretty well. Almost can’t tell that you didn’t always live here,” Kakarot’s expression told Vegeta that he didn’t have a clue that he was casually smashing buttons that he shouldn’t be smashing. The process of learning to accept his home being on this stupid rock, was not an easy one and much of it was spent in denial and struggle to figure out who the hell he was with Frieza gone and no longer controlling his existence down to whether or not he could read leisurely.

“Don’t you have other things to do, Kakarot?” He snapped at him, shifting in his seat as if he was ready to get up and walk away in the event he kept aggravating him. It never did take very long for the big idiot to make him want to pop some of Bulma’s migraine medicine. Unfortunately, he did not have near enough of that to keep him comfortably numb to his ridiculousness.

“Eh,” Kakarot shrugged and then kinda sat up to lean over, peering in a nosy way. “What are you readin’ anyway? Is it one of those smart people books Bulma likes? Those are really confusing.”

“I was under the impression you weren’t all that literate,” the prince snorted a bit, knowing that he had at least the most basic of reading skills. He was able to function a phone well enough to be a thorn in someone’s side, and he had shown he could at least read basic signs.

Kakarot frowned a little, accentuated by the downturned corners of his mouth that put a bit of a pouty wibble on his face that Vegeta just inwardly groaned over. What a giant child. “I can read...It’s just...boring...I mean...just readin’ all the words on the paper… havin’ to sit still the whole time...I’d rather go do stuff.”

“One track mind is your problem,” Vegeta found that to be the most obvious statement he’d ever made, but a true one nonetheless. “I suspect, you don’t have much of an imagination for this sort of thing, anyway.”

“Oh? You’re not readin’ those kinda books are ya?” Kakarot leaned forward a little more, bending to try and get a peek at the book’s cover.

“What do you mean?” Immediately, Vegeta turned the book flat in his lap, keeping the cover against his thigh, in case he needed to defend himself against the big clown’s nosiness.

“You know, the ones with the shirtless guys on the front and the girl in her panties. The old books Bulma used to read. She still read those? You read those?”

Vegeta had no idea what books Kakarot was actually referring to一because he’d never seen Bulma with them一but he wasn’t stupid. It did not take a genius to figure out what sort of book that might imply, especially adding that oddly sly expression on the other saiyan’s face. That expression was always strange on him, but he never had the chance to pay it much mind一largely because he was in the middle of defending himself from Kakarot’s teasing. Realizing this, Vegeta lifted the book so he could see the damn cover of the book. It was a painted cover by some artist he didn’t give a damn about and the book’s title was innocuous with little room to assume anything elicit within the pages.

“Oh, what’s it about? Pirates? Looks like pirates!” Easily amused, Kakarot looked over the cover like it actually did interest him, even though Vegeta knew that it likely did not and he was just bored.

“Yes, now, if you don’t mind, I would like to go back to reading and I would like you to go back to being quiet.” This game of entertain the clown was getting a little too stale for his taste. He was perfectly content to read in peace until the time they set. It had nothing to do with him that Kakarot had gotten bored waiting until the time they agreed upon. If he was bothered by it, then he should have said something. Until then, Vegeta was not dealing with him.

“So what’s so good about it that you’re so into it?”

Or apparently he was not done with him.

Smoothing out the wrinkles between his eyes with his thumb, the short tempered Saiyan just exhaled slowly. Patience was not the greatest of his skills and, unfortunately, the person he was prisoner in this place with for a little under three years was the biggest strain on his self control. “Why don’t you just read it for yourself and then you’ll know.”

“But you’re reading it…”

“When I’m not reading it, you’re welcome to it, I have another one with me and then maybe you can stop harassing me.” The edge in his voice made Kakarot sit back and rest his head on his arms, pouting a little. Shutting him up was an art and sometimes his tone was enough, other times, Kakarot just dug his teeth in harder to watch him bust a blood vessel. “Any other questions, or can I have my peace?”

“...Guess not.” The dejected droop of his voice almost made Vegeta glance back up at him to make sure he wasn’t seriously pouting, but he was not going to give into his subtle manipulation.

Kakarot recovered quickly once he realized that Vegeta really was done with him and he trotted off to go count push ups and then probably sleep some more before they would spend another handful of days smacking each other around at full power. He preferred that to this weird bonding thing he swore Kakarot was trying to do. There was really no other reason why he would feign interest in what he was doing in his free time unless he was doing that. Trying to open him up was a waste of everyone’s time, but even thinking about that brought him back to Bulma and the look she’d given him.

When he’d used his Instant Transmission to head up to the lookout, Bulma had turned and pinched him relatively hard for a little human woman. Apparently, the way Kakarot acted in that brief interaction wasn’t his normal behavior, but that didn’t really concern him any. Of course, until Bulma was yelling at him to be less of a dick. Evidently he couldn’t deny this so called “friendship” they apparently had, in his own home, without being offensive to a nosy fool who should consider knocking once in a goddamn while.

He leaned his head back in the chair with an annoyed grunt. His concentration was all shot now and getting back into the book when his stupid thoughts were bouncing around was next to impossible. Conveniently opposite of the other, who seemed just as peachy as always, while Vegeta stewed in his own thoughts for far too long.

Oh sure, Kakarot, go do push ups all carefree, while I try to figure out why my wife was pissy with me because I don’t want to be your best friend forever. I don’t even like you most of the time. All of the time. Some of the time? ‘Battle Husbands’ my ass, woman. I’m not goddamn denying anything. Denial is just a river, Vegeta. Now, shut up and go take a nap.

Without another word from his mouth, but plenty annoying ones in his head, he stood up and threw the book in the chair. before deciding he needed a quick shower and some sleep. This was going to be a long three years.

Chapter Text

Five days of purposefully battering each other around had passed much more quickly than the Saiyan Prince had expected, only stopping when his body ached down to his bones and his stomach was screaming at him loud enough that even Kakarot could hear一an incredible feat considering that his own stomach was rolling thunderously. A momentary truce was called without either of them having to actually say it, and food was decidedly the main objective.

Between the two of them, they were not even a fully competent cook, but they managed with the presorted rations and a book or two of the most basic instructions. It was mostly Vegeta who bothered to prepare anything that was beyond what a simple countryside boy could do with fire and a piece of meat stuck on a stick. Thankfully, Kakarot wasn’t dumb enough to resort to such archaic tactics, but if he wanted any flavor in it, he had to step in and help it along a little. Taste really didn’t matter ultimately; but he’d spent enough time eating chalk flavored stale bread and swallowing appetite killing pills in a space pod, that when an opportunity arose to make it taste good, he took it.

“Hey Vegeta,” he heard from somewhere in the direction of the food storage. Kakarot was grabbing the items he told him to and, surprisingly, being useful一of course, that only happened when he was trying to stop someone from blowing up the planet or trying to see to being fed. There was no in between.

“What?” He didn’t look up, busy with his culinary attempt.

“...What happens in the book you were reading?”

He paused and then did look up, leaning a bit to see Kakarot from where he was in the cramped little place to prepare food. “What?” He couldn’t find a whole sentence, because he wasn’t sure what the fool was even asking.

“The book. The book from like a week ago. Y’know...You told me to read it…?” His tone suggested that he thought his point was obvious; Vegeta did not think so.

“Yes, and what about it? If you want to know, then read it.” He settled back into food preparation and debated on whether or not he wanted to continue contributing to this conversation—because he knew it was going to continue once Kakarot came back into full view with an armful of ingredients.

“I tried, but, after like the first chapter or something, I kinda got bored…?”

He didn't even look at him and he knew he had that cheesy expression; what a dunce. “Then why do you care about knowing what happens if you were bored?”

“I mean...” he exhaled and found a chair to sit in, facing Vegeta. He straddled it so he could lean against the backrest with his arms and watch him going through the motions. “I wasn’t bored by the story...just, reading the pages...y’know…? Some of the words I don't really know, and when I read too much, I see the words but I just...stop reading them?”

Kakarot sounded as if he didn't even understand what he was experiencing when he was reading, but Vegeta didn't need a whole lot more than that to realize what his problem actually was. And suddenly, so much made sense that he didn't necessarily consider before. Of course, if he hadn't read the books he had read—courtesy of his brainiac wife—he wouldn't know either.

“Have you ever been seen by an actual earth physician, Kakarot?...Stupid question, even if you had I'm sure no one would know what the hell to do with you.” He snorted as if it was an amusing inside joke. “It sounds to me like you're just attention deficit.”

“Attention whatsit?” He leaned closer, craning his neck to make eye contact any time Vegeta looked away from his cooking.

“Deficit. It means you just don't have the attention required to sit down and focus.”

“But I can focus on things…” Kakarot’s eyebrows scrunched together in mild confusion.

“Yes, things that especially interest you. But if it's not something that intense, you’ll wander. Hell, try to hold a conversation with you for ten minutes that's not about combat and it's...actually surprisingly clear how distracted you are...how did Bulma not notice this…”

“...so does that mean it's gotta be fixed or something?”

Vegeta turned to make a comment, but the expression on the other saiyan’s face stopped him for a reason he couldn't explain. His face was open and waiting, as if he really was asking this with complete sincerity and he didn't break eye contact—looking to Vegeta for honesty that he assumed no one else really gave the big buffoon. Would any of his friends actually call him out on any of his quirks in the same way he would? No. But he didn't actually feel like he could tell Kakarot to fix his mental issue, since it really wasn't much of an issue for him in his way of life.

“No. It just means you're a dumbass for a reason, I guess.” He shrugged, breaking the visual exchange and continuing to add things to the pot—keeping himself busy and trying to ignore just how close and personal this clown was being.

“But you hate that about me, don't you?”

The question came from a blind spot that the saiyan prince didn't know he had and he almost burned his damn hand in the moment of hesitation while he was handling the pot. He swore under his breath and moved away from the stove, grabbing a towel to wipe some of the splash from around the burner.

“What does it matter what I think, Kakarot?” He snipped at him, keeping his attention away from his big stupid, open face.

“I dunno...I guess maybe it doesn't matter what anyone really thinks...but I'm around you a lot more...and I...hahah,” he interrupted himself with a sheepish laugh. “A...anyway, so...what happens in the story?”

The awkward shift was welcomed and Vegeta began carrying things to the small table for them to dine at. Having Kakarot place such personal question on him was not doing anything for his mood and making him think more than he cared to in regards to whatever their interaction was actually called. He curled his nose at the concept of friendship; it sounded like a damn fairy tale. Or at the very least, not something he was accustomed to—most saiyans weren't...mostly. Camaraderie was definitely more prevalent than familial closeness...By some definitions, Kakarot would be...a comrade.

What a stupid train of thought, he almost grunted his disdain aloud.

“Vegeta?”

“Hm?” He turned abruptly, train of thought killed by the realization that he'd blown off the man’s question entirely for the sake of agonizing over his stupid thoughts.

“You got real quiet for a sec…”

Thank you, Captain Obvious. “I was thinking. Foreign concept, I know.” He couldn't help the bite in his retort, it came naturally with every interaction with Kakarot. And somehow, Kakarot didn't actually seem at all fazed. Maybe he was used to his scathing words being a strange form of endearment... Endearment? Hell no. “I couldn't summarize the story, Kakarot. You’ll just have to read it. Slowly.”

“But…” The pout was so evident that Vegeta almost cracked him in the head with a spoon for being so pitiful about it. “Hey...can you read it to me?”

And the urge to beat him into the afterlife came in a quick second wave, accompanied with a sour hiss. “What? You want me to what?”

“I...I mean...you're already reading it right?” Kakarot waved his arms in defense of himself. “I could definitely pay more attention if I'm not tryin’ to read—and you said learning is good right—”

And he's manipulating me again, this fucking dunce…. and I'm fully aware of it. Kakarot, you goddamn—

“You don't gotta…”

Don't you fucking use that irritating tone—

“But I’ll be quiet and—”

And it's working.

Vegeta interjected before he could lay on another pouty word, “fine. Whatever. But if I catch you losing interest, then I’m done. Also, in exchange, you will shut your damn mouth for at least five hours a day so I can have some peace.”

Five hours of uninterrupted silence would never happen, but it sounded a lot less like he just gave in too quickly. Or that he was that susceptible to his provocation. Kakarot was not an innocent angel. He was a fool hiding a trace of demon horns somewhere and Vegeta was occasionally a sucker. That was how he ended up in the damn time chamber with him to begin with.

“I can totally do that!”

He sounded so joyful at such a simple exchange. Because he was such a simple person. Figures. Vegeta sighed a little and stabbed a fork into the center of his plate, sticking out of a finished piece of food. “Silence starts now. Eat your damn food.”

Surprisingly, Kakarot quietly obeyed.

Chapter Text

Settled comfortably and sprawled out on one of the small beds to wait for him to start, Goku was actually very surprised that Vegeta didn't back out of his agreement to read to him. After three separate sessions, he was still expecting him to just decide it wasn't worth it and quit. Though he knew Vegeta really well—all things considered—he still had his moments of being completely thrown by his behaviors. Vegeta flipped through the pages to find where he’d left off after the last time.

Truth be told, he really hadn't been all that interested in the idea of reading the book at first. Boredom was a key motivator, but also he wanted to get an idea of what Vegeta was putting his time into—something he really never did in regards to anyone else. Maybe it was because he spent so much time with Vegeta and knew that they had a bunch of things in common, despite their differences. Pushing and challenging themselves were key things that defined them and kept them both on their toes. He just wondered what Vegeta’s other interests offered him, since he himself had very little focus outside of martial arts and training.

Once he was ready and Vegeta started reading, he stopped running all the simple questions through his head and focused on the tones of his voice. He was usually stiff and severe, speaking with a clip to his tone that always showed impatience—even if he wasn't being impatient, he just had a way of making it sound like he was waiting for someone to get to the point when talking to him. But reciting the words on the pages didn't give Goku that impression at all. Each word flowed to the next one in a pace that was natural and he absently wondered if he'd read aloud before. He had a son, but was he ever close enough to Trunks to read to him? He trained with him, yeah, but this seemed...somehow more personal than that.

Vegeta didn't like it when he watched him read, so he stared up at the ceiling, thinking about the story he was being read. It wasn't hard to get a good picture when Vegeta’s way of reading had a smooth transition into each part. Though he didn't read in funny voices, he did make his narration have enough color that even Goku could make the difference between characters and their dialogues in long chapters. He could visualize at least enough to get an idea of the setting—though admittedly he entertained the characters as mental images of his friends with funny pirate accents.

He especially enjoyed the one he likened to Piccolo, partially because he felt like Piccolo would have a fit about it and that was somehow funny to him.

He closed his eyes and listened, arms stretched up and hands tucked behind his head. Vegeta usually read for something like an hour. He was fairly consistent with his time and when he decided he was done talking, then that was it for the day. He had yet to leave on a cliff hanging note and Goku never really argued with him when he decided he was finished for the time being. A part of him worried that if he did, then Vegeta might stop doing it entirely. Even Goku was able to pick up on how easily he annoyed him. Vegeta was just not a very cuddly and rarely had enough softness in him to care about how he interacted with others, which was sort of a shame… Goku thought he was a pretty good person, when he wasn’t being super defensive of himself.

After listening for a little while, comfortably, he suddenly noticed that Vegeta had stopped. Of course, he would be done at some point, but when the last sentence left off in a weird place, Goku realized he’d just abruptly ended the session. That made him open his eyes and glance over at him, seeing Vegeta fold the page and close the book. The expression he had was framed in just a tinge of annoyance and he furrowed his brows in confusion.

“...You stopped…?” He found his voice, not really protesting, but wondering for the strange timing of it. He was following the story.

“You weren’t paying attention,” Vegeta responded, very flatly. Possibly offended.

“I was!” Goku actually moved to sit up and lean against the mattress, facing him. He really wasn’t trying to look like he wasn’t focused on it, but he couldn’t really figure out what to do to make it more apparent. Staring at Vegeta wasn’t an option and if he was sitting up and looking everywhere else, he really would end up wandering. “I was listenin’, really.”

“You looked more like you were about to sleep, Kakarot.”

Aw, man, he is definitely offended… “Nah! Really, I wasn’t...I mean, I was just comfortable is all...It’s easier to listen with my eyes closed.”

“How exactly am I supposed to determine whether or not I’m wasting my time if you seem to be barely interested?” It seemed as if Vegeta had already decided he was wasting his time, but he was at least giving him the benefit of hearing his excuses. “I don’t know what game you’re playing, Kakarot, but I’m not playing it with you. We’re here to train and if you’re out to make a damn fool of me—”

“I like listening to your voice is all...I’m not tryin’ to make a fool of you…” He managed to frame his tone with a bit of an innocent pout, letting his words trail in a way that usually made people forgive him for his occasional thoughtlessness. It rarely worked on Vegeta, but it was habitual and he rubbed the back of his neck awkwardly. Vegeta’s gaze being turned on him, put him on the spot in a way he only ever experienced with him. Everyone else usually let him slide on everything. Not Vegeta.

“The very idea that you would be interested in this is ridiculous to begin with and you know it. I've been playing along to see just how long you were planning to let this nonsense continue. Honestly, I'm surprised you have the dedication to protest. Admittedly, keeping you quiet was worth the wasted time.” The wrinkles between his eyes came back and Goku inched a little closer toward him, really wanting to calm him down, clapping his hands together in apology as his words got more severe.

“C’mon Vegeta...you and I both know I'm not that smart. You're the smart one. I just wanted to listen to you, not bein’ mad at me for a lil bit…” He was earnest in the way he defended his reasoning, but he was a little surprised at himself for that being the explanation he went with. Thinking things through was Vegeta's thing, however, not his and he just had to roll with it and smiled widely. “I even can tell you everything that’s goin’ on in the story! Promise. You're at the part where Piccolo was captured, but totally turned it around and then you stopped.”

The expression on Vegeta’s face would have been worth taking a picture of if he'd had a camera and the presence of mind to think about saving that moment. The anger seemingly melted off his face, replaced by a wider eyed confusion that left the sour man quiet for a few brief moments before he blinked and parted his lips with a gentle, “huh…?” He shook his head and rubbed his face.

“I'm sorry, Kakarot did you say Piccolo?”

“Yeah, that's the one guy. The one with the leg thing who got separated from the others. I can't remember the name, but he reminds me of Piccolo, so…the kid’s definitely Gohan, well if Gohan was a girl and still younger. But it's close enough. I mean, Piccolo would totally defend Gohan from a sword.” He watched the kaleidoscope of expression cross over the other Saiyan’s face and he was partially pleased with himself, really. Vegeta couldn't hide his surprise, especially when he'd already assumed Goku hadn't been paying a lick of attention. And really...he probably wouldn't have if it wasn't for his interest in Vegeta’s interest. Or maybe he was just interested in Vegeta in general. And what made them so alike and yet...different. Very few people seemed to be toe to toe with him.

“You...really are a simpleton…” Vegeta exhaled, but his voice lost all its acidity. He couldn't argue against the truth of Goku not really being clever enough to string Vegeta along like that; he really wouldn't want to upset him to that degree anyway. His manipulations against Vegeta were much more simple than that.

“Yeah, maybe...so...are ya gonna keep going or?” He was just a few feet away from him and watching him intently, trying to determine if he was too soured for more, but Vegeta’s weird mask bounced around from thought to thought and settled across his face in a comfortable scowl. The little spot between his brows just scrunched up again; and while waiting for him to make a verbal response, Goku couldn't help just leaning that little extra bit so he could just...press a finger right between his eyes and flatten it right back down. He hardly even realized he’d done so before he was looking level with a pair of wide eyes. “...fixed it for you…?”

“...Ka...Kakarot, what the fuck is wrong with you—” Vegeta recoiled instantly and the wrinkles between his brows deepened again.

“Aw, but I just fixed that,” Goku pouted, perched at the end of the bed, with just a little chuckle under his breath after a minute of watching Vegeta process his reaction. He was surely gonna be mad, but he just couldn't help it. He was always so sour…

He didn't, however, expect to be brained with the hard spine of the book and his hands flew up to the painful knot he'd have to show for his playing. Vegeta looked like he was going to do it again, but he refrained, instead choosing to grind his teeth so hard that Goku could almost hear it. Yeah he's ticked…

“You dumb bastard…” Vegeta hissed and gripped the book, apparently talking himself out of bludgeoning Goku to death.

“...so...are you still gonna read…?” Goku risked his wrath, and nearly jumped away when Vegeta stood up, but there wasn't a malicious aura coming off him. Just an irritated one. Without warning, Vegeta’s strong hand flew into his face, but didn't connect with a smack, rather, a grab. His whole hand gripped Goku’s face and he realized only at that exact moment that Vegeta was throwing him back down onto the bed. He was certainly not prepared for the pillow that followed with a hard swing into his face.

He couldn't help his own loud laughter when he wrapped his arms around the pillow and rolled with it. This was as close to a good sense of humor as Vegeta would likely ever have, if his only retort was to beat him with a pillow and leave it be.

Though he did grumble, the sour man did sit back down and crack the book back open to the last page he could remember. “If I even think you're not listening, next time I'm just going to start beating your ass. Also, we had an agreement, shut the fuck up for at least five hours.”

“Okay okay,” Goku laughed and leaned on an arm, grinning like the fool Vegeta said he was. “Oh—before that, can you replace that one guy’s name with Piccolo?”

The sound of exasperation was so tangible that Goku could feel it in between the pause of him acknowledging he heard his dumb request and him actually starting to read.

And despite that, he did start reading the character’s name as Piccolo.

Chapter Text

A year spent with Kakarot passed a lot more swiftly than Vegeta had ever thought it would and he could easily chalk that up to the intensity at which they trained. Many cases ended up with them going and not stopping for days on end, only pausing briefly to refuel and then go right back at it. These moments were the easy ones. Taking swings at him and dodging his returns for hours upon hours, without pause, was preferable to the moments spent in recovery. Not because he particularly disliked reading—however strange it was that he was reading a goddamn novel to a clown—but because he rarely had to think about much when he was fighting with him.

An hour of reading became an hour of him reciting words with little recollection of the words, because of the thoughts that crept up on him and made him sit there for the whole session agonizing over stupid details that he never should have to confront. Kakarot was just being Kakarot and there was nothing to it outside of his simplicity and lack of personal boundaries. Kakarot was the one who would wrap and arm around him in public and get him in a friendly headlock, cheering about anything that could even slightly excite him.

Vegeta was not that sort of person. Even a celebratory event was met with crossed arms and a grunt that suggested that he wasn’t that invested in anything. He was not trained to be as carefree as Kakarot. Quite the opposite. Any hint of legitimate happiness or joy in his childhood was turned around and beaten out of him and warped into sadism. That had mellowed over time, but he still found he was filled with the competitive nature of his saiyan blood. He preferred that, to this weird...whatever the hell it was that Kakarot was roping him into.

Are we bonding? Is that what this is?

Was Kakarot worming his way in—or at least trying to—in an attempt to settle their constant rivalry? That didn’t seem too plausible, as they still smack talked and fought like they were always trying to jump over each other. But he was doing something and Vegeta didn’t understand the weirdly complex nature of an idiot enough to really get what his endgame was. He shouldn’t even try to think about it, but he was the one known to agonize over even the smallest things and focus his attention on the details that he should let go. He’d spent years in the past focused on the one detail of never getting to really fight Kakarot and now that he was here, in front of him, he’d barely made the attempt to have that real fight. They trained and punted each other around, but it never was like that first crushing defeat, where both of them fought until they had nothing left.

The fight where Kakarot let him go. Respected him, despite the small little detail that he’d intently aimed to kill the hell out of him. And his friends.

Kakarot had even dismissed his judgments of his actions during the whole Buu conflict.

The man was a forgiving fool and his disdain for him, was really hanging by a thin thread—whether he wanted to admit it or not. It was hard to seethe at someone who seemed genuinely happy for your presence, though Vegeta was determined to try. Trusting people was not his strong point, and Kakarot was a sore point for him to some degree. He was the embodiment of the hammer that came down and crushed everything he thought he understood. This fool made him question himself as a warrior, as a person, and as a saiyan. The latter of which really had tendencies to creep in and mess with him, because—despite his stupid nature—Kakarot had the mentality of a saiyan, almost more so at times than he did.

He would kill himself before he ever spoke that thought aloud, but he couldn't deny that sometimes, Kakarot just had the personality of a true saiyan. Not all the time, because he did care deeply for his wife and children—which most saiyans didn't generally bond to immediate family that way. Most saiyan families were scattered immediately and bonds formed much closer to who they worked with, and Vegeta could also see that in Kakarot at times. His tiny bald friend pushed him to Super Saiyan upon his death. Kakarot also sometimes vanished on his own wife for days or longer without so much as telling her. Not that Vegeta could talk, he did the same thing in the past. Though, that was where he realized how Kakarot had something over him, in the way of his desperate clinging to his saiyan pride.

Vegeta couldn't leave Bulma now without telling her where he was going, possibly when he was coming back. Kakarot could. Kakarot’s focus on one thing remained as steadfast as always, sometimes to the detriment of others. Vegeta...was willing to bow at Beerus’s feet to protect his family. Sometimes, the revelation left him dazed. Kakarot hadn't changed. He was the constant, and by that measure, he could see how much he himself had changed. Him of the past would be furious. Him of the present, didn't...care? Maybe he'd finally accepted that Frieza’s reign on who he became as a person was over. Maybe he was released from the culture requirements of what being a saiyan came to entail. Maybe he wasn't any one particular thing and actually became a unique individual that could stop holding on to remnants.

Perhaps, but that wouldn't stop him from holding on to them. He was proud to be what he was. The last saiyan prince who survived extinction. If that wasn't a testament to his perseverance, then he didn't have a word for it.

He just had to come to the realization that Kakarot was, unfortunately, just as prime an example of being a saiyan as he himself was. Better at some things, where he was better at others. In a way he hated so much, their strengths covered each other’s weaknesses. If they ever learned how to fight in unity, he was fairly certain there would be no one who could challenge them. But he'd be damned if he relied on him for power.

“Hey...Vegeta?”

The voice broke through his thoughts and he glanced up, startled a little to see another face, not even the length of his fingers away from his own. Shifting back abruptly, he barked quickly, “what, Kakarot—”

“You alright?” Kakarot did not take the hint about personal space being invaded viciously and he actually goddamn followed him, moving closer as if he was looking for something.

“Yes—get out of my face before I remove you.”

“You just stopped reading, so I just wanted to check…”

His big bright eyes didn't carry a lot of intensity in them, but somehow they managed to make Vegeta feel like they saw something deeper in him than he'd be comfortable bearing to anyone else and he felt defensive of himself in an instant. Kakarot and his lack of respecting personal bubbles would probably be the doom of all of them one day, but it was about to be the doom of Kakarot if he didn't get back.

“I won't warn you again, to get out of my face,” he made probably the most unfriendly expression on the entirety of planet Earth, and that seemed to be enough to make Kakarot move, leaning back and holding his hands up defensively.

“Aw, don't be so uptight, it's just me.”

It's just you, is entirely the problem. But he had no immediate response to give and that startled him a little bit. Kakarot saw more of him than he dared to say anyone else did, barring his own wife. His thoughts recoiled right back into the earlier ones, where the thought of saiyans placing more importance on comrades over family had rolled around a bit. Clearly Vegeta was different, right? Kakarot was a comrade, of sorts. He definitely didn't care about him…

That was totally why he made such a quick dive to catch the fool before he fell back to the deck after fighting Beerus, right? Because he definitely didn't care. He obviously placed more importance on his family.

And why do you think you can't divide yourself between both?

He swallowed down the counterpoint and trained his eyes back on the person in front of him. His train of thought derailed and he wasn't going to be able to get it back enough to keep reading, so he closed the book, brows furrowed as they usually were—drawing his memory back to the one time Kakarot had actually reached forward to poke him right between the eyes to make him put away his permanent scowl. Like Bulma did. Goddamn it.

“Do you miss Bulma?” As if reading his mind.

He blinked at him, slowly, as if registering the question and sending it down the conveyor to his brain to have it processed and sent back with a signed document from someone in charge who could give an answer. The paper came back blank but for a little note attached telling to figure it the fuck out himself.

All he could manage was to answer a question with a question and hope Kakarot was stupid enough to not see through his ploy. “Well, do you miss your wife?” He grunted.

“Huh? Ah, course I do. I could really go for her home cooking,” he trailed off, mentally wandering to a place where he'd dream of all the tasty food he could shove down his throat.

For some reason, it struck Vegeta. “Don't tell me you just miss her cooking?” He knew better than to ask, but a stupid part of himself pursued the answer.

“Well, I mean, I do miss her cookin’, but I miss her too. I mean, she yells at me a bunch, but I guess I kinda like that? Sometimes I forget to come home, haha. Or forget to do somethin’ in the field. Or that one time I accidentally left Goten in the city when I went on an errand for her. He got home okay, though. She sometimes gets mad when I don't come home for dinner, but she still makes a bunch and I eat it anyway later and that does make her happy. Oh, have you ever had her cooking? It's super good, you should come over sometime. I don't think she’d mind. I mean she's used to cookin’ a lot. Bulma could come too! Though….I think she’s jealous of Bulma sometimes, ‘cause I'm always at your place a lot, but I definitely don't have any interest in Bulma like that, y’know. She’s got more to worry about with you than her,” and Kakarot’s rambling just cascaded down into his cheerful chuckles, leaving Vegeta staring at him for some time.

He recovered after the onslaught of useless information and broke it down to the one or two bits of information that his brain told him he had to respond to.

“Wait, what did you say? What do you mean she has more to worry about with me?” Inwardly, he was screaming. What the hell did that mean?

“Huh? Oh, I mean, I definitely spend more time with you. I told her I was training for three days and she kinda looked at me funny, yelled at me a bit about not bein’ home for a while, but told me that it's okay if I spend time at your place as long as I tell her. Though she said she’s gotta talk to Bulma...so I think maybe she's upset with Bulma.”

“...and why do you think she's upset with Bulma?” Suddenly, he could feel his heart stopping. Just what is going on with their wives. Kakarot was dense, but Vegeta was not dense enough to not realize there was something there if their wives were at the ‘gotta talk’ stage.

“I dunno, she just told me it's not my fault and I shouldn't feel guilty. I really have no idea what she was talking about, but she made a really good dinner. You’d like it, I think. I could tell her to leave off the little round things that you don't like that much. The water...what were they called, wa—”

“Water chestnuts.” Vegeta finished mechanically, somehow taken back that Kakarot even noticed such a trivial detail. He would eat them, but he didn't particularly go out of his way to do so. But that little fact didn't detract from the alarming questions that started raining down between his ears. What exactly was his wife referring to? What did Kakarot have to feel guilty about—or not feel guilty about?

Why did he suddenly feel extremely anxious about their women talking?

He rubbed his temple and relaxed back against the chair. This was why he preferred their days of training to their hours of rest. When Kakarot spoke to him, or did anything around him, he felt shifts in his thought process and the last thing he wanted was to change anymore than he already had. Before long, he'd start liking being around Kakarot. He couldn't have that.

“I think we’re done here for now.”

“Aww—.”

“Shut it, Kakarot. You owe me five hours of silence,” he pointed at him with a stern reminder. “That starts now.”

Kakarot pouted at him, but once he saw that Vegeta was set in his way, he had no choice but to accept it, flopping back on the bed and accepting that rest probably wouldn't be a bad idea.

Lucky him, that he could just shrug it off. Vegeta on the other hand, sat in the chair, staring at nothing silently, while his whole brain turned every detail over in an agonizing buzz of thoughts.

Kakarot was wrong about a thing or two. Chi Chi wasn't jealous over Bulma. If she was jealous she could have turned into a controlling bitch and tried to put a better reign on him. No, she wasn't jealous of Bulma about anything relating to her husband. If she had anyone to be jealous of, Vegeta realized it would be of him and not Bulma. That she wasn't jealous, left him to assume she was perfectly accepting of the sheer quantity of time they spent together. Of the fact that Kakarot would disappear for days on end to spend with him. Bulma didn't seem to mind this either. She just smiled and waved him off, telling him to have a good time and play nice. She jokingly referred to Kakarot as his goddamn Battle Husba—

Fortunately Kakarot has his eyes closed, so he couldn't see the look that must have crossed Vegeta’s face. A year and some odd weeks and he only just put the implications together and why Bulma teased some of the things she teased, and why she gave him such a severe look just before he left.

“Fucking hell—” he hissed, forgetting himself for a moment.

“Nnh? You say something, ‘Geta?”

“No.”

Two more years could not pass quick enough, because he had to talk to Bulma and find out just what the fuck they thought was going on between he and Kakarot.

Chapter Text

Echoes of fists colliding, grunting, and the occasional yell, filled the white void for hours before there was any pause. Not even briefly; they powered up, powered down, then powered right back up again to continue their brawl. Between the two, Goku was more wild and Vegeta was much more savage—the main difference being, that Vegeta pulled no punches at any time and had the tendency to hit like a truck with raw intensity. And Goku knew all about being hit by a truck.

But something about the way Vegeta was pushing, made Goku think something was just a little off about him. He'd been that way for a while, something like a month, but his lack of attention and poor memory couldn't trace back to exactly what had made him so volatile. He just knew that when Vegeta managed to catch him open, he pummeled him hard enough to make him quickly pick up his pace to not be hit again. They'd always been a little rough, but there was an intensity in it that gave him a distinct impression that Vegeta was venting something. He was brutal, and Goku made a loud wailing noise when he managed to catch him at just the wrong angle in the head.

“Ow—” he broke their silence with a dramatic exclamation. He'd been hurt much worse, many times, but he wasn't expecting a bloom of pain in his temple at that moment. “Vegeta—what the hell—” He stopped, keeping a distance between them for the time being. He clapped his hands over the throbbing part of his skull. “I don't even remember you hitting me this hard when you were mad at me, what’s goin’ on? Did I do somethin’?”

Getting on Vegeta’s nerves was almost a hobby for as much as he managed it, but for once, he really wasn't aiming to get him this prickled. He really had no idea what could have sparked his intensity. Vegeta stopped when he questioned it and if he was reading his expression right, it seemed as if Vegeta himself didn't realize he was being as vicious as he was. Sometimes he did get himself really deep into training. He was very serious and very determined to hone every aspect of him that he could. That was just how Vegeta was and Goku liked him that way, but not when he seemed to be using their sparring as a release for something else bothering him. He couldn't explain how he knew. He just did. He could feel it in the way Vegeta’s ki pulsed against his own.

Once he was sure that Vegeta wasn't going to catch him off guard and pounce, he relaxed and settled back on the ground, watching him with furrowed brows. “Hey, I'm a little worn out,” he offered, rubbing the back of his neck. “Call a lunch break?” He offered, giving Vegeta the out he probably needed to figure out what his issue was without pressing him again. If he decided he didn't want to talk, then he wouldn't. No matter how much Goku needled him. This much time spent in solitude with him had definitely taught him some of the subtleties of Vegeta. Perhaps Goku wasn't the best at being tactful, but he knew where Vegeta’s buttons were, how to push them, and he was starting to catch the warning signs of when not to push them.

Fortunately, Vegeta relented and didn't pursue their battling, coming down himself with a troubled look on his face. Troubled enough that Goku could see it. He took a risk in approaching Vegeta once he was back on the ground and back into a more relaxed state—and less likely to snap. If they were going to make any progress together, then he knew Vegeta needed to work out whatever got him riled up to begin with. It couldn't be from the result of their sparring, because he and Goku were easily matched for most of the time. The gap Goku had on him had been closed significantly at some point, and he was fine with that.

“Hey...what’s up with the hittin’ so hard…?” He rubbed his face again and perched a closed fist on his hip. “If I made you mad, least ya could do is tell me. You do every other time…”

“It's nothing, Kakarot,” Vegeta started walking, set to pass him without a second glance, but Goku wasn't always passive and he grabbed him by the elbow before he could actually make it out of his reach. Vegeta’s demeanor didn't give him the sense that he should back off just yet.

“It's definitely something. You're being a jerk, but not on purpose. And usually when you're bein’ a jerk, it's on purpose. If it's about who’s stronger, then it's nothing to get mad about; you still hurt, a bunch.” He motioned to his face and the bit of a welt he had from the force of the sock to his head. “And I still can't beat you outright. ‘s not like you don't still challenge me, because you sure as heck are right now. If you're still worried about th—”

“It's not that, Kakarot, good god. Shut the fuck u—wait a minute—” The tone of Vegeta’s voice pitched briefly and he grit his teeth, yanking his arm away and facing him with half of a defensive battle stance. He looked bristled with offense and bowed up a little to make himself look bigger before he dropped his voice to a threatening tone. “What to you mean still worried—You...you fucking heard me—”

Goku realized his mistake about the time he found Vegeta’s fist curled in the material of his undershirt and pulling him closer, twitching with anger. He waved his arms and tried to smooth down his ruffled feathers. “N...no...no way. I didn't hear anything. I just—”

“You're a terrible liar, Kakarot. Save lying for people smarter and better at it,” he hissed at him and nearly lifted him off his feet.

“Vegeta….c’mon—you said it wasn't because of this—” Deflating Vegeta required a lot of back peddling and Goku was losing his foothold, but it was at least a little better than wondering why he was hitting him like he wanted to knock his head off.

“It is now! You play around and make a fool of me constantly—” He snarled slightly and had the clear look of someone who was debating throwing Goku as far off into the void as he could. Thankfully he didn't.

“I promise I'm not! Super promise!” Goku’s expression turned more serious to accentuate his point, staring him down and reaching to grab his wrist with one hand. “You're awesome, seriously. I'm not good at all this stuff, but you're amazing and I don't want you to think I'm just playin’, because I can't really relax with you, ‘cause you’ll knock my head off—”

“I'm about to knock your head off, Kakarot—”

“Whoa—hold on Vegeta! Seriously,” he wrapped both his hands around his wrist to loosen his white knuckled grip. “C’mon, we’ve been doing great, haven't we?”

“We haven't gotten anywhere significant in the last several months in here. I spend my goddamn free time reading books to a mental toddler. What exactly have we been progressing? The best growth I've made in here is that now I can completely tune out your goddamn snoring. You are oblivious, and I have to wait another year and a half to figure out what the hell your wife of talking to mine about. Because you're a stupid shit, you don't even realize assumptions are being made.”

Goku blinked at him, not really getting it, or rather, not really willing to think that deeply on it. Vegeta apparently had a lot of things that had been piling up and at least now he was expressing them, in his own way—veiled in thin anger that would dissolve once he wore his irritation out. He thought they’d done really well. Maybe they hadn't exactly achieved a new level of super saiyan, but he at least thought he’d achieved something during their time in the chamber. Vegeta wasn't shutting him down completely like he had before. Though, he did recall Vegeta vehemently declaring how Goku was not his friend, and how that had felt like a big step backwards.

He stepped back a little and awkwardly rubbed the back of his neck.

“I’m sorry Vegeta…but I really mean it. You're just so complicated, I don't know what to say most of the time. If we’re not sparring, then you're gettin’ annoyed with me, but I can't really do anything else without tickin’ you off first. I thought maybe…” he looked down and pouted a little, in such a typical Goku way. He paused, thinking deeply—for him—before looking back with with odd determination for what the nature of the discussion was. “Do you really hate me that much? Are we really not friends? Because I thought…”

He just closed his mouth, lips turn into a steeper pout and brows turned together in a childish way. He was simple—dumb even, compared to Vegeta—but he didn't like when people hated him. Especially when the person who seemed to have the most difficulty getting over his disdain toward him, was someone he had so much unreturned respect for. He thought that after Buu, they were okay. Vegeta was still Vegeta and grouchy to the point of contention, but he seemed at least reachable.

“Kakarot…” Vegeta slipped between gritted teeth, but his expression wasn't harsh or the usually impatient one. Goku couldn't read this one and that placed a whole new angle on this oddly placed conversation.

“Well? C’mon Vegeta, if you still have stuff going on, then let's talk. Because I never disliked you, even when you first showed up. Don't just say we’re enemies, because I'm not your enemy. If we’re not friends, what are we?”

There was no place for Vegeta to run without looking like he was backing out with his tail between his legs. Goku knew that and he had plenty of time to wait for the answer.

Chapter Text

If we’re not friends, what are we?

The words echoed in his head and he just stared at the taller man, trying to find his footing in a conversation he wasn’t really wanting to be a part of at all. Answering this question felt more difficult than any battle he’d ever had and Kakarot was a much steeper wall to climb over or break through. Something about the way he looked at him so expectantly, left him feeling like he should step back and shut down completely. He was far too close to being considered vulnerable at this fool’s hands. He could handle being manipulated a little bit, but being openly cornered… His defensive walls struggled to thicken with every second that he remained fixed face to face with him.

How did he answer that? He had never had any kind of relationship with anyone enough to know what even entailed being a friend and if it was anything like how Kakarot was with the others, then he just didn’t have that. He had only gotten comfortable existing among them within the last few years and he never made any attempts to be closer to them or try to mingle, let alone bond with them. If it hadn’t been for Bulma’s pestering, he wouldn’t likely see another person’s face for years on end. He was oddly a shut-in, despite his entire life being lived here and there, with little to no stability or stationary residence.

In the early days of living on Earth, he could barely stand it. At present, he was comfortably tucked away in the little corner of the world with Bulma and their son. If Kakarot hadn’t come to bother him constantly, he’d probably never see the man again. He’d gone as long as a year without seeing him, until Kakarot showed up and almost bullied him out of his shell. In that time, the best he’d had for social interactions, was standing quietly near Bulma with his arms crossed while she mingled among others一none of whom were the people he’d have recognized.

Kakarot showed up, bringing his son for Trunks, with a big idiot grin and pleaded to spar with him. He relented and it never stopped from then on. He went off to train with Whis, and Kakarot followed after. They stayed there, and he shared a room with him.

He was sharing a whole patch of reality alone with him and he wasn’t flying off into an indignant rage about it. Bulma...was一to some degree一right about the change in him. But...friend? Is that what this was called? Friends were what Goten and Trunks were, right? They spent their time together, playing and sparring. He’d seen the boys doing homework or playing video games. Goten was over for dinner often enough that he absently wondered how Chi Chi wasn’t knocking on their door to look for her runaway child.

Come to think of it, Kakarot...did much of the same.

“Well?” Kakarot urged his answer, never content with letting one have their crisis internally. This fool was honest and open to a fault and didn’t understand that it wasn’t that way for everyone. He could speak anything he felt to anyone, but Vegeta was barely able to grasp what he felt and speaking it to another person was just the heavy vice of weakness threatening to crush him.

“...What do you want from me, Kakarot…?” He finally found his voice among the thoughts that weren’t even close to sorting themselves out.

The bright eyed dunce just gave him a soft smile that made him want to crawl out of his body and let the conversation happen without him present. “I just want to be closer to you. You’re always talkin’ about us being the last...though I guess your brother kinda takes that away, but he’s not really like us anyway. There’s really no one else that holds up to you, ya know? Feels like such a waste if you’re just right here in front of me and I can’t even talk to ya.”

Just how innocent can a person be?

Vegeta regarded him with bewilderment at how frank he was and how absent minded he was about what he was wanting. Bulma was making assumptions and apparently Kakarot’s wife was too if what he said implied what he thought it did. He never actually considered the possibility that he and Kakarot could possibly have been close enough to be considered friends, let alone close enough that he’d be actively searching to bond with him.

Realization hit him like a ton of bricks and he just stared at him for a long time, knowing that he probably looked ridiculous. But the person standing in front of him had actually become the only person outside of his little family to take any of his time and occasionally his concern, and not expect anything out of him other than him being himself. Vegeta hadn’t actually had a proper definition to go with what being a friend entailed, and despite camaraderie of the past, had never really considered it legitimate. Friendship was for other people. Despite thinking this, maybe he had become friends with this dipstick at that moment when they threw everything they had together to defeat Buu. His one and only admittance that Kakarot was the best.

Even at that moment, squaring off with him, he realized he could begrudgingly accept that outcome as long as he was next to him. If anyone came along and tried to dethrone either of them, then he would have a problem with it that would be unparallelled. They were essential to the growth of each other and he was no longer offended by that revelation. There was some connection that had been made somewhere along the way.

Kakarot had been willing to hold off the most critical moment in that fight against Buu because he didn’t want to kill him. Because he cared that much.

Will I ever stop owing you my life? Probably not.

“I have never had friends, Kakarot,” he finally spoke and the words felt thick and strange. In a single instant, he understood just how steep the gap between them was in handling emotions.

“Yeah...but you do now.”

“You say that as if it’s as simple as that,” Vegeta growled a little, feeling defensive of just how easy he made it sound to transition from trusting no one, to having someone he could place his life safely in the hands of.

“Why isn’t it? We’ve been through a bunch together. I mean, I guess we fight a lot, but it's not serious anymore, right? You're just kinda grouchy all the time, but that's just you,” he chuckled, knowing that Vegeta wouldn't exactly be mad about that—it was the truth. “It's okay, though. I guess you probably didn't have time to make a lot of friends.”

For some reason, that made Vegeta tick just a little bit. “Not all of us had exciting childhoods with wholesome life lessons and people cheering us on.”

“I know,” Kakarot responded to the surprise of the older saiyan. It was enough to silence him for the moment and allow him to continue, uninterrupted. “You were a jerk when you showed up, killed the guy you were with, tried to kill us, turned on everyone you were supposed to be working with. You didn't really have anybody at all. But you're not there anymore, right? You don't feel like killin’ us anymore, yeah? You’re still kind of a jerk, but that's just you. You trust me, don't ya?”

With my life.

He didn't respond immediately or use those words, but he thought them and he was loathe to admit that lying to himself was becoming a thing of the past. His coping mechanism of self deception was being replaced with having a stronger will to accept the facts. Kakarot just didn't get the gravity of it all, and likely never would. His outgoing personality and ability to find positivity and redemption in everyone made him charming and likeable. Even Vegeta had, to some degree, been seduced by his colorful cheer and zest for life. That this dunce could talk to him so simply, and get so much reaction was a super power that was a mystery to him.

“Do you trust me?” He countered, not answering his question; instead choosing to emphasize it in the other direction.

Kakarot’s answer left him with a strange feeling in his chest.

“More than anyone. I know that if I was in a bind, you’d totally go down with me, if you weren't saving me,” he laughed, knowing it was true, because it had happened before.

Vegeta wanted to argue; to tell him he was wrong and being ridiculous, but he wasn't wrong. He absolutely would jump in and if the ship went down with them both on deck, then so be it. They’d go down fighting. His life without Kakarot would be dull, even if he loved his family. Kakarot was part of that and it took countless days of staring at a white void to understand. Hearing his words did nothing but cement that in and make it impossible to shrug off. Suddenly, the assumptions he assumed the wives were making seemed plausible.

Especially if Kakarot talked like this with either of them.

Battle Husband was a cheesy term by Bulma, but it wasn't...inaccurate.

If he was thinking about this even two days earlier, he would probably have started screaming, but being cornered by a man too innocent to be real sometimes, really twisted his reality and presented it in a new light. This wasn't something he was familiar with. Friendship sounded like a fairy tale, magical thing for kids, and way too simple for what it was.

Kakarot was more of a...partner…?

“You need saving from yourself, most of the time,” Vegeta found his voice enough to settle back into his usual retorts, but Kakarot threw him again, and left him stunned into silence.

“So do you, that's why I'm here!” He smiled widely, fists propped on his hips and standing there like he was so proud of himself for his assertion. “You're my friend, and I won't tell anyone if you don't want them to know, but it's just us in here, y’know?”

He was cheery enough, that he almost expected him to reach forward and wrap his arm around his shoulders and catch him in his friendly headlock. At that moment he realized that he was perfectly off guard and if he had, he would have been unprepared for it. At some point, he'd become completely relaxed around him. It was both relieving and frightening. Being comfortable was a chance to be taken advantage of.

But then again. This was Kakarot.

“...Yeah, if you say so. Lets just go get something to eat. I can hear your stomach from over here. Then, I go back to hitting you.” Recovering from the weight of the topic was a struggle, but fortunately the other saiyan was either smart enough to know when it was progress enough, or he was legitimately that easy to distract.

“Aw man, at least be gentler.” He pouted, but the mirth in his voice was undeniable.

“Never.”

Either way, he trusted Kakarot to not give him a reason to regret leaving himself completely unguarded.

Chapter Text

“Man, I’m wiped,” Goku exhaled loudly, stretching as he flopped back on the bed and sprawled out. The air between them had felt a lot clearer since he’d stopped Vegeta and talked to him. The last three sessions felt a lot less distracted from both ends; and Goku felt like Vegeta even started to play back a little toward the end, up until the last big brawl that left them both drained and starving. They called another break to eat, but afterward both decided maybe that a night of sleep wasn’t unreasonable either.

Vegeta came into the room, wiping his face with a towel. He was the tidy to Goku’s mess, and it was very apparent between their beds and how they dressed for sleep. In Vegeta’s company, Goku just put on sleep shorts and sometimes not even that; and he sprawled like an animal across his small bed. Vegeta, on the other hand; wore sweats, a tank top, and even socks to sleep―which Goku thought was weird, but it was Vegeta. Vegeta was just different to begin with. Good different. But different nonetheless.

But this time, Vegeta came in and he hadn’t yet pulled the rest of his sleep clothes on. Goku could be nosy at times, and often turned his attention very obviously on people; to the point where he didn’t really care if people noticed him watching. He had nothing to really hide and his carefree nature often made others forget to be upset with him for his nosiness. Vegeta was a strange exception, but even he seemed to pause and try to discern what his interest was.

“What, is something amusing you, Kakarot?” He grunted at him and turned a half-frown on him, but Goku just brushed the look aside.

“Ah, sorry. I just don’t see you undressed all that often.” Perhaps it was the way he said it that had Vegeta make the expression that he did. Dense as he was, even he knew that sounded a little weird and probably looked a little weird coming from him that way. So he backstepped very quickly. “I...I mean, I guess I wouldn’t. Just threw me off, is all.” It didn’t sound smooth coming out at all, but his tone helped to flatten out his oddly made comment to seem more innocent―more like he’d meant it.

“I, on the other hand,” Vegeta managed to keep his voice even, despite processing the awkward nature of Goku’s comment, “have seen much more of you than I think you wife would be comfortable knowing.”

The comment was meant as a tease, Goku knew that; but it certainly didn’t help the weird atmosphere his comment made. He was not very good at covering up his interests with dodges, but he almost felt like he had turned the topic away. “I’m not as bad as I used to be,” he chuckled sheepishly.

“That is difficult to believe,” Vegeta just snorted, in response, throwing the towel over a chair and sitting down on the edge of his bed. He faced away from him, a habit that Goku had assumed had come from how closed off he was to people in general―let alone him. Despite their talk, he still felt like Vegeta had a thick barrier around him at times. But watching him, made him also take notice of how the usually tense muscles of his back were relaxed and he wasn’t rigid or on guard. Was he comfortable? It seemed like it. That did make him smile at him a bit―especially since Vegeta couldn’t see his smile. He’d be a little sour if he did see him.

But his insatiable interest in Vegeta was a lot stronger than Vegeta’s barrier and no amount of heated looks would probably make him stop from trying to worm a little closer to see more what he was hiding. There must be a whole personality underneath his stiff demeanor and because Goku was so transparent himself, the very concept was fascinating. He found himself sitting back up despite his sore muscles.

Staring down his back, he found himself drawn a little to the battle history etched into his skin and burned into the landscape of his back. He’d never really noticed before, because―as he told Vegeta―he never really saw much of him without his usual suit. Any time they battled hard enough to damage clothes, they were too preoccupied for him to really care. He’d never really taken much of an inventory of his own scars, let alone someone else’s. But with so much time in his hands, he could take a minute or two and actually see and respect the evidence of the other Saiyan’s life. There were so many overlapping marks, that Goku wondered where they could all have come from. Vegeta had always been strong, however, the evidence showed that he wasn’t strong by accident. But by survival.

Without thinking, he edged forward until he was close enough to reach out. Vegeta’s back was open and he unguarded, completely. His ki was flat and pulsing quietly, humming with trust that he was in the safest place he could be. Goku wouldn’t give him a reason to bow back up and strengthen his walls again. He would never be fully open, but he was open enough that Goku’s fingers managed to actually graze over a thin, but deep dip in his skin―long since healed, but leaving a permanent line in his body.

To his amazement, the strong muscles under his fingers didn’t tense and Vegeta didn’t whip around and smack him off the edge of the bed like he almost expected him to. He just turned his head and looked down the length of his shoulder, with something of a quizzical expression. It wasn’t enough to stop Goku from drawing a line all the way from the top of the marred tissue to the bottom. The edge of one, led to the outline of another and they connected and crossed, layered up all over his back. His arm were covered too and probably wrapped around his ribs and to his chest. Some of them were faint, but others looked like they would never fade.

“That one was from Zarbon,” Vegeta’s voice seemed so loud in the infinite quiet of the time chamber. “The one next to it, was Frieza. Still not quite sure why Frieza kept me around, but that was his mistake.”

“Yeah...I remember this one too…” Goku tapped a knot that dipped a bit like the remnant of a bullet. That was when Frieza shot him through the chest.

“The most humiliating one,” he grunted and shrugged, as if that was enough to brush off the damage done. Goku could tell it wasn’t, but he had enough sense to know not to pursue certain touchy notes. That fight was one of the few that remained as vivid in Goku’s mind as it did. Back then, he was upset seeing someone like Vegeta meet a fate like that, out of respect. If something like that were to happen to him now? He couldn’t really gauge how he would respond, but he had a suspicion that he would lose all sense of restraint in the retaliation; not out of respect, but out of affection in the same way he would fight for Krillin. He couldn't pinpoint when he'd begun to view Vegeta in the same way, but that was where he stood.

“You got a lotta these, is that one really the worst?” Goku asked, still tracing line to line and wondering how long some of them had been there.

“Probably not the worst, physically. I suppose my tail would be the most damaging. But...well you were there, Kakarot, you should know why,” his voice suddenly hissed severely. It was still a deep sore spot, after all.

“Yeah...but it's not like I had an easy time with Frieza...and when I showed up, I was fresh and ready to go.”

“We are not discussing this, Kakarot, I don't need the reminders of you making me look like a fool.”

Goku was quiet for a moment, thinking back a bit and remembering the chaos of that day. Vegeta was always thinking that Goku was trying to make him look like a fool, but that really wasn't the case. Vegeta didn't have the power to defeat Frieza...but he almost didn't either. He sat up a bit, pressing the pad of his finger over the scar, covering it as if it was something he could fix.

“You know, you're kinda responsible for pushing me in that fight.”

Vegeta just cast a glance back at him, confusion clear as day. “What are you talking about?”

“I dunno if it was because I was tired or what, but I had your voice in my head telling me I could do it. You kept driving me to push myself when I ran out of energy. Guess that’s because you're the one who keeps going until you really can't. You're so stubborn, even I can't keep up with that. Dunno why you were naked in the mental images I had, but I guess, since that you didn't have all these scars, that really does confirm it wasn't actually you in my head...don't think my image of you was wrong though. You'd be mad at me if I lost to someone you lost to.”

The logic was definitely Goku’s brand, but the look on Vegeta’s face suggested he was correct. As sour as Vegeta seemed to act about being second to Goku at any time, he would be more disdainful if someone came along and clocked them both. Even more so toward Goku, who he expected more out of than anyone.

“...Why are you telling me this..?”

“Because you’re strong as hell, Vegeta. You jump over me all the time, but you're too hard on yourself when I jump back. You're not as bad as you used to be, though. But I'm really not trying to make a fool outta you. ‘Cause you know you’d get mad if if didn't keep pushing too.” His years of time with Vegeta had at least given him some understanding and if he had a subject matter that he was most educated on, it was probably Vegeta. It did help that he had the remnants of what being fused with him felt like.

With that, Vegeta turned around finally, drawing his legs up onto the bed and staring at him for a long minute, face to face, before he slowly lifted a foot. Goku watched him curiously, even as his brain registered he probably should move. But he didn't move and Vegeta’s foot pressed against his chest and the smaller saiyan shoved him right back over to his own bed—springs of the bed crying a little as he flopped over on them with a whine.

“You're goddamn ridiculous,” Vegeta said with his usual hiss, before he turned over and laid on the bed with his back to him—still showing the canvas of his life to him.

Among the scars, were a number of etches that Goku himself had left; and he had his fair share of Vegeta’s pain laced gifts to remember their history by. He didn't have any on his body that he was ashamed of and hopefully one day that would be the same for Vegeta.

“Stop staring at my back, Kakarot and go the fuck to sleep before I put your lights out.”

Goku grinned a little, rolling over on his back and closing his eyes. He felt like he'd made some progress, if not in training, at least with Vegeta. He fumbled a lot, but he knew a lot of the right things to say to get under his skin. He was closer to Vegeta than he'd ever been, if he only got shoved after a handful of minutes passed, and not punched immediately.

Once upon a time, Vegeta was trying to kill him.

Now he was rolled over, facing away from him to hide the slight reddening of his face that Goku managed to catch anyway. And that was more of a power rush than any Super Saiyan God form could ever give.

Chapter Text

“Vegeta, get out of the way!” His voice echoed and he jumped into the side of the other saiyan, in order to shove him out of the way, before he took the brunt of a ki blast that had enough force to knock them both into the upper atmosphere, if caught in it. He risked being hit too, but couldn't take a chance of Vegeta getting obliterated without any resistance. Something in him screamed, telling him that if either of them were hit, they would be done for.

“Kakarot, what the hell, get out of my fight—” Vegeta scowled at him, turning to him with a fist raised and a threat present in his voice.

“We have to work together on this one, Vegeta—didn't you feel that?” He argued back, voice strained more than he thought, desperate to get the other saiyan to listen. “The power coming from that could—”

“I don't care, Kakarot, I don't need your damn help defending myself, now stop getting in my way!” Vegeta flew away from him, bursting with energy, before Goku would reach out and stop him.

“Vegeta—wait—!” He flew after him in a desperate rush, aura exploding with power to close the distance in a hurry. He pushed his body to double his speed, trying to stop him, or at least slow him, but he couldn't seem to catch up. Something wasn't right. Vegeta was fast, but could he outrun him so easily? And going faster by the minute. “Vegeta—!” He shouted after him, straining his voice; hoping he would be heard, but it fell on deaf ears. Goku knew he was stubborn, but this was insane, even for him.

How could he not see the danger? How did he not feel the tingling sensation that was telling even Goku to stop? Maybe he did, but he was being bull headed again. Now was not the time for that—and if Goku felt that way, then it really was more dangerous than he should try to take on. But he wasn't listening—

Vegeta!

He couldn't hear his own voice anymore and he felt like he was having an out of body experience, desperation kicking in, for some reason that he couldn't explain. He just knew that he had to get to him. He had to stop him from whatever he was trying to do. Vegeta couldn't go toward that danger, and if he did, he would suffer consequences that Goku wasn't ready to see. His body bristled with sparks, coming off his skin and his muscles screamed to move him forward, faster and faster.

Stop him—the voice in his head urged and he broke through his boundaries, skipping several stages of powering up to go right to Super Saiyan Blue. But try as he might, the distance between them seemed to get wider and wider until he couldn't even see him anymore. All he saw was darkness in front of him and he stopped, trying to feel where he was—turning to find the blackness behind him as well and closing in. He'd lost him completely, somehow.

“Vegeta—!” He yelled into the creeping shadows all around him. “This isn't funny—Vegeta—!” No matter where he looked, he couldn't make sense of what direction he was facing anymore and an oddly unfamiliar sensation of panic began to set in. Vegeta wasn't answering him and he couldn't see him in the void. It struck him then, to close his eyes and try to focus, instead of letting it get to him. Very little could fog his ability to sense Vegeta. Being fused with him before had placed something of an invisible link between them that was difficult to explain, but impossible to erase. Instead of running after him, he'd skip the travel and go directly to him. Then he'd try to reel him back in. They could beat any enemy, but not like this.

The space around him warped as he honed in on him, skipping him across the fabric of space to place him in the single spot his senses pinpointed. He immediately prepared to find a fight with Vegeta, but was met with nothing.

Nothing? He felt him, stronger than he had before; yet there was nothing around him but darkness and it was closing in. “Vegeta?” He turned and tried to make sense of the dense, inky fog; but he couldn’t even tell where it began. It wasn't tangible, but he could feel it. It was bizarre and felt like the time chamber, but worse. Dark and hollow.

But he felt Vegeta right where he was standing. How could be not see him, but feel him so close? He toyed with the idea of walking, but he couldn't leave the spot he was at, or he risked losing track of Vegeta’s ki. Was this a projection? Who was playing this trick on them? Had Vegeta really fallen for it?

A sensation hit the back of his neck, like dripping water and he raised his hand quickly to wipe it off his skin, trusting nothing. He couldn't see much, but even in the shadows he could see the dark sticky liquid smeared across his fingers. The metallic smell hit him very quickly after and he stood frozen for a moment, processing what that meant. Another drop came down, directly into his open palm, and he slowly turned his head. The heavy stench of blood permeated the air and more came down in a sporadic rain, before Goku realized something was coming down at him from above.

Instinct, and a terrible sensation in the pit of his stomach, made him brace to catch whatever was dropping down on him. His arms and legs prepared for the impact that came, like a lead weight, and he went down on one knee to steady himself as the force of the body colliding with him set his balance awry. Immediately, he felt something pouring down his leg and soaking the front of his gi. The smell of blood became almost unbearable.

It took several moments for his brain to work through what he was seeing and he felt his heart stop a little, a seizing in his chest that made him feel a little faint. The pool of blood was growing where he kneeled and he set the body down, hurried to try and find some solution—but he was no medic. He was no healer. If he could find his way out of this fog, he could save him.

“Vegeta—hang in there—I’ll figure something out,” he said to no one but himself. There was no response from the body before him and he stared, wide-eyed at the gaping hole in his chest. There was no way he could close a wound this size and there was no one he could sense around who would be able to. How the hell had someone done this kind of damage—?

He kneeled beside the body, red soaking up into the cloth over his knees.

What do I do?

“Vegeta…? Hey, c’mon—this isn't funny…” If this was a joke, it was the worst one; but when there was no movement at all, the cold reality began to trickle in. “Vegeta…? Vegeta—”

He repeated his name louder, trying to force him back into consciousness, but his breath was wasted and he felt like he was running out of breath. Quicker and quicker, his head was swimming and the pressure in his chest increased until he felt like he was shaking. A loud voice started barking in his ear and his eyes—that he didn't know he had closed—flew open and he sat up with a wild look, blinking rapidly and panting a bit.

“Kakarot? What the hell?”

The sound of his name—his name as Vegeta knew it—brought him back, looking around like he was in a strange alien world. The long pause of his brain kicking back on had Vegeta shaking him a little again, and that shaking sensation made him finally jump up. Vegeta had no idea what was coming and Goku pinned him to the bed in a frantic flurry, pulling up his shirt—despite the excessive protests. Vegeta’s clenched fist nearly collided with his cheek, but he moved just enough to avoid it, focused on one thing. He nearly tore his shirt open in the fumbling, holding him down with his own weight, his knees on each side of his hip. Nothing would stop him before he could see for himself and confirm that the images and feelings he had weren’t real.

“Kakarot—Kakarot, knock it off, what the fuck are you doing—” Vegeta’s voice was pitching wildly, thrown back by the sheer force of Goku’s assault.

Vegeta had no idea what he’d seen and he seemed just fine, but moments ago, he was not fine. The smell of blood was still reeling in Goku’s head and he shoved a hand right down across his collarbones to keep him from moving, using the other to press his fingers against the spot that was burned into his mind as a deep, life threatening wound. But all he felt was warm skin and tensed muscles—Vegeta’s heart racing and his chest rising and falling rapidly with his quick breaths.

Relief flooded Goku’s senses and he finally started to wake completely—panic gone with the confirmation that he wasn’t bleeding to death. He exhaled and leaned over him, pressing his face against his shoulder and panting slightly—coming down from the oddly gripping fear he hadn’t ever had before. The knowledge that he couldn’t just wish him back this time if it was real, stuck with him until his memories of it started to become hazy and he calmed down.

The moment seemed to stretch forever and Goku only realized he was still pinning him after a few minutes had passed. Warmth stretched through his chest and to his face and he couldn’t bring himself to look at him. He had a feeling that Vegeta was going to be furious, but his fury was something he could deal with as long as he was alive. His fingers curled, sliding from his chest and he lessened his hold on him—letting him breathe easier. All he could think about was the sheer amount of blood and the large hole in his chest.

Risking his anger, Goku shifted from straddling him to fully laying on him—snaking his arms under him and wrapping them around him, embracing him tightly. His face pressed back into his shoulder and he didn’t move, couldn’t be moved, and Vegeta got the message after a few minutes of protesting.

“Kakarot, it was just a dream,” Vegeta’s voice was softer than he expected to hear, though still had the gruff that was typical of the saiyan. “You’re still half asleep and crushing me a little, but it wasn’t real.”

“Don’t die, Vegeta.” Goku mumbled, finding himself growing drowsy again, coming down from his sudden adrenaline induced haze and slipping right back to the sleep he was jarred awake from.

“I’m not, unless you annoy me to death. Shut up and go back to sleep.”

Vegeta’s patience was legendary at that moment, and Goku was just too drained to appreciate it—instead, choosing to relax and let the whole event slip away as he fell closer back into unconsciousness. His head throbbed and he just paced his breathing until he could barely feel anything aside from the pressure in his head; and before long, he stopped feeling that. “Don’t die,” he mumbled, feeling separated from his own voice.

“Shut up, Kakarot. And sleep,” he heard Vegeta grunt, feeling the vibrations of his throat. It sounded like it was far far away, but the familiarity was enough to put him at ease and he let sleep swallow him back up.

Chapter Text

Sound of water splashing somewhere in the background was the only noise to permeate the stifling air of the time chamber. It had been days since they’d taken baths and they’d decided to take turns cleaning up after so many hard sessions of training. They were getting more and more intense as the time started to run down. They had roughly eight months left and were spending most of it stomping away at their own limits to the point where breaks weren't optional, but required.

He was sore. His body was bruised a bit and he felt like he needed to take a leaf from Kakarot’s book and sprawl out to stretch everything and hope it all felt better when he woke up. They had Senzu Beans with them, but they were limited and Vegeta knew the advantage of a good old fashioned recovery sometimes outweighed the convenience of an instant heal, even if he wanted to keep training nonstop. He preferred to go until everything broke, but Kakarot whined a lot. It was mostly stiff muscles, welts, and bruises anyway. Kakarot didn't hit hard enough to break bones—purposefully, anyway—because he was just that sort to pull his punches. Especially since the night he’d woken him up screaming his name and telling him not to die. As if he was afraid hitting him too hard would break him. It was hard to get him to loosen up when he was funneling his energy into dodging, just so he didn't have to risk a hard hitting counter. It was infuriating, but it would be much more infuriating if Vegeta himself wasn't still a little perturbed by the whole scene.

Kakarot’s memory of the whole event was either just faded or he was choosing to let it go. He couldn’t really deny it, but he didn’t really talk about it either. When Vegeta woke up following that event, he still had Kakarot laying over him, arms wrapped up under him and holding onto him like he was vanishing—sleeping, with his face turned into where his neck curved into his shoulder. It was uncomfortable for the smaller man, knowing that Kakarot was having such a moment, but moving meant addressing that moment and he spent several hours pretending to be asleep and hoping Kakarot would just get up and slip away. He did, but it left a weird feeling settled between them that Vegeta couldn’t quite explain.

He rolled over on the bed and let his body relax into the mattress. It felt divine, despite his mind racing at him to go out and push himself harder. He was not like Kakarot and didn’t generally like to have all this time laying around, but he was becoming a little more used to it. He was becoming...comfortable. Comfortable enough that he could tune out Kakarot’s noise making and let himself drift. His head felt heavy, but once he was fully relaxed, he felt relieved, even if it was just temporary.

His strained muscles lost their tension and he eventually exhaled the stiff breath he had been holding. The knot between his shoulders felt like a dull throb and he absently wondered when that had started. Among all the bruises and sore spots on his body, that one seemed to stick out more than the rest, but it wasn’t enough to concern him or even make him lift his head. He just laid out on his stomach, and dissolved into the mattress, content to remain there for days if uninterrupted.

Unfortunately, interruption didn’t feel like it took that long and he could feel Kakarot close to him not that long later; physically close to him. He wanted to grumble at him and tell him to stop disturbing him, but he also didn’t really feel like acknowledging him either. However, he did wonder just why Kakarot was hovering so close to him and he felt himself bristle involuntarily when the mattress dipped a little under Kakarot’s weight. He was sitting on the bed, but why…?

He wasn’t about to address it. He was content to pretend he was still asleep. Whether Kakarot knew he was awake or not was hard to determine, because Kakarot rarely changed his behavior depending on who was watching, and that made him dangerous in his own way. He wasn't the sort to hold back on doing the first stupid thing to come to mind, and when he felt a hand on his back, he almost recoiled in response. Two fingers edged against the uncomfortable knot between his shoulder blades and he involuntarily rolled his shoulder—alerting Kakarot that he was at least a little awake.

“Hey, ‘Geta, you want a Senzu?” The tone in his voice made Vegeta finally break his temporary vow of silence and he turned his head to glance briefly at him blearily.

“Why?” Kakarot had been so insistent on them being sparing with them, so they had saved them—only using one each on the rare occasion they really went out of control.

“Because it looks like you got a pretty nasty mess on your back,” he answered, still absently touching him.

Vegeta continued to watch him from the corner of his eye. The injury wasn't likely anything to be concerned about. The pain from it was really more of a tight tingling sensation or a sharp knot. It was irritating, yes, but nothing he couldn't sleep off. “No, it's fine, why are you concerned? I've walked off much worse.”

“It's just...it's really...discolored. All over your back. I noticed it earlier, but it wasn't as bad…” Kakarot mumbled, yet pressed his palm flat over his back. His hand felt cool against his skin and Vegeta knew he was a little feverish,from that alone. They both typically were when they were healing like this, but it appeared he was feeling the affects of their brawling more so this time. He didn't fight him off or tell him to remove his hand, truthfully, the cool touch felt good and he had gotten himself comfortable enough to ignore the breach of personal space.

But Vegeta was not entirely convinced by this display of concern.

“It's not about this at all, is it?” He breathed deeply and stretched his legs to the edge of the bed, feeling his back pop with an odd satisfaction. “You're hovering, Kakarot, and you don't do that. You've never done that. Not to me.” He accused.

“I'm no—”

“You are. You've pulled most of your punches, and have been inspecting me for injuries for days. I'm not an idiot. If you're still affected by whatever your episode was, then it's time you talk about it.”

He surprised himself, letting these words just slip out without any planning. They weren't the ones he was prepared to say or a topic he was itching to delve into, but Kakarot had cornered him once and it was time to corner him back and get to the bottom of his odd behavior. His relationship with Kakarot was one that was comfortably brutal and he liked it being that way. If he lost that brutality to his panicked nightmares, then he felt like he would be losing part of what his bond with Kakarot actually entailed. He didn't need to be protected constantly. He could stand on his own two feet. He could return the favor and even save Kakarot’s stupid ass from time to time. Their balance was built around him not needing to do this out of place hovering that he was doing. He stood on a level playing field with Kakarot and he was going to make certain he remembered that.

“...Guess it just stuck with me,” Kakarot admitted after Vegeta waited him out for several long minutes. Only when Vegeta closed his eyes did Kakarot start talking. So it seemed like Kakarot could feel pressure after all. “If you die again, it's permanent, unless we really jump through some hoops...though I'm sure Bulma could find a way. I don't like it, though.”

“I'm not going to die, Kakarot.”

“You could—”

“If something kills me, then you’d better be on goddamn standby, because there’s nothing that’s killing me without me putting up a damn fight and if you don't at least make an effort to put up one too, on behalf of our saiyan blood, I will find you in the afterlife, and proceed to beat you into a new form of death,” he threatened, yet his voice was still smooth and calm; lacking his usual bite, because he knew that Kakarot was actually bothered by something for a change.

“I mean...if we both die then I guess it can't be helped, but if you die…it would feel awfully empty.” His fingers tapped against his skin, in something of a nervous twitch, and Vegeta didn't have to open his eyes to see the furrowed brows and twist of concern on his face—the rarest feature of all on the face of a man who rarely ever thought that deeply about anything. It disturbed him. Immensely.

He rolled a bit and shook himself out of the comfortable haze he was almost given to; finding the willpower to sit up as a chore, but he righted himself and sat face to face with Kakarot. The big buffoon was slumped a little, but his terrible posture had him sitting at about face level with him—convenient for his purpose of confronting his issue and raising his counterpoints.

“You think I'm weak, Kakarot?” His gaze was steeled and left nothing for him to run from. Vegeta searched the subtle responses in his face to gauge how he felt, because while he knew the man was very forthcoming with his feelings, sometimes to a fault, he possibly didn't always know what his feelings were. Kakarot was simple like that. “You think I’m going to die so easily that you have to tiptoe around me?”

“No...but...I…” he faltered a little in his eye contact, turning his eyes off and itching to rub the back of his neck in the way that he did when he was feeling nervous. Vegeta knew his body language. He managed to pull his eyes back to him, however, though they flicked here and there. “I know it could happen...and I know how you are. And I don't...hah...I don't know how I'd feel if you were just gone…I feel like...there's a lot more left for us to do. But…”

“Kakarot,” Vegeta interjected, not letting him continue his mumbled rambling. “Instead of wibbling about unlikely scenarios, which isn't like you to begin with, focus on...whatever the hell else actually goes on in that mostly empty head of yours. If I die, then by all means, whatever killed me is something to be afraid of and probably a concern that would send you in my direction shortly after, anyway. There's no sense in learning to worry about anything now,” he flicked the man’s forehead a little, “it's a little too late to start running concerns through this thick skull isn't it?”

“Vegeta…” Kakarot’s voice turned down to a slightly pitched whine, breaking away from his seriously concerned tone, returning to something that sounded distinctly more like him.

“You drooled on me for four fucking hours that time and I let you, in between your sleepy pouting in my ear. If you whine at me, one more time, I am going to slug you so hard your sons will feel it.” His threat was not a hollow one. At all.

But Kakarot didn't seem to feel threatened by it. His face softened a little and his concern cleared from his eyes and he smiled; shoulders seemed to lose some of the sag they had. He was sitting close enough to Vegeta, that Vegeta could see the twitch of his muscles before he even moved, and he knew what motion he was going in for. He saw it coming, and had plenty of time to prepare himself to brush it off or stop him, but he didn't bother; he just let Kakarot wrap his large arms around him and embrace him. He was not affectionate like that, but Kakarot was and some part of him felt like allowing him to do so would fix the problem. Or maybe he didn't mind it himself, even if he didn't reciprocate it any.

Bulma would have a field day.

He exhaled, something of a sigh, but it was made a little bit in relief passed off as annoyance. “When you're done, we don't talk another word about it, got it? No more nonsense about me dying. Honestly, that you think I would lose!” He forced emphasis into his voice to throw off the very strange feeling settled somewhere between them. Kakarot probably didn't feel anything, but he did. Comfort and trust came to mind, and it made his chest seize a little in defense of himself; a natural defense of someone who struggled to feel so at ease with anything at all. “Idiot.”

“Alright...alright, I get it. I’m sorry…” he just turned his face away a little, loosening his bear hold; moving back, but remaining close. Kakarot still had his arms around him and briefly, Vegeta wondered what he was doing, but any questions were answered when Kakarot leaned them both and set Vegeta down, smiling in a very deceptive way, clearly up to something. He set to protest, but Kakarot snatched up the corners of the blanket and proceeded to roll him up nice and tightly in it, leaving him carefully packed in. “Get some rest, ‘Geta,” he added pleasantly, standing again. “I'm going to cook for us.”

“Kakarot—” But he was already moving away from the bed and leaving Vegeta to try and fumble his way out of his cocoon. He was wrapped so tightly that—while his struggle released him from his prison—he found himself almost content to just lay there after all, finding that comfortable place he was before Kakarot came in and ruined it. He closed his eyes and relaxed again, only to immediately stiffen up again with realization that Kakarot was cooking unsupervised, with cooking instruments that weren't a bonfire and fucking stick, and would likely taste like cardboard and leathered sadness. Oh goddamn it—

He sat back up in a hot hurry, “hey wait a minute, I thought you said you didn't want to kill me—!”

Chapter Text

For the most part, Goku slept pretty hard. Once he made peace with his bed, and found just the right position to really loosen up, he’d fall into a steady slumber most of the time—mouth wide open and snoring, probably to the dismay of his roommate. Vegeta made the occasional comment about it, but he never did actually, really, complain. It wouldn't do a lot of good, since Goku couldn't really change how he slept. He really had to praise Chi Chi, because he knew she had put up with his noisiness and active sleeping for years. She was a Saint, and it seemed like Vegeta actually had that in common with her.

The time chamber was a weird place to sleep and sometimes, he just couldn't find that perfect position to get to sleep, even when they managed to block out most of the white light from the endless void, just outside the little building in the middle of it. He knew it was sometimes the same with Vegeta, but it seemed like that was not one of those nights for him, because he was turned on his side, watching the other saiyan sleep.

Vegeta slept still and he often started on his back, but ended up on his stomach. He hadn't always been that way, though, as Goku noticed from the beginning of their three years in the time chamber, to the present. In the beginning, Goku could feel Vegeta’s ki pulsing as if he was still wide awake and ready to defend, but now, he was calmer. He was peacefully asleep, with an arm under the pillow and his face half turned into it. Unlike Goku, he was quiet, only making the occasional noise when he stretched. He was completely unaware that Goku was watching him in the dim light, and that seemed so weird to him.

Their time in the chamber was beginning to turn short, with only six months left. It felt strange to think that six months felt short for what remained. That was half of a year left. But it seemed like the days within the time chamber moved so fast. Before long, it felt like their weeks and months had flown by. While their reason for coming in had been specific, Goku started to...enjoy their time in general. Training with Vegeta was easy, they knew how hard they could go with each other. Now, he knew when Vegeta would stop and actually rest—even if sometimes he knew he was up in the middle of what would be night to keep training himself. He was better about it at least. Their downtimes were short, but they weren't filled with empty silence and discomfort. Vegeta was almost done with the last book, and Goku had long since stopped having even the slightest nervous dream.

Most of all, Goku could sit up and find himself at the edge of the bed, watching him. Vegeta’s guard was so relaxed that he wasn't even aware. It seemed unreal that this was the same person as in the past. His hard exterior had been chipped away enough while they were locked away by themselves, that Goku could see how he could easily have been just as open and carefree as he was, if he’d had a different life. He never thought about these things, but there was little else to think about when he was awake and Vegeta was sleeping. He didn't want to wake him and he was content watching him like this. By all means, he could get up and go count to a thousand push-ups, but instead, he sat at the edge of the bed and watched his roommate sleep.

Usually furrowed brows were relaxed and the lines of his face smoothed out enough that he looked younger sleeping than he did when he was awake. He looked comfortable, or perhaps just exhausted. They trained more and more intensely as they started to near the end of their time. He frowned a little, for some reason, sad about that. He'd gotten used to their routine. It would change once they left. It would go back to how it was before, most likely, and most if not all of their interactions would be left behind in the time chamber—forgotten in the years suspended between a few days. For some reason, that bothered him a little. Not enough to affect his behavior any bit around Vegeta, but he wished they had more time.

He thought about something Chi Chi had said, before he left, that he didn't understand—or at least didn't quite catch the implication of until he found himself watching Vegeta sleep with no real necessity other than just wanting to. Something about how Goku’s attention was hard to pin down sometimes, but she knew when he was invested in something. His interested generally stayed broadly static, remaining fixed on the same type of thing, even if it moved on to different subjects within it. When he fought people, he liked to move on to stronger and stronger opponents. He liked to push himself with new skills and forms, even before fully mastering old ones at times. His interest was in training and fighting and, despite variances, never really changed. When he was working, he was still daydreaming about it.

But then she had said that Vegeta seemed to be a different kind of interest. A different friend than Krillin was. The weird look she had for him was one he still didn't really get, but she’d sat him down; patting his knee gently, like she did when she was going to talk about a subject that was important. She told him that it was perfectly okay that he spent so much time with Bulma’s husband, she understood. She wasn't mad at him for it, as long as he still came home and still remembered his sons. It confused him, somewhat. Of course he would come home. He lived there. Sometimes he stayed with King Kai, but she never got like that about it. Not in the same tone; not with the soft compromising words that told him it was okay and she wanted him to be happy—as long he was responsible, or at least tried to be. And oftentimes, he even took Goten with him for Trunks. So he was left a little confused, but smiling and nodding in agreement. He wanted her happy, if nothing else.

But watching the saiyan prince sleep, unaware of him entirely, made a few lose pieces click around and settle into a place that sort of made a picture. One he hadn't really...considered. Despite Vegeta’s yelling about it and him actually pointing out the obvious, he hadn't really thought about it enough to process an actual response; usually content to let the idea tumble around and then be forgotten if it wasn't really all that pressing. Most of the time, he just didn't need to worry about details or what people thought. It didn't matter. He didn't actually get it at first, because he didn't stop to think deeper than the surface of the words. Why would Vegeta be concerned that their wives were talking? Why would Chi Chi tell him not to feel guilty? Why did he even assume it was Bulma that Chi Chi was upset with? Why would Bulma cast that look at Vegeta, when he popped in, a little wounded by overhearing something that wasn't meant for his ears?

Their wives thought there was something going on between them, he finally realized completely, no longer letting Vegeta’s clues and expressions roll off into a forgotten place in his mind. This suspicion by their wives was a fact that Vegeta had obviously really clicked with for some time and it wasn't that Goku didn't know that it looked like a lot of his time was taken up by the other saiyan, he just never really gave any credence to the idea that it was being taken in that kind of way; that something more concrete was happening. It wasn't. They were friends, if Vegeta even accepted that. Vegeta made it very clear he was offended by the concept of whatever their wives had gotten in their heads and would confront them when he got out of the time chamber; and Goku would have been perfectly okay with letting him be the one to sort it out, so he didn't have to think about it or even be involved. He could shrug and go on like he always did with these things.

But, how did he actually feel about it? Did he really want to think that deeply on it? He’d gone this long without even taking into consideration all the details that Vegeta apparently had agonized about, something like a year plus ago in the time chamber. Or their conversations, where Goku just casually talked about Chi Chi’s odd acceptance of whatever it was she assumed.

Or the fact that Goku actually told Vegeta he wondered why Chi Chi would concern herself with Bulma, when Vegeta would definitely be more likely to be a worry in that regard.

Oh.

Goku stared at the saiyan sleeping in the other bed for a long long moment, gears starting to unstick and turn back to every detail he missed or decided wasn't worth savoring in the moment. He always ran his mouth without his brain present, but it seemed like at that time, his brain was on standby and leaking in realizations he hadn't actually recognized yet.

In his desire to just talk to Vegeta, his mouth ran away from him and it had taken him literal years of time to realize the implications of a lot of what he did and said that seemed to paint him as actually stupid enough to be unaware of accidental suggestiveness.

Like telling him that he imagined him naked once, after an awkward comment about not seeing him undressed often. Or telling him he just wanted to hear his voice. Or telling him all these other things that suddenly seemed really personal and beyond what entailed a normal friendly topic.

Goku was lacking in the social awareness department at times, he was fully aware of that, but he'd missed enough marks individually, that when they all caught up, his expression just bounced around like a hyper child that couldn't decide what emotion to land on. The sensation of filling some void he had with Vegeta’s presence was so intense, that apparently it had leaked out into his actions and had his wife thinking he was...what did she actually think? Did she think he was seeking to find in Vegeta, something that would take him away from her and their sons? Was that it? That would never happen. He did love her, dearly. He didn't feel like that toward Vegeta or anything. So, really, their wives were probably just making huge assumptions. Especially since he didn't even remotely consider it at all until that moment, when it all closed in at once.

But then again…the feelings he’d had following that nightmare about him dying, had been more intense than any dream he'd ever had in the past. That wasn't the same kind of feeling, though, right? If Vegeta wasn't the subject in question, he would have been the person he would have gone to to ask him sort out the feelings. He had friends he cared about, loved and cherished, and then there was Vegeta. He was his friend too, but he was...he was. Something...different.

But what, Goku couldn't figure out, and his head hurt trying to understand these details. This was why he left most of the complicated stuff to Vegeta. Vegeta would straighten their wives out. He didn't have to think about anything. Nothing worth any suspicion, or implication was even going on. He hadn't even had time to consider the option. They were both men anyway; why would their women even raise those ideas about them? Maybe Vegeta was overthinking it. And now maybe he was too.

He took a deep breath and let his mind drop all the thoughts that were rolling about. It didn't do any good to really focus on any of it. It would change nothing, even if he did get it. What he did know, was he wanted to be closer to Vegeta, enough that he wouldn't be so intense in denying that that they were friends. Companions. Partners?

Partners. That sounded right. Too bad Vegeta would probably sock him into the void if he actually said that outloud.

He exhaled the breath and his glazed over vision cleared back up, making him aware that he’d zoned out a bit with all his thinking. So much that led to less function in other places and Goku’s gaze caught a pair of dark eyes gleaming back at him from across the tiny space; from the other bed. It startled him a little and he straightened, realizing he was still sitting at the edge of the bed. The look on his face must have given away his inward alarm because Vegeta moved and the bed whined a little under him.

“Kakarot, what are you doing?” He rubbed his face, voice low and still sleepy.

Having a crisis, don' worry ‘bout it…

“...Just couldn't sleep.” Not untrue, but not everything that was keeping him awake.

“And you've chosen to stare at me instead?” He pulled the pillow under his neck and shoulder. Vegeta liked to turn over in his sleep. “Don't tell me you're still having ridiculous dreams? I'm not cuddling you.”

“Ah...ah no, it's not that.” He laughed, rubbing the back of his neck in his nervous twitch. “I think I just need to go work it all out a little.” He tensed to stand, hoping to brush everything away. After a brief workout, he’d forget about all these confusing thoughts, go to bed, and wake up feeling like new. But for some reason...

“Do you need me to catch your punches?”

...Vegeta’s offer make him pause, looking back to him, with a raised brow, as if he really expected Vegeta to just roll over and let him go about his business; like he always used to, with no interest.

“...if you wanna. Don't wanna keep you up, or anything.” He actually wanted to drag him out of the bed before he changed his mind, because Vegeta never offered his presence like this.

But he didn't have to, because Vegeta rolled out of the bed relatively easily, draping the blanket across the end of the bed and grabbing something to wrap around his palms; content to just a light spar for the sake of it and nothing more. He came around the bed once he was ready, and looked down at Goku, who had yet to move from the mattress. He held a hand out to help him up and get him moving. “It’s fine, Kakarot, its better than wondering when you're going to stop staring at me while I pretend to sleep.”

Goku stood with a quick lift and Vegeta started to walk away the moment he let go of his hand. He remained there frozen for a moment and then actually groaned a little, rubbing his face.

Aw man….

Chapter Text

Two fists swung, crossing each other, and making quickly for the intended targets; the equal distance, making both of them connect at the same time with the same tremendous impact. Bruised knuckles cracked a bit as they collided with unrivaled intensity into each other’s faces. Neither of them could escape the sudden kaleidoscope of colors and the immense rush of blood to the head as the weight of such a hit caught up with two exhausted bodies. It was the last good swing they had left in them after training nonstop for days on end, when they’d devolved into ruthless brawling. No tactics, no super saiyan. No ki. Nothing but raw brutality; fists and feet.

It led to both men meeting forced sleep at the hands of an instant double knock out.

They didn’t even have the chance to stumble back and try to maintain standing composure. Both bodies just fell backward, hit the ground, and remained still—unconsciously panting to catch up with overworking their bodies. Time ticked away in the white void, while both of them were left out of commission, and neither of them moved for a considerable amount of time. The first to stir, barely managed to roll over before sleep swallowed him right back up.

The fight between them was never really serious to the point of deciding a true winner, but it was always taken seriously to this point, where both of them ended up in the same state of nonfunctional. Vegeta normally trained himself to this condition, but it was different when Kakarot was present. When the other saiyan trained with him, he felt a need to put his lights out to the same degree that Vegeta tended to put his own lights out. Maybe it was a self punishment that he was making Kakarot experience, or maybe he really just hated to lose and simply didn’t know how to train any other way. He didn’t have the training guidance that Kakarot had. If he was going to beat himself up like usual, he was damn sure going to take the fool down with him.

Rolling over, he blinked heavily at the other body in a heap, just a few arm lengths away from him. He could see his chest rising steadily and would have smirked if everything didn’t hurt. Kakarot wasn’t immune to a good old fashion ass whoopin’ after all. This would likely be one of those times they’d crawl back in and dip into the senzu bean stash, but that would actually require one of them to get up and neither of them looked quite ready to jump up and be the hero.

A deep inhale later told Vegeta that the shirtless dunce was awake again. Both of them were getting down to their last sets of clothes and once they’d finished ki blasting each other half to death, they gave up entirely and started brawling with whatever they had. Vegeta had one good set of armor, and he wasn’t about to break it before they left. This had the benefit of letting him see when he’d managed kick Kakarot around hard enough that he might need to be tended to, because unsurprisingly—between the two—he was a little better when it came to generalized first aid.

“Still with me, Kakarot?” He grunted, managing to push himself face down, relishing in how much better it made his back feel.

“Everything hurts.”

Vegeta managed a lazy snort, “welcome to the party.”

“How do you do this...every time…” Kakarot managed to scramble off his back and on to his side. “I train hard, but you just destroy yourself consistently, dontcha…” He didn’t even bother to open his eyes and Vegeta didn’t hide the fact that he was openly inspecting him for injury. Kakarot was of no use to him if he was damaged beyond function. He knew he’d made a few significant points of contact, but Kakarot was made of tough stuff and Vegeta would know if he actually managed to break anything. Worst he’d get is a bruise. They didn’t fight with anything that would lead to lacerations, so any blood present was from split lips and the occasional bloody knuckle—another point to Vegeta, who normally wore gloves.

“I have to get stronger somehow, Kakarot,” he curled his nose at him, not particularly fond of how he seemed to dismiss his methods. “How else am I supposed to do that?”

“Get stronger or punish yourself for not being stronger? Because you’re definitely good at beating your own tail. I mean really, really good.” Kakarot laughed a little, but it was a tired, hollow, sort of laugh that seemed to have an echo of confused bewilderment.

“What the hell makes you say that?” If he had any strength left in him, he would have used it to knock the bastard back out so he wouldn’t have to listen to him continue to spout his bullshit. But the best he had was to pull himself the short distance and force his beaten body into a sitting position so he could glower down at him and at least feel like he had a position over him—even if he knew that Kakarot’s points weren’t inaccurate. That was why they were so quickly digging into his nerves, right? He’d been training with him for closing in on the final week of three years and he knew that Kakarot could probably write a manifesto about him in terms of battle. And Kakarot could barely speak functionally, let alone write.

“Cause, you could dodge, often, you’re quick as I am. But you don’t. You take it. You hold your ground to see if you can be pummeled and walk it off. ‘S like you wanna be hit til you’re hurt. No pain, no gain to the extreme, huh,” he folded his arm under his head, looking up at Vegeta. “Since we got in here, ya kinda been doin’ that and only really get annoyed with me when I hold my punches. Guess I was kinda hopin’ you’d learn to dodge more and take the punishment less. I don’t really...like helpin’ you with your self-flagellation. Training with you is one thing, but intentionally hurtin’ you is another...But then, I guess you hurt yourself more than I could.”

Somehow, the way Kakarot was watching him, made him feel more naked than if he was stripped down to the bone and he almost turned away in dismay at the thought that this buffoon could read him like this and came to these conclusions so clearly. But after three years, he’d be stupid beyond reason, even for him, if he couldn’t. Vegeta wanted to be mad at that very fact. Three years had taken away his mystery and opened up the door for Kakarot to understand that his determination was partially inspired by a vicious cycle of growth and self destruction.

“Falling behind you is not an option, Kakarot. I’ll be damned if I let you beat me, at anything.” He grunted, finally turning his gaze out into the void and away from the fool who was still watching him—still taking in every twitch of his expression. What was Kakarot even doing anymore? Why was he this invested? This was the moron who didn’t think about complex things, so why suddenly was he thinking about complex things?

“You’re not gonna beat me going at it alone like that, though.”

Effortlessly, a nerve was touched, and Vegeta’s whole body felt a little jolted. Not because he was in defense of his way, but he because he knew Kakarot was right and he was inwardly confronting it. “It’s like you’re trying to piss me off, and you’re marvelously skilled at it,” he gritted, grinding his teeth a little, wanting the subject to be changed, before any positive feelings he’d had of the whole experience in the time chamber went away entirely.

“Hey, hey, come on, don’t get so severe, I didn’t say I was winning. Because I’m not. I’m not beating you either. I mean, look at us. I’m not jumping up either, right now. Pretty sure we’re both going to end up sleeping here until one of us can wobble the short jump back into the building to get the senzu beans.” He laughed, his voice light and trying to defuse Vegeta. By now, Vegeta had begun to learn what Kakarot’s voices meant, and this one was the backstepping tone that he used when he didn’t want to lose Vegeta to his probable mood swings. It worked, Vegeta had to credit him that much.

“You’re stupid,” he finally conceded with a grunt and laid back on the ground, letting his body rest again. He was sore. He’d spent more time looking over Kakarot to make sure he hadn’t stupidly taken injury, that he forgot to check himself, but he tended to ignore his pain. Eventually a senzu bean would fix any of it anyway. It wouldn’t be long before he’d be beating himself up again anywa— “Wait, where did you hear a term like self-flagellation?” His brain rolled back after a moment of laying there and he just looked over at him, just within arm’s reach of him.

Kakarot stared back and they shared a long, silent exchange, where Vegeta could visibly see him trying to process the answer and he started to worry about what to expect for this response. “Bulma gave me a phone, and I was on the internet, trying to find the perfect description for y—”

“If you finish your sentence, how will I respond?”

“You’d probably hit me.”

“I am close enough.”

He went silent for a moment, pouting a little and stretching. “I could totally dodge,” he mumbled back at him, but didn’t really make any show of preparing to do just that.

Neither of them were going to be moving any time soon. They were worn out and silently calling a truce, both physically and on the front of Kakarot taking the battle against Vegeta’s training habits. One day, he suspected he wouldn’t back down and he would end up combatting him a little harder, but Kakarot was too light hearted to push him at the moment.

Vegeta almost managed to let himself relax again, content that Kakarot was letting it go, when the fool’s voice broke the silence once more, “I’m gonna miss this a little bit, though.”

“Eh?” He raised a brow at him.

“Being in here. It’s not been that bad, right? I mean, well, I guess being with me probably has been a pain for you. But it hasn’t been that bad, I don’t think. You’re actually talking to me, sort of...Well, I mean, you’re not communicating by grunts. That’s more than before.” He grinned widely, and Vegeta just rolled his eyes deeply at him.

“I can’t wait to get out of here. Maybe I will get to actually experience a night without your snoring.”

“You said you were used to it,” Kakarot made a face at him that made him want to roll him off into the void—that stupid innocent, kiddish pout.

“I shouldn’t be, you big brat. You aren’t my wife.” No, you’re just my ‘Battle Husband’, according to Actual Wife….Oh, fuck off, Mental Bulma.

“She snores too…! What’s the difference!”

“I can hit you!”

“I’m right here then—”

“When I’m good and ready—”

Neither of them moved, despite their bickering. Exhaustion came back before long and both of them just exchanged their challenges lazily by way of unenthusiastic glares, before sleep swallowed them back up. Kakarot lost the fight first, trying his best to huff at him all the way up until the first damn snore started—a sound Vegeta heard so much he almost didn’t hear at all anymore. It was part of his environment. He learned to tune the sound out and even found he didn’t sleep until it was present as background noise, knowing that it meant Kakarot wasn’t awake and staring off into space in his bed. It filled silence he once had been used to, but filled it in a different way than Bulma’s sleep patterns did.

Everything Kakarot did was a different pattern from hers, but one he was now used to. One he didn’t have to worry about anymore after the next week passed.

...

Shit, I will miss this too.

Chapter Text

Time was almost up in the chamber. Hours were left and they were still smacking fists back and forth, though not as intensely as the previous time—knowing full well that they would have to come out feeling at least a little ready for battle. This was more like a warm up spar. Goku was always ready to square off with someone and challenge himself; but he felt a little knot in his gut that he was attempting to ignore and for once, it had nothing to do with the upcoming fights. It wasn't really a knot of nervousness, but it felt similar. The last time he remembered feeling this sensation was when he moved in with Chi Chi. But why was he feeling it now? Essentially, he was just moving out with Vegeta. He wasn't moving into unfamiliar territory and he didn't feel this way moving in here with him. It was mildly distracting and he was doing his best to keep it off his face, so Vegeta wouldn’t catch him being distracted.

Seeing something other than the white void would be a much welcome change, and yet, he wasn't ready to step out just yet. Three years of time seemed like so long, but it had passed by relatively easily. Their training sessions were fast and hard, eating so much time that they could forget days and days at a time. It seemed like they were marking off entire weeks as if they were measures comparable to days. It was a wonder their bodies could handle them at all. But they trained that way just to make it so they could. Being able to fight the long battles was what they pushed themselves for, especially Vegeta.

He blocked another solid swing and dodged with a full flip over him. Compared to Vegeta, Goku was what some people could consider “bouncy”. He could take a hit, certainly. He could take a lot of those, arguably more than most people, but he was a pain and a half to hit in the first place often. He'd especially become this way with Vegeta, who didn't have any problem clobbering him if he wasn't paying attention. Vegeta had somehow made him more dodgy, whereas Goku seemed to have made...marginal progress in making Vegeta less self abusive in his own training. He still pushed it. He still overdid it. He still beat himself up about it. But at least he took breaks now. That was some progress.

Would that change once they weren't stuck together in a place that Vegeta couldn't just lock himself in the Gravity Chamber and ignore everyone in? Goku tended to run off to King Kai’s place, but he had guidance there. Vegeta didn't when he was off training without him. At least when he was with him, they had some system of checks.

The knot in his gut tightened a little and he started to identify what feeling went with that sensation. Sort of. He didn't exactly know why he felt this way, because the last time he had this sort of feeling, was definitely not a similar situation. This was just Vegeta; his enemy turned rival, turned friend, turned...something closer than friend? Because friend was starting to look a little dry. Piccolo was a friend. Krillin as a friend. They didn't make him feel like this; but then, he also didn't live with them for three years in a white void with no contact with anyone else. All he knew was, leaving the time chamber meant that they wouldn't be around each other as much anymore and that made him worry about Vegeta. He was concerned. He was worried about him, and also worried that stepping out would step everything back. Vegeta was marvelously good at pretending things never happened when they did.

The anxious knot twisted at the prospect of pretending they hadn't actually made any connection at all in the three years. He cared about their friendship, and maybe Vegeta didn't. Maybe he did. He couldn't always tell. He said he didn't, but then, he also spent several years reading books to him and willingly let him sleep on him for a handful of hours over a nightmare. That was definitely not something an enemy would do, not even something a rival or stranger would do. Leaving the time chamber meant uncertainty, and normally he was perfectly fine with that, he didn't care about the future. He went with the flow, he didn't make plans or try to build his life around any set boundaries. If something came along, he went along with it. But if one of those things happened to be parting ways with Vegeta and sweeping the events within the three years away as if they didn't happen…

Then he finally understood what it felt like to really dread something; to really think of possible change in an anxious way. To be worried about something more complex than the next fight.

His movements became automatic and he knew that Vegeta felt it, because their sparring tapered off until they were both face to face with Vegeta standing, folded arms, with all the dignity of the saiyan prince he loudly proclaimed to be. He looked annoyed and a little impatient, but Goku knew it was because he was feeling second place to whatever was distracting him. It wasn't intentional, but Goku’s mind latched onto things and he couldn't multitask to save his life—especially if it was saving his life from Vegeta’s intense scorn.

“Kakarot, you're barely in there, pay attention, or I'm going to punt you into the void,” Vegeta threatened, but it seemed to be his way of asking what was wrong. It was just laced with less concern and more irritation; the standard Vegeta fare, and one Goku had gotten so used to, that he never really even felt he needed to toe the line delicately anymore. He figured him out enough that the balancing act of Vegeta was more of a well practiced juggling game, where he only fumbled when he tried to add too many moving parts all at once.

“...Sorry...guess I'm getting a little side tracked,” he laughed, deflecting and forcing himself to inflate his casual demeanor. Sometimes, it helped that Vegeta thought he was a little bit of an idiot, because then he didn't press him when he was being a little off his usual. Of course, having lived with him for so long, seemed to have changed a thing or two.

“What’s the problem, fool? You're not getting yourself wound up over a lousy fight are you? It's not like you’ll have any opponents more difficult than I am for you,” Vegeta declared, even though he didn't know that for a fact. The reason they were training was to make sure that they won, and that they were ready for any surprises. Vegeta was just very determined to remind Goku that he was not going to be forgotten or ignored.

“No...it’s nothing...really...just remembered that I gotta leave a little before you is all. Don't wanna forget... Or I'll be stuck here. Remember, I got here first,” he stuck his tongue out with a smile, rubbing his neck to work out the invisible tingle he got when he couldn't figure out what to do with his hands when confronted.

Vegeta was having none of his dodginess. He was far too accustomed to Goku and that was alarming, because dodging him was one of Goku’s stronger points. He stepped closer, until they were standing within arm’s reach and Vegeta looked him over, eying him with a critical gaze that meant he was under his intense scrutiny. He was just short of making him hold his arms out to inspect him physically. It occurred to him then that Vegeta thought he might be injured, which wasn't the case at all.

“N-no no! That not it—” he protested, waving his arms before Vegeta could even ask the question, cutting off his chance to sound concerned, and probably saving the saiyan from having to risk sounding openly compassionate. “Really, I'm just, getting used to the idea of going back out. It's been a long time and I guess I just got used to being in here. Y’know? Not gonna lie, I won't miss the view…” he glanced off into...nothingness, but then back to Vegeta, silent. He didn't add that he would miss the company. Vegeta had been so prickly about sharing that.

“It's not like this place has much further benefit.” Vegeta seemed to not see in between the lines of Goku’s excuses and he was thankful for it.

“You're right, but I think it was worth it. I mean, even if we didn't break any limits, I feel like I definitely heightened my stamina. Dunno ‘bout you, but fighting for ten days without hardly any stopping seems like a pretty good rate of grind,” Goku grinned, trying to detour the topic, usually an easy task, when he seemed legitimately interested in what he was talking about.

“You’ve definitely improved your bullshitting,” he just cast Goku a look that told him he wasn't entirely convinced by his play off, but he wasn't going to press it. Something was weighing on him, but he wasn't going to clarify and Vegeta wasn't demanding, or interested, enough to force it out of him.

“Cut me some slack, Vegeta,” he scratched at his head, fist propped up on his hip. He looked over at the hour glass and the time dwindling down. It wouldn't feel like much time at all for Vegeta to pop out after him once he left, even if Vegeta would still have hours remaining...though he wish he did have some hours to think a little; an odd thought that he wanted hours to think, for a change. That was Vegeta’s territory. Spending so much time with Vegeta had an affect on him, just like he had probably affected Vegeta a little bit...he hoped. Wondered...did he actually have any lasting effect on the other man? Vegeta was difficult, much more so than Goku.

His thoughts were so preoccupied that he actually didn't even see the fist come at him; completely blinded to the bare knuckles that caught him in the cheek and nearly knocked him off his feet. He wailed a little and stumbled back, teetering a little to find his balance and not end up fumbling over. Rubbing his face, he fought not to power up and go right back into it, Vegeta was asking for another round; but it was meant to grab his attention. He wasn't going to go off the rails and explode at him, because that would show he was affected by Vegeta’s personality more than it seemed.

But he also wasn't going to take a punch to the face without a return and he bounced back, determined to give back what he was gifted at least once before he had to leave. Vegeta seemed to expect this response and was promptly in defense of himself. This jolt of determination seemed to be enough to get him back on track, even if he didn't have long left to maintain it. He could at least push it to the last minutes, stretching it as far as he could go—raining Vegeta with kick and punch until one managed to sneak through, only to he caught and thrown off.

They batted at each other, standing off for a while with no real edge in one direction or the other. But Goku was always willing to use out of the box tactics in ways his opponents weren't expecting, and he managed to catch Vegeta’s arm to draw him in, hooking his own arm around his shoulder. He nearly had him in a total hug by the time he full body kicked his legs out and tackled him down, getting him pinned. He was showing much less martial arts class and more wrestling brutality, but they weren’t playing by any rules. Vegeta was incensed a little, but that was his usual state of being anyway.

Goku actually managed a smug look down at him, pinning him into place and almost bracing himself for a surprise Final Flash, but it never came. It surprised him a little and he searched Vegeta’s face, just waiting for the retaliation—trying to predict it, but he was seeing something else. He was interested in something else entirely; face so close to his that he could actually hear his slightly labored breathing. Vegeta’s expression was one he’d never seen before and he was so enamored with it, that he forgot almost entirely to be on guard against him, if Vegeta was going to counter, he'd have likely punched him across the void; yet he didn't. He didn't break eye contact. The dull fluster of his face was one Goku had only seen a few times and he almost reached a hand out to touch his cheek, and feel if he was warm. The inclination to dip his head down, face just a touch away, and—

“Ah—I have to go back—” he remembered, suddenly, catching himself once he realized what he was actually doing and what the repercussions of that would have been, had he actually done something so unbelievably impulsive. The brick after brick that started to pelt his brain with clarity didn't come gently, and it took everything not to have a full blown panic over experiencing a sudden extreme avalanche of feelings that he was not really all that good at understanding to begin with. He still didn't have the capacity to word it, but he felt it, and he felt like a line had been drawn and he just Super Saiyan’d over it. “L...lemme help you up,” he tried, not even asking him, and not waiting for him to offer his arm.

He didn't try to make sense of Vegeta’s expression, and he didn't try to hold eye contact with him for very long because there was absolutely no way that the more experienced saiyan didn't just see through every last awkward bit of what was going through Goku’s head at that moment. He was transparent, and he hated that for once, because he felt like sometimes he needed to be more like Vegeta when he was trying to stay in Vegeta’s favor, at least a little.

Once he pulled them to their feet, he turned and stepped away, making every effort to get out of Vegeta’s reach and turn out of his direct line of sight. “I'll see you on the outside, gotta grab the few things I brought with me. I know you got a couple more hours. Guess I shouldn't have come in here early.” He tried to laugh it off, and it helped a little. His carefree personality made recovering from a flub really easy, even if it left his mind in complete confusion and disarray of what to make of his feelings.

“I'll leave with you.”

Goku stopped dead when he heard Vegeta, brows furrowing and he glanced over his shoulder, confused but also, too intrigued to ignore it. “Huh? But you have like a bunch more hours. I know you can make use of that.”

“Not worth the time,” Vegeta grunted and walked toward him, toward the time chamber’s living quarters to gather his own things. “I've trained all I’m going to get worth in here…” His expression was still and odd one, but he seemed to be convinced that the extra time was better spent lost to the chamber. That wasn't a Vegeta sort of move after all. Goku had been absolutely certain, without fail, that he would remain and train solo for the rest of those hours, pushing himself to the last minute.

But he decided to give them up to leave with him instead.

The knot in his stomach that twisted and curled and jumped around for a while, seemed to settle a bit and Goku realized that Vegeta really had made enormous leaps that weren't obvious right away. “Alright, let’s go then, before I get stuck here. I'm sure they're all waiting.”

“Mmhm.” Vegeta disappeared first and Goku glanced back the place that became something of a home for three years. Home with Vegeta in a way. Such a weird thing, but a sort of reality for him. He would go back to life as usual. With his family and Vegeta with his own. Everything would be just as it was.

Except now he had to figure out exactly why he almost let himself cross a line with a man who was supposed to be in a friendly rivalry with him.

And figure out exactly how to deal with it. And pray to all the various gods he didn't actually catch wind of it. Because Vegeta didn't take these sorts of things well at all.

Not when it involved Son Goku.

Chapter Text

“Vegeta, dear, open up, I've got a new recipe, I want you to try it for me,” Bulma’s mother came from his left, her voice sweetly controlling him as if she reigned supreme. He obeyed and paused with the project he’d started on the couch; while overseeing Trunks and Goten finish their homework, before he'd let them pay whatever stupid video game they were ranting and raving about. He was content with this, as it opened the door for Panchy’s cooking, and being a test subject was a punishment he could handle. She delivered the bite right off the fork and he swore he’d have to look around for Beerus or Whis, because he was afraid they’d magically appear for the rest of it. This woman here, Bulma’s blond dainty mother, was the secret weapon in the event they really needed to bribe the two gods.

He tucked his materials under his knee and turned to grab his drink and wash it down. It was the right amount of sweet and spicy and she seemed very pleased by his response. “Oh good, I’ll bring some more out for you and the boys. I'm sure you’re all hungry.” She poked Vegeta’s cheek, being the only human able to get away with the act with no negative response, and she turned to head back toward the kitchen right about the time that Bulma came in.

“Hi mom,” she greeted, sniffing the air and looking around. Vegeta was already back to his business and the boys were still quietly getting their homework done. She had no reason to get herself worked up this time. He made sure of it, in fact, she was probably surprised he still wasn't in the training room, given that he didn't usually waste this many perfect afternoons like this; but he really wasn't in a mood for it again today either. Too much was rolling around in his head, and not enough answers for questions that had been rattling since he’d left the time chamber.

After he and Kakarot left, they’d participated in their stupid battles, summoned the stupid super dragon, and then...went back to just the way it was. And that should have been just fine. Except for one little problem.... that it wasn't. Weeks passed and he hadn't seen him and he was torn between relieved and annoyed. Being alone in the Gravity Chamber made the annoyed feeling stretch out almost unbearably. So he was sitting in the damn family room watching his son and Kakarot’s little dumb lookalike scribbling math problems, while curled up on the couch honing a homemaker skill that he still didn't know why he let Panchy teach him. She could try to teach him to arrange flowers and he’d probably do it, though, so maybe she was the most powerful woman on the planet. Too sweet to be mean to; that just meant if she ever did get really pissed, she’d probably be beyond terrifying.

“Mom, are you spoiling Vegeta again?” Bulma’s voice made his ear twitch and he glanced up, brow raised. “At this rate, he’s going to think he’s a prince of this planet too,” she drawled dramatically, waving an arm and looking in his direction. He had the inclination to give her a finger, but he was in the middle of using that finger.

“But it’s hard not to, dear,” he mother chuckled, with a tray under her arm and a cheery smile. “He’s just so charming.”

“Vegeta,” Bulma turned to face him, folding her arms, “what did you do to my mother, I know you’re not charming.”

“If I had less respect for your father, and didn’t find you attractive in a vulgar sort of way, I would steal your mother away and make her a saiyan queen,” Vegeta answered, in the most deadpan of ways, not even pausing in threading the needle through the seam of a torn sleeve.

“Vegeta一”

“Dad一What the hell一” Trunks sat back and looked over at him with a bewildered expressions and Vegeta remembered he was right there, only after the fact.

Vegeta largely ignored Trunks, just leaning forward and turning the brat’s face right back into his homework, but zero’d in on Kakarot’s half sized body double. “Goten, don’t repeat any of that. Your idiot father might think I’m being serious.” Goten quickly nodded, arching his brows and smiling a little half-heartedly, in a way that easily suggested the kid even knew that was a very real possibility.

“Ohoh, what a sweetie. It makes me feel young again, though,” her mother just giggled and continued on her way back into the kitchen, chuckling all the way out with a little bit of a sway.

Bulma watched her mother go and rubbed her temple a little, before exhaling deeply, “honestly, Vegeta. She really is spoiling you.”

“I see no problems with this.”

“Of course you wouldn’t….Augh, why aren’t you training or something?” She had her hands on her hips, like she was legitimately surprised he was home, in the house, watching the brats, and being...domestic and not beating himself up somewhere else. Which, she wasn’t unreasonable in being surprised. He had become much better about it, but he was still very likely to be busy doing anything other than what he was doing.

“Food, mostly,” he motioned toward, the kitchen. That was the excuse, but it was a very good one. He was still largely shrugging off the conversation he swore he was going to have with her about whatever discussion she may or may not have had with Kakarot’s wife. Several years passing in the time chamber had dulled his eagerness to confront that topic, even if it occasionally came to the forefront of his mind.

“Food huh? So, besides food, what’s my mom got you doing now?” She came over, stopping in front of him and blocking his direct light from overhead; forcing him to give her his attention more fully; in mid stitch. “...Are you sewing?”

“Are you judging?” He shot back, giving her such a severe look that he could have lit her on fire if he was still as much of a villain as he used to pretend to be.

“...No, I just…” She looked like she was trying not to laugh, but her face was getting a little pinker. “...Can’t say I would have expected that sort of chore for you.”

“Sit down,” he grunted at her, half snarling, “you’re in my light and I can’t see.” She held her hands up in defense, still suppressing her chuckles, but accommodating his request, taking the empty spot beside him. He had a shirt across his lap, turned inside out, so that the stitches wouldn’t been seen when he was done.

“Hey, isn’t that the shirt you ripped when we went to dinner some time ago?” Bulma blinked at the familiar color remembering the way Vegeta had raised his arm and torn the whole sleeve across the back of it and just how pissed he’d gotten over it. He just grunted his reply at her. He had actually liked that shirt. She was perfectly okay with wearing a different damn piece of clothing to everything, but Vegeta actually selected things and favored them. Once he’d determined he liked something, he wanted to maintain it. It was the primary reason he had never really changed his battle attire style. She seemed to not quite understand that concept. “I could have bought you another one.”

“I don’t want another one, woman,” he lifted the piece of fabric, squinting a little to see a small gap that he wanted to reinforce. He was not going to see this sleeve tear again. “Once I’ve strengthened it, it won’t need to be replaced at all. Your mother has given me a valuable tool.”

“Only you would take something like sewing and manage to turn it into a power trip, Vegeta.”

“What else would I use this for? Do I look like a seamstress? It was your mother’s idea anyway, I am just utilizing it for maximum efficiency, and if you say anything otherwise, then you are the ridiculous one.” He didn't bother to look at her, knowing there was some reason she was needling him, so to speak. The longer she lingered, the more suspicious he would get and the more he would purposefully pretend he wasn't seeing it. This wasn't the first occurrence of it; her watching him and waiting for something, but this seemed to be the one he wasn't going to be able to jump up and fly away from.

She settled back into the couch beside him, getting comfortable, crossing a leg over her other and putting one of her hands on his knees. She didn't say anything, but she was there and her presence spoke more volumes than words would have. She was waiting for him to speak. The best she had been getting out of him was the occasional smart remark and their usual family banter, like with her mother.

“Hey boys, how’s your homework coming along?” She finally broke the silence and Goten turned and gave her a huge pout.

“There's so much of it...mom wants me to do all of it...for the whole week.”

“The whole week? That’s Chi Chi...for sure…” Bulma’s voice gave away a little pity for the kid. She was much easier on Trunks, but Trunks was naturally very bright and raised in a family of geniuses. Bulma’s father was a brilliant man, Bulma was a brilliant woman, and Vegeta himself was a prodigy among his own.

“Yeah, he's almost done,” Trunks leaned against his arm, his own books closed and helping Goten. “Then we can go do other stuff.”

And that was when Bulma played her cards, and Vegeta saw the exact moment she was making her move. He wasn't imagining it after all. She smiled and patted his knee absently while he tried to focus on anything but her tactics, but she was already steps ahead of him. “Oh? Well why don't you two go take a break for a little bit? Go outside and stretch? Then you can eat when you come back and finish up after, okay?”

The boys perked up, grinning widely, and he felt his doom step in when they jumped up to run out. They were the presence in the room that was saving him from having to talk to her in depth about whatever was clearly bothering him. Because she was a brilliant woman; he couldn't hide much from her. That he hadn't trained excessively for a couple days was a little odd; he hadn't stopped, but he hadn't pushed himself to his normal level and Bulma wouldn't let him skate by without words for too much longer. He quickly turned his face back into his damn stitching as intently as he could, but he could feel her gaze. Eventually he could feel it so strongly he just paused, staring down and not focusing on anything but the feeling of her eyes on him.

“Vegeta.” He glanced at her from the corner of his eye, still frozen in place and his shoulders sagged a little. Her fingers tapped against his knee a few times before they settled and gently kneaded into little circles. He set the shirt aside, sticking the needle into the seam, so he could pick it up later. She won.

“What,” he grunted, leaning back and letting her adjust herself to sit across his lap a little better. He put an arm around her, and resting his head back to closing his eyes to give the impression of disinterest.

“You've been acting weird since you got back, you know,” she started, settling her head against his shoulder a little.

“Hm, you must be imagining it.”

“I'm not.”

“Woman, if you got something to ask, then ask it, don't skirt around it,” he furrowed a brow at her and pulled the hem of her skirt a little. As if to emphasize his point. He was three years post-Kakarot and having a difficult time constructing exactly how he felt that first year when he swore he was going to come back out, guns blazing and confront her on her apparent assumptions toward he and Kakarot and whatever Kakarot’s own wife thought. He wasn't about to accuse the two women of talking behind them if it wasn't offered up. Not when he wasn't sure what the hell he had going on in his head in the first place. If she started, maybe he could figure out how to deflect until it went away.

“It's Goku, isn't it? You miss him.”

Or no, maybe she’ll just punch you in the throat with it, Vegeta, your wife is a goddamn savage.

“What...why would I miss Kakarot?” He hated the lack of surprise in his voice, or the pitiful level of accusation he mustered. He understood that his thoughts were tangled up over some of what happened in those three years, but he had been carefully shoving away the void that crept in when Kakarot was missing—despite the fact that they’d actually left a real void. The quiet was supposed to be good, but maybe he’d gotten accustomed to it.

“You were with him for three years. You were basically living with him. And I know how you two are. If you didn't end up killing each other. You had to have met met a middle ground somewhere...right?” She looked up at him, almost as if she was looking for something; searching his face. She was fishing and he could see it as plain as day. He narrowed his eyes at her and lifted his hands to take her face between his palms, looking at her in dead seriousness. Her cheeks turned a little pink and she looked like she might realize she was caught in her ploy. “...Vegeta..?”

“Spit it out, what are you after here?” He wasn't buying it and he was also going to use this as the door to wiggle in and ask about Kakarot’s wife if he could manage it without sounding accusing. Last thing he needed was to make it sound worse than it was.

“...Vegeta, I'm just…” She stuck her lower lip out at him and put her smaller hands over his bigger ones. She had delicate little hands, soft and dainty compared to his own, but they felt powerful in that moment, by the way she caressed the backs of his hands. “I know you don't have a lot of people you care about...I know you care about us, your family…but you know... I support it if you do care about someone else too...even when it's not us. You know?”

“You think something’s going on, don't you?” He came back at her, not bothering to beat around the bush.

Her expression shifted to one he wasn't expecting and a brow lifted gently, “...Well, is there?”

It threw him off and he stared at her for a long minute, trying to discern what she thought he meant...and if he thought she meant what she actually thought and if he was wrong all together and imagining it, but the way she was talking made it sound awfully...suspicious...and she referred to Kakarot with an awfully cheeky term for what she must think…. “No,” he finally answered, after way too long processing it.

“...because I wouldn't be mad if there was.”

What.

“What?”

She smiled at him, and leaned up to settle in his lap better; to be face to face more squarely. She had a pleasant smile, surprisingly. He'd heard his fair share of stories about Bulma in her youth and her possessiveness and perhaps this was not exactly the way he expected a conversation like this to go. He never expected to have a conversation like this. He still wished the conversation was not happening; because the implications were entirely too much for him to stand, given the subject matter was the fucking dunce he was trying to pretend didn't exist for a while. And failing.

“Vegeta, I trust you to always come back to me. You leave sometimes, but you come back. You spent a lot of time with Goku. Maybe it didn't feel like it to me, when you went in the time chamber, but it was a long time to you, and I know that he sees a lot of you that I don't ever get to see, and that’s okay. I'm your normal spouse, he's your battle spouse. And I'm perfectly fine with that,” She turned her face a little to kiss his cheek, leaving him a little wordless.

He couldn't tell if she was joking before, but he was starting to understand that she was not joking...and he was baffled beyond words for quite a while. She wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed his ear, making him grunt at her a little. She left him no real room in the conversation to respond, because she also knew he wasn't capable of arguing, when arguing against her was somewhat a lie, and agreeing with her was also just out of the question.

If he had any retort, it was lost by the sound of the boys coming back and Bulma easing back to sit more ladylike. She leaned against his chest and smiled at the kids, who came in, looking excited about something or other; but Vegeta didn't hear them or really bother to pay any mind to whatever they were going on about. Bulma was humoring them and that was enough to keep them occupied while he sorted his thoughts out, trying to come to terms with the fact that his wife was perfectly comfortable with assuming her husband had some sort of...something with her close friend. But the real question was, what the fuck that something was. Because despite Bulma’s acceptance, it still didn't mean it was there or that either of them wanted it there. It just meant that he wasn't in trouble for it if it was there.

He hated every bit of it.

The frown on his face must have been obvious because he could suddenly hear Bulma shooing the boys off to the kitchen to see her mom and get food. He almost wished that she went with them so he could agonize alone for a little bit, but she patted his shoulder and kissed his cheek, instead.

“I talked to Chi Chi,” she eventually added, and he was both grateful that he didn't have to ask, and dreading the continuation of this horrible topic and the very fact that this was real and their wives were actually discussing them as if there was anything to be concerned about. “She said that she just wants Goku to be happy. So as long as you both are okay, I'm sure everything will work out.”

“Nothing is happening, what the hell,” he finally found his voice, and it felt weak, much to his extreme dismay.

“I'm not saying it is like that, Vegeta. But, I've seen weirder happen, you know. Goku does grow on people,” she just poked his cheek, and then stood up, brushing her skirt off. “You two can't deny, at least, that you're close. There's no one else close to you like he is. It's okay to admit that.”

“Whatever,” he all but dismissed the topic, ears burning from the sheer embarrassment of the subject. He couldn't believe any of it even happened and he wondered how he thought for a second that he was going to be able to come out and confront her about her talking to Kakarot’s wife without curling in on himself.

“I'm going to go back to work for a little bit,” she leaned to kiss him, despite his frown, and he let her. “Would you like to accompany me for dinner?” He just grunted his response and she smiled wider. “Excellent. Have a good afternoon, Vegeta, don't let my mom spoil you too much.”

He waited until she was almost at the door, before he finally uncurled from his inward cocoon of humiliation, and grunted again. “I'm taking your mom and the cat and leaving this planet forever.”

“Don't forget Goku, I'm sure he’d miss you, if you left him.” She stuck her tongue out as the door closed behind her and he knew she caught the sight of his middle finger just before the door clicked into place and he was left to his new avalanche of annoying thoughts.

Chapter Text

Goku had never considered himself a truly sneaky person. He never really tried to hide his entrance or make his presence unknown, usually content to just show up and let everyone know where he was with good natured greeting. But he found himself doing the exact opposite for once, quietly snooping around in the dark and trying not to be found out. He checked briefly to know where each person in the complex was, because none of them were bothering to hide their ki. They had no reason to at the moment, like he was; or they couldn't. Bulma was close, but she was relatively stationary, it seemed, working in another room, lost in one of her projects probably. He wasn't going to be in there very long anyway.

It was unusually dishonest for Goku, and he could have just come out and asked, but for some reason, the potential rejection made him feel that acquiring it on his own was just that much...easier. Maybe. If he could find what he was looking for. If she didn't have it on her. But Bulma rarely kept her phone on her when she was actually in her workshop with all her equipment running; he paid attention sometimes. She'd have it in that particular room. There was less chance of her damaging it when it was in there and if it wasn't with her, then no one could distract her; besides, if someone really needed to reach her, they'd page page her on the intercom. That left Goku plenty of reason to believe he'd find it in that room.

Last time he’d seen it, it had been in a red case, if he remembered right, but Bulma was always changing it, so he could easily be wrong, but that was what he was setting out to look for—carefully tipping things over in the dimly lit area. He'd found one small light to click on see with, because if he tried to light the place up with any ki, then Vegeta would pick it up immediately, and he didn't want to turn the lights on, on the off chance that Bulma might see it and wonder who was snooping around. Once again, he thought about how much this wasn't his way of doing things, but if he could grab what he was looking for and go, then he'd feel a little better about it.

He just hadn’t anticipated Bulma’s office area being such a mess. There were stacks of books and papers strewn everywhere and boxes with gadgets and wires and all sorts of other things that Goku couldn't even try to guess at. He didn't want to touch any of it, because he didn't want to make noise if possible. And it all looked fragile. If he was going to be quiet, now would be the best time to be quiet, but he had to move some stuff around...because it was looking like maybe her phone was under some of this mess...or maybe it was in a drawer? He took a guess and tried to gently slide some of them open, nearly yanking one of them out of a desk entirely, when he forgot his own strength and overestimated the give of her poor little desk drawers. Catching it, he sucked in a breath and tried to silence all the items within, so they didn't clang around and make noise. He immediately went still and looked around, just to make sure he was still alone—as if he'd instantly be found out if he made any sound.

He was really on the lookout for Vegeta, who he was most on guard for, all the time. How exactly would he explain what he was doing? Especially if he hadn't seen him since they’d split after the whole fiasco last time? They hadn't been alone since they’d walked out of the time chamber together and they hadn't spoken at all since the last get together at Bulma’s. And really there wasn't much to that.

Maybe I should make some noise. Get his attention and get him mad. Just to see what he'd do...No, that's a bad idea. That’s how you get him to stop talking to you all together. Not that he's been conversational with you much… If I stir the pot just a little—

The sound of something falling over on Bulma’s desk made his eyes flick over and he reached out to catch it quickly before it rolled off. If it hit the floor, the little glass tube would surely shatter and he couldn't let that happen for a number of reasons. Bulma would have a cow and he would definitely be found out. He exhaled deeply and stared at the fragile looking piece, holding it between his fingers, whispering gently at it, “please do not.” He just stuck it in a drawer and closed it again—not all that concerned with what it was or if it should be just randomly stuffed away like that. Bulma should be a little better about organizing her stuff than this. Though, he really shouldn't be snooping, anyway.

He opened another drawer, pulling up her chair to sit in it, while he rummaged. She had so much stuffed away in her collection of junk, that it was a wonder she could find anything. Parts for any machine that could be named, various desk items, older model phones that gave him hope—but turned out to not be the one he was looking for, guns...more guns than he wanted to say was reasonable, but he also wasn't surprised by... A pair of panties... That he just...stuffed into the other drawer with the mystery tube and pretended he didn't ever see.

It was starting to become apparent he wasn't going to find her phone in this mess without some help and he didn't know any other way to track it down other than to call it...but there was also the possibility that it just wasn't in the room at all. So he was risking calling her and having to come up with a reason for a call, if it turned out she did have it on her...but he really didn't think she did. He’d been snooping about for a while, waiting to get an opportunity to drop in and make off with his prize. Of course, he really could get away with saying it was an accident, but he didn't like lying to Bulma. Goku could figure out some nonsense to tell her if it came to that. In the meantime, he sat up on her desk and looked around the room, with his own phone out to dial hers. He prayed that her phone ringer wasn't loud, but he had his finger ready to quickly cancel the call in the event that it was.

He listened and hit send. The phone in his hand showed that it was ringing out, but he heard nothing in the room. His brows furrowed together and he listened harder, worried that he had been wrong and the phone wasn't in the room and it was with Bulma...that meant he had been looking for nothing...but then, she wasn't answering? Did that mean the phone was somewhere else in the house? Oh no, maybe it was in the bedroom?

If it was in the bedroom, then that would be much more risky to pop in and get, but he could probably do it. He rubbed his face and felt around for Vegeta. He was the one he had to worry about. If Vegeta knew he was in their house, trying to poke through Bulma’s phone, then he would likely start a fight and then Goku would have to explain himself...and he really didn't want to have to explain why he was even doing this in the first place. He wasn't ready to admit to his face that he was being so underhanded for such a reason. He really wasn't even sure what he would do once he got what he was looking for...if he was going to get the desired result or if it was going to backfire horribly. At least this way, it could only backfire after he’d made the full swing.

He focused, finding Vegeta in the kitchen and far enough away from where he knew the bedroom was, that he could use Instant Transmission discreetly enough to pop into their room and try her number again. This time, he heard the buzzing sound of her phone on the nightstand, vibrating on silent. So she hadn't had the ringer on at all. He wouldn't have heard it in that mess of a room even if it had been there. Guess it was a good thing it wasn't in there. He glanced around and decided that the safest bet would be to grab the phone and take it back to the previous room. He could snoop through it in there more comfortably than standing in Bulma’s actual bedroom. Then he could leave it in an obvious place and she’d probably just find it and forget she’d left it there. It would be just fine.

When he popped back over to her other office space, he plopped back in her chair and turned her tiny phone on. Compared to the one she gave him, hers was so little. The screen was much smaller, obviously because Bulma’s hands were half the size of his own. That of course made him have to fumble with it a bit, but he didn't get very far before he found the first major roadblock in this plan. Oh no.

A passcode.

Of course she would have one. Its Bulma. He didn't have one on his own, because he knew he'd forget it anyway, and there really seemed to be no reason for him to have one. Who was he hiding anything from? But Bulma also had a whole company or something, and probably had stuff to lose if her phone got lost. He couldn't even begin to guess what four numbers she’d pick. He keyed in a few at random just to hope he’d get miraculously lucky, but none were correct. Scratching his head, he sat for a minute and tried to think. This wasn't really a hurdle he expected to come across. Thinking that far in advance was actually not his forte, that was more in Vegeta’s court. This was turning out to be a bust, a frustrating one. He couldn't even get in there and delete his own calls so she wouldn't call him back, wondering why he’d called her twice. Especially this late. Well, late for when Goku was usually out, bothering his friends. Chi chi preferred that he was in after dark, if possible, to set a good example to Goten.

Instead, he was setting the worst example by hijacking his good friend’s phone and trying to break into it. But he was only doing it for...a completely selfish reason that would make Chi Chi really frown at him. But as long as he didn't get caught it would be considered him being a bad examp—

“Goku, what are you doing?”

He almost jumped out of his skin, the chair helplessly rolling him back and banging against the poor trash bucket behind him. He scrambled to keep from dropping the phone and tried to silence the little can with his foot, but he realized that it didn't matter if he made noise, because he was caught. He stared up, just when a light clicked on and he smiled sheepishly when he saw Bulma in a classic hand-on-hip pose.

“H...hi, Bulm—”

“Goku, what on Earth? I came in here to get my phone, because you were calling it and here you are?”

He blinked at her. “How’d you know I was trying to call you?”

“I have a watch, dummy. It buzzes when someone calls me. And I came to get my phone to call you back, and for some reason, you're here, trying to get into it. Now why is that?” She folded her arms, raising a brow, and he could feel her scolding him like a child—waiting for his answer.

“...I…” He just looked down at her phone and sat cross-legged in her office chair, whining a little and rubbing the back of his neck. He really didn't want to be caught for something this dumb...he didn't really expect technology to rat him out…

“You wanted Vegeta’s phone number, didn't you,” she answered for him after he took too long and he finally looked back up at her, eyes widened a little. “Because if that's all you wanted, Goku, you didn't have to go through all this trouble, you know. I'd have given it to you.” She smiled a little, and came closer, holding her hand out to take her phone back from him.

He quietly deposited the phone in her hand and watched her. She hopped up on the desk and thumbed through her phone easily. She had a soft look on her face that Goku wasn't sure he understood, but he knew that she was at least forgiving him for his intrusion. Maybe she understood why he didn't come to her directly, or maybe she trusted that he wasn't doing anything bad natured by default, regardless of his apparent sneakiness. Either way, she didn't even ask him for an explanation beyond what he was there for.

“Let me see your phone, Goku, I'll put it in there for you.” She held her other hand out and he didn't hesitate to give her his phone too. She’d given it to him and he could see that she was relatively surprised to see it was still in fairly decent shape. He’d had Gohan show him how to use most of its features and the rest of it he figured out by telling it what to do with the voice options. It was a little banged up, but Goku was usually pretty rough on anything he owned and she took note of that. “While you're here, I have a new case for you to try out for this, if you’d like. I'll get that for you. How’s that?”

“Huh?” He blinked at the ease of her offer, and just how effortlessly she seemed to keep her tone. She wasn't even slightly bothered and that seemed weird. He was more bothered than she was, but the way she kept talking, made him feel more relaxed and he calmed down and grinned. “Yeah, that would be awesome. I've been really careful with it.”

“Awesome, you can help me test it too, then. I gave one to Vegeta, but he never really leaves the house, so he's not a very good test monkey. You on the other hand, will be much better for it.” She leaned over to place the phone against her knee, so she could pop the device out of its case. The case was a little beaten up, but the phone itself was still in pretty good shape. “Not bad, Goku, I expected you to lose this thing by now, honestly.”

“...Me too actually, but it's kinda been useful. Gohan really showed me how to use it though. He's super smart. And Chi Chi showed me how to use the internet on it.”

“...Oh did she…” Bulma’s expression changed and he couldn't tell if it was one of amusement or steep concern. He has a feeling that she worried about him having access to the internet, based on just how long of a talking to he’d gotten by Chi Chi about being careful on it. She’d said something about setting up parental controls, but honestly, he didn't use it for much anyway, just to look up things he didn't understand, if he even had the presence of mind enough to remember he could look it up. It saved his tractor once when he asked his phone to walk him through fixing a simple mechanical problem.

“Yeah, but don't worry. I don't really mess with it all that much. Not really all that much to do.” He waved and he could see the sigh of relief that she breathed. He suspected that he could get himself into a lot of trouble if left unattended, but really, that was true with anything; least he could do was not add another layer to the problem.

“Well, that’s good. I know that Vegeta reads on it. But I think that's all he does. Lord knows he doesn't answer my phone calls. I'll warn you, he probably won't answer yours either.” Goku couldn't help his response, feeling his shoulders dip a little and his face fall. And Bulma must have seen that very clearly. “But he may answer you if you text him. You know he's just shy, Goku. That's all it is.” A faint little tug at the corner of her mouth pulled higher and he almost caught a little reflection of Vegeta’s smirk rubbing off on his childhood friend.

“Vegeta? Shy? Nah….really…? You think that's what it is?” Goku hadn't really thought about it like that, but he never really understood what being shy entailed anyway, just that he never really pictured Vegeta to be that. He was pretty straight forward for what he knew.

“Trust me, Goku, he thinks more highly of you than he lets on, I promise. He just...he’s unsure of himself sometimes, I think. And doesn't know how to play nice, is all. Not even with himself. But you probably know that, spending three years alone with him probably made you realize a thing or two about how he plays, huh?” She slid off the desk and went for a box on a shelf.

“...He kinda beats himself up a bunch, doesn't he?”

“Yep, that’s Vegeta. He...is pretty good at it. I sure do try to make him stop. But I think being with you has been good for him,” she chuckled, turning a cheeky grin toward him and plucking a little case out of the cardboard box. “Just keep being you and I'm sure he’ll come around before long, okay?” She dropped the phone into the new case, the same royal blue color as the one before it, snapping the hard plastic into place and making sure it was nice and secure.

Without warning, she suddenly pitched it to him and he scrambled to reach out and catch it, missing with a delayed sense of horror as it slipped between his fingers and shot right for the wall. He was prepared to turn and make a sound of dismay, but instead found the corner of the device coming right back into the side of his face—having bounced right off the wall with the springiness of a rubber ball. He was not expecting this, and he didn't bother to try and catch it a second time; choosing instead to catch his face and whine heavily about the knot forming over his temple. The phone just continued to bounce away until it stopped, tumbling over onto its side and then plopping down flat onto its back. It was protected by rubber edges that were made from some sort of otherworldly materials, apparently! He turned a pouty face back to her, but she was grinning so widely.

“Reinforced to handle any saiyan shenanigans! Take that trial phase as a punishment for snooping around my workspace, Goku,” she put a hand on her hip and he could not contest that at all, and just put his hands up in defense, grinning back in defeat.

“Sorry, sorry...I just didn't wanna get him mad...you know...he's not stuck with me anymore...there nothing to hold his attention if I'm not threatening to jump over him.”

“Yeah, and I'm gonna have to ask you to chill on that one for a minute or two, because he gets super competitive, and a little obsessed with you and then I have to listen to ‘Kakarot this’ and ‘Kakarot that’ all day and night and honestly, sometimes I’d like to remember he’s my husband, not yours,” she just waved at him, dramatically, but he felt a little hot under the collar the moment the words left her mouth—for some inexplicable reason.

And when her gaze fell over him, watching his reaction, he felt like she was seeing every weird feeling he was having; things he didn't even have words to explain for. Like the weird static feeling in his gut, that Vegeta thought about him when he wasn't around.

“He...he definitely likes your loud manly snoring better, Bulma,” he countered, throwing an easy jab back at her, knowing that she could be thrown off her course without effort.

“Now listen yo—”

And thankfully, he was right. He managed to pull his face back together, wiping the feeling back off his expression and managing to stuff the thoughts back down enough to get himself wrapped up and ready to head back home. He picked up his phone and tucked it away in his gi. “Thanks a bunch, Bulma,” he quickly interrupted her,” knowing he’d catch hell from her later, but content to get forgiveness in the future. He was just known to do that, waving in the middle of his chuckling and focusing his attention back toward home, so he could teleport back and away from Capsule Corp.

She didn't even manage another word in, but he could have sworn he caught the tail end of a smirk on her face and he almost felt like maybe he'd been the one who’d been duped at the end. But ultimately, he got what he went for… He took out his phone and thumbed through his phone to find Vegeta’s number and confirm that he did have it. Vegeta’s picture was now in his phone, which must have been Bulma’s doing, but that was how he knew which number was Vegeta’s because she didn't save it under his name properly.

She had it listed under: Battle Husband.

Goku nearly dropped the phone and almost felt like he was sweating. That dumb static feeling came back and he recognized he had a lot to sort out. But first, he had the real battle to figure out.

How to start a conversation with the most unfriendly man on the planet.

Chapter Text

Bing!

Bing!

Bing! Bing!

His phone was sitting on the table beside him, with messages incoming steadily. Trunks glanced over at him with a raised brow and Vegeta tried not to look as if he was already perfectly aware of who that was; and trying not to show whether or not he was interested in answering. He was supposedly helping the boy with his homework, but Vegeta was only so useful for Earth subjects. He was a prince and as such, he was educated; but once the subject was no longer within universal knowledge, he fell back into a student’s territory, where he was still learning himself. As a result, he was sitting on the floor with Trunks, who had his books all over the living room—finding it easier to spread them out—and he was thumbing through a textbook or two to help narrow down some topics for the boys to work on.

“Are you gonna answer that, dad?” Trunks looked like he was curious about the sudden influx of activity on his father’s phone; or really, the boy looked like he was itching to go see who could possibly be sending Vegeta so many messages back to back like that. Because mom certainly didn't; not to mention, she had her own special text tone. This one was more of a bell sound, different from the other ones and quieter, as if expected that it would be heard likely in rapid succession—just like it was.

“It's not important,” Vegeta answered, pulling two pages, and putting them together with a few more, making a few wild guesses about themes and basic grouping of historical facts and how the boy could manage to relate them enough to write some garbage paper about them if he tried hard enough. He was quickly losing his drive to focus, when most of Trunks’ attention was elsewhere and he was starting to lament not putting Kakarot on silent.

He had surprised himself in answering him the first time he texted him, given that Kakarot had the tact of something with no tact at all, and had announced with the glee of a child that he snagged his phone number off of his wife and was messaging him to say “Hi”. He had stared at the device for a good long while, not sure if he was hallucinating at five in the morning about seeing the messages coming in and actually seeing Kakarot’s goddamn picture on his actual phone. He rubbed his face and spent probably fifteen long minutes putting his brain to work to determine that it was easily Bulma’s doing. She had to have been the one to put a picture of that dunce in his phone.

And labeled him as “Battle Husband.”

At least ten of the minutes spent staring at the first contact made, was due to seeing that; seeing those damn words and Kakarot’s stupid fucking face attacking him at five in the morning for no reason. But he’d still answered and he still wasn't sure why. He was not a conversational person, and he really had no idea how to maintain any degree of conversation with someone, let alone someone he was more accustomed to exchanging fists with more commonly than words. When they did talk, more often than not, it was short bursts done in the moment as a result of training sessions. Otherwise, verbals exchange amounted to him reading, mostly. Something he hadn't done since he'd left the chamber, actually…

Kakarot had managed to be cheeky and excited, sending him a wild range of dumb little icon faces that Bulma called emojis. Oddly, Kakarot didn't pester him about his lack of immediate responses, like he’d expected him to. That idiot seemed to be the sort who needed instant attention, but when it took him hours to respond at all, he actually didn't seem to be pouty about it. Kakarot was irritating, but maybe he was going out of his way to not irritate him to the point where Vegeta just simply blocked him. It made him realize he had some degree of power over him; the power to silence him if he really wanted to.

He did send a lot of messages, however, apparently not knowing how to group all of his thoughts up into one long message and be done with it. So the phone kept making the short little bell sounds. Bing. Bing. And Vegeta kept trying to ignore it, while also ignoring his son’s stare. He knew that he wanted him to check it, and his own curiosity was starting to trickle in and he was trying to crush it back down viciously; because he was better than this. He was supposed to be busy with something, and whatever Kakarot was messaging him, was likely not important enough for him to interrupt his task. Otherwise, if it was, Kakarot would have teleported into his living room and been standing in front of him instead.

The phone buzzed against the table and then went quiet and he glanced at it, then back to his son, who was looking at him somewhat expectantly. He couldn't stop himself from giving the boy such a warning glare. Don't even ask, or you will be grounded forever. That was what the glare said, but he didn't speak it. He really didn't want to confront his new found social life to a teenager. Supposed social life. Trunks was a busy body and would easily assume this meant that Vegeta had friends. He had no such thing. He had Bulma. His bratty son. And Kakarot. That was it.

And Kakarot. Kakarot was now part of his list. Somehow that made him twitch and he made to stand, brushing down a rolled up pant leg and throwing a few pages into his son’s nosy face. He scowled deeply, ignoring the way he could see Trunks’ stupid smirk hiding behind a few printed sheets of paper. Idiot kid with his mother’s face. As if she was channeling her expression through him to watch him go pick up the phone to check it; check his messages from Kakarot. Ten messages. Half of them were photos. God damn it Kakarot.

“Trunks, get back to your homework, and stop being a snoop,” he hissed at the boy, nearly stomping his foot and barking once he noted that the teenager was actually leaning up to see what he was doing and who it was from.

“Aw, who is it dad—”

“Homework. Now.” He left no room for argument, and Trunks made the large pouty lip at him, but Vegeta had long since mastered the sharp tone that silenced the child. If Trunk didn't listen, then he'd take him into the gravity room and train him until he did listen and Trunks knew just how hard Vegeta trained.

Vegeta flicked his thumb across the phone to clear the front screen and open the messages from Kakarot. They were sent in rapid succession, as he’d come to recognize him to do, particularly, when he misspelled a word beyond recognition and at least was making an attempt to correct it. It was almost like Kakarot was trying to make his communication efforts up to Vegeta’s standards, but he couldn't tell. He felt like the device’s autocorrect played a part in some of the coherency of his messages, but at least it was readable. That was an improvement honestly, to some of his verbal speech. Several files loaded and while they started to download in, he read the captions above.

‘Finished plowing the field this afternoon and check it out!’
‘*ploughing’
‘The net says its also plowing’
‘Whys it spelled 2 ways, that's silly’
‘Just look at the pictures!’

Despite shaking his head, he found himself scrolling down, not sure why he would be interested in Kakarot’s farming adventures, but there he was, thumbing down to look at them. The first picture showed a surprisingly well turned field, bathed in a soft glow of sunset coming off from the right side of the picture. He couldn't actually remember ever seeing much of Kakarot’s home or where he farmed, or really anything about where Kakarot spent any of his time. During their stay in the time chamber, he recalled maybe once or twice over a meal, he’d run his mouth off about Chi Chi and her cooking, but rarely did he talk about where he lived.

More pictures showed more colors, steeper reds and brighter oranges. The setting sun cast warm tones across the fields in front of the hills that led to the mountains and the water crossing the horizon glistened on the picture in just a way that it almost made the images look like some kind of strange fantasy land. If Kakarot was a decent photographer, Vegeta might have thought these weren't actual pictures, but clever computer graphics made to sell a landscape. He knew he lived near a mountain area. Mount Paozu, from what he recalled? He believed it was in the East District. These were probably deeper details than he was expected to have known, honestly.

‘Much nicer view than big wall of white huh?’

The new message popped up as he came to the last picture, which was starting to be dotted with splashes of purples, pinks and some blues among all the glowing orange. He lived in a city, with a distinct lack of natural landscape to appreciate the sort of view these pictures were showing him. He was also not that much of a nature boy, as Kakarot was; but that was largely due to Kakarot having more opportunity to be adventurous when he was young, while he was trapped in a space pod. A little touch of envy would be there if he was the sort to need that kind of experience.

Still, he was a little surprised by the clarity and the color of the photos. The real view from Kakarot’s end must have been quite something. He tapped the screen to pull up the tiny keyboard, squinting to see the letters before tapping at them some more to make words.

‘You see sunsets like that often?’ He asked back, not really sure why he was asking this in particular. Maybe he just didn't know what to say, or maybe he really was curious. He rarely left Capsule Corp., and when he did; he was either with Bulma, where he was mostly glued to her, or he was running off to some wasteland to destroy it, alongside himself in his angry rage-fits over something or other.

‘Sometimes! Its really nice out right now’
‘I know Bulma said you don't go anywhere much’
‘But you should come see it sometime’
‘Fresh air’
‘And a good place to spar out here!’

Kakarot followed it up with few of the little smiling icons and a thumbs up and Vegeta just raised a brow. Bulma was always running her mouth, but she wasn't wrong. He did not leave much. He definitely did not leave much to appreciate the fresh air and mountain view. He usually left to scream angrily into canyons and blow up cliffsides; not appreciate the views or have friendly sparring sessions with idiot farmer boys at sunset.

‘Unless youre worried you might have fun’
‘Now Vegeta’
‘I know that scares you’
‘But’

And the little ring of bells as the texts rolled in just made his face twitch a little and his thumbs just chimed in before his brain to counter in the same way his mouth would if the idiot was standing right there in front of him. It was as if they were in person and he was being teased to his damn face. Kakarot knew how to press his buttons even when he was out of sight. He was flawless at crawling under his skin in such a way that made Vegeta unable to let it just roll off.

‘Like you could possibly introduce the concept of fun to me.’

After a long moment of silence from Kakarot’s end, he received an incoming picture image, blowing it up to see a photo taken from the man’s own phone facing himself. He was standing in front of the sunset, with all its warm hues playing over his dumb features, while he was sticking his tongue out and making a fool’s expression at him. A clown indeed. Vegeta just scowled at the simpleton’s silly retort. It lacked any cleverness at all and was really such a Kakarot response.

Another Bing!

‘Well youre still invited anyway, sourpuss, chi chi would prolly cook’

Vegeta just ignored the text for a few minutes, content to pretend he wasn't interested, while dodging his son’s gaze. Trunks couldn't see his phone screen; not from the way he was sitting, but he wasn't deaf, and Kakarot sent messages like a Gatling gun. He didn't have to answer to his own teenaged child, but he also didn't really have the desire to have that teenaged child asking questions in the first place. “I don't see you working, boy,” he finally shot him a lazy, but somehow stern look. It was enough to make the teen straighten up and get back on track.

He dropped back on to a chair and tapped his phone screen again a few times, pulling the images back up. Moron. Sending me all this useless stuff as if it's necessary… Without really thinking, he held his thumb down and dragged the first photo up until the save box appeared. One by one he archived them. For no real reason that he could explain to himself. The pictures themselves meant nothing more than being aesthetically attractive, potentially nice wallpapers for the phone itself—if he ever decided to change the basic one he had on his. The colorations were attractive and Kakarot raised an excellent point about scenery. It was nicer than the scenery they'd shared for three whole years.

He hesitated on the last picture, but the decided on a whim to save it as well. Choosing to utilize that picture above the others. If Bulma was going to go into his phone and change his contacts and put pictures in his damn phone of an idiot, then the least she could do was put ones in that properly exemplified the idiot’s usual state of being. So he set the stupid tongue-stuck-out-of-his-face selfie of Kakarot as his contact image. And then sat there and scowled at it.

He finally recovered from his scowling enough to give a proper response to Kakarot, feeling his ears burning a little for some reason he couldn't explain and grateful for distance, because the expression he had was likely one he wasn't intending to make. Something about the way Kakarot just so casually asked him to come to his home and see his world, felt so unnerving and personal. It was his natural response to hide from that and all the weird feelings that came with it.

Why do you insist on inviting me into your world Kakarot? You innocent fool. You're toeing a fine line.

He didn't respond to his invitation immediately. Only to later send him several icons of a middle finger and a brief text that just said, ‘never in a million years.’ It was his hope that it sounded textually like his usual tone, and not the desperate one that was in his head, begging Kakarot not to complicate this like he was beginning to feel like it was quickly heading toward.

Unfortunately, he had a prickling sensation that the crash course was already set.

Bing!

Chapter Text

He couldn't sleep. Not for lack of trying, just sometimes, he was too restless and sleep wouldn't come easily. The quiet, clean air was relaxing enough, but sometimes even being out in the relative stillness of nature didn't really help calm him down enough to drift off and stay there. Nights like these were usually ones that Goku found himself outside, some distance away from his little house, training by himself. A few thousand push-ups and jogging couple dozen miles helped, but he had gotten himself entirely too used to a slightly different routine on nights when he wasn't ready to settle down.

‘Need me to catch your punches?’

The memory drifted across his mind as he counted off the last of a thousand set, and he let himself drop back onto the thick grass to stare up into the dark sky. The stars were clear above him and they sparkled down at him, looking far away and innocent. They didn't hold his interest beyond wondering if there was anything else out there among them that would challenge him. No, his interest at the moment was constantly coming back around to Vegeta. The man who’d showed up one day, many years ago, and turned his whole world around; made him see that there were people out there powerful beyond his own scale. Amazing opportunities to find many people that he could challenge.

But maybe it was simply that he thought that Vegeta was amazing. Out of nowhere, someone with this tenacity appeared and he never did leave.

Goku stretched his arms out beside him, letting the cool air swim over his warm body. He wasn't sure when he started to think so much about it, but he was beginning to realize it might be the cause of his restlessness. Three years of Vegeta’s constant presence had conditioned him to a different way of functioning and he thought he'd be over it by now. He thought he'd appreciate looking up at the night sky, instead of seeing a whole wall of white nothingness. But the wall of stars above him may as well have been nothingness when he couldn't reach out and find comfort in a kindred spirit. Was that really it? He had struggled to make sense of it when he was in the time chamber with Vegeta, and he struggled to make sense outside of it as well. It seemed like there was no real answer.

Except maybe the simple one that Goku just missed Vegeta, plain and simple; no long explanations around it.

He chuckled to himself, making a face that no one but the distant stars could see, and he rooted around in his pocket for his phone, finding it after a minute and wiping the grass and dirt off the screen. The glow of the phone was the only artificial light for as far as the eye could see and he dimmed it so it wasn't drowning out the natural light from above. He fumbled a bit, pressing his fingers around the menus to pull up the camera, raising his arms to the sky to focus the little box in the center on the glittering sky. The camera wasn't the greatest, but it was enough to pull the dull glow of the stars and the way they seemed to spill out in a speckled river across the whole sky. Bulma’s phone was really a nice gift, even if he barely managed to use it to its potential.

Drawing the phone closer, he looked over the picture and saved it, capturing the moment and opening a blank message in a sudden desire to share it. Technology was still a hurdle for him, but he wasn't going anywhere for a while and he was taking his time to try and make sure he was at least texting like a half functional adult. He suspected that Vegeta would just ignore him if he couldn't understand him, so he tapped the letters slowly and let the computer correct all of his poor spelling. Gohan and Goten really had been a big help in showing him how to do it and he smiled once he attached the picture of the crystal clear sky above and sent it on its way with a brief blurb.

‘Much nicer view than a big white nothing huh?’

Closing his eyes, he laid his arms out again, phone still in hand. Sleep wasn't ready for him yet, but he felt comfortable enough to relax, settling into the cool earth and letting his body just rest a bit. Being alone wasn't really so bad, given that Vegeta had never really been a talkative companion or anything, but there had been something really comforting about the presence they’d had in the chamber, even when they weren't engaged in any interactions at all. Some kind of awareness of him was really all he felt like he needed to make it feel better; it really was filling an empty spot. No matter how he looked at it, he couldn't put any other perspective on it. Vegeta was a missing piece of something. One that he had gotten spoiled with having in arm’s reach.

A deep breath and he nearly jumped when he felt his phone buzz in his hand. With a quirked brow, his expression spelled a curiosity about his phone making any noises at him so soon after his message had been sent. He poked at the screen and found a reply to his freshly send text. Vegeta had responded already, much to his surprise.

‘Did you make a wish on it?’

He tilted his head a little, raising the other brow, wondering what that meant. Not really sure he got the question. Maybe Vegeta was half asleep in his response. It seemed somewhat out of place for him, but Vegeta’s tone was so hard to read over text. He could easily be mocking him and Goku wouldn't be able to catch it as easily. He hated that a little bit. He liked being able to read Vegeta’s nuances, especially since he'd spent so long learning the finer details of them. All he could do was to respond with a few question marks and a very simple, ‘what do you mean?’

To his surprise, what he got in response was not a smart remark at all, but an image. His own photo that he'd sent Vegeta just moments before, but it looked like it had been zoomed in and the screen had been saved exactly as it was. Every detail of the screen was just as the phone showed it from Vegeta’s side, most prominently, the center of the text image where Goku had apparently, accidentally snapped a shooting star that he'd not noticed when he'd sent it along the first time. He wasn't looking that hard and he grinned widely. That was just a great example of him and Vegeta. He wouldn't see that, some small but extraordinary piece in a sea of detail; but Vegeta would, always looking harder and searching with that analytical gaze that he had.

‘I didnt even notice it’
‘Good catch!’
‘Guess this wish is yours’

He sent back, laughing out loud into the empty night air. The only other sounds around him were the gentle sway of leaves in the wind, and the swishing dry grass around him. How crazy it would look if someone else would come across him, but he was so far out into the wild that he was surely never going to be bothered by anyone else. He couldn't help but grin about it anyway, even if he didn't think Vegeta would be nearly as amused as he was. It was such a little thing to notice and that Vegeta took the time to comment on it, at such late hour, meant that he wasn't the only one who couldn't sleep. He at least humored Goku and that exceeded expectations by quite a lot.

‘What are you even doing awake at this hour, Kakarot?’

Goku glanced over the message and debated the direct answer. He didn't really know the real answer. He was awake because he just couldn't sleep. Insomnia or was there something that was actually keeping him up? Deep down he thought maybe he knew the answer, but he wasn't about to explore the depths of that, knowing that was territory that was way deeper than he could tread and come out of still making sense of. Vegeta was the thinker, not him. He just knew that he wasn't sleeping because he was restless and subconscious was juggling around things that the rest of him wasn't ready to openly explore.

He couldn't just come out and say that he missed the hour of time Vegeta would read before they’d sleep. Or the meals they’d quietly share. Or sparring in the middle of what would have been the night under a normal daylight rotation. He didn't miss the time chamber itself, but he wouldn't mind going back to that for the comfort of the familiarity of their pattern. And yet, at the same time, he loved his life here with Chi Chi and Goten. The duality of it was confusing and he nearly rolled over on the grass in dismay of his own thoughts. Goku did not think about these things because they were complicated. With everyone else, it was easy. He knew at least what to identify the feelings he had for everyone. Except one. One person was being difficult in every capacity he possibly could be.

Typical Vegeta behavior.

And he still hadn't squashed down that moment in the time chamber. The one that was leading to these recurring thoughts, that was starting to affect him on a daily basis. Recalling his expression and making him constantly wonder what the shorter man would have done if he had just leaned in that little bit of space forward...and…

Goku rolled over and let out a deep breath. These thoughts needed to stop, because they were going to get him in trouble. Wanting to get under Vegeta skin was the quickest way to tick him off and gaining Vegeta’s trust was really no easy task. Goku took forever to accomplish that as he still wondered how deep that layer of trust laid. To even think of breaking that all apart for the sake of his curiosity was dancing on that fine line all over again. He rubbed his face a little and just grunted to himself before turning back over to stare back to the stars.

“Too bad you're not here, right now, though,” he mumbled, blinking slowly. If Vegeta was there, at least he knew he would easily be able to break himself free from half of the weird things tumbling around in his head. Vegeta would just hit it out of him.

A buzzing from his phone made him raise a brow and blink. That wasn't a sound he'd recalled hearing from it before, or at least not recently, and he raised it from under him to look at the dirty screen. He'd forgotten it in his turmoil and rolled over on it a little, but it was fine. The case it was in was sturdy enough that he could throw it into his field and find it hours later and it would be fine. He'd done that before on accident. But sturdiness didn't mean it made the touch screen any less sensitive and he realized the noise the the sound of a message being sent. One that he hadn't meant to send, that he'd forgotten his phone could do. A feature he used sometimes when he couldn't spell a word and wanted to at least get in the right ballpark. Talk to text had just played the cruelest joke on him.

Oh no.

The silence of the cosmos weighed down on him for a long moment, once he saw that it had a read time on it. He saw it already and there was no saving it. Not that Goku knew how to cancel a text anyway, if he even could. He would have to ask Bulma, for future reference. Maybe to save his life from future mistakes he'd have to worry about smoothing over. He'd been doing so well with keeping from losing Vegeta’s patience, or making the man mad and getting blocked. He couldn't read him anymore, when they weren't face to face and he whined a little, feeling like he'd accidentally set the forest on fire. Vegeta closed up the second it sounded like Goku was expressing anything that vaguely sounded like he wanted Vegeta’s company.

But, to Goku’s complete surprise,

‘What, need someone to catch your punches again?’

Vegeta hadn't been able to catch the tone of his text enough to know how wistfully he’d said it aloud. He probably didn't credit Goku with much capability of thought beyond when and where to hit things. And mostly, he wasn't wrong in his assumption. The only other alternative was that Vegeta was in need of company too, but Goku really doubted he had any difficulty being alone. He did that pretty well, even though they both had done pretty well together.

How should he even respond? He wondered. If he answered a simple yes, then he felt like it would be too simple or Vegeta would tell him to stop being so needy. But...it was kind of what he wanted. Training by himself wasn't working out his energy or making him less restless and Vegeta seemed to be awake just the same...but it just didn't feel right to come out and say it. Something in him felt this prickling need to goad him, anyway. Not that he was intentionally out to manipulate Vegeta, but sometimes, he did like to steer how he felt he might react, and he could predict how he would respond with certain phrases and meanings.

‘Why’
‘You think you can?? Or you’
‘Gonna catch them with your face??’

He smirked to the little glowing screen, and then the grin grew even wider when he saw the immediate response. He could almost see Vegeta furiously tapping the screen back at him.

‘You know where I live, Kakarot, if you want your lights knocked out for bedtime that badly.’

Without another word of exchange returned, Goku turned the phone’s light off and tucked the device into a pocket. Effortlessly, he took a breath in and lifted his legs to kick his body up and get a swing of motion to right himself into a crouching position and then into a standing one; bouncing up with a little more eagerness back in him. Leaving in the middle of the night was bad practice on his part, but he'd be home before Chi Chi knew he'd gone any real distance. That was the upside to Instant Transmission. He placed two fingers to his forehead and searched out a familiar signature, one he'd probably always be able to pinpoint, and he left the grassy, empty plain to bathe in the night sky without him.

Chapter Text

It used to be, years before, that setting the gravity so high would have his muscles straining and sweat slick on his skin; the room would feel so heavy that every breath would feel like a punishment. To some extent, that hadn’t changed too much, the gravity was still punishing. This body still screamed against the pressure and he couldn’t let himself lose focus or he was at risk of having to fight just to pick himself off the ground. It was just good fortune that the room no longer required that he be able to touch the panel to turn it off. He was able to control it with voice command if he were to push himself too far; and additionally, have it placed at timed intervals. Bulma’s idea. He supposed it wasn’t a terrible idea.

Unfortunately, his need for the voice command was lately due to his thoughts taking him away from his task and ending up planted on the training room floor; an irritating revelation, because he wasn’t accomplishing anything while this was happening. Kakarot was not only bothering him at stupid hours of the night, and occasionally during the day, with his nonsense phone messages, but he was bothering his goddamn thoughts too.

Because unlike Kakarot, Vegeta didn’t let things go. He held onto things for all eternity and he was still holding on to the smallest nagging thoughts as if they were bulletin boards that were being lit up right behind Kakarot every time he was in the same room with him. Maybe blocking his phone number would have been the smartest thing to do, but he knew that if he did, Bulma would come at him with the most accusing look and accent it with disappointment that would make him undo it anyway. Not that he needed her permission to do what he wanted, but he knew her response would have that effect because even he knew when he was being unreasonable. It would be just a case of him actually running away from the buffoon.

Running away was a moot point, however, as Kakarot would probably track him down to the edge of the universe and drag him back; if only on Bulma’s request. Sometimes, he really wished he could run away and manage to shrug off all of the nonsense trailing after him that came with Kakarot. Instead, he responded to the idiot’s midnight texts and started saving his goddamn stupid farming adventure selfies on his phone; as if he was in need of constantly updating his contact image to keep it current with his idiot face. These were not things he wanted to make a habit.

These were things that were becoming habit.

These were things that Kakarot did not have the capacity to see as a fucking problem and that was what his fucking problem was. Actually, Kakarot in general was his fucking problem. He furiously pushed his body into whatever number of push-ups he could make it do; having given up entirely on counting. Counting was a lost cause when all he could think about was swearing over his preoccupation with someone who was supposed to be more of a amicable rival. An innocent idiot rival who seemed to have no goddamn idea that everything he did was just another damn step in clouding Vegeta’s thoughts.

I used to be able to concentrate, before all of this garbage, Kakarot.

Training was easier when all he had to think about, in terms of the fool, was pushing himself to catch up to him. When Kakarot was an annoying goal for him to crush, because he was angry and spiteful. He wasn’t angry and spiteful anymore. He wanted to be. He would prefer being angry and spiteful. Anger and spite were much easier to make sense of than whatever this pressure in his chest was that stirred up when Kakarot sent him weird messages in the middle of the night that read like a damn romance novel on one end, but he knew sounded completely different on another.

It was no goddamn wonder Bulma looked at him with that slightly raised-brow expression when he’d said that Kakarot had dropped by a few times at night for a short sparring session when neither of them could sleep.

Kakarot’s way of talking was just so blunt, but usually meant innocently enough that he wouldn’t even understand his own damn tone. His actions and expressions were so open and apparent that he could send mixed messages that he couldn’t even try to make real sense of. It frustrated him to no end. It frustrated him to no fucking end.

He slammed his fist into the floor, losing his composure and nearly bowing his spine. He had to arch his back and bend a knee to not end up straining any muscles or tendons in the extreme gravity, during his momentary lapse in stability. He thought he’d effectively shoved it back down into a dark place where it would never come back from, content to leave it in the time chamber to die. But when he let himself think too hard about all the small nuances of an idiot and his sometimes misleading behavior, he always bounced right back to that dumb expression Kakarot had given him right before they left the time chamber.

The more time he spent around Kakarot, the more that one moment seemed to creep back into his mind, and the more he wondered what was actually going through his mind. If Kakarot thought about anything at all. Maybe it was just him. Maybe only he was the one agonizing over this. He was the one who had been irreversibly affected by three years spent with the other, and he was now wishing he could turn the clock back to decline his offer. His obsession with Kakarot was nothing new, it was just apparently changing its colors and reforming to focus around every detail that made him wonder if he wasn’t just desperately seeking to bond with another saiyan.

That had to be it. It couldn’t be Kakarot. It was a lust for something social that he didn’t have access to anymore. It was necessity to cling to what little was left of a lost society.

Except he knew better than that. Saiyans weren’t the sort to seek out bonds. If they happened, they happened in battle. They grew over time and that was what happened, and Kakarot happened to be one who he gravitated toward. It wasn’t even tolerance anymore. He didn’t offer to catch his punches in the middle of the night because Kakarot was badgering him. He could have ignored him. He did so because he wanted to.

That was a problem.

One that was probably always a little present, given how often Vegeta had jumped in to fights, howling at the enemies that Kakarot was his to take down and no one else’s. But this wasn’t about that anymore. Kakarot wasn’t his to take down, an enemy to overcome. He was just his, in general. Kakarot likely did not view this in the same way and he needed to reel this back in before he made a fool of himself.

A horrifying thought crossed his mind; that maybe he wanted to know exactly what Kakarot’s view toward him was, but asking him outright was mutually assured destruction; because then he would have to explain himself and he really didn’t know what the hell he was even in the process of working out. Just that Kakarot was ingrained in his life to the point where he was beyond the point of stepping back and ignoring he ever existed at all. If he asked, and Kakarot had no idea what he meant…

...Crushed, the feeling would be crushed. He ground his teeth together and tried to fight the gravity, losing his battle with concentration. This was why he hadn’t been using this room much. Kakarot’s damn sleepless sparring matches had been more of benefit than this. He couldn’t do this without thinking so much and letting himself reel in the fact that he, the Saiyan Prince, apparently needed to feel some sort of return from a backwards dumbass.

I want you to want me the same way, you goddamn dunce.

...what.

“WHAT.”

He hit the floor of the gravity chamber so hard that his ribs hurt immediately on the impact and he had to power up forcefully to not crush his lungs from the weight of his body. The split second that he’d shocked himself still, had tipped the delicate balance of oppressing gravity versus his strength and he had to fight to get it back and recover his stance. The short battle was almost a welcome one, because it was just enough to make him have to throw aside any real thoughts for a few minutes just to recover himself physically. This was why he had been spending less time in the gravity room. These distractions were opening chances for him to slip and end up placing himself in situations where he left himself vulnerable.

This was a completely different kind of distraction, however. This was a metaphysical punch to the face. What the fuck was happening in his mind when it came to Kakarot.

You miss him.

He powered up and forced himself back on his feet, fists clenched and knees bent to bridge himself.

Shut up, Bulma. He doesn't ever actually leave, how can I miss him, when the dumbass never actually leaves me alone.

But you still do.

He literally texts me twenty-five times a day, there is no feasible opportunity to exist without his presence.

Then why are you thinking about this.

Because he won't leave me alone.

Is that really what it is?

Listen, inner Bulma, I'm going to have to ask you to leave. Because I'm busy working out my crisis and I don't need goddamn help, I can manage my crisis all by myself—!

You're doing a fantastic job, Vegeta, you're going to end up injuring yourself again, just like usual.

His jaw hurt from how hard he ground his teeth together and his energy was wildly dancing around him, uncontained and he made no effort to draw it back in. Lack of focus was preventing him from putting any rein on his outburst and he was just shy of blowing the circuits out of the training room panels again; the only thing that stopped him, was that he ramped up his energy and shifted from one state of super saiyan to the higher god state, letting himself just burn through all of his power for the first time in a while. His frustration was at max level and he was far too clouded to get anything accomplished. At the rate he was going, Kakarot was going to be laughing at him from leagues of power away while he was busy agonizing over this bullshit.

So he just pushed and pushed until he was straining his body against, not only the gravity, but also his super saiyan God form, trying to see how long it could go before he flickered out. Which would give first, his body or his stupid mind drifting away and thinking too hard again? Whis said he did that too much. But he didn't think he meant like this.

God damn it.

It was Kakarot’s fault. He wanted to be friends. He wanted to act like they could be closer so easily. He wanted to act like Vegeta was a decent person, worth being on the same level as an idiot with a huge—though incredibly stupid—heart. He wasn't aware of how his innocent playing affected others. He didn't agonize over the stupid shit Vegeta did—

“Goddamn you, Kakarot—” he howled, feeling the air crackling around him, and the gravity felt like it didn't exist, that's how strongly his own pressure within felt. “Who the hell do you think you are—” He felt his whole body trembling from the strain, but the pain of it felt relieving in its own way. Pain was more cathartic to him than it should have been and maybe when he was done, he would be able to sit down and figure out how to block Kakarot from his life for a while, so he could figure out how to put him back where he belonged, at a distance with the rest of the earthlings that weren't Bulma and his son.

But for the moment, he just exploded. All his thinking and weeks of distraction coming apart and flowing out with his energy, in the form of guttural screaming that probably made the building vibrate something fierce. Bulma was probably relieved he was back to training and not sulking around and hiding from places he’d be stuck addressing his hang ups. Maybe he had been running. Maybe not literally from Kakarot, but from thinking about Kakarot. He was just absolutely terrible at it. Running away was something he was always really terrible at. Because even when he tried to run away from it, it was clawing its way in. And now he was squaring off with it, and no amount of super saiyan brutality would overpower that. Physical power had nothing on mental turmoil. Feelings were bullshit.

He just screamed and let the last bit of his energy cascade down his body, until he lost God form and returned back down to regular super saiyan. His throat was raw and he tasted blood from how hard his teeth ground together. It had been a long time since he'd let himself have such a colossal meltdown that it made him feel weightless for a brief moment, in a weird way. Three years with Kakarot hadn't allowed him this sort of venting; but then, he hadn't needed it in that time. No. He only needed it now. Thinking about the three years that had been, looking back, easy. Easy to live, and now impossible to pretend didn't happen; when, technically, they didn't to everyone else. Worst of all, he couldn't tell what Kakarot’s endgame was anymore. He couldn't tell what his own endgame was. He couldn't make sense of anything because feelings were bullshit and he preferred it when he was in the dark with his own emotions.

His last bit of frustration just flew out of him, and he just bellowed, unable to maintain his inward thoughts when they boiled over. “KAKAROT, HOW DARE YOU MAKE ME CARE ABOUT YOU—”

The explosion was complete. The words came out of his mouth and he admitted it to himself in the same instance. He hated it, but it was a fact. Somehow, yelling it into the gravity room relieved the pressure, but made him tired. His body sagged and he powered down. He was coming back down, almost crashing back; letting his ki plummet back and remembering that the gravity was jacked up high enough that he would feel it bearing down on him again, punishing him. He had to reduce it while he still had the energy to do so, or he'd have to yell at the machine later from the floor when he would inevitably lose to his own exhaustion. The soreness in his body and the sheer weariness, made him want to just lay down where he was and close his eyes for several hours and maybe he would once the gravity was turned off.

Wiping his face with the back of his hand, he moved his body with a laziness he wouldn't normally display. Somehow, yelling at the machine felt like more of an effort than dragging his whole body over to the panel. Maybe it was the weight of words. Maybe he’d just screamed himself breathless a little more so than he realized. Regardless, he wasn't far away from the panel anyway; able to step over, mash the buttons and let gravity return to normal.

The pressure relieved and yet he didn't feel any less heavy. Sagging against the panel, he turned around and leaning against it, propping an elbow on the opposite arm and rubbing his temple with his finger and thumb. Only then did he catch the other soft hum of someone’s ki close by.

His heart stopped in his chest for a moment and any motion he had been making froze, as if the whole universe stopped.

The tired calm that had almost come over him vanished in a second and a whole new wave of anxiety flooded his system, filling him from head to toe with alarm in seeing that he wasn't alone. The gravity chamber had never been disengaged at any point, for any reason, during this session, so no one had manually entered through any door. The only entrance possible, would be made by a person capable of teleportation. His brain couldn't connect the proper wires to make him utter a single sound for a solid minute after realizing Kakarot had Instant Transmissioned into the gravity room. The look on the big idiot’s face was not his usual cheery, stupid, innocent one either.

Suddenly it felt like the gravity was cranked back up to five hundred and he felt his bones liquefying in his body.

“...I...came to...make sure, nothin’ was wrong… felt you...powerin’ up….” Kakarot spoke, and Vegeta’s soul nearly left his body as soon as he registered the wavering tone of his voice. Kakarot never had the sense in him to feel any hesitance in speaking, but he sounded almost nervous.

Kakarot heard him.

Instantly, he reacted and his body moved before his brain did, aiming for the door. It wasn't even the intended goal, he wasn't thinking about it, he was just reacting—instinct was telling him to get the hell away and flee. This time he was running and he was doing it without any intention to deny it or try to fight it or resist it. He didn't know if he could stand there and deal with the twisting in his gut and the warmth creeping into his face, once humiliation started to actually take effect. How much was he there to see? He didn't want to ask, he didn't want to know. He wanted to fly away and find an ocean to sit at the bottom of for about ten minutes.

But he didn't make it to the door, instead, he found a large hand catching him by the arm.

“Vegeta—wait—”

The words barely came out of the big fool’s mouth before Vegeta started to protest, pulling his arm back. He was shaken a bit, for a reason that was stupid beyond even him. How dare he just show up and invade his privacy! He had no concept of personal space at all! He had no concept of any of the complex feelings he was feeling! Stupid bastard—

He nearly shoved him, balling his fist up, and ready to swing it, but Kakarot had made the first move; and it was a blow that somehow accomplished the equivalent of Instant Knockout without rendering him unconscious—though he desperately wished it had. In that brief, split second, Kakarot had gotten the upper hand and spun him, taking his surprise and capitalizing on his inability to connect brain wires in the midst of all his confusion and inner turmoil. Kakarot’s size gave him an upper hand that rarely made a significant difference, but for once, it did. It made a huge difference. The advantage he had could fill canyons from the way he pulled Vegeta toward him and clamped a hand firmly against his back, fingers curling into his workout shirt. The other arm circled around and Vegeta was trapped.

Not only trapped by Kakarot’s arms, but by his own self instilled paralysis. His heart was about to kill itself in his chest and he couldn't even function enough to move, staring in a strange sort of shock, off at the wall blankly. Kakarot didn't speak like he was expecting him to. He didn't say anything stupid, or try to brush anything off. He didn't act like it was just another normal Kakarot thing, to pop in and humiliate his friends. Standing out beyond all of these things, he wasn't as calm as Vegeta expected him to be.

Being so close, pulled against his chest, with his face so close to his ear, he could feel that the racing of Kakarot’s heart was as traumatic as his own, thundering in his chest in the same way, and his breath as pitchy and erratic—like he couldn't get air to his brain to make it think what he needed it to. For once, he felt genuinely baffled by not only himself, but by Kakarot, on top of his humiliation and his anxiety and it all made him feel so naturally exhausted. He had no fight left in him. He lost his will to even attempt to escape and Kakarot was more than aware of this. His grip slacked, but his...embrace remained. Vegeta just closed his eyes and exhaled deeply, resting his forehead against his shoulder.

“...I hate you,” he muttered after several long minutes, voice much lower than he intended it to be.

It was meant and perceived completely differently than it was spoken, and somehow, the fact that Kakarot understood it, obliterated everything he thought he understood and set him right down in the middle of a giant road with a question mark going forward.

Kakarot didn't let him go.

And he didn't tell him to.

Chapter Text

Farming was, as Gohan called it, cathartic for Goku. It took him at least twenty minutes to understand exactly what he meant by that, but when he finally did get it, he decided that he thought that was a very fitting word. He saved it in his phone so he could commit it to memory; Bulma showed him where he could save notes for himself. He now had more notes there than he thought he’d have. Most of them were nonsensical; trivial details and a date or two that he forgot to put the event they were there for. But he liked to save words in there that struck him. So he kept that one, because he thought it sounded like a word Vegeta would say; and it was true, mostly.

It was helping him that day, anyway. The day was a warm one and he was probably a little silly to be out in the middle of it, working so intensely when the sun was bearing down so hard, but it was honestly more help to him than harm. Working was keeping Chi Chi happy and keeping him busy. Being busy was keeping him from thinking too hard and it was giving him a chance to let what happened the day before soak in and make sense. If it trickled in, then maybe he wouldn’t feel his stomach dropping out so hard with the nervous abandon it had the previous afternoon.

Feeling Vegeta’s ki flaring up so suddenly, so powerfully, had sent him into an immediate defense mode that he hadn’t really considered he’d take before. The unexpected nature of it made him think something was terribly wrong; but neither of them ever called out to each other for any reason, so it was presumptuous to think he needed to fly to his rescue. Vegeta could handle any enemy that Goku could handle, he firmly believed that; but he felt an instinct to pop in and see why he was surging into so many powerful states of super saiyan. He hadn’t meant to intrude on his personal moment. He really hadn’t meant to hear him having one of his self-beatdowns.

He plucked up roots and sifted through turned up earth with his bare hands, absently. He couldn’t feel the grains between his fingers or the dirt under his nails; but he could still remember the feel of the fabric of Vegeta’s black shirt, with the cut off sleeves and low neck. He couldn’t feel the sun on his back, but he could feel the thumping of a heartbeat that wasn’t his, pressed against his ribs; Vegeta was shorter than him, he really hadn’t noticed the degree of which until that moment. He had expected to be sucker punched when he put his arms around him, trapping Vegeta like that, but he hadn’t been. Somehow, the stubborn man had allowed it and he hadn’t quite let it leave his mind. He’d pushed his luck and somehow, it didn’t come back to bite him. With Vegeta, it was always an equal chance of failure and success. He was just marginally good at reading Vegeta in most circumstances.

These circumstances were starting to become much more complex than they used to be.

He actually heard Vegeta say, with his own two ears, that he cared about him; and he felt his stomach twist into a knot that persisted up until he left afterward. Neither of them had spoken another word to each other since. Probably because Goku hadn’t let go of him for a good long time; the embrace he had on him felt like he needed it more than he knew Vegeta did; but he acted like that wasn’t the reason. For a moment, he had at least part of what he wanted―he knew not to press his luck too much. What he was feeling for Vegeta was hardly what he suspected Vegeta felt in return, but he at least...felt like maybe he wasn’t dealing with the degree of distance he had before. It wasn’t like he could even place where his own feeling lied either, anyway. He just knew things had definitely changed.

Leaning back, he brushed the dirt off his hands, leaving dark smudges on his pants, and he rummaged through his pocket to find his phone. Taking and sharing pictures of his farming adventures, as Vegeta called it, wasn’t all that exciting; but it was what he had to share―and regardless of what Vegeta said―he never actually told him to stop sharing. Goku knew that it was probably better to leave the gap of silence to widen for a while, but he didn’t think he really could anymore. The longer he let himself go without any contact with Vegeta, the more starved for attention he thought he might actually get. Even he was aware of it. Vegeta had no idea just how important he was to Goku’s functioning after being part of his life so consistently, apparently.

“Maybe I shouldn’t have showed up yesterday,” he whined a little to himself, turning the phone and swiping the lock screen off to take pictures of his nice, clean new rows of freshly deweeded plants. “Let him blow himself up, see if I care,” he frowned and pouted steeply, making a face for no one but himself, and he couldn’t even see it. As it was, he had to turn up the brightness of his phone to max and use his hand to shade the phone just to see the screen. Only then, did he actually see that he had a message waiting for him. It was from Vegeta.

The message was about thirty minutes old and he was surprised he’d missed it. Somehow, he’d zoned himself out enough that he’d not heard the text come in. Effortlessly, he lost his previous puffiness about Vegeta’s stubbornness and he found himself torn between anxiety and relief. Tapping the message, he opened it to a longer message than he was expecting from Vegeta, who usually gave him short responses―and never initiated conversations to begin with. Instantly, it made him feel weird and brought back the nervous twisting in his stomach, and that twisting turned sharply once he began to actually read it.

‘I don’t know what the fuck yesterday was, Kakarot. But if you’re playing a joke on me, you’d better knock it off. I am serious. If this is a game, then end it, and leave me alone. I am not equipped to be toyed with.’

Goku almost couldn’t believe what he was reading and the fact that it sat in his pocket for thirty minutes made him terrified that Vegeta might think he was delaying his response. He just hadn’t seen it. In no way, at any point, would Goku ever consider being so cruel to Vegeta and he suspected Vegeta knew that...he also suspected that Vegeta needed him to tell him that. The saiyan prince, who had such a hard time trusting people, was being asked to trust people. Goku wanted him to trust him. Goku trusted him and desperately wanted that to be mutual at all levels of whatever the level of their relationship was. Vegeta’s text, if spoken in words, would have sounded gruff and defensive; but in text, sounded vulnerable and reclusive. Bulma was right, he was just shy, wasn’t he?

He didn’t waste anymore time thinking about it. He needed to reply, so he pressed the button that would let him speak out loud and commit his voice to text and speed the process up.

“I would never do anything like that, Vegeta. I didn’t mean to upset you. Guess I just look for excuses to come see you. But I really did show up because I thought I had a reason to be worried. The only time I ever feel you powerin’ up is with me. An’ I was afraid if I let you leave the room, you wouldn’t talk to me again.” He stopped talking, and hit the send button, letting the little bing noise confirm its delivery, before he let the second thought boil up and decided he had to continue his thought and started a second message. “I didn’t mean to get in your space or whatever, I know you don’t like being touched and stuff, but I was just, happy, overhearing you. I want you to feel what I feel, but I’ll take what I can get.” His thumb pressed the send button and his brows instantly turned together in confusion with himself.

Wait, what did he even mean, what did he just send―. He covered his whole face with a hand and put the phone face down against his thigh, because it was already far too late to put the phone in airplane mode and cancel that send out. He was not good enough at this texting business to catch his goof ups yet and it wasn’t like he could just plant Gohan next to him and have him monitor his conversation so he could save him from technology. Goku had to actually function this whole thing himself. Even Goku had to admit he was a barely functional adult most of the time. Vegeta was going to actually think he was doing this on purpose and that wasn’t the case at all. He could understand why Vegeta might believe he was teasing him. Goku did tease him a lot.

Goku teased him a lot because he genuinely enjoyed seeing Vegeta’s warmer personality peeking through. Like seeing Vegeta lose his cool over Beerus smacking Bulma―while horrible to see his friend hit like that―gave him such a warm feeling toward the goodness in Vegeta showing itself.

Bing!

The face down phone alerted him that he had a response and he felt a shocking amount of despair in turning the phone over to read it. These were relatively new feelings for him; someone who usually did not have much worry about anything. Vegeta just had so much draw over Goku at that moment, that he was weighing all of his thoughts and feelings on the outcome of a single conversation.

‘I don't understand you, Kakarot.’

Goku found himself just smiling somehow; he and Vegeta could not possibly be any different, and yet, somehow he thought that was the reason it was okay.

‘’Its ok.’
‘Most people dont.’

Really, most people did seem to find Goku to be a strange guy; even when he was a kid, he was different and often mystified people. Vegeta was even less likely to understand, because he didn't really seem to connect with people in general. But Goku tried to connect with him anyway and maybe that’s what Vegeta didn't understand. Most people probably assumed Vegeta was like hugging a cactus, but he could completely confirm that Vegeta was much less like a cactus than previously assumed. Actually, he knew that Vegeta wasn't really that prickly, since the day he’d woken up panicked from a nightmare in the time chamber and then slept on him for several hours after. Twice, Vegeta had allowed him to touch him. Twice, he didn't hate him for it. Twice, he didn't even bring it up with any resentment or real annoyance.

He didn't have any control over the first time, but Goku may or may not have taken advantage of that the second time, taking a chance and counting on him not punching him out of the room. Maybe it was because of his family, but Goku felt like he was just naturally more inclined to want to touch others—he always hugged his sons, his wife, and was close with his friends. But Vegeta sometimes felt like he was at the end of his fingertips and he could almost feel himself making grabby hands at him. But he had him there, right there, in the middle of an acknowledgment he wasn't supposed to hear, and he clutched it. He couldn't blame Vegeta if he had been mad about that one, but he didn't feel mad. He felt vulnerable. That's how his texts read. Goku wasn't really a scholar or psychologist, but he could just feel Vegeta’s words.

‘What do you want from me, Kakarot?’

The question caught him off guard, because he really didn't have an answer to that. All he wanted, was what Vegeta already was in just being Vegeta, but how could he explain that without making that sound...questionable? How could he just say something that brazen when his toes were already at the very edge of the line he was trying not to cross—assuming that embracing him in the gravity room wasn't already toeing over it.

For once, Goku’s road forked and he had to actually choose whether to be silent and do the smart thing and let it be, or blurt what his thoughts really were and risk the repercussions that came with being Goku. He thought about it. He put a handful of minutes into it and hovered over the keys, trying to determine whether he lied and just gave a cardboard response that he thought Vegeta was an amazing fighter and a great friend; or if he told him what he really thought, and took that invisible line they were dancing back and forth on and just leave it on another continent.

He thought about his wife and he winced a little, because he really hadn't talked to her about much of his feelings; he never really had. Guilt wasn't usually his thing, but it was strangely present while he weighed his options. The conversation he had with her came back and he remembered her telling him she didn't want him to feel bad for anything, but he didn't get what she was talking about and he just couldn't remember the bulk of that talk...he was going to just have to talk to her again, and be an adult for once. Doing the right thing, or what most people would probably call the right thing, felt like the wrong thing, and for some reason, he was just struck in the moment by the memory of Bulma telling him to just be himself. So he washed the rest of his fumbling out, and decided that he'd worry about the clean up efforts later, and go the path of most destruction as he tended to do. Sorry Vegeta.

‘I want to be close to you.’

He waited for the inevitable moment of silence, but it was shorter than he expected.

‘But why?’

How do I answer this without making this weird.

‘Because I care about you a lot.’

Apparently, I don't. Huh. So that’s how we’re doin’ it.

‘I tried to kill you.’

Goku actually snorted a little bit of a chuckle to himself and pressed the button to talk his longer text, knowing he wasn't good enough to type so much with his thumbs. “That's not a milestone anymore when everyone’s tried to kill me. But you also saved me a bunch too. I didn't mean to make this weird. I wanna be around you is all. I'm not asking for anything else. I got used to it. Three years of it bein’ just us. Even kinda miss you readin’ too. Isn't that silly?”

The more he said, the more he felt like he should delete the message, for fear of Vegeta closing up on him; but he also remembered the one time he almost crossed the line, but didn't, and wondered what would have happened if he had. Maybe crossing the line was what he should do. Making Vegeta uncomfortable was basically what he existed for anyway; so he pressed send and shoved the phone back in his pocket. It was time to pack up and go back inside anyway.

His phone went silent for a while. Subconsciously he was listening for it and he knew it would take a while for Vegeta to come up with a response—assuming Goku didn't just shove a giant wedge between them. Where this was going really was a mystery to him; he had no real way to describe it, but letting it slip out of his grip didn’t feel quite right either. He had him in his arms; to let him go and then let him stay out of reach forever seemed just too awful to him―for reasons he didn’t really have the capacity to explain in words.

What he did know, was Vegeta meant a lot to his life.

“I’m home,” he called, coming into the house to be greeted by the sound of Chi Chi’s cooking and a chair sliding in the kitchen. He could hear Goten bouncing out and saw him launch toward him. Goten was always excited to see him after he’d spent all day studying while Goku worked the field. One thing he was glad he never had to do, was study the amount of time his poor son did.

“Hey dad!”

Goku caught his little body double and grinned widely. “Hey! Wow, it smells good in here,” he took a deep breath and his mouth watered; stomach rumbling a bit. “How are you able to study in these conditions?”

“Mom slips me taste tests when you’re not lookin’.” Goten smirked a little, his face a little mischievous, and Goku could see a little of Trunks’ influence rubbing off on him. It was cute.

“Whaaaat, no fair,” he pouted, carrying him back toward the kitchen, where his wife was working away, cooking up a storm. She seemed very into her task, moving about the room with practiced ease among the most organized chaos he could imagine. The amount of food she cooked, meant she had to organize her space to max efficiency. She was a master of household management, and she paused only briefly to look him over.

“It’s almost dinnertime, Goku, you need to go wash up,” she said, before he could even get a word in. Some would call her a nagging wife, but he found her very endearing; without her, he would be a mess. He was certain of it.

“Goten said you sneak him samples,” he frowned, pretending he didn’t hear her; but showed he did by emptying his pockets of everything and setting the items on the little cabinet just outside the kitchen door. He was preparing to go catch a quick bath like he usually did.

“Dad―traitor―” Goten puffed up at him and Goku just prodded his cheeks until he deflated helplessly.

Chi Chi shook her head, coming over to the two of them. Goten pouted at her, but she just pinched his cheek a little and then came to Goku with a spoon that offered something tasty, “mouth open, then you go wash up,” she said simply, commanding even. She was firm, yet somehow sweet. He obeyed without question, leaning a little to meet the delicious looking offering. The flavor hit him very quickly and he licked his lips, excited by dinner. She patted his cheek gently, wiping her hands on a towel, “now go. You’ve got a little while until it’s ready. Goten, finish up your homework.”

“Aw, mom―.”

“Now, young man,” she left no room for argument and Goku just gave the kid an apologetic smile and shrug. He wasn’t going to argue with her. Chi Chi knew what was best, and he let Goten down to go back to the table. Without anymore whining, Goten went back to work and Goku just watched for a moment before he remembered he had his own thing to do and he set off to do that. Though, he didn’t make it very far before her voice caught him, just as he was stepping out of sight, “Goku.”

He popped his head back in, “yeah?”

“Don’t forget your phone,” she met him at the doorway, holding his large phone in her tiny hands, grabbing one of his to deposit the device into it. He was confused and the expression must have been painfully evident on his face, he thought he had come in relatively washed of all his of complicated feelings and he shouldn’t need his phone just to go take a quick bath; but apparently something was making him transparent. His anxiousness wasn’t swept up under his usual cheeriness. “Take your time, Goku.”

The long moment he stared at her felt like a puzzle that he was trying to solve on the fly and he was not very good at them. Vegeta was also this same kind of puzzle. Trying to figure out what they were thinking and what to say to get the desired response was usually not that difficult once he’d figured out the usual pattern, but when it was outside of familiar territory, it was uncomfortable. He had no idea where he was standing with Chi Chi at the moment. Her tone was sweet and honest, but he felt a twist in his gut from guilt. She was here, being a good and loving wife, and he appreciated her; but he was also preoccupied unfairly. He was just so bad at understanding other people in comparison to himself.

She leaned up, kissed his cheek and smiled at him, shooing him away and he managed to smile back, going on his way―phone in hand.

He looked down at the device once he was out of the room and gathering his clean clothes. He had several new messages he’d somehow missed. One from Vegeta, that he expected. And a few from Bulma, apparently.

The one from Vegeta read simply, ‘You’re an idiot, Kakarot.’ And though it seemed dismissive and didn’t add anything else to the conversation at hand, Goku knew exactly what that meant, from Vegeta. At least it meant Vegeta wasn’t going to shut him down completely, but unfortunately, he still had to combat with Vegeta’s dodginess. Maybe one day he would break through and make Vegeta like him enough to want to meet him in the middle.

There was some relief in it, at any rate.

The messages from Bulma were the ones he wasn’t expecting, however, and he opened them up with a sense of dread that hit him at the last second like a premonition. He felt like he was opening a trap, because the timing of it seemed suspicious enough that Goku caught it. The photo downloading into his messages showed up before her text and he found himself momentarily confused, but the confusion melted away to a weird flustered feeling.

The first picture Bulma sent him, was not a picture that she could have taken at all, because it was a picture of him, when he was out in the field working earlier. Or at least when he should have been. In the picture, he had the phone open and appeared to be talking to it with a wistful look on his face that Goku couldn’t even recognize on his own face. The words came in after and he almost threw the phone away in alarm. ‘Chi Chi sent this to me earlier.’

The next picture came in, but the text was first this time. ‘So I sent this back.’ And the next picture that showed in, was one that Bulma did take. It was of Vegeta, who appeared to be folded into the couch, with his phone close to his face and a cat on his shoulder. He was half turned into the back of the couch and Goku could see that telltale red hue around the saiyan’s cheek and ear. ‘You saiyans are so stubborn,’ her last text read.

Goku rubbed his face and realized that Bulma and Chi Chi were talking about them. He really needed to talk to Chi Chi, but he didn’t even know what to think anymore, it was even more complicated than he thought. Not only was Vegeta complicated, but so was the fact that they were both very loyal and dedicated to their wives. Though, that shouldn’t really make a difference… What he felt toward Vegeta wasn’t really anything similar to anything like what he felt toward Chi Chi.

He lowered his phone and just stared for a long while, not specifically at anything. It wasn’t similar….right? Oh boy, that was a whole new layer of things he didn’t understand to unwrap and a whole new potential reason to make Vegeta want to knock his head off at the first opportunity.

The phone made another noise and he decided he was done with it for the night after this. He could respond to anyone else in the morning, unless it was Vegeta. He assumed Vegeta was already done with him for the night, but to his surprise, the message was from Vegeta.

‘The cat wanted to say hi.’

Shortly after, a picture popped in. A lazily taken picture of a little black cat making its home on the spot between Vegeta’s shoulder and neck, its paw was reaching to the camera and Goku could see most of Vegeta’s very barely relaxed face―even if his relaxed face still looked grouchy.

Goku’s smile could have cracked his face. He still had some hope left.

He saved the picture as his new contact image, then went to get ready for dinner.

Chapter Text

“No,” Vegeta had answered, without even trying to make an effort to act like he was thinking about it or show consideration. It was a simple negative and he didn’t even look up from his stitching to give his decision. He didn’t even have to look at Bulma to see her steep frown about it either.

“Come on, Vegeta. It’s not like you’ll be bothered by the crowd this time. It’s a movie. They make it so you don’t have to interact with anyone around you.” She pressed a little more and he felt less and less interested by the second. He’d never actually been to a movie theater that he could recall and really didn’t have any desire to change that. If he needed to see the movie, he could see it later, at home, like any other movie.

“I have no interest,” he persisted.

“Goku’s going,” she finally pulled her trump card.

And that was what started it. That was how he’d ended up recanting his immediate negative. He tried to make it look like he didn’t care that Kakarot was going to see some stupid movie with her and Kakarot’s wife, but he also was a sucker and fell for her trap. The problem with this trap, was that he didn't know how this trap even worked. He had no reason for it to work, because he had no real gain or loss in not going, despite Kakarot’s attendance. The idiot’s presence didn’t have a single bearing on anything other than him being physically in the same room with him, and yet, he felt the borderline standoff with Bulma over his inability to admit that he couldn’t turn away knowing that Kakarot was going to be there.

He was still working his stance on Kakarot out with himself and his wife’s nosiness was not helping. It did not help that he was fully aware now that Bulma and Kakarot’s wife were in near constant contact with each other. At least he knew that they were comfortable with whatever they thought was going on; but he didn’t even know if he was comfortable with what he didn’t even know if he thought he thought was going on—Even the words in his head stopped making sense. What ridiculousness.

Kakarot didn't help, because he continued on as usual, almost as if what took place before, hadn't at all. That was the typical behavior of the two of them, though. Kakarot didn't think enough, he thought too much. He was still having a stroke over every stupid damn text message he’d traded with Kakarot that damn afternoon, and Kakarot was still innocently sending him farming selfies like a dipshit with no awareness. The idiot seemed to love doing that, but Vegeta didn't quite understand it. I don't want to see your damn face in person, let alone on my phone every few hours, he thought. But he didn't stop him and Kakarot didn't bother to slow himself down. If anything, any long period of time without some message from him seemed strange.

Vegeta was the worst about sending two different messages at the same time, as Bulma said. On the one hand, he had no problem telling Kakarot he wanted nothing to do with him. On the second hand, he answered his messages and showed up when Kakarot goaded him even the slightest bit. Despite his extremely abusive stance toward the giant buffoon, he somehow couldn't put enough in there to drive him away legitimately; because Kakarot knew when Vegeta was truly not in the mood for him.

You also read to him over the phone now. That is absolutely someone who doesn't want anything to do with him, correct?

Fuck you, go back to sleep, inner voice. You're getting on my last nerves and I will kill you.

Try it, bitch.

“Vegeta, do you want any snacks? Keep in mind we’ll have dinner after,” Bulma's voice cut into his thoughts and he took himself out of auto pilot, standing in the middle of the theater lobby, arms folded and looking angry for someone who was supposed to be doing a leisure activity. It was her business to get them there and worry about all the tickets and concessions. None of that was his idea, so none of that was his problem. He only showed up because she somehow used a weakness he hated to admit he had. “Oh, I see them—Chi Chi!” She yelled out, waving. “Vegeta, they're here. Did you say yes or no to snacks?”

“Woman, I do not care,” he folded his arms and committed himself to not even looking up to search them out in the crowd, which was strangely more difficult than he expected. Identifying Kakarot’s location, once he knew he was in his vicinity, seemed to be a necessity to his instinct and it eventually gave out, making him glance up and pick him out specifically. Immediately, he shot a look from the corner of his eye at Bulma and caught the smirk on her face. Damn her a lot.

“Sorry we’re late, I hope we didn't miss it. Trying to get Goku into nice clothes is a lot more of a bargaining than you’d think,” Kakarot's wife laughed it off a bit, patting his chest while he made faces behind her. Nice clothes for Kakarot was apparently a long sleeve, button down shirt with the arms folded to the elbows neatly and seemingly pressed slacks. Clearly Chi Chi’s work, as Vegeta knew Kakarot rolled out of bed looking like he was going to look for the day usually.

“I feel like if I move at all, I'm gonna rip something…” The man whined a little and made that deep pout that somehow got Vegeta ruffled.

“Then don't behave like an animal, Kakarot,” Vegeta found the words coming out of his mouth before he could stop them and he crossed gazes with Chi Chi briefly, because her mouth was open, ready to fire what was probably something very similar. He just grunted a little and folded his arms. “Even warriors need to have some class.”

“Vegeta…” Kakarot actually had the nerve to whine directly at him, as if he had hoped that Vegeta would understand the same suffering—which he did, he tore all of his good clothes when he forgot himself. But he also had learned how to fix that. He had a secret advantage.

“Alright you two,” Bulma cut in, shoving two pieces of paper at the man, “tickets here, go get the seats, we’re going to grab snacks. I trust you can find them. The movie previews are probably going, but we won't miss the movie itself.”

Vegeta moved to argue, because he really didn’t have any desire to move beyond the spot he was in without her, but Kakarot was the one to move. He took the two little slips right out of her hand and grinned at her. “Easy peasy, Bulma. Bring me something tasty?”

“You know I won’t forget you, Goku,” she patted his cheek, and Vegeta got the distinct impression that Kakarot went along with her command on the promise of food. He was a simpleton after all. Simultaneously, he was baffled at him and also himself. He wasn’t about to start exploring why he was baffled at himself, however, he spent most of his time already wondering what the hell was wrong with him as it was.

“Go, boys, or the good seats will be taken,” Chi Chi all but shooed them away, and Kakarot brushed past Bulma and had the nerve to grab him by the elbow and start to drag him away. If he was more of an actual animal, he would have clocked the big dumbass in the face for it, but for some reason, he just shot Bulma the deadest glare he could muster as he let himself be walked half-backwards.

He had a prickling suspicion she was amused by the puppy-like nature that Kakarot had and just how easily he could be put to a task and apparently, Vegeta was the object with which Kakarot was playing fetch with at all times. And it seemed like a perfect analogy to him; because Kakarot would be that dumbass puppy that didn’t realize that fetch was supposed to be about bringing the stick back in a calm and obedient manner, so instead, he was going to get sprinted through the yard by a wild, excited beast. This was why he liked cats.

“Kakarot, I can walk myself,” he grumbled and found his feet in the other direction, yanking his arm away from the big fool, turning a glare up at him; he was just met with an earnest smile that made him want to snap a paper bag open and shove over his head. How can one person smile so purely all the damn time? Except...

“Sorry, sorry, I just…kinda don’t wanna be here,” he looked behind him a little, out of the corner of his eye, to make sure their wives were already in the line and out of sight and hearing range. He still maintained that smile, despite the shocking admittance and Vegeta just paused their walking and looked up at him with such a look of confusion that it prompted Kakarot to do that little tick he did when he was nervous; rubbing the back of his neck. “Chi Chi said you’d be here...that’s the only reason I came at all...I don’t really like going to see movies all that much…”

Vegeta’s expression could have probably frozen the core of the Earth itself if he’d been able to harness it into a physical power. This was Bulma’s attempt at forcing him to get out of the house and be social and he wasn’t the only sucker, and he couldn’t even admit to that without admitting to the fact that he only showed up because Kakarot did. God damn it. It was okay if Kakarot admitted it. Kakarot was a weepy dipshit all the time. Kakarot once had the nerve to hug him with literally zero remorse or embarrassment. He was a big idiot marshmallow.

“You agreed to this because you were told I was coming? You thought I agreed to this?” He raised a brow, and the expression he got back told him that Kakarot thought it was odd.

“...I mean, I thought maybe that was a little weird, because we all know you’re about as fun as a heart attack, and I totally know what that feels like.”

“I...You…” He raised a hand to protest that and was distressed to find he could not. The problem was largely that Kakarot was not wrong at all and that somehow made him much more incensed by how borderline witty that made him sound. “Shut up and let’s get the damn seats. If I’m lucky, maybe I can sit on the other side of the damn theater from you.”

“Aw, don’t be like that.” The pouting only made Vegeta pick his feet up quicker and stomp away from him faster, only to have to slow down a second later when he remembered that Kakarot had the tickets for the two of them in his hand. When he glanced over to him with a weak snarl, he just got a cheesy, almost sly grin in return. The instinct to fly away and never come back was a strong one, but he knew he’d never hear the end of it from Bulma if he did that. Not to mention, Kakarot could not be beaten in a game of hide and go seek, unfortunately. Sure, he could hide his ki and probably slip under his radar for a while, but he knew himself. He’d get mad about Kakarot’s existence before long and slip enough to be be found eventually.

“What theater was it, clown?” He looked down each corridor, not even sure what movie they were being dragged in to see. Please let it not be a weepy romance movie. The idea of both he and Kakarot dying together of sheer boredom by sappy girl movie was the most unpleasant thought he could actually conjure up.

“Looks like...7B. Guess that’s on this side,” he thumbed the direction to the left and Vegeta reached over to take the tickets from him and read them over. The theater number was what he said and the name of the movie was printed in movie short hand, so he still wasn't sure what they were watching, but at least he said it was action adventure.

“Alright, come on.” With a shove, he got them back on track toward the person who would check their tickets and let them into the theater room itself. He almost had to step on Kakarot’s foot to keep him from opening his mouth and talking to anyone. This fool as way too friendly and he knew from experience it didn’t take much to distract him, especially since he apparently didn’t want to be there either. Vegeta’s scowl just strengthened in intensity. This was such a set up and they were the worst kind of suckers.

“I can’t see, it’s dark in here,” Kakarot’s voice had that annoying edge of whininess to it that made Vegeta prickle with irritation. The previews were running and they were forced to navigate through the theater with the lights mostly dimmed already.

“Then echolocate for all I care, but keep your damn voice down,” he hissed at him, punching him in the shoulder lightly. He was not sure if Kakarot had an inside voice, actually pretty sure he didn't, but he was starting to see that this was a terrible idea on behalf of the women. Could they not just pick an activity that could keep him a little more entertained? Or at least one that wouldn’t involve the possibility of inconveniencing others, and therefore, annoying him? If he was lucky, Kakarot would just fall asleep and the movie would be over before they knew it. The real reason they were there was apparently the promise of food afterward. It absolutely was not the fact that they only both agreed because the other was stupid enough to agree. “There’s some seats right there, just pick one and sit in it.”

“You think they’ll be okay with these seats?”

“I said keep your voice down, dipshit, and I don’t care if they are. If they wanted better seats, then they should have come and picked them instead.” He paused and leaned a bit, pointing to the seat right at Kakarot’s knee, “this one. Right here. Sit in it. It has the handicap seat down in front of it, so you’ll get legroom and won’t have something to whine about.”

“I’m sure I’ll find something else.”

Vegeta’s gaze flicked up and he had to squint at him a little harder than usual in the dim light. “Did you just sass me, Kakarot?”

Kakarot just puffed his face a little and plopped down into the seat, giving him a cheesy, sly look. How dare he. The regret of showing up was starting to show itself and he just balled his fist and lightly butted his knuckles against his thick skull, brushing past him and taking a seat a few down, leaving two empty ones between them. Even in the dim light and from the corner of his eye, he could see Kakarot looking his way, stupid pout present. As if he was going to sit next to him. The seats were not big enough for the two of them to be crammed that close together and the point was to save seats for the women, anyway.

The women were taking their time, that was for sure. Watching the exits was a bit of a strain on his vision, but it was more engaging than purposefully glaring at Kakarot or watching the previews. When he finally did see them he was relieved to see that at least they didn’t have any problem finding them quickly. Finding Kakarot wasn’t that difficult when he was being fidgety and the draw of food made him wave excitedly to them. Vegeta didn’t bother to make any efforts himself, only turning to give Bulma a look when she was close enough. It was an accusing one, but she apparently had her own accusing one to give back.

She scooted past Kakarot and turned a glance back in his direction, then immediately shot a look back at Vegeta, making a very obvious to and from motion with her gaze. Even as she deposited a drink and bag of some kind of candy into his hand, she was locking eyes with him in a way that suggested she expected a different outcome than this. Did she believe this was going to play out any differently? Did these people not know him by now?

“Goku, keep your voice down, the movie is starting,” he distinctly heard Kakarot’s wife from the other side of his own wife and he knew this was going to be a long movie. They chose to do this, they earned this. He was just going to sit quietly, snack a bit, then when he was finished, close his eyes and wait it out. That was the plan. If Kakarot was smart, that would be his plan too, but Kakarot was not smart.

Turned out he had no concept of an inside voice after all, and while the quiet lasted for few minutes, the moment anything happened in the movie that confused him, he was turning to his wife to ask her. Who was that guy, where were they, why was that happening...details that he should honestly not have to ask, because the movie would explain them, but Kakarot was not very patient if he wasn’t inherently interested in it. Vegeta wasn’t interested in it either, but he was content to ignore it when he wasn’t. Kakarot would just sit there and annoy everyone half to death. However, all of his annoying questions一and his poor wife’s attempts to stop him from pissing off other viewers一made him pay enough attention to the movie itself to realize that he did actually recognize a thing or two from the material on the screen. Well, not the screen itself, but the content, the characters.

The names and places were familiar and if Kakarot wasn’t a dunce and liked to use his own substituted names, then he’d recognize them too, maybe. Hard to determine Kakarot’s attention span at times, but he had tendencies to be surprising about which details he did and didn’t carry with him. Evidently, Kakarot wasn’t aware enough to notice the similarities yet, between the movie scenes and the book he spent the better part of a year reading to him. Of course, movie adaptations were different, and the movie wasn’t using Piccolo as it’s character base like Kakarot apparently had in his head. Buffoon.

One more loud question out of Kakarot and he could see this was going to be an ongoing problem, because Kakarot wasn’t going to take a nap just yet. The man behind him was getting sour and he couldn’t actually blame him. I don’t like him either, old man. Just be thankful you don’t ever have to see him again, he closed his eyes and rubbed his temple. Chi Chi pinched his cheek and he whined at her once more. She was hissing something about him needing to just hush and watch and listen for once and he’d probably be able to figure it out, but she was giving him too much credit. He recognized a man being purposefully difficult when he saw it. He didn’t expect it to be a thing he’d see on Kakarot一and in such a fashion一but that’s exactly what it was.

When he saw the gentleman behind Kakarot move to kick the seat, he got up first. “Kakarot,” he spoke, hissing loud enough to halt the man before he made contact. Just don’t get involved in this, old man. Contact with Kakarot is a punishment. “Get up,” he grunted, shifting around Bulma and in front of both her and Chi Chi. He shot them both a look, eyes low and voice quiet enough, “I’m going to babysit him in the back row, I hope you’re happy.”

He wanted to set fire to the whole building when they both smiled sweetly giving a matching thumbs-up.

Kakarot looked at him confused, but he didn’t repeat himself. He just grabbed him by the collar and helped him the rest of the way out of his chair and shoved him up the stairs, pointing to the farthest spot from people he could find, so he could at least try to have some barrier around them with which he could explain things to him without gathering attention of the stupid earthlings. His pushiness was enough to silently control where Kakarot went well enough that all he had to do was point and the man parked himself in the seat back against the wall. Isolated way in the back. The closest person to them was at least far enough away that he could punch Kakarot enough times to keep him from being heard by anyone if it came down to it.

“You are doing this on purpose,” he hissed at him, taking the seat next to him and immediately lamenting the lack of space they had. The seats weren't particularly large and they were not thin men. Vegeta wasn't tall like Kakarot, but he made up for it in bulk and between the two of them, they crowded the small space. Kakarot seemed to get this, and his solution was to rest the arm closest to him over the back of his chair—which wasn't unusual for him anyway. The sheer lack of personal space was boiling Vegeta’s blood and he was absolutely certain Bulma knew it; could feel it.

“Can't we just slip out…” He managed to lower his voice marginally, and the prince raised a brow at him, as if half considering the option. So that was his endgame. That was almost smart on Kakarot’s behalf. Everyone is playing you today, Vegeta.

“You know, Kakarot, if you stopped being a pain in the ass, and paid attention, you might be interested in it,” he had to lean a little to whisper to him, when the movie audio got quiet.

“You're not interested,” the look of disbelief on his face reminded Vegeta that this fool was capable of snapping back at him. He demonstrated this more often than Vegeta allowed himself to remember and he nearly snarled at him.

“It's based on that book, you absolute dunce, the one you were so enamored with me reading to you,” he hissed at him, voice forcefully trying to be heard over the sudden surge of noise from an action sequence in the background. “You know, since you all but begged me to read you the damn thing, you’d think you’d be marginally interested,” he was just shy of getting in his face about it, and if he wasn't as close to him as he was, he wouldn't see the sudden shift in his expression. His pouty, difficult-child face turned into one that was significantly more flustered than before and Vegeta had a difficult time reading that one.

Kakarot slid down in his seat a little, his arm coming off the backrest and folding across his chest with the other one. He was now at level with Vegeta and was able to turn a little to whisper in a proper inside voice that showed he was capable of not inconveniencing everyone in hopes he wouldn't have to stay. That tactic must have worked once, but this time Vegeta was having none of it.

“Is it really based off that book?”

“Yes, Kakarot. If you need me to explain it to you, then I will, but keep your voice down. You are annoying others, but most importantly, me.”

“Okay, but when don't I do that?” The raised brow from Kakarot and how he was close enough that he could actually see a glitter of mirth that made him almost reflexively sock him in the throat. He was being particularly cheeky that day and Vegeta was feeling unusually victimized by it.

“Watch the movie or I will leave this planet forever.”

An empty threat, but an effective one after Kakarot made a childish move to stick his tongue out and reposition himself to get comfortable. At least he was showing an effort to stop being a troublesome pest and he wouldn't have to battle with his noisiness or deal with the wives in the aftermath. Though, he had the suspicion this outcome wasn't unexpected. How played was he, that day, he wondered? He didn’t have time to agonize over it, because it didn’t take long for Kakarot to start asking questions一and after a few times of reminding him to tone down his voice, he got him easily into a pattern of: short question, short answer.

It was about halfway through the movie that he realized the questions had actually started to slow down and Kakarot wasn’t inundating him with things that would be obvious if he was actually paying attention or waited for the movie to answer it. At some point, it seemed like he started to at least either connect the pieces or his brain finally turned off and he was sleeping with his eyes open. But when he heard Kakarot mumble about something not being in the book, he realized that maybe he was actually still cognizant.

The movie itself was not exactly a cinematic masterpiece but Vegeta managed to watch through it without wanting to stand up and leave outright. If Kakarot hadn’t been there, he probably would have, however, and it made him ball his fists up and grumble at himself, unintentionally attracting Kakarot’s attention.

“You okay?” Big eyes blinked at him, so close to his face, he almost wanted to bite his whole face in retaliation.

“Yes, Kakarot, stop breathing on me.”

He got the hint and sat back, returning to his earlier position; his arm snaked back behind Vegeta and laying across the backrest. When he was sitting up, it was really the only comfortable way for them to sit that close together when they both had such wide shoulders. It was the only reason he ever allowed Kakarot to do so.

The mood he was in was becoming a weird one and he only started to realize why, about the time that Kakarot moved his arm again and shifted his body so they ended up sharing the armrest. Kakarot was used to being close to people, sitting in their personal zone and being comfortable near them. He was not. This was probably the first occasion he’d actually been out of his element around this buffoon for any extended period of time; in a different way than the time chamber. Asocial and stuck to the most social person of all and unable to dodge the discomfort by hitting him.

He just committed to sitting uncomfortably for the rest of the movie as he thought about nothing but that for the duration of it, suddenly acutely aware of Kakarot’s presence. Kakarot never had any of these difficulties and he was furious by that. He could glance off to see Kakarot’s attention was undivided for the moment and he was just unaware of himself as he always was. Vegeta was not that way. He couldn’t relax like Kakarot could, but he managed to at least take in some of the movie.

But he was grateful for when it was over. It was two and a half hours he would never get back, but it was done and the lights started to come back. The fool at his side wasted no time in standing up and stretching. The seats they retreated to in the back didn’t have the same legroom as the first one, but it was his fault for being a petulant child. “Eeh, that wasn’t so bad, I guess. The main guy was definitely not green enough.”

“You mean he wasn’t Piccolo enough,” Vegeta quirked a brow at him and straightened next to him, tilting his head.

“Well, yeah, but...I mean, I guess he was okay. I had a different picture of them, ‘cause you read them different, but other than him, I also really didn’t like the narrator guy. Kinda ruined it.” Kakarot seemed really intent on his opinion and it surprised Vegeta, given how little he thought the man invested into it.

“And why was that?” Admittedly, he barely paid attention to it himself, too busy overthinking. He followed behind him, heading on their way back down the stairs to meet their wives and see what their plans were now that the torture was over.

“I’d kinda pictured him as you the whole time you read it. And he didn't look anything like you.”

Vegeta stopped, but Kakarot just kept on down the stairs. He was halfway in the action of lifting a leg to kick him down the rest of the steps, but he stopped himself. He told himself that it was because the story was told from the narration of the first mate and he was reading it, not because Kakarot was an idiot and equating him to a character that was portrayed as a good guy with a big heart despite a gruff exterior. That was nonsense and he was primed to yell about it, but Kakarot interrupted him with a topic change that only lit him further.

“Hey...where did Chi Chi and Bulma go…? They’re not here…?”

He blinked, recovering quickly. Looking around, he saw not even a hint of the women and Kakarot looked confused as he always did. Neither of them had noticed them leave, apparently. How, he couldn’t even guess. They were sitting down in the front of them, but it also had been dark, and Kakarot was preoccupied with the movie and he was having a crisis again. He really had to pull in the reins on that. Quickly, he pulled his phone from his pocket, intent to call her and find out what was going on, but he found he did not need to. He had a message on his phone already.

Tapping and pressing the screen opened his inbox and he almost threw the phone into the stratosphere when the picture and words connected with his brain and he understood just how suckered he was. I’m a fool. I’m a big fucking fool. I’m going back to space. I’m going to live on the comet that I will steer into this planet, and then we can all die together.

“Vegeta?”

“Kakarot, they fucking ditched us,” he growled and turned the phone, coming down the steps so he could see the picture.

“Wha…” he leaned forward to read the text and see a photo from Bulma of she and Chi Chi clearly somewhere else in the mall, shopping and looking like they’d done a dirty sneaky thing. The message under it read, ‘have a nice time boys, left a card in your shirt pocket, get some food after.’ Kakarot actually had an insulted look himself and Vegeta found a hateful little part of him treasuring the sheer amount of disdain that little flicker of expression meant. “What the hell一This was their idea一”

“They think they’re cheeky, don’t they?” He twitched a little, reading the message over again, wanting to reply so many things.

“Why even come if they didn't wanna see the movie? That's dumb…!”

Oh Kakarot, that's not the only dumb thing here, you thick knucklehead. He knew his wife and he should have known what all her insisting and smirks were all about. She wanted him to get out of the house now that he “had a friend.” But this was absurd, no matter how he looked at it. He shoved the phone back into his pocket in annoyance and fished a card out of his shirt pocket. He hadn't noticed her do that either. Distracted by Kakarot. He was surely going to beat himself up about that one later, he frowned hard.

“How hungry are you?” He gave the other saiyan the most serious and severe look he'd given him since fighting Majin Buu.

“Hungry enough to put a dent on your wife’s card.” Kakarot’s expression was just as intense.

“Good.”

Chapter Text

The sound of rain on the roof was such a steady drum, that he didn’t hear her enter the room. Only when she gently lifted his arm to take the phone from under his hand and place it on the table, did he actually realize she was milling about. She must not have realized he was awake either, because she was halfway through pulling a blanket over him when he blinked up at her, letting a yawn slip through.

“I didn’t mean to wake you,” she smiled and patted his cheek a little, leaning a bit to kiss his forehead and brush the mess of hair back from his face. He’d fallen asleep in the living room while waiting for the storm to pass, but it never had. It seemed like it wasn’t going to, since the sky was darkening and it was still going strong. The temperature had dropped and his farming chores for the day were decidedly done.

He sat up a bit, leaning against the cushion of the window seat that wrapped part of the way around one wall of their little home. He glanced out the window, watching the rain smack into the glass without any sign of slowing. “Good thing I got all those plants in last week...hopefully they don’t get flooded out...need the rain but…”

“They’ll be fine, the ground should soak the water right up,” Chi Chi, moved over and took a seat by him, hip to hip and leaning right against his side so she could wrap an arm around him. It was his instinct to bring his arm around her the same way and cradle her to him. “You’ve been working so hard, Goku,” she was always very appreciative of his hard work and he’d been a little better lately. Even if he’d had his fair amount of distractions. For some reason, she’d accepted his distractions a little better when they weren’t just him running off to fight people bigger and stronger than him. Maybe it was because she liked knowing he’d come back. And also Vegeta at least wasn’t bigger than him.

“Yeah, makes me sleepy, though, with all this rain.”

“You could use the rest,” she curled her legs under her and settled, pulling the blanket over her bare feet. Goten was spending the night with Trunks, so it was just the two of them left to curl up in the house and she hadn’t bothered to put on much more than one of his big shirts while she was doing some of her more mundane household chores.

“Normally all this sitting around is kinda boring for me, though,” he yawned a little again, pressing his face against the cool glass.

“Maybe you ate way too much last night,” she chided him a little and he turned an expression back on her that seemed as if it was a reminder of something.

“Oh yeah, you mean after you two totally ditched us,” the accusation was so strong that he almost envisioned his eyebrows pinching together just like Vegeta’s for a minute there, and he had to force himself not to press a finger between his own eyes to flatten out his scrunched brows. How Vegeta did it all the time was a mystery to him...he was just too good at being grouchy.

“You had fun though, didn’t you?” She didn’t seem in the least bit bothered by his tone and just took the blanket and wrapped it more around them, closing them in and using the little cocoon she’d made to steal his warmth. “Trying to figure out what to take you boys to was hard enough as it was...it’s not like we can just take you to dinner as entertainment alone. You devastate any restaurant you go to. As evidenced by the one you went to.”

“But you two didn’t even stay with us, what was the point if you weren’t gonna stay. That doesn’t make any sense to me. Seems kinda dumb to buy the tickets and not even watch the movie, what did you guys even do?” Goku thought it would have been much simpler to just forget about the whole movie… but at the same time...he sort of did enjoy it. Actually… It reminded him of many months that he’d never see again, back in the time chambler and strangely, it had a nostalgia feeling to it without really being there. It was a hard thing to describe. When he was talking to Vegeta earlier in the afternoon, over text, they’d discussed watching the second movie...just not in a theater, because there really was nothing comfortable about that theater. Two large men in tiny seats...well, one large man and one medium man with large proportions. Goku kinda smiled to himself; Vegeta was compact ferocity.

“We went shopping. You two looked like you had a good grasp on it. Besides, it didn’t seem like our kind of movie after all. You know you enjoyed it more with him anyway,” she elbowed him a little, looking up. He glanced down at her, his face kinda betraying him and he turned his face back away. He wouldn’t look at her directly, because he felt a little guilty about that one. Chi Chi used to talk about wanting to go see movies and he never really made even the slightest attempt to try to go in the past, and he made a relatively earnest display of his desire not to be there at the beginning of the one the previous night; but then, he sort of started to be okay with it. She didn’t seem to be upset by that, however.

“It’s...not like….He just doesn’t let me...complain all that much, is all…” He found it weak and he knew she did, because she chuckled enough for him to hear it. “...What…?”

“Honestly, Goku,” she shook her head, but didn’t offer anything more than that and he was left a little confused again. “I’m glad you had fun, you should have fun,” she sat up, taking his face between her palms and she kissed his cheek gently. “I thought for sure you were going to talk him into skipping out with you, so I am a little surprised, but I’m glad you got to enjoy a movie.”

Goku glanced out the window, even while she had her face close to his and her hands tenderly against his jaw. The things he felt for her were the reasons he felt weird when he started to think about it again. When he had his arm wrapped around her, he also remembered his arm around him and it turned an odd knot in his gut that he couldn’t unravel. He lived with her, but he had also lived with him. It had been an adjustment that was getting easier to bounce back from, but he still dwelled on it. His only excuse to see Vegeta was usually to spar. Chi Chi...Oh...she must have known that.

“...Hey…” His voice felt small, smaller than the small lady in his arms. He just scooped her up, and drew her across his lap, hugging his arms around her and pressing his face right into her soft neck. “You know I…” He felt at such a loss.

She just found her arms around him in whatever way his embrace allowed her, her fingers pressing into his sides a little. “Goku, I’m many things, but blind is not one of them. You are, and never have been, like anyone else. You are a wonderful husband and father, but I also know there’s more complex feelings in here that you’re working on,” she spoke softly, tapping his chest lightly. Goku knew that he was transparent to Chi Chi, even if he wasn’t trying to be, and it made his heart beat a little harder at the feeling of being caught having complex feelings outside of what he should be having. All of Bulma’s teasing didn’t help and his own thoughts were personal sabotage. He couldn’t help but actually feel stress over the concept of Vegeta knowing the exact degree of how much his blood pressure must spike when he thought about his feelings toward him一confusing as they were.

He’d put all of his tiny fury into slugging me out into space. Vegeta’s mad enough that he cares about me at all, just imagine it…

“Chi Chi...It’s not...there's nothing really anything to…” He trailed, really finding it difficult to think of words to pull to make it not sound worse than what the truth was. It sounded like an affair. It sounded so blatant that even Goku could put words on how badly it sounded, and he generally tuned out all that relationship business. He had a perfect, wholesome, stable marriage. He was happy with his family and should want for nothing; but yet, sometimes had those thoughts sneak in and remind him of that void that disappeared only when he was around one other person.

“You know, at first, I thought I would be upset about it, but I’m really not. Watching him with you, makes me realize he's got a very good handle on you. I mean, anyone who can pull an inside voice out of you has to have some sort of special power,” she laughed at the noise he made in response. She was teasing him and he was in distress, now how was that fair? He wasn't good at any of these things! That's what he had her for! To tell him what he was feeling half of the time, but she was doing that thing where she was spelling it out without spelling it out in a language he understood. He'd get it, but not without sitting there and unraveling the puzzles for a little while longer. Maybe she just wanted him to really get it on his own. He had a pretty good idea, pretty darn concrete idea, but it was putting a weight on it and wording it that was hard. And she wasn't helping.

“I think...maybe it's just a big misunderstanding,” he mumbled into her neck softly, taking in a deep breath to enjoy the fresh flowery scent of her hair.

“Whatever it is, Goku, its okay that you take time to think about it. I know how you are when you try to think too hard about something.” She rubbed his back and he pulled her into a more comfortable position for her once he was done crushing her in his embrace. She was a strong woman, but her spine was not made of steel. “I’m a very patient woman, you know,” she motioned in a very proud way, knowing that she managed her way through the many years of being the wife of Son Goku. He managed a light grin and she offered a loving one right back. “You know where you belong. Sometimes, it may not be right here all the time.”

“Chi Chi…” he realized her tone was the same one she had the first time they spoke in a similar manner.

“Just know, if he hurts you in any way that I can't fix,” she pressed a finger against his cheek, making a strong case for her dominance, “then I will destroy him.”

Despite his confusion—over his own feelings, her acceptance, and the uncertainty of the entire topic of whatever his relationship with Vegeta was—he barked a laugh. Her earnest promise, and complete self assurance, broke through his turmoil and turned his mood to a more mirthful one; and not just on the surface. “He's bigger than you, you know.”

“Excuse you, Goku, I have plenty of pairs of heels. I've got that covered.” Her warm hands framed his face again and he couldn't find anything in her face that suggested she didn't mean any of what she said or how she said it.

Her heart was purely in support of letting him work himself out and he didn't quite understand it. He wasn't entirely dense, he'd been lingering around other people long enough to know that what was going on in his life was probably something that would place immense strain on any other family; in any other marriage. He spent enough time with Vegeta, that any other wife might consider him neglectful. He wasn't sure how the rest of his own friends or family might respond to what his own feelings were starting to shape into. He wasn't even sure how to respond to them himself, and he was the one who was trying to sort them out. All he knew, was that was missing something when he went too long without him. He always came back home, but he couldn't seem to shake the part that needed to be close to him.

“He wouldn't stand a chance,” he grinned, knowing that Vegeta’s weakness was strong willed women, for sure. Bulma was proof.

“Of course he wouldn't,” she patted his cheek and shimmied a little to sit on his thigh, preparing to get up again. “I'm going to make some warm drinks. I'm chilly. Keep a nice warm spot for me?” She tilted her head and he nodded.

“You betcha.” He watched her hop down and pad away, looking as content as ever, despite the heaviness he felt personally from the topic. He wondered to himself, if this was really okay; but she didn't give him the chance to feel anything but okay. It was so difficult to agonize with this woman who made him feel so warm and easy. If only he could feel so easy about certain other things. He supposed...it would just make a difference if he knew what the other person felt, in the same way he knew how she felt.

Vegeta, you care about me, but do you care about me like I think I care about you?

He turned to look out the window again, watching the rain keep on coming down. It showed no signs of stopping and just made him sleepy again. Maybe a lazy day wasn't a bad idea, he yawned for the third time and sprawled out a little on the cushions, waiting for her to come back, carrying two steaming cups. It didn't take her long, because she tiptoed quickly back over, clearly ready to come back to the warmth of a shared blanket and he held an arm out for her. His arm circled around her and she leaned over a bit to set both cups on the little ledge, so she could get curled right back in. Once both cups were safely out of her hands, he just picked her up and shifted her over to settle her in his lap and nestled in the corner between him and the back cushion.

In that brief moment, he caught a little flash of pink that he hadn't seen before and he raised a brow, running a hand gently up her smooth thigh until the large shirt lifted and peeked a hint of a lacy fabric he wasn't aware she had. “Oh? What’s this? I've never seen pink before.”

“Hmm?” She curled her legs, hiding her feet in the blanket and laid against his chest. “Oh! I did go shopping with Bulma. She has wild tastes, that woman. But it was fun,” she smiled and picked up one of the cups to sip from warmly, “maybe it wouldn't be so bad to do that more often. That was nice. It's a matching set.”

“Oh yeah?” His voice held a tone of interest and he took a cup that she handed to him, relishing in the rich smell and sipping the steamy sweet drink himself. She pulled the blanket tightly around them, cuddled close to him to keep the warmth in. Her cheeks were a delicate tint of pink all by themselves and a small tug on the corner of his mouth slipped through. “You gonna show me?”

Her little giggles into her cup almost made him forget that it was raining outside and that it was storming inside. And eventually both would calm down and let him get back to proper working order.

Chapter Text

“You need to talk to Chi Chi,” Bulma had said, the night before this ridiculous engagement and he just gave her the most unenthused glance he could muster from the other side of the room. She pretended she didn't see it, but he knew she did. She probably felt his expression. He knew he was very obvious about his discomfort and just to make sure, he gently approached the topic with a response of his own.

“About what, exactly? She’s your friend, not mine. I'm just apparently dating her husband, according to my pushy wife,” he rolled his eyes in exaggeration, but even saying the words made him feel much weirder than he wanted to call attention to. He was trying to be a smartass, but it was apparently backfiring inwardly and he hated it. Bulma had that know-it-all aura about her that only served to make it worse.

“Vegeta, you're being so difficult. Not that it's anything new with you, but I think you might feel a little better if you actually did talk to her. Avoiding her because you’re feeling awkward about being friends with Goku isn’t going to make it easier.”

“I am not feeling awkward about anything,” he barked back at her, not even remotely willing to be having this discussion at this time. “I just don’t see the need.”

“Make an effort for once, or don’t. I don’t care, I’m not going to force you. But for god’s sake, at least put on a better bullshit face than that, sheesh,” she’d rolled her eyes, picking up a bag and leaving the room with it. “Don’t make me come find you tomorrow, Vegeta. Be ready,” she called from the other room and he just sneered at her, heavily debating on whether or not he wanted to text message her a picture of his middle finger from the other room. That was how petty he’d become.

Bulma had decided to invite Kakarot and his wife to a dinner and honestly, he was beyond shocked that Kakarot agreed to go. Chi Chi, yes he could see her attending, but Kakarot? No. That meant he had to wear a suit. Kakarot didn’t wear suits. Kakarot didn’t even like to wear casually nice clothes. There was either a promise of a lot of food, he was threatened, or Kakarot was lied to severely. Any one of these things was plausible and he lamented the likely result of this, because Bulma should know that she wasn’t going to make it through any event without him making a catastrophe of it. This would be entirely her problem, however, and he wasn’t going to fix it for her. No. He was not.

These stupid dinners were always business ventures and he never really understood why he even needed to be there to begin with outside of appearances. Bulma herself didn’t really seem to like being there if not for having her ego stroked for her genius. Maybe that was why she wanted Chi Chi there, because she seemed to enjoy having her company more lately. He hadn’t really considered that she may just enjoy the company. He couldn’t actually recall Bulma having many female friends. But if that was the case, why not just invite her and leave he and Kakarot alone? He would most certainly much prefer to be anywhere but one of these damn functions.

He found himself wandering the lobby, looking around and watching the wait staff hustling to set up while Bulma barked orders. She learned pretty quickly not to ask him to help, because he did not play well with others; but also he just didn’t have the required amount of delicate touch to do anything without destroying something in the process. Last year she wanted him to move the four ton ice sculpture. Last year he moved the four ton ice sculpture in four separate pieces. Evidently that wasn’t good enough. Should have specified what you wanted, Bulma.

Some smart looking people in expensive suits stopped briefly to greet him and he put his best face on in order to not disgrace his wife, much to her appreciation. In the beginning, he hadn’t been a gentleman about it and he’d probably terrified a handful of very respected members of society just being himself, but he’d dulled that terrorizing to a manageable level.That didn’t make him any more social, however, and he just pointed them toward his wife and quickly slipped away. People seemed interested in him, because he was Bulma’s husband and he didn’t care for that.

For at least another hour, he could probably get away with sitting up on the roof and being unreachable. She’d start firing off texts at him when she needed him to sit next to her and remind everyone she was married. He was very aware of his role in these things and he was perfectly content with that. Trunks would be there for the same purpose, but to be there to remind everyone she was a mother. At one time in his life, he would be annoyed by such a role, but he had long since accepted that he didn’t have to do anything other than show up and everything would be just fine.

Two short blurs from the corner of his eye and he took note of where Trunks actually was, and apparently so was Goten. The boys weren’t getting in the way or Bulma would be yelling by now, but they were teetering into dangerous territory with their playing and in suits no less. It made him double take for a moment, when he realized that both boys were already dressed and he watched them for a moment, not noticing the wall he was walking right into.

The wall actually wasn’t a wall at all. Not literally anyway, but rather a body that was less likely to be punched through than a wall. He almost jumped out of his skin when a hand clamped down on his shoulder in the friendly way that it always did. He was so distracted wondering where the hell Goten had come from, that he hadn’t noticed Kakarot standing in front of him. Hiding his Ki like a sneaky little motherfucker. “Hey Vegeta!” His cheery voice felt like a sucker punch, somehow.

“Kakarot, what the fuck, why are you even here,” he hissed, unnerved by his own unawareness.

“Chi Chi said it would be good for me, or something...she said there would be food...Bulma also wanted me to help her, I think, because I can teleport stuff. I’m bein’ bribed, but I already know that. They said you’d be here though, so it’s alright.”

Honest as ever, Vegeta just rubbed his face and then took a step back, absently smoothing down the idiot’s suit jacket after he’d nearly collided with him. He hadn’t even realized he was doing it, but he had done so, straightened and patted him down and moved away before his brain even had a chance to catch up with the actions of his hands. What the hell. He put a hand to his face and rubbed his temple, trying to put his head back in its place. Just when he was starting to work things out, he was getting stupid again.

“So that’s what her endgame was. Figures she had a reason… She has no shortage of food. Go find her, so she can tell you what she needs you for.” He pointed in the general direction of where he knew she was and he received that god damn pout. “Do not give me that face or I will punch it down your throat.”

“I just got here, though...It’s not started yet, right…?” He looked around, then turned his eyes back to Vegeta and there was just a prickling sensation that turned up from his stomach into his chest that literally erupted into an automated response that he had no control over whatsoever, as if it was scripted.

“Kakarot, no, do not even ask. Bulma will have a stroke if we start fighting. Your suit won’t stand a chance and I’m not going to be the one held responsible.”

“C’mon Vegeta, you haven’t hit me in like a week and that feels way too long.”

“Go see my wife, Kakarot,” he left him zero room to argue and somehow, that was enough. Vegeta didn’t need to bargain with him. Once he laid down his law, Kakarot usually went with it. Unless he actually thought he could get away with it, then he would put up a fight, but this was not one of those times.

“Fine…But when this is over, you owe me at least one good match.”

“If you need your ass whooped, then I’ll happily do so, but not before you go make yourself useful. Bulma is right over there.” He motioned again, this time a little less patient. It felt like he was shoving Kakarot away almost as soon as he saw him and maybe he was, but he also wasn’t sure how to deal with some of his immediate reactions to him anymore. Sometimes he could maintain a long coexistence with him without his brain terrorizing him, other times, he immediately starting bludgeoning himself from within. This was one of those later times. He snuck up on him and that wasn’t supposed to happen.

Kakarot finally did what he was told and went to track down Bulma and Vegeta thought he was in the clear, but then he realized that he’d sent Kakarot away without his wife一who had been behind him the entire time, he just hadn’t seen her. He suddenly found himself eye to eye with her and now was not sure what to say, having just departed her husband off to busy himself with other things. God damn it.

She smiled at him and he realized he’d never actually come face to face with the woman like that, because he’d never actually seen her that close before. Kakarot had a pretty wife, who he knew was also smart and strong, and he found himself so struck by the very concept that his mouth moved before his brain and he spoke like a garbage can instead of a proper person for a brief moment.

“...How the fuck did you pick a dumbass like him?”

The wild range of expression that her face went through was almost impressive and would have been priceless if he’d been able to record it, but he was so traumatized by his own lack of class. This was possibly one of the first real things he’d said to this woman, and this was what it ended up being. He didn’t pride himself on being a sophisticated high class gentleman, but he was supposed to be better than that.

But she didn’t seem nearly as offended by him as he was offended by him. In fact, he was fairly certain that no one was as offended by him as he was. His whole life was built around being personally affronted by everything he did and then building bigger and worse things to be more affronted by. Her face took a little bit of a pink hue and she actually found a bubbly laugh come up and she covered her mouth to hide an open laugh.

“I could ask you the same,” she shot back and he felt like he’d lost the whole war and he wasn’t aware there was even a battle going on.

His arms folded in front of him and he just, drew his mouth into a fine line and managed to say absolutely nothing. This woman raised two boys and had a manchild for a husband, she was a powerful opponent. “I’m stupid, what’s your excuse?” He countered, admitting his own folly. He knew he had her beaten on that one, because she wasn’t stupid. Without waiting for a response, he motioned for her to follow him. Fine Bulma, you win.

It was not his intention to get himself into a position where he would have to talk with her one on one, but he also had just sent her idiot husband away and he now had no excuse to just run off and do nothing, leaving her in the middle of the set up while Bulma made use of Kakarot’s ability to cheat distance. They really shouldn’t take that long...maybe he could finally explain to her that he was not out to steal her husband and it was largely just a damn over exaggeration by Bulma. Yes, just like he said he was going to jump out of the time chamber and confront them immediately about their assumptions before. That never happened either.

He agonized about these things to the point that he could write books about how much he didn’t want to think about them. Bulma meant well, but she had a tendency to tease him about his habit of dwelling until he dwelled on that too. Obsessive, yes. Yes, definitely.

The headache forming over his temple didn’t help any, but he managed to work around it; bringing her through the bulk of the catering staff and to a less populated area. There was no hiding the fact that the food was being prepared with a few saiyans in mind. She noticed and she probably sighed a little, knowing that meant some table manners would be dying at some point. By now she knew how this had to go; he knew how this would go. There was no containing Kakarot, if nothing else.

He had his hand on the handle to the door to the big room, where the tables were lined up and he turned back to say something to her, but stopped short. It was just a brief moment, but he barely caught it and she was very swift, he had to hand it to her. If he wasn’t acutely aware of everything, he probably wouldn’t have seen her dodge the cart that almost caught her by the leg. He’d be completely unaware of the very subtle look of distress she had, turning back against the wall. The cart missed her, but muffled sound of tearing fabric told him it hadn’t missed her dress. With her arms behind her, and the hesitant look around, it was apparent that she was holding part of it together in the back and hoping it wasn’t too painfully obvious. He noticed, but only because she had moved with the reflexes of a warrior一refreshing to see in a woman.

Cracking the door open, he drew her attention with a wave, beckoning her to follow the wall and come through the door. This was more than a good enough reason to escape from the rest of the people; a much better excuse than just him being asocial. Too bad it also meant he was alone with Kakarot’s wife. He had to wonder what was going through her mind, but he suspected the panic of having the back of her dress suddenly torn open was a lot more pressing at that moment. At least he had that comfort, knowing she was likely more stressed by outside circumstances.

She slipped through the opening and he pulled the door shut behind them. The room would be used in short while, but for the moment, they would be left in peace. Immediately, she turned away and felt around the back of the dress. It looked new and she looked so distraught about it. “Oh一I get on to Goku about tearing apart all of his clothes and then this happens一” Her voice wasn’t nearly the level of whiny he’d imagine out of Kakarot or even Bulma and that relieved him, immensely. “I’ll have to borrow something from Bulma一I can’t wear it like this!”

“...Do you have a sewing kit in your purse?” He raised a brow, just figuring a woman like this came prepared for these sorts of situations. This woman was the one who made Gohan smart and well adjusted when he came from Kakarot’s lineage.

“Yes, but I have nowhere to take it off and一”

“Let me see it,” he grumbled, holding a hand out and leaving her to question whether or not he was serious. He was serious and the second glance he gave her told her that much; she rummaged around in her purse for the little travel kit that he wasn’t surprised at all that she had. He somehow knew it. “Thread it for me, while I pin it.”

She paused for a moment and for a brief second, he felt like she was looking at him in a completely different way than she did before and he wasn’t sure how he felt about that. Mainly, because he wasn’t sure what sort of way he was being looked it. Before and after. Honestly, he didn’t know how she felt about him either way. He’d never interacted with her enough to really know. That was probably why Bulma wanted him to, because she wanted them to have some exchange, given the nature of whatever the hell was happening between he and Kakarot.

“You know how to sew?” She finally asked, her attention snapping back enough for her to prepare a needle with a thread for him.

“There’s a reason my clothes don’t tear apart whenever I move in them,” he pulled up a chair and directed her to sit, taking his jacket off for her to sit on and wrap around her so he could lift the back of the skirt without her worrying about flashing him. The skill was useful, he just never actually thought he would be using it for something outside of therapeutic sleeve mending.

“I never...would have taken you for a crafting type,” she admitted and he couldn’t blame her. He didn’t see himself as crafting type either.

“Bulma’s mother is to blame,” he confessed, kneeling and starting the mend at the top and working his way down. It wouldn’t be perfect. The seam would at least be fixed on the inside, but the tear was far from smooth and the line of it would end up going crooked toward the inside of the leg. At least it wouldn’t be open wide. “It was her idea. I’m not a creative person, I prefer to train, no different than Kakarot.”

“Goku...has a very one track mind about it,” she smiled a bit, as if she was almost arguing in a subtle way that she didn’t think Vegeta was quite as bad as Kakarot. He wasn’t sure he agreed, but his obsession with Kakarot was hardly as well-meaning and wholesome. “If I could teach him to sew...hah, then maybe he’d have a nice pair of clothes!” She laughed a little, and he actually found it in him to snort a short chuckle at the very prospect.

“The idea of teaching Kakarot the patience that would require... you know that wouldn’t happen. Three years in the time chamber with the buffoon taught me that he’s got a very pitiful attention span. He could probably be medicated for it, but at this point, it’s probably half of his personality.”

She had a soft expression and turned her head back to watch him a little. He was aware of her eyes on him, but he was almost directly behind her and, in a way, hiding there. The conversation was focused on the one topic that they had in common and he knew he had very little to add to the discussion that would be meaningful. She was the one who knew him best and he was stepping on her territory somehow. So he just focused all his attention to each stitch in her torn dress, halfway through with the hasty repair after a handful of deafeningly quiet minutes.

His silence did not bother her, however, as she seemed content to continue the conversation just fine with him having retreated. “That you accept him like that, tells me a lot about you, you know.”

He paused briefly, staring at the stitch to distract himself from her words. There was no point in doing anything other than accept Kakarot for what he was, because he had a way of forcing people to just deal with him being himself. Something about how honest he was, made it impossible not to just tolerate him. He hated to call it a charm of his, but that wasn’t too far from the truth of it. In a way he loathed to admit. “I don’t know what you mean, it’s not like he gives anyone a choice.”

“Maybe not, but I feel like you do understand him much better than most,” she continued, toying with her bracelet while she waited patiently. “He’s...very simple, but he difficult, you know. Being his wife, is no easy task.”

“I can’t imagine it is,” he found himself muttering to her, as if he actually pitied her task in taking care of that manchild.

“I don’t mind sharing the task a little bit.”

He almost jammed a needle all the way into his fingers and swallowed a few select swears in response to it. There was a monumental effort made to not make a sound in response to her words, but he failed the task, because the grunt he made was nothing short of traumatized; traumatized by his own instant response to her words. Her manner of speaking was so blunt, that he could not even remotely compete with her. He thought Bulma was an opponent, this one was on another level entirely. Suddenly, it made sense how she domesticated Kakarot as much as she did. He had to do the same thing with Kakarot. Get straight to the point and use words that hit their mark. They hit their mark.

Five or six different attempts to respond ended with nothing but silence, and he just quietly unstuck the needle and went back to the damn stitching, trying to figure out how he’d gotten himself into this. Talk to Chi Chi, she said. It’ll be fine, she said.

Before he could find a response, his phone rang. For once in the entire time of him having it, he was grateful to hear that annoying ringtone and he paused to root around for it and answer. It was Bulma. “One moment,” he mumbled to Chi Chi and then tapped the phone, setting it on the edge of the chair by her hip, so he could keep working the thread and finish with the repair. “What, woman?”

‘Vegeta, where are you?’

“In the conference room,” he answered, knowing she was probably looking for him anywhere else.

‘What are you doing there? You want to come help me for a moment?’

“No,” he didn’t even bother to pause.

‘Vegeta!’

“Isn’t that what you took Kakarot for? Put him to work. He’s a big boy, he can handle it.”

‘I’ve got him moving stuff, he could use a second set of hands. He’s not very delicate. Neither are you, but between the two of you...Just come help!’

“I’m definitely more invested in what I’m doing right now, sorry. Please call back later, when you’re not asking me to babysit my apparent manchild husband that our wives are trying to force on me.”

‘Veget一’ But he’d already hung up on her and gone right back to stitching, ignoring the gentle chuckle from the wife of the husband in question. She was amused and that made him feel very weird about it. Why was she amused by this? Why did she accept this? This was her husband, her spouse. Was she actually serious about sharing him? What was even going on anymore?

“I’m almost done,” he mumbled, finding the last part of the mend, and preparing to start closing up the bottom of it. It wasn’t perfect, but it wasn’t open in the back anymore and she could at least walk out without having to scoot awkwardly along the wall. The task hadn’t really taken that long, but it felt like it was taking forever for the last little bit and he knew he was getting sloppy. He was just starting to think a little too much and that always seemed to distract him.

He turned the fabric back down and looked it over, clipping the thread and flattening the seam. It looked smooth enough, but it was definitely obvious it was a repair. It wasn’t pretty, but it was functional and it wasn’t going to come apart for the rest of this event. One crisis averted, now if only he could resolve the one that was in his own head surrounding Kakarot, that would be grand.

Standing up, he brushed himself off and straightened his suit out. “It’s not perfect, but it’s doable,” he announced and she stood shortly after, giving him his jacket back and turning her body to look at what she could from that angle一feeling the seam and appearing impressed.

“Thank you,” she bowed a little, returning the chair to the table and smoothing her own dress back down. She moved over to him and he had the instinct to flee, but somehow didn’t manage to accomplish that. This woman had a much less pushy way of handling herself than Bulma, in the sense that she seemed much more polite toward him right now, but her presence was certainly just as strong willed. He found himself staring eye to eye with her and couldn’t exactly turn away without looking like he was backing down. That was not his way of doing anything; but he also wasn’t prepared for the tender way she leaned forward and delivered an appreciative kiss to the cheek.

He was struck for a moment and didn’t function from the neck up, stunned by her move and defeated once again.

“We should probably go find Bulma,” she offered, and his brain immediately latched on to that sentiment.

“Yes. And I need to go hit your husband,” he added stiffly. Bulma could get pissy all she wanted, he was going to find Kakarot and deck him into the next country for hiding his wife behind him and leaving him alone with her. He was not prepared for her.

“I’m sure he’ll be happy with that result, anyway, knowing Goku,” she gave a little sigh, but it was framed with a smile.

“He’s a goddamn idiot, that’s why.”

“And you like him that way.”

His whole face contorted into a scowl and he turned abruptly and started to stomp away. The amount of defeats at the hands of this woman could only reach so much before he couldn’t handle it anymore and he got the feeling that she knew that, because he could feel her goddamn smile behind him as she followed behind him, walking with more grace than any of the rest of them combined. She conducted herself in a polite, yet stern way, that he felt he couldn’t snap back at her like he did with Bulma.

She, for some reason, had trust in him with Kakarot and he found himself honored a little by that, despite the mountain of anxiety going with it. Which only served to piss him off and made his expression more sour than before. Yes, he felt better in a sense.

But admitting Bulma was right never made him happy..

God damn it.

Chapter Text

Most of the time, he did know when to mind his own business. At least when it really was important; because sometimes, he really didn’t think it mattered whether or not he was bothering someone casually. Popping in to see a friend when they weren’t expecting him was usually considered a bit rude, but that was just him and it was often laughed off and forgiven―that was just how Goku was after all, he was harmless. He did that often and to almost everyone. Except to Vegeta.

That was one person that Goku still found himself being a little more hesitant to just pop in on with his usual cheer and announce his intent. He’d always show up at Capsule Corp. and approach that one through the front door, and through Bulma usually. Or he’d talk to him through text to announce his intention ahead of time. But since the time he’d shown up in the gravity chamber in response to Vegeta’s episode, he’d refrained from surprise visits. If Vegeta needed him, then he was certain there would be some other tell that would draw him. Not that he thought the man would ever actually purposefully call out for him. Vegeta was stubborn.

That was fine, Goku wouldn’t change that about him for sure, but sometimes, he could feel him training distantly and he furrowed his brows. They didn’t always need to spar together, they just happened to do so often, and sometimes, it was a benefit to get some training in solo; but his own training always felt more relaxed and less pressured. When he felt Vegeta going at it, it didn’t feel that way at all. Maybe Vegeta didn’t know that Goku could feel him, maybe he did and just ignored it, it was hard to tell. There was always some small part of him that was aware of him, ever since their fusion really, but once Goku’s attention became as engrossed with Vegeta as it had been, it seemed magnified until it was all he could feel. Like a prickling, needling feeling between his shoulder blades that intensified when Vegeta was busy beating himself up again.

He was finishing up his work, what little he managed to accomplish when he was so distracted by the distant hum of Vegeta’s violent aura. His fingers twitched and he stuck a shovel into the dirt firmly, leaving it to stand in the ground by itself. Damn it Vegeta, he made a face and wondered why he couldn’t tune it out more effectively, but he knew that even if he could, he wouldn’t. Some part of him was purposefully focused on the way his energy was tumbling forcefully.

They weren’t dependent on each other, even if Goku sort of wished Vegeta would lean on him a little more. He wouldn’t hesitate to reach out to Vegeta if it came to it, but he knew the case was not necessarily the same in the other direction yet, at least not without it being a traumatic experience. He was loosening up, at least, Goku smiled and wiped his face, grabbing his things and heading back to the house to hose himself down and then dry out a bit in the sun outside.

The problem was, he still had these moments where no amount of relaxing seemed to take away whatever brought him into these self brutalizations. Goku could almost see him under the intense gravity, at the breaking point, pushing himself nearly to the point of shattering bones. What even brought these intense batterings on? He couldn’t understand it, but Vegeta operated on a completely alien mindset to his own. He supposed that Vegeta probably thought he was strange too, but at least he wasn’t committed to beating himself up. He preferred it when other people beat him up instead.

Setting his things down, he quickly opened the hose on himself to wash the dirt off. He would take a bath later, but he wasn’t ready to go in just yet, not when he was so offset by Vegeta. Instead, he found a nice warm place to sit in the sun and he closed his eyes and just visualized what he was sensing in the other saiyan; turmoil that he knew was always present to some degree. Those were things he’d never get Vegeta to talk to him about, probably. Goku wasn’t really the kind of person that anyone talked to about those kinds of things; especially not Vegeta. Most people didn’t think Goku was that functional for intellectual conversation, and most of the time, they weren’t wrong. That stuff was too heavy for him.

Vegeta was a different matter, though.

He was somehow something that Goku wanted to reach out to and pull to him. Feeling his ki spiking over and over, made him itch to zip over there and step in between him and himself. If he really needed someone to terrorize, then he could easily cover those bases.

Let me catch your punches too, jerk, he frowned a little. He knew the meaning of that was different for them both. Vegeta assumed Goku was entirely a simpleton, which was fair, but that wasn’t always the case. He could identify when stuff was bothering Vegeta and when he was letting something get to him, he just couldn't always tell what it was. It wasn't like Vegeta really made it easy to tell. Sometimes he wondered if he was the problem. Vegeta did seem to try to hide from him at times and Goku didn't always let him. But lately, he thought they’d been relatively okay. They trained together, they texted relatively often, and sometimes even—through the gentle pressuring of their wives—went to get dinner at whatever unlucky restaurant could feed them. It was fine, he thought.

Of course, it may not have anything to do with him at all. Vegeta just had his moods and Goku had a personality that could be hard to deal with when he was in his mood. He wished he knew a little better...but there was no way to really swing the door open and ask him to declare it. He'd lose him entirely that way. But in a way, he lost him a little bit every time he sat by and felt him training himself half to death this way. He'd recover just fine and bounce back without any problem, but he'd be harder to handle; feel rougher around the edges. It would be like having Vegeta take a stride backwards and he'd have to coax him back out of his shell again. Almost like he was kicking himself down again just to remind himself not to get comfortable. It wasn't even a physical thing; purely emotional. Goku understood it at least that much and that probably would have surprised Vegeta.

That was so dumb, though. He frowned. There was no reason for it anymore. They were over that, he thought. Maybe he placed more importance on their friendship than was actually there, but it mattered to him. It mattered a whole bunch and he was not actually the sort to just let it be, when he knew he could interject. His respect for Vegeta didn't stop him from stepping on his toes sometimes; and he bounced up and brushed dirt from his pants, intent to actually go do just that. If he was going to feel this level of turmoil coming off Vegeta in waves at a distance, then he could go see it in person and see what he could do to help. What was the worst Vegeta would do? Hit him? Wouldn't be the first time.

He just couldn't take the pressure in his chest. It built up and he wasn't equipped to deal with it in the same way someone else might. He wasn't smart like Piccolo or Gohan. But he was honest and reactive, and his impulse was to go to what was making him feel that pressure. It just happened to be that he hadn't before because the source was someone who he didn't want to drive away by being too pushy. In some ways, he already was too pushy. But those were ways he already knew he could be. He could pressure Vegeta to spend three years in the time chamber with him, but could he pressure him to vent openly to him about things that were weighing him down and causing him to actually, in a way, hurt himself?

There really was only one way to find out.

Chi Chi wouldn't hesitate to tell him to go, so he didn't bother to let her know he was stepping away for a bit. By now, she knew he wasn't really all that far away—and now he was a text away if she really needed him, when he remembered to check. Sometimes he forgot it, but he made sure to tuck it away this time, just in case. He just needed to step on that line again and jump.

He thought about the last time he did that and his heart raced a little. Vegeta’s moment was a private one that he’d invaded and made him uncomfortable, but he learned something out of it and if he’d gained anything from that time, it was that he shouldn't always refrain. Step on it sometimes. He didn't kill you last time. He won't kill you this time. Put him on the spot and force him to put down the self-beating stick. He cares too, even if it’s in his own gruff way. Maybe he won't retaliate negatively like he would have once. Forgiveness later.

Two fingers pressed to his forehead and Goku braced himself in place, muscles in his legs tightened and prepared for what he knew was going to greet him in the gravity room. Vegeta never trained in anything that wasn't absolutely punishing. Goku could handle it with no problem, but if he popped in there without preparing for it, he was going to hit the ground. He almost had the last time―especially when he’d overheard what he’d said. It had been a miracle that he’d been able to recover himself from that. Fortunately, he was quick to save face on the fly. This time, however, he was a little more prepared and he knew that Vegeta wasn’t in any real danger. He was just being hard on himself a little bit.

Teleporting was effortless, mostly, and he closed the distance in an instant, appearing in the room and being suddenly flooded up close with just a massive wave of energy. With the gravity going so strong, it felt like he was drowning. This was what Vegeta really wanted to be pushing himself in? Three years of training together and he still did that… Well, at least it wasn’t nearly as often...but still…

He didn’t have time to really think on it, however, because this time was different than last time and Vegeta noticed him very quickly. Not a word left his mouth, but he found a fist coming at him like a comet and probably with the force of one. If he hadn’t been prepared for the crushing force of the extra gravity, he probably wouldn’t have been able to catch that. As it was, Vegeta still had the upper hand, being so used to the conditions. But that was fine, Goku wasn’t one to back down from intense fighting with Vegeta. He responded to Vegeta’s feral growling with his own and blocked his other fist with his arm, letting the shock wave of make the air crackle.

Vegeta looked like he’d already put himself through a few rounds of pushing his body through rigorous strengthening and Goku could appreciate that for what it was, but he knew there was a point where he needed to breathe and let himself cool off. He legitimately thought that maybe Vegeta just didn’t know where that point was and the reason they reached it so easily when they were training together, was because Goku had the ability to convince him to stop when he didn’t think he should.

Watching him, Goku could see that he was just pouring ki off uncontrollably, in a way that Vegeta didn’t usually. His stance was actually very loose and very open, almost as if he didn’t care at all that Goku had just stepped into his boundary. Unlike last time, where he was clearly unsettled by it. No, this time, he was almost drawing Goku in, with a look in his eyes that asked for him to not back off at all. Magnetic, even, if Goku had a word he’d saved to use for it. Gohan had said it some time back; he thought it described Vegeta pretty well. It went in his little notes page in his phone.

He couldn’t help but bounce, finding the gravity so heavy that he had to force himself to really push his body to get the springiness he needed to combat with Vegeta’s gorilla-like nature. Souped up with ki and down to just raw brutality, Vegeta could hit like a truck. But he’d rather Vegeta hit him than beat himself up. If that was what he needed, then he would give him a hell of a punching bag to come after.

Neither of them used ki for anything other than stabilizing their bodies and shoving a little extra speed and power into their limbs and it seemed like it was the kind of sparring that Vegeta needed. The saiyan prince had a tendency to get soured quickly when he lost the upper hand on a short notice and didn’t hesitate to surge his power to counter Goku, but he wasn’t doing that at all. He took a heavy blow to the face and didn’t even attempt to block; he just took it, spit a mouth of blood and came back at him with a howl.

It was savage, but Goku didn’t like it. It was ferocious and very much raw Vegeta, but it wasn’t Vegeta that he knew best. This was the version of him that wanted to be hurt and Goku didn’t want to hurt him. He felt like a stranger when he was like this and Goku wanted to pull him back and shake the wrong Vegeta out of him. It reminded him of everything that happened back during the resurrection of Majin Buu. That Vegeta was also not his Vegeta. That Vegeta was the embodiment of all the things that he let darken the person that Goku really admired in there. He was always a bit of a jerk, but Goku could trust him with his life even in the worst situations. Even when Vegeta claimed he was going to be the one to kill him.

It was a front and they both played it for a long time; still played it a little bit, but didn’t have to when they were alone anymore and Goku dropped every single attempt at discretion.

Fine, Vegeta. You want to be hurt, then I’ll hit you where you take it the hardest.

He powered up to block another forceful blow―missing a strong arm connecting with his face by just a hair. Letting him that close to him was always such a risk, because if he got hit, he was going to feel it; but he had to be close. If he wasn’t close, then he never would gain any ground. Vegeta was not an opponent he could take on from a distance; he never wanted to either. Something about colliding with him hand to hand felt empowering in a way that other opponents didn’t. It came like a thunderstorm; crackling like thunder and bursting like lightning between them.

Sweat beaded across his forehead and he wiped it with the back of his hand, taking a brief moment to catch a deep breath. The air was thick, but he barely felt it. The focus was so closely drawn on Vegeta that nothing else mattered. All that mattered was drawing him back, but Vegeta wasn’t going to just hand that over. He had to wear him down and Vegeta had one thing that Goku would commend him on, and that was stamina. That was perfectly fine, however, because Goku knew how to handle him. Three years of tangling with Vegeta’s stubborn habits made him more than aware of the degree of his self-punishment and Goku knew that he could destabilize his patience and corner him.

Don’t hit him physically, was the idea. Not enough to give him the satisfaction of pain. And don’t let him land a hit either.

Frustrating Vegeta was what Goku lived his life on and he was good at it.

The results didn’t take long once he stopped playing into Vegeta’s plot to get him to help him beat him up. The shorter man wasn’t sloppy, but he wasn’t refined anymore either, he was just untamed. He didn’t care if he wasn’t precise and Goku took every advantage of that, until he managed to direct him exactly where he wanted him. Nonstop brawling at a powered-up state was burning them out; but as long as it was Vegeta who burned out faster, it was fine.

He was counting on that, actually; dodging him until the gravity was making his feet tingle. This man was no joke, he never was. Not from the first moment they’d met. But Goku took him seriously and he did put all of his effort into forcing him back when he felt his strength start to waver. His stored up retaliation came with a burst and Vegeta didn’t have it in him to block it.

If he was going to actually hit him, he’d have probably left a pretty damn good mark on him, but that wasn’t his goal. His real goal was to push him, driving him back against the wall to trap him. His body was exhausted and Goku’s larger form gave him that rare advantage that he never got to exploit. Only once before had he used it so brazenly and that hadn’t been on purpose.

But this time, he shoved the smaller body forcefully until he felt his back crack against the wall and break Vegeta’s perfect stance. Legs buckled just barely and it was all he needed to scoop up control and snake his arms around him, just gripping the body he had trapped between him and the steel panel. He braced himself for a fight in response, because Vegeta was in much more of a destroying mood than before, and Goku treaded wildly all over every bit of Vegeta’s personally reserved nature.

Muscles in his back tensed and he twitched when he felt Vegeta move, but his whole body froze at the response he did get. If he didn’t have his face turned into the side of Vegeta’s neck, holding him against his body, he was sure that the prince would be mocking the absolute look of bafflement. But the two arms that circled around his neck took him by surprise. In fact, he felt like he was having a heart attack―and he really did know what that felt like!

If he could make a sound actually leave his mouth, he felt like it would be a loud, strangled verbalization of what a question mark would sound like if it had its very own sound; but over the thunderous roaring of his heart, it occurred to him with a stupid, earth shattering clarity, that Vegeta had actually...called him. The pressure he felt that made him come, when he felt like he probably shouldn’t...was because he was being pulled.

Two gloved hands were digging into his shoulders and he could feel his breath against his neck. Goku had the loose understanding of how difficult it was for Vegeta to express the things that Goku did much more easily. He could ask for things that Vegeta would never be able to with the same ease.

After a few minutes, the gravity room’s computer announced that it was releasing the increased pressure back down to base level; having been set to disable with a lack of motion after a certain period of time passed. The heaviness lifted, but neither of them moved from that spot. Goku only parted his feet, keeping him so close that he could feel his heart beating against his ribs.

Every steady beat was a crystal clear message from him.

Come save me from myself.

He wouldn’t say it, or couldn’t say it. But that was okay. Goku heard him, perfectly fine.

Chapter Text

“Finally done!” A loud cheer followed the sound of a book slamming closed and small whine came immediately after.

“I'm not…” Goten’s pout was very reminiscent of his father’s and he looked up, still a few pages away from finished with the last of his homework. Trunks had completed his and stood up to stretch, standing over Goten and leaning a bit to glance at his progress. “Can't I work on it later?…We’ve been doing it for hours…”

“Finish it now, and you won't have to worry about it at all,” Goten’s mother said firmly, coming in from the kitchen with a plate of snacks for the boys, setting the plate on the table. At least they were being spoiled a little, but there had been a lot of work for them. The stern mother liked to ensure that education was taken very seriously and the written work for the week was looked over as early as possible, it seemed, and reviewed later to cement it in. Gohan turned out bright enough, so clearly her methods were solid enough. When the two boys got together to study, it often took quite a length of time.

“Aw c’mon, Chi Chi, they’ve been doin’ this all night. Even my head’s hurtin’ and I’m not the one readin’ any of it. A little break wouldn't really hurt, would it?” Kakarot made the weak attempt on his son’s behalf, but he knew better. His wife would have none of that. She put a hand on her hip, brows turned sharply together and she stood in front of him with an aura that dared him to say something else. Kakarot sunk into the couch a little and put his hands up in defense, immediately backing down.

“Honestly Kakarot, maybe you should join our sons and expand your brain a little,” Vegeta watched from the other end of the same piece of furniture, where he was leaned against the arm, watching the boys at the coffee table. They’d gotten to slack off all day long and that was a miracle all by itself; they really should be thankful she let them get away with that. “Procrastination is a bad habit to flourish. You’d do Goten no favors.”

“See, Vegeta gets it,” Chi Chi pointed and Kakarot made such a betrayed face at the other saiyan. “This is why he's more reliable than you, Goku.”

The pout on Kakarot’s face was the same one Goten previously had and Vegeta couldn't help but smirk a little bit. Seeing Kakarot losing to her with the same ease was at least a comfort. “Is this because I forgot Goten in town once, because he was fine—he got home okay!”

“Goku, you know better—” her voice raised a little and she looked like she was just amazed he defended that mistake still. Vegeta was unsurprised, given the frequency of which Goten seemed to stay there with them, anyway. Bulma had a tutor for Trunks, but occasionally he sat with the boys to make sure they didn't slip off when the poor teacher was not looking. They wouldn't dare try that nonsense with Vegeta. They could not run fast enough to get away, even if they wanted to.

“Sorry, sorry!” He glanced back over to the boys, seeing Trunks move back over to help Goten out. “It's so boring, though…I don't get the big deal at all...” Kakarot made a face, clearly showing his interest had waned quickly. He let it go and Chi Chi backed down once that became clear. Kakarot then turned his body on the couch, making no apologies in stretching himself out across it. His long legs reached the other end and his feet met with an obstacle in their path. He did not forget Vegeta was sitting there, not a damn bit; because he cracked a little bit of a smirk and challenged him to do something about the invasion of space.

“You come into my home, Kakarot—” he hissed at him, affronted on a personal level by his brazen attempt to display couch dominance. The black cat sitting on the backrest by his shoulder lifted its back legs and meowed softly in defense.

“Bulma invited me,” he even scooted further into the couch to make himself more comfortable, nearly seatbelting Vegeta in and leaving the smaller man to seethe, muscle twitching and making him reactionary. Kakarot made himself at home very easily. Their wives were going with Kakarot’s older son and his wife to some event and they had simply arranged to dump the idiot father and younger son off for the night. Bulma said it would be fun. Like a sleep over. Goten and Trunks would just play their video games all night and the four of them could just snack on wherever Bulma’s mom spoiled them with; they'd be fine. Vegeta realized this was the first time since the time chamber that he'd be around the fool for this long; the first time he’d have to hear his goddamn snoring again, probably. He groaned inwardly.

“I didn't ask to babysit you,” he countered, closing his fist around a stupid decorative pillow and throwing it square into his face. Kakarot didn't bother to catch it, and he still had the stupid grin when it slid down and into his hands. “Goten is welcome here, he’s smarter than you—” His arm wrapped around the big idiot’s leg to shove him off, but Kakarot resisted, clearly looking for some sort of fight. “Idiot, if you don't get off of me, I will punt you into the next universe—”

Kakarot’s grin was so wide that Vegeta’s whole body tensed in preparation to react, “I'll tell Cabba you said hi—”

Vegeta pounced; so suddenly that Kakarot barely had time to catch him before he had already closed the distance. His fist was raised, but it never made contact, because of the foot that caught his chest, holding him back—even if barely. Kakarot had much more leg than he did, but that wasn't enough to stop Vegeta from catching his collar and yanking the big buffoon half off of the cushion, in an attempt to choke him. He hooked a leg across his hip and defended against the arm that came at him in defense of this new uncomfortable assault. Vegeta was smaller, but he had intensity and he was determined—grabbing the pillow again and brawling with Kakarot enough to get around the foot against his chest that was the last thing holding him back.

Then he withdrew, sitting back suddenly; and it took Kakarot by surprise. His laughter had his face red and he rubbed his palm across his cheek, but he had just a little hint of confusion in his big stupid eyes and just briefly, something else crossed his expression. It wasn’t like Vegeta to suddenly relent, but he realized it too late that he’d been faked out. Vegeta didn't give in at all; he took that second of delay and shoved Kakarot’s leg enough that he could climb over it and proceeded to just slam the pillow down on his face and then wrap his arms firmly around it, crushing the cushion between his chest and the idiot’s head. Kakarot made a loud muffled noise of protest, but Vegeta had the upper hand—straddling his chest and curled over to make it difficult to be removed.

“It’ll only take like three minutes, Kakarot, just relax.” He grunted, and held on despite his thrashing. Big hands pulled at his shirt and he sank down just a little more, getting his right knee and elbow deep into the crevice of the couch. Long legs couldn’t bend far enough to reach him and he smirked, triumphant and unwilling to be defeated. Kakarot’s muffling got louder and he could even hear some portion of his name being yelled in distress. He could feel the flow of the bigger saiyan’s ki changing it’s hum and knew that he was about to have to block a charged fist.

He had to let go in order to block him; leaning back and catching his wildly thrown fist without much effort. Kakarot shoved the pillow from his face and nearly rolled from under him, shoving him back and launching a counter attack that was purely based on instinct. Vegeta braced himself against the backrest and was more than ready to meet that fist in a trade with his own, but they both froze at a sudden sharp command, having forgotten they were not alone and broken out of the battle ready state they’d jumped into.

“Stop that right now, you two!” It was Kakarot’s wife. He and Kakarot turned their eyes to her and she looked down at them with such a look of disappointment that both of them deflated almost unwillingly, but obediently. Raised fists actually lowered and she put her hands on her hips and shook her head “Honestly, the boys are better behaved. And they’re supposed to be looking up to the two of you. Maybe they should be the ones left in charge.”

Kakarot turned and sat at the edge of the couch, folding his arms and looking like a kicked puppy and Vegeta did something similar just off to the side from him, sitting slightly behind him after their tussle. It seemed like Kakarot was going to say something, but Bulma came in from the next room at about that time and cut off any words he planned to say. She was hurried and had an arm full of blankets, with what appeared to be a little capsule case sitting on top of the pile.

“I found it, I knew I had one around here somewhere. I was sure it would be big enough. Trunks, Goten, move the table off to the side for me,” Bulma instructed, pointing to the boys and where she wanted them to slide the little coffee table off to. She needed room enough to pop the capsule and the living room had plenty of open space. The table could be easily turned and pushed off to the side so they could still use it for finishing work, as well. Bulma dumped the blankets on a chair and then noticed the way the two husbands seem to be cowering to Chi Chi’s might. “...What’s going on in here?” She raised a brow, glancing around and clearly wanting to know what they’d done. Nosy woman.

“Oh you know the usual, five minutes and a fight breaks out. Right boys?” Chi Chi shot a glare at the two offenders and they both looked away.

“It was more like a slaughter,” Vegeta countered, unwilling to let his sensible side take over and let it go; and he knew his mistake the moment he made it, but Vegeta took his mistakes and he ran the whole course with them. Back talking Bulma was basically his daily routine, back talking Chi Chi was not yet a skill he’d come to master, but damn it if he didn’t still find himself putting in the effort.

And he found the powerful opponent that was Kakarot’s wife directly in front of him. He couldn’t pretend not to see her. Even feigning interest in what Bulma was doing一something about the capsule and the blankets一was not enough, and he had to turn his eyes up to meet hers. She managed a threatening, stern look that made him want to bow up and challenge her; but then it softened a little in a way that she didn’t do toward Kakarot. Her hands moved from her hips and she held them together in front of her in a very patient manner that made him drop his resistance. So this was how she operated; shit, that’s clever.

“Vegeta,” her voice cut him down and he felt like he lost before it started. “You’re smarter than Goku, please don’t antagonize a fight until tomorrow at least, it’s getting late. I would prefer you not be beating each other to death while we’re out.”

He felt, not only Kakarot’s eyes on him, but Bulma’s and the two boys watching as well; and he just grunted. His face screwed up into an annoyed grimace and he snatched a pillow and smacked Kakarot in the back of the head briefly with it before he threw it off to the side and sat back, folding his arms. “Fine, whatever.” He lost quickly. He couldn’t put up a fight when she came at him like that and she knew it. His drive to suffocate Kakarot to death was largely over, anyway, as the big buffoon was no longer laying on him like he was part of the furniture and he was clearly not going to escape from the same scolding.

His submission seemed to please her and she smiled wider, before her eyes turned to Kakarot and her expression hardened a little again. He watched her, very carefully. It was a curious metamorphosis and at first he didn’t quite understand it, but once she started to admonish him for his participation in what he actually started, he realized that she was really just a master of control. Kakarot would not respond to the method she resorted to with Vegeta, he needed to be talked to more forcefully. Vegeta always suspected maybe he even wanted to be handled forcefully like that. He understood that, in a way that he had with Bulma; but Chi Chi had a different magic toward him. He couldn’t yell back at her when she pulled that battle of wits shit on him. Kakarot had no wits, so he was just a battle of yelling at him. Simpleton really.

“He started it,” Kakarot frowned, but it offered him nothing, she just flicked him and wagged her finger at him.

“You know you have a habit of taking things one step too far, just the same. Both of you are supposed to be watching the boys. If we come back and they’re alone, I’m gonna be very mad.”

“But they’re old enough to take care of themselves just fine!”

“Bond with your sons, you numbskulls,” Bulma cut in, throwing more blankets at them after popping open another capsule. During their scuffle, she’d opened one capsule to release a large floor mattress for them to camp out on. Trunks and Goten seemed excited by the idea of the sleepover and were already pulling out pillows and some more sheets to throw on the pile. The TV was close enough that they could lay on it and play their video games from it, and the fathers could at least pretend to bond with them over that. Kakarot was more of a nature boy and Vegeta was not a very cuddly, but Bulma was telling them fairly directly that they could at least make an effort. “We have to go, like pretty much now. Can you two at least try not to ruin everything while we’re gone?”

“I’m not sleeping on the damn floor with this buffoon,” Vegeta answered, simply, sitting back enough that he could put his foot directly on Kakarot’s back and actually launch him off the edge of the couch. He watched with some satisfaction as he tumbled off, not expecting the sudden betrayal. He landed ungracefully all over the freshly placed mattress and rolled, making such a heated face and bouncing back to return the gift of a fist, but he caught himself.

“Damn it, Vegeta,” he froze in place, poised to make the attempt, but knowing that he would get barked at if he didn't catch himself. He slumped back, dropping on the mattress and folded his arms with a very steep frown at him.

“Vegeta, stop. Now,” Bulma scolded and rubbed her temple a little. “Chi Chi, let’s just go. I’ve given them basically everything they need. They should be fine... Trunks, you’re in charge, make sure your fathers don’t misbehave.” She exhaled and seemed to be almost not joking about it. Chi Chi shook her head and leaned to give the meowing cat a brief little kiss before she straightened and moved to join Bulma. The two women were dressed nicely and it was very clear the men weren’t invited because they couldn’t behave for long enough to not embarrass them. It was something about Videl’s father’s business anyway and neither husband really wanted a thing to do with it. No offense was taken no matter what the reason.

“Get your homework done, Goten, then you boys can stay up for a while.” Chi Chi cast a glance at Kakarot, as if she knew she needed to warn him not to let Goten put it off. Vegeta wouldn’t let that happen, anyway. He was at least on the same page on that front.

“Good night mom,” Goten waved, having quickly bounced back over to the table to blow through the last of his homework on the promise of having fun. Trunks joined him and waved to Bulma as well. The two husbands seemed a lot less joyful, feeling more domesticated at the moment.

“Have a good night, boys, we’ll see you in the morning. We’ll say hi to Gohan for you.” Chi Chi smiled and looped an arm with Bulma’s in good nature. Vegeta couldn’t help but notice the glances Bulma cast him, but he didn’t give her the damn satisfaction of a response. She left him alone with the kids and Kakarot on purpose and he was already perfectly aware of that; but the joke was on her, he spend three years alone with Kakarot already, this was nothing. The two women sashayed out and he just sank back into the couch and declared it his new seat of power.

“You all can sleep down there, I am sleeping here,” he had decided, from the moment she uncovered the mattress. He would not share a mattress with Kakarot. He was not ready for that battle and he already knew Kakarot slept like a goddamn animal.

“You’re no fun, this mattress is actually pretty comfy,” Kakarot had the nerve to sound disappointed.

“I’m the death of fun, haven’t you learned this yet?” He stretched out across the length of the couch and committed to his new throne; cat across his chest and all.

“Well, we can bring that back to life with the dragon balls!”

“Kiss my whole ass, Kakarot, because we don’t do anything halfway in this household.”

“Hey, does this mean I’m part of the household now?” He leaned up on his arms, at the edge of the cushion and right by his face. Vegeta just responded by turning away.

Kakarot and his stupid family basically were part of his household at the point they’d gotten. They didn’t live as a singular unit, but they lived connected enough that their sons were being raised by each other’s mothers and he had been at least responsible for both boys plenty of times. He couldn’t speak for Kakarot on that one, however. Goten spent more time at Capsule Corp. than the reverse, but the same could be said of Kakarot spending more time there than the reverse. Bulma went to see Chi Chi, but Vegeta never had gone to see Kakarot. He never had been to the fool’s home, even after he’d been invited. He played that one off and it was never brought up again. Maybe he should. But then again, maybe it was better if he didn’t. He wasn’t going to be the one to bring it up again.

He thought about it for a few moments before his concentration was broken by the feel of his phone buzzing in his pocket. That was odd. The only person who would message him just left and should have no reason to message him, unless something was wrong…? He fished around for it and flicked the screen, only to be met with an image that made him express the most offended noise.

“What the fuck, Kakarot,” he said out loud, without meaning to. The message was Kakarot’s stupid face. He was making a ridiculous expression behind him and he took a picture of it just to send to him. Literally, right behind him. What a damn fool.

He just got another picture in response. And another. And when Kakarot ran out of different idiotic faces to take pictures of, he apparently opened up the internet on his phone and started to send him random stupid pictures he’d searched, tagging every picture of an angry cat with a caption of ‘Vegeta it’s you’. The disgruntled noise he made probably gave Kakarot more satisfaction than he wanted to admit.

Unfortunately, Vegeta could not deny that some of these angry looking animals touched him spiritually. He felt like they were an expression of how done he was with everything, because these stupid cats were evidently done with everything too. Kakarot seemed to think so, by flooding his goddamn inbox with them.

Kakarot was waging war on a different playing field and Vegeta didn’t let that slide very long before he was opening his own browser and searching for pictures to send back. Ones that he felt were a fantastic representation of Kakarot. A dog mushing his face against the glass begging for attention even though he needed to just behave himself? Yes, definitely Kakarot. Wedging its head between two bars that were too small and getting stuck because it wanted pets, but wasn’t being smart about it? Kakarot. Stupid puppy swiped by the furious cat for being a damn pain in the ass? Every day, all day.

For every pissy cat picture he recieved, Kakarot got a dumbass dog picture in response. While their sons eventually finished Goten’s homework and got around to playing their video games, they continued to antagonize each other silently; intensely staring at their phones while the boys yelled at each other in the background over some fighting game.

It was the most colossal waste of time Vegeta had ever experienced in his life and literally at Kakarot’s level of intelligence; but it passed more time than he’d expected. Messages started to send a little slower and he didn’t notice it at first, because he closed his eyes in between them once Trunks cut the first set of lights off. After a few hours, they’d turned off the game and turned on some TV show to watch instead. He didn’t really care what they were watching, as long as they kept the noise down. The purring cat laying by his neck would not be woken or there would be hell to pay.

TV was clicked into standby before he’d realized it and he looked up, blinking slowly at the sound of it. He felt a little stiff and he noticed that, at some point, one of them had gotten up to turn the last light off in the living room, leaving only the lamp glowing in the hall. Goten and Trunks were sprawled all over the part of the mattress closest to the TV and they seemed to have fallen asleep a while ago, judging by the soft snores and sleep twitches. He blinked and rubbed his face, realizing his phone wasn’t actually in his hand anymore at all either. He too, had fallen asleep at some point in the middle of all their stupid messaging.

Lifting his head a bit, he felt around for the phone and eventually just gave up on it. He couldn’t remember if he’d responded or what the last response even was, just that it wasn’t that important if he dozed off doing it. He could look for it in the morning. Catching the realization that he was half asleep made him want to just give in and succumb to the rest of it. The warm pulsing hum he felt when he was close to nodding off was the only thing that stopped him, making stretch out again. He was almost comfortable, despite sleeping on a couch. He turned face down and let his arm hang off the side, spilling off the couch.

He felt movement from the mattress below and he remembered that Kakarot had been just below. Only then did his brain actually stop tuning out the sound and he heard his snoring. He was so used to the sound that he didn’t even hear him. That was a strangely comforting sensation that he was tired enough that he could admit. He hadn’t experienced that since being in the time chamber, but it still remained; his ability to just absorb his presence and tune out his annoying sounds. With that ability, the only thing that kept him from immediately dozing off, causing him to adjust before he could sleep, seemed to be requiring confirmation of where Kakarot was. His tired brain thought that was such nonsense.

He prepared to roll back over and give the buffoon his space, and partially hide from his instincts of verifying an idiot’s status. He was evidently also asleep and sprawled out along the mattress opposite the way the boys were. He was not about to wake him up and have to talk to him half asleep. Without any reason to remain as he was, he grunted and prepared to change positions, but Kakarot actually stirred first, making him pause. He almost recoiled when he felt a large hand brush knuckles with his; but he didn’t, and he should have. As if in response to coming in contact with his hand, Kakarot’s just curled around his and he rolled over to face the couch.

Wordlessly, Vegeta leaned up and peeked over the side to see if he was actually awake. He had to be. He had to be awake and playing games with him. He could barely see him, but the outline of his face in the dim light made it very apparent he was asleep. His snoring should have been enough, but it seemed surreal.

He’s holding my fucking hand. He’s asleep and he’s actually holding my fucking hand.

Vegeta just put his head back down and turned his face away, but didn’t move. He had half a mind to tear his whole arm off and march his body away. But the other half of his mind remained there, quietly, comfortably, completely stunned with himself in his sleepy haze by the sobering realization that he was going to go right back to sleep without doing a single damn thing about it.

He’s holding your actual goddamn hand.

And you’re going to do nothing about it.

Chapter Text

Midnight sparring sessions always felt refreshing. Outside, in the middle of the night, with nobody awake and everything around them quiet. The only sound he could pick up was the sound of crickets; and Goku could only hear that once they’d stopped moving, after the smacking of fists and the grunts and yells died down. These were not meant to be intense exchanges, but they could get as brutal as any fight and often left them both worn down as if they'd boxed a tournament. It left him with a huge grin and he could even see that coming through on Vegeta’s face by the end of it.

He wiped a line of sweat from his forehead and dropped back on the grass, letting the fall knock the wind out of him. The pressure and need to suck the air back in felt strangely good and he couldn't help but laugh. “Good run, Vegeta,” he turned his head to watch the other sit down. Vegeta wasn't going to flop down like he did, always keeping some form of poise.

“Agreed,” the usually stubborn man actually acknowledged, and that's how Goku knew it was some progress. Vegeta usually wasn't much of a talkative person following a session, but he was used to that. It was a comfortable silence for the time they spent to let their heart rates come back down. Once they’d calmed, normally, he'd go back home and settle into bed; but this time, he'd actually have to take Vegeta home first—they'd left the direct vicinity of Capsule Corp to train out in the middle of the wilderness. Vegeta scoffed at the idea of it at first, but once they got out there, Goku really noticed how much looser he felt.

Much preferable to the form of him that brawled like a beast. He felt fluid and all of his hits were sharp and focused. The burnout wasn't abrupt and hard either, it was languid and he felt like Vegeta seemed content in the aftermath of it. Laying back on the grass, he watched him sitting beside him; staring up and catching a little bit of his features from the glow of moonlight and the stars. He was relaxed, completely, elbows rested on his knees and looking out at a landscape of nothing but wild. It wasn't what Vegeta usually saw, but it was normal to Goku. He didn't think much of it. He was much more interested in watching his sparring partner.

At some point, that sparring partner seemed to have noticed.

“Something wrong, Kakarot? You seem to be staring at me,” his voice cut the cool air and Goku jumped a little at being caught.

“Huh? N...nah, I was just…” he cut himself off and decided to select his words carefully. Vegeta was easily offended by poor choice of phrase, but also he didn't want to make it sound weird. It wouldn't be necessarily meant weird, but his idea of odd wasn't everyone’s. Everyone else seemed to think Goku was odd, afterall. He just thought that Vegeta was far more interesting than all the natural “wonders” around him, but he couldn't exactly say it in that wording. “Thinking,” he settled on.

“That does tend to mess with you.”

“Hey—” he puffed his cheek at him and the corners of his mouth turned down in defense of himself. “I meant…I was thinking about you.” He paused, and that paused stretched a little longer than he meant to, but it seemed sufficient enough to catch Vegeta’s attention and drag it to him. He could see dark eyes glinting over at him. “You seem to do better out here than in the gravity room, is all I was thinkin’. Least when I'm around.”

“You only show up there when I'm angry,” Vegeta snapped back and Goku kinda shrugged a little, knowing to back off just a little. He wasn't wrong. Goku never trained with him in there, because that really wasn't the kind of training ground he preferred; and also, that was more Vegeta’s personal space. If asked, he probably would, though; but he already knew Vegeta would never ask that much and he was perfectly content to training outside like they did. He enjoyed finding a sparsely populated patch of land to toss each other around in, or kicking around just outside in Vegeta’s backyard. Those things made him just as happy.

“You're always angry,” Goku finally retorted, knowing that a little back talking always worked wonders on keeping his peace with Vegeta.

“You're always being you, therefore I'm probably always angry,” he turned his face back away, but Goku caught the rolled eyes and heard the exhale of breath. Goku wasn't a people reader and he wasn't exactly great at understanding finer details, but he’d started to understand Vegeta enough to know what he meant by that, or at least that Vegeta never actually said what he really meant in exact words. He left out entire sentences when he spoke and expected people to get it. Most people probably didn't. A lot of the time, Goku didn't get it either. This time he did, though. Vegeta’s annoyance was largely due to feelings, and Goku already knew he caused those in him.

“...What if I’d been different?”

That caused a second pause in Vegeta, but this time it was accompanied by a brief confused lift of a brow and the saiyan actually leaned back a bit to express bewilderment. “How do you mean?”

“If you’d shown up, and I'd been the saiyan I guess I was supposed to be, instead of who I am,” he explained, knowing that Vegeta back then would have probably been much less mad about it, but the Vegeta of now would be much more conflicted.

“That’s a stupid what-if, Kakarot. The answer is simple, I’d have recruited you, taken the dragon balls and we’d have gone on with the plan as intended. Under the assumption you lived that long. As your persistence seems to be entirely based on being a hard to kill pain in the ass to everyone around you and as a saiyan, you would have led a more solitary life.”

“You did that, didn't you?”

Vegeta narrowed his eyes, as if he was gauging whether or not he was walking into a trap, but Goku never meant it that way. “Did what?”

“Lived a solitary life?”

“I had Nappa. And Radditz to some extent, useless as he was.”

“But you didn't really trust them, I mean.”

“What is it you want me to tell you, Kakarot? Trust wasn't a luxury under Frieza’s rule. Either of them would have turned on me if they had to. I was not above turning on them. You know the score. It didn't matter if we were the same race. What did it matter when Frieza eliminated the rest of them anyway? Regardless, this is a stupid discussion, and one of the reasons you make me angry anyway. Your dumbass questions.”

“Don't gotta be such a jerk about it,” he frowned at him, but he knew it was in defense. “I’m just sayin’, you don't seem so stressed out. And you’re always stressed out, you’ve been stressed out since you showed up callin’ be that dumb name. It's not a bad thing.”

Vegeta looked perplexed for a moment, as if he wasn't sure if the direction of the conversation really was going where it was, but it had. Goku had paid enough attention to Vegeta from that early to notice the changes in him. Anyone with two eyes could see some changes, but Goku noticed more of them than anyone else. He was the first person to really square off with Vegeta—the first person to meet him on a personal level, and he liked to think he was one of the people to still meet him closest personally still. He could almost feel a the knot of tension in Vegeta, as if it was his own, when it was bad enough—he still believed it was a side effect of their fusion, but some of it was definitely the amount of his attention given to him.

“Would you prefer I not call you Kakarot, then?”

It was Goku’s turn to be surprised, “huh?” That was not the response he was expecting, and he knew it was Vegeta trying to steer the topic away, but it worked. “What do you—”

“Would you prefer I no longer call you ‘that dumb name’? Is that what you would like?” Vegeta’s voice had a strange tone to it that Goku didn't quite think he liked. Was it amused...or? “Goku?”

The word off his tongue left a deeply unsettling twist in Goku’s stomach that he couldn't quite explain and he made a face that he couldn't control—brows furrowed and mouth turned into a straight line, as if trying not to express precisely how uncomfortable he was by hearing those syllables come from the one person who’d never used them before, at least to his face. Hearing his name out of Vegeta’s mouth sounded more alien than the alien name he'd shown up one day throwing around at him. He hadn't actually considered a possibility of it ever coming to pass that Vegeta would call him by his name and hearing it actually bugged him in a way he wasn't sure he could put into words. In the past, he'd have preferred he stopped calling him Kakarot—may have even said so a time or two—but at some point he just assumed it as an immutable fact that he would be Kakarot out of Vegeta’s mouth.

And the smug expression he received told him that Vegeta knew this. He had conditioned him to this, after all, but Goku wasn't about to say it. He just…placed a very weak, very unsettled smile and tried not to feel like he wanted to pluck that name out of his mouth and throw it away. Don't ever say it again.

“Does that bother you, Goku?” The edge to his voice was antagonizing and clear in its intent and Goku was far too stubborn to just give in.

But he hated the way it sounded in his voice. Everyone else already called him that. No one else called him Kakarot. That was Vegeta’s stupid thing. He didn't even like the name, but it was just for Vegeta and he was perfectly fine with it staying like that. “..N..nah, just sounds...weird.”

“I'm sure you’ll get used to it, Goku.”

He twitched instinctively at the sound again and he swallowed in discomfort. Vegeta was watching him and waiting for him to respond and he was just about ready to roll over and make whiny noises at him, but that’s what he was waiting for. Vegeta had the curled sneer on his lip that told him he knew it was getting to him. Just the sound of it was so foreign and out of place that it didn't sound like Vegeta at all. There was no way he’d get used to that at all. He couldn't even imagine responding to it without making a face, kind of like smelling spoiled milk. He wanted to just tell him not to ever say that word again, but he didn't have to.

“Kakarot, I'm not going to call you that. I'm more likely to call you Dumbass than forsake your saiyan name.” He finally relented, after Goku had gone through enough distress over whether or not to rebuke his evident teasing. Vegeta wasn't the teasing sort usually, but when he did, he knew how to be a real jerk about it. Hearing his name as Vegeta spoke it relieved him, however, and he actually relaxed a little. It was painfully obvious. “The whole conversation is ridiculous, anyway. Stop talking nonsense.”

“If I stop talking nonsense, then according to you I won't be allowed to talk at a—hey!” He sat up, pulling a handful of grass and dirt, halfheartedly throwing it at him. “All I was saying is, you seem a little better now. What's so wrong with that?”

“You don't know when to shut up, do you?” Vegeta knew the answer to his question, but he wasn't asking it seriously, so Goku didn't bother to give him a real answer. He did stick his tongue out at him, though. “It doesn't matter what it was anymore. So don't bring up what doesn't matter.”

“Guess you're right.”

“I usually am, Goku.”

The noise he made was involuntary and he almost bit his tongue to suppress it, but it slipped through and he strained his voice to cut through the pitch, to at least make it not sound like a distressed squeal and hopefully more like an alarmed grunt. He sucked in a breath and made the worst kind of displeased face at him, caught off guard in a way Vegeta hadn't gotten him before. “Okay, fine—I’ll say it, don't call me that—like ever! Ever again. It sounds wrong!”

“I will make a note of that and honor it, Kakarot,” he had the grin of a victor and he stood, brushing himself off and folding his arms. He held that same haughty air he always did, whether he won or not; but this time it was safe to say he was the victor. “I think it's more than time to head home, clown.”

Goku stood up, feeling a little petty by Vegeta’s apparent ability to play games with him—and also the effect he had on him in a way he didn't think he would. He agreed it was time to go home, they'd already gotten their training session out of the way and he was starting to feel a little calmer and closer to sleep; even if Vegeta got him riled up in a different way. But he wasn't about to let the jerk get away with his heckling that easily and he cast a glance at him, placing two fingers to his own forehead. He was standing just far enough to be out of reach of Vegeta. He smirked right back at him.

“See ya later, Vegeta.”

And he left him to get home by himself.

Chapter Text

“Kakarot, you are cheating.”

“I am not, you’re just being a sore loser.”

A low snarl followed and Vegeta’s grip on the controller tightened a little. The stupid game was testing his patience. It was not his idea of fun, but he went along with it just the same and once he committed to something, he did not back down. This sort of thing was more of his son’s entertainment and when the boys played, he was more content to watch. It had been Kakarot who played with them more actively, more often; and it was showing, since he was a little more practiced in this particular game than he was. This new system the brat got was more complicated than he thought it was. It was nonsense, but he was not a quitter.

The two of them were sitting next to each other on the small couch, waiting for the boys to be done with their school work. Kakarot had opened his mouth and promised them a training session and he was remiss to back out when he could already see how excited the two of them were. They had stayed outside with the tutor and Vegeta dragged Kakarot back inside initially for food and because he was in the middle of a lesson with Bulma’s mother when the buffoon showed up.

Kakarot attempted to tease him about it, but he found very quickly that Mrs. Briefs shut him down with tasty treats. Vegeta was not about to let this dunce attack him for a skill that he used to save his wife’s dress anyway一not that he was going to tell him about that incident. That was between he and her. He liked it that way and it would stay that way. Instead of leaving that one open to more discussion, he put it away and agreed to turn the stupid game system on and proceeded to make himself more angry with the game. He almost preferred the heckling to the victory goading he was getting out of Kakarot. At least with a needle in his hand, he had a weapon.

“When I figure out what the fuck I’m doing Kakarot, it’s over for you,” he hissed and mashed buttons that did fuck all and he commenced to get slaughtered again. These new controllers had far too many parts on them and he wasn’t that dedicated to them. Trunks played single player games when he was with him; the boy had to know he didn’t care for this nonsense. When he did participate in this, he preferred to sit with the boy and solve the dumb puzzles when he played the dungeon crawling games. Those were the ones that interested him more. The racing and fighting games just made him want to beat his opponent to death in reality一and it didn’t help that Kakarot was his opponent.

“I mean, if you ever figure out what you’re doing in general, Vegeta, let me know, I wanna be there for it,” Kakarot grinned, elbowing him and giving him a cheeky chuckle.

“He says like he actually has a clue what he’s ever doing himself, that’s incredible,” Vegeta snorted, actually unable to be angry by his goading for once. The hilarity of someone as crossed in the brain wires as Kakarot teasing him for something like that was beyond the ability to be incensed about.

“I sort of know, sometimes, I mean, I have pretty vague idea. Sometimes, I get up and I come hang out with you,” Kakarot started, voice filled with excitement and innocence and immediately, Vegeta felt like he was about to experience a roasting that he wasn’t prepared for, “because I think I just enjoy hanging out with my best friend. Best friend in the whole wide world.” Kakarot’s stressed syllables made him feel like he was winding up; “Because I just get a lot of joy watching him lose to me, an awful lot.”

Vegeta swung an arm on instinct and lamented that Kakarot was prepared for it and caught his wrist without any effort. He was still as flawless as ever at getting under his skin and maybe more so than before, after what they had just been through together. Getting back into the regular swing of things was difficult as it was, but they’d always managed to before. It seemed like it would be just fine, but the triggers for physical interaction seemed much shorter. It didn’t escalate, but he had no problem withdrawing his arm, then immediately swinging again and cracking his head with the butt of the controller when he wasn’t prepared to catch it. Served him right.

“Damn it Vegeta一” He whined at him and Vegeta just inspected the controller to make sure it wasn’t damaged. Trunks would be upset if he broke the new device that quickly. It could be easily replaced, but he didn’t want to hear the damn whining. He already heard enough of it from Kakarot.

“Serves you right,” he grunted and digging his elbow into his side. He didn’t acknowledge that he was actually sitting that close to Kakarot. Neither of them actually acknowledged how that happened. It just had. Somewhere in their bantering and half hearted threats, the couch got smaller.

Kakarot folded his legs up, crossing them and leaning forward a bit, focusing back on the screen as the game loaded again. “Ain’t you hit me enough yet?”

“No, I have a full lifetime left to hit your ugly mug,” he grunted before his brain caught up with itself and he realized how that sounded. What did he just say? He had actually meant that he could probably punch him until he died and he’d be content, but it definitely sounded less passive than that.

The tilt of Kakarot’s head and the glint in his eyes made Vegeta tense, ready to go into fight mode again by default. “Is that why you got super offended because someone else wore my face? Because it wasn’t me wearing it? Aw Vegeta, that makes me feel really special. You only actually want to hit me if it’s really me!”

“You fucking moron, I was more angry by your lack of anger.” He hissed, but he could regrettably feel his face getting warm and he was feeling so called out at that moment.

It had been almost a week since they had dealt with an enemy that had taken them both down several notches and he was terribly sore about it, but most of his sourness was a result of something that he didn’t want to actually want to admit out loud. Seeing some arrogant shithead carry Kakarot’s body the way he had, taking its power and running wild with it, murdering with it and一showing a disturbing depth of potential with it一made him furious on behalf of the real Kakarot in a way that Kakarot hadn’t been smart enough to be. His rage filled attacks against that enemy hadn’t been the amicable, comfortable ones he had with Kakarot.

He wanted to kill that motherfucker. He hadn’t felt a murderous rage like that in many many years. So many that it actually alarmed him somewhat that he could feel that level of wanting someone to die that badly. Not even Frieza returning had sparked that depth of feeling in him. He hesitated to acknowledge that it was some defensive instinct on behalf of Kakarot, but he knew that was exactly what it was. How dare some weak little bitch show up and act holier-than-thou using Kakarot’s body like a tool? That seemed like sacrilege.

Literally, only a fucking moron should be operating that body. That was just the way it should be and any other method of operation would just be wrong in Vegeta’s eyes. The moron sitting next to him was too dumb to be mad about it, so he had been on his behalf.

“It’s over anyway, right? You said before, leave it in the past right?” He echoed some words Vegeta had said not too long ago and he had no choice but to let go of it in response. It was probably best that he had. The whole event was over and done and nothing could be changed anyway. The alarming reality that they could be backed into a corner was not gone, but Kakarot never worried about a damn thing and he wasn’t about to for the time being either. The problem was taken care of on both sides, thanks to Whis and Beerus.

It had given him a glimpse into himself, however. One that he didn’t think he’d be met with so soon. He was definitely willing to die fighting next to him; die fighting for him. He was definitely working that one out still, but at least he hadn’t gotten to the point of beating himself into oblivion about it. Actually, he hadn’t had the inclination to really do that all that much since they’d left. He had a few suspicions for that reason, but he had a lot more thinking to do before he actually put that one into a solid theory.

“Whatever, Kakarot, you’ll forget about it before long anyway.” He grunted and pressed a few buttons, hardly trying to win, but remarkably doing better than when he was. Maybe it was his rekindled irritation catching back up.

“C’mon, you know that’s not true, it’s just...not gonna do any good.”

“Idiot,” he jammed the buttons, brows furrowed and his own attitude surprisingly difficult to keep in check. He had been doing good, up until Kakarot made his stupid joke.

Kakarot had at least enough sense to notice his shift in tone and he paused the game, forcing Vegeta to have to sit there, with the controller useless in his hands一though he did not turn his attention back to him. “Hey...you’re actually upset aren’t you…?” He questioned, as if he didn’t quite catch the tone prior to that exact moment. Could he really not feel how furious he’d been all along? Kakarot, you dunce.

“Like you said, it’s over. It doesn’t actually matter, in the long run. It was taken care of. It’s no problem of mine if you don’t care that some jackass took over your body and then did fuckall with it. It’s just a shame I didn’t get to batter his asshole face a little more while I had the chance,” he deflected as much as he could, looking anywhere he could, except at Kakarot at that moment.

Movement beside him didn’t make him react, because he was determined to ignore him, but it was very hard to ignore him, when that movement was made with the exact purpose of drawing his attention back. Kakarot leaned to the side a little, resting his elbow against the back of the couch and Kakarot felt larger than Vegeta wanted to admit right then. He wasn’t threatened by him, but it was curious as to what he was doing, and Vegeta finally glanced over一at about the same time that Kakarot had set the controller down and brought his hand to his face, drawing his fingers under his chin to turn his face. This buffoon had the nerve to take him by the fucking jaw and turn his head toward him, how dare he一

But any temper he thought he could muster from this callous action didn’t manage to even remotely break the surface. In fact, any thought suffocated and died before it saw the light of day and he found himself staring slightly upward at Kakarot, unguarded and unprepared for the sheer proximity. His face was so close that he was sure he’d be able to see his own startled expression in the reflection of the fool’s eyes if he looked hard enough.

Kakarot said nothing, but the look on his face had a thousand different meanings that Vegeta was struggling to find the proper words to define; none of them could fill in the sudden blank spot that filled his head. He was shut out from his own mind and the only thing he could focus on was the way he leaned into the backrest, arm sinking into the cushion a little more. Kakarot’s face was relaxed and open, and the usual dopey grin was replaced with something more contained, more intense than he was used to. He was not used to being on this end of Kakarot and he made no attempt to counter him.

What was he doing一

The softening of his face and the way he moved a little closer made Vegeta’s hands grip the controller tighter than he realized and he felt the plastic strain in his hands, but he could barely function. Faced with this directly, something he was not prepared for, he was paralyzed and the foolish part of his brain hiked over the cautious half, desperate to see where he was going with this. The idiot said he didn’t do this一

So what the fuck was he about to一

Unless he really was just messing with him all along and Vegeta was gullible enough to believe it. Kakarot was a special kind of stupid and Chi Chi struck him as a saint enough...But his face was so close that he was refusing to believe this was an accidental invasion of space. His heart thumped so hard that he was afraid that Kakarot would actually hear it. He watched him with some inward alarm, seeing his normally bright, wide eyes looking half-lidded and focused; and he held his damn breath.

“Daaaaaaaaad一!” The door slammed open, and instantly the moment shattered and Kakarot moved away like he’d been actually hit by something. The breath he’d held released and he wasn’t sure if the internal shrieking he was experiencing was from relief or intense frustration. Half of him didn’t want to deal with the repercussions of what he thought that just was and the other half was punching the first half in the throat and yelling that it just wanted to know what the fuck was actually going on anymore. All of him was having a traumatic experience.

“God damn it, son, what?” He barked, feeling a lump in his throat.

“We’re done!” Trunks yelled, and Goten popped up behind him, bouncing excitedly. “Can we train now?!”

Right. Training. He rubbed his face and did not even spare Kakarot a glance and that was fine, because he could feel Kakarot move away from him and turn to shake himself out. At least this time, it felt like he wasn’t the only one put off by whatever the fuck almost just happened. He found his legs to stand on, turning the game off mindlessly and dumping the controller back on the couch. He needed a moment alone. “Go get ready outside, I’ll meet you there. I’m going to change into training clothes.”

In his usual manner, he didn’t wait for anyone to say anything and the only person who was going to protest or comment at all, was busy apparently thinking too deeply himself. The distant look Vegeta managed to catch in passing spoke volumes, and only served to confuse him further. Just when he thought it was getting easier. He did not have this problem with Bulma, but Bulma bullied him with her feelings. Maybe he just wanted Kakarot to do the damn same.

Maybe you needed to just fucking do it, Kakarot, and give me no room to wonder where you stand.

He almost socked himself in the face on the way out, heading to the bathroom to wash his face and to debate seriously on jumping out of the window and flying away forever.

Chapter Text

Bulma was tinkering with some machine on her desk, pulling it apart and bolting new pieces on一over and over, testing it until each small tweak gave her the result she wanted. Goku couldn’t tell the difference each time, he barely understood what she was doing to begin with, but he wasn’t there to learn about her work with machines, none of that stuff really interested him and he’d never understand it anyway. She was updating his phone and he was waiting on it to finish up. In the meantime, he sat in her chair, crossed legged and watched her.

Sometimes he forgot just how focused Bulma could be when she was into her gadgets. She had the whole table covered with tools and parts; she had every color of wire he could imagine and she knew exactly what to do with them all. She really was smart, he couldn’t help but lean against the edge of the table a little and watch. He had a lot of things to think about and keeping his eyes occupied didn’t take much effort while his brain ticked away. All of those things came around to Vegeta, of course.

Vegeta had gone to clean up after their strained training session with the boys and he’d escaped to see Bulma about the message his phone had given him. He didn’t know what to do with it, but she said it was a simple fix and she took it from him and said he couldn’t use it for a while. He didn’t have the chance to protest, or really, didn’t want to explain why he would want to protest. In a strange way, communicating with Vegeta was easier when he could shoot him a message and let him take his time to answer and he’d almost decided to send him one in an attempt to gauge his mood. There was absolutely no way that Vegeta didn’t see what he was leaning toward before the boys walked in.

The first time, in the time chamber, even he didn’t really catch himself; but he knew exactly where he was going with it the second time. Vegeta was smarter than he was, he would have seen it too. The deepening urge to rub his face was pushed back down by the reminder that Bulma was there and he didn’t want to draw any attention to just how displaced he was. Vegeta didn’t punch him out of the room, so he was led to believe he wasn’t mad at him for it, but maybe he was taken by surprise. But even when the surprise wore off, he still hadn’t shown any signs of anger.

The only real thing he sensed was confusion, but the problem was he couldn’t identify whose confusion it was, his or Vegeta’s. They were likely both experiencing the same similar problem that came from the extremely recent fusion into Vegito again. The flickering hum of each other’s ki didn’t adequately tell what emotions were showing, because it was difficult to tell whose was whose when they were on the same wavelength. Sorting out what feelings went where was more pressing, he guessed, than being angry about it. Even Vegeta seemed to get that.

Goku had to commend the kids for their willingness to fuse so often, but he thought maybe it was because they were so young and didn’t really butt heads all that much, that they were able to do it so easily without the recoil. After defusing with Vegeta, Goku felt like he was threaded to Vegeta for a long time. He didn’t know how Vegeta felt about it, because Vegeta never once spoke about the fusion with him; of course, he never mentioned it either. He wondered, but it did no real good to bring it up, it wasn’t something that would likely happen again. It only happened out of sheer desperation anyway.

He sort of liked the sensation, but at the same time, the fusion wasn’t one he would ever want to depend on it. It didn’t suit either of them. It just left him a lot more focused on thoughts that had been boiling slower before. He found himself wanting to know Vegeta’s thoughts more than ever. If there were any lines left drawn between them, he was going to take his foot and snub them out. It could damage a lot of things between them if he was too rash. But some part of him said to jump. He almost did, but the kids ruined it.

A short mumble to himself and he shifted, eyes focusing and coming to realize that Bulma had leaned over and was watching him. Her large eyes were so close to his face that he almost jumped back and swallowed his tongue. “B...Bulma一”

“Wow, Goku. I had almost thought you actually fell asleep for a minute there. I said your name twice,” she said, standing back up with a little tilt to her head.

“...Ah...whoops, all this stuff just can’t keep my interest, sorry Bulma,” he feigned, knowing she shouldn’t be offended by that. He was very transparent about what he was and wasn’t interested in. Goku didn’t have the patience required to learn much more than his phone when it came to technology and he still bothered his friends and family about some of its basic functions. He’s just figured out how to use video on it; that probably terrified everyone enough as it was.

“Looked like you had a little more going on in there than just being bored, Goku.” She didn’t accuse him, exactly, but she definitely indicated that she knew he wasn’t free from heavy thoughts. Goku was simple, not empty. “I’m not gonna make you talk about it, because it’s definitely not my conversation, but you know I’m here for you if you need me.”

He debated on opening up and spilling it all out to her, but that felt wrong. The weird way it twisted was actually not on his behalf and that felt like another result of Vegeta’s feelings blending into his own as a result of fusion. To tell her about anything he felt before he confronted it with the actual subject matter, felt like going behind his back. If he confided in her about his thoughts toward Vegeta, before going to Vegeta, he suspected the saiyan would take that like a betrayal. Maybe not literally; but at some level. Face me like a man, Kakarot, he could hear him say.

Backing down to a challenge with Vegeta was out of the question. But the challenge between the two of them had been to see who was the most stubborn between them, it seemed.

“It’s nothin’. Just the usual stuff,” Goku finally answered her, sitting back and resting his hands on his knees. Bulma watched him with a look in her eye that made Goku feel a little see-through. She was smart, he hadn’t forgotten, but he was hoping she wasn’t going to call him out on it. No such luck with Bulma.

“The usual with you two lately has been a lot less usual than it used to be, you know. Don’t think we don’t see it.” Goku made a face, some amalgamation of a smile and a nervous grimace. She didn’t mean it in a bad way though, because her chiding tone turned into a teasing one and she poked his cheek with a finger. “Pick a better place than in the living room, next time.”

He didn’t get what she meant and he tilted his head at her. His brain clicked on and processed the afternoon to piece together what she may have been referring to. All they had been doing was playing video games. They had been sitting a little close, maybe. But then一. His eyes widened when he realized what she was suggesting. Neither of them had eyes in the back of their heads and Bulma wouldn’t necessarily announce herself. He opened his mouth to make a sound at her, any sound, but nothing came out. The horrible probability that Bulma had photographic evidence occurred to him and if Vegeta found out…

“I have no idea what you mean…” He tried, but it was weak. His expression made it very apparent he already lost the fight.

“Goku, don’t make me clarify it. You and I both know what I’m talking about, but it’s fine. Just remember, the kids could have walked in at any point. Get it worked out with yourselves first, before you blow it up. It’ll make it much easier on you both, you got me?”

He knew the point she was making and she was right. The timing was bad, but also fortunate in its own way. “Yeah, I got you, Bulma. Thanks.” He swallowed thickly, but relaxed a bit. Though he hadn’t actually said anything of meaning, he felt a little better and he had a better idea of what he wanted to do about it. It was about whether or not he could meet that ground with Vegeta. One way or another, he was going to find out. Skirting around the weird stand-off they were doing wasn’t helping them anymore.

“Good.” A soft beep behind her took her attention and Goku followed the movement. She gathered up his phone and tinkered around with it some more. It appeared that it was done with its updates, or at least she was working on it. He was ready to have it back, at least then he could find out where Vegeta went. He wasn’t going to pop up in front of him without warning, just in case he was in a sour mood. His moods could polarize very quickly. He didn’t feel anything negative coming off him, but the slushie of post-fusion emotions made it more complex. Bulma was unaware of all those details, but somehow, she seemed to just know they were going through an ordeal anyway. She turned toward him and presented his phone, “all ready for you Goku.”

“All right!” He reached out for it and turned the screen on, glad to see the annoying message gone and his screens all clear again.

“Every now and then, you need to clear it out, or bring it back to me and let me do it for you. I know that’s not your thing. Gohan probably could. But I’d understand if you didn’t want him to look through your hundreds of selfies you send to Vegeta. He might question that a little bit,” she teased and Goku found his face getting a little warm. He hadn’t considered that she would noticed how often he sent pictures to Vegeta, but he’d suspected that wasn’t much of a secret...but the quantity probably was a little absurd. He really just did it to irritate Vegeta.

“Okay,” he pouted a little, “but I’m not deleting everything….”

“You don’t have to delete everything. I don’t think you need the pages and pages of cat pictures you’ve saved either, though… Honestly, half of your photo gallery is silly selfies and the other half is pictures of cats you’ve saved off the internet. You two meatheads brawl like wild animals, battle the most dangerous things in the universe...and shitpost pictures of cute animals back and forth in your free time? Sometimes, I don’t know about you two…” She shook her head and shooed him lazily. “Go take care of your business. Chi Chi told me that she’s going to stay with Videl and the baby tonight, so you can camp out here.”

Goku could tell by that look in her eyes that Bulma had given Chi Chi the exact play-by-play of what she may have seen and he wanted to put his hand to his face in dismay. That definitely meant there was photographical evidence. Somewhere. That was not something he could focus on, though. He didn’t think they would use it against him, so he let that one go, shoving it in the back of his mind and letting it float off where most things went that were not worth worrying about it. Vegeta did the worrying, not him. Or at least he’d rather just let Vegeta do the worrying. It was easier that way; but he was worrying about some things. All of them related to Vegeta.

He was going to sort them out.

“Thanks a bunch, Bulma,” he slipped his phone into his pocket and stood. Instead of teleporting out of the room, he decided he was going to wander back out and find the boys. Dinner was likely calling them all and after that, he would find a time to actually talk to Vegeta and see whether or not he could make or break the boundary that they’d been sitting on. If nothing else, at least it would give him an idea of how Vegeta viewed it. Because it was hard to figure everything out from just his end and Vegeta didn’t talk with words at all. He opened up so much more than before, but how much did that equate to?

Guess I’ll find out.

Chapter Text

Of all things to dwell on—of all reasons to be stuck on a thought and have it eat at him in the obsessive way that things usually clung to his mind; he found himself almost exasperated that the one that he was battling with this time was actually a direct result of his lack of neurotic overthinking. Yes, a lack of it. His brow furrowed and he stared into the fabric in his lap and tried to focus on it and tried not to dwell on the fact that he was dwelling about his lack of dwelling and just how stupidly contrived he’d gotten about the whole damn scenario. At least before, he knew he was relatively normal when he was just short of having a meltdown over every little thing involving Kakarot.

He was not having a meltdown at that moment and that was causing him to have a meltdown at his lack of a meltdown, and he didn’t feel the three or four stabs of a needle into his opposite fingers. I don’t need those fingers anyway, he grumbled to himself and continued to blindly stab the threaded needle back through the sleeve and hope for the best. He was so deep in his wild ride of thought that he didn’t hope to come down from that roller coaster, for fear of the outcome. Am I even tall enough to be on this ride? He twitched to himself and ground his teeth. That thought actually ran through his mind and he was mad about how not angry he was about it.

I would laugh at my own self inflicted short joke if I had a sense of humor at all, he snarled inwardly with a strange sense of remorse at the death of his apparent trauma over his feelings. It left him with a strangely embittered sense of relief. Bitter, in that he was just never not going to be a sour piece of shit, apparently. Kakarot, the shining beacon of hope and nicestuff, was not enough to wash off all his jadedness; but his puppylike way of pushing into his boundaries had made it so hard to push back that the resistance snapped at some point. He had unknowingly led Vegeta right up to the door of acceptance, shoved him through it and left him there to figure out he’d already passed the threshold.

And now the Saiyan Prince was mad about that. Not mad about the thoughts that crossed his mind the last time he looked Kakarot in the damn face before the kids burst into the room. Not mad about Kakarot being that bold to begin with—because he knew where that was going. And not mad because he was almost dragged around the whole time with very little control over his feelings and the direction of his so called rivalry. He was mad because he wasn’t mad about those things. He was mad because he didn’t have the energy to be mad about them anymore. He was mad because he’d left the room after the kids walked in and nearly wanted to hit something because he felt so close to a goddamn answer. He was mad because it was cut short.

Like being at the finish line and losing his legs. Or the goal line kept moving. Or the questions kept changing when he almost had the answer on his tongue. It was not supposed to be so complicated, but it became that way. Kakarot made it that way. Kakarot wanted to be close to him and he didn’t fight him nearly as hard as he should have. But maybe he didn’t want to at some point.

His whole face soured and his eyes narrowed; he could have torn the sleeve in his hand and thrown the whole piece of fabric like confetti if he let his emotions bubble out. Of course he wanted to fight him, that’s all he ever wanted to do. Right? RIGHT? The deepening growl in his chest made it all that much harder to pretend he still thought it was that simple; or even pretend that he could still cling to denial. Denial was long gone and that realization hit him harder than any fist ever had. Majin Buu had nothing on the reality bitch slap that came up and clocked him from his blind spot.

The problem was simply that Vegeta didn’t know what the hell to do with that. It took him years even partially function as a social creature in a family setting and he wasn’t even very good at that, honestly. Expression and feelings were everyone else’s business and he was there to let them do it for him. Or so he liked to pass it off that way. If he didn’t have to do it, then he had an excuse for not knowing what the hell he was doing. Bulma knew him well enough that she gave him a pass if he at least tried. Kakarot was happier than a puppy with a stick if Vegeta showed even a little bit of tolerance, let alone...emotion.

All of his emotion was best expressed in the moment, in fury. It wasn’t gentle in the stupid way Kakarot’s was or with the calm intensity. But he wasn’t angry enough to express anything. He wasn’t angry about it. Confused and filled with a ton of questions, yes. Explosive enough to take him by the face, throw him around and yell it all out? No.

What do I do with this…?

He paused and just stared down at nothing, having forgotten what he was doing. He wasn’t really sure if he was working on the project as a therapy or as a desperate claw at distraction to hide from his compulsive need to zero himself in on anything he could find to punish himself with. He had nothing else to think about until his brain folded in on itself; why not begin a full scale internal debate on the merits of why or why not he should be angry about not being angry about losing a long, hard fought battle with himself and his stupid feelings. Obviously this hobby was no better of a distraction than beating himself up in the gravity room, but at least this one didn’t end in broken bones and Kakarot jumping in with his dumb worried expressions.

It offered him no relief, but he at it offered him the platform to feign being completely unbothered by anything. Saving face was the last thing he had, even if it was thinner than the orange thread that he was attempting to pull through a ripped sleeve of the same color. Kakarot’s stupid color. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath and silently wished to be colorblind for a few minutes. No such luck. He stared back down at the bright color in his hands and resisted the temptation to throw it.

This is what brain damage feels like. I’ve actually lost enough brain cells being around him that this is what I’ve devolved into. I don’t even know what I’m angry about, but it’s Kakarot’s fault.

His teeth ground together and he only calmed down when he heard a soft mewing by his ear. Little paws stepped onto his shoulder and he turned his head to the little black cat that butted faces with his. Instantly, he deflated and his shoulders lost some of the tension he didn’t realize he’d been storing. He was just easily pulled into a black hole of thought and if something didn’t drag him back out, he could have been there forever. Which was all that much more ridiculous, when he didn’t even really know what he was feeling so much anxiety over.

Don’t you fucking lie to yourself, you know exactly what.

Inner Bulma, shut up.

I’m not Bulma.

That makes this even worse, shut up—

“Vegeta, dear? Are you alright?” A soft, airy voice crashed his train of thought and he couldn’t even pick up the wreckage before he responded; his instinct was to snarl and his head flicked over to do just that, face scrunched into the most unpleasant growl he could muster. But that mask dropped quickly once it hit his brain that it was Bulma’s mother; appearing as unoffended as ever by his extremely sour countenance. He could have snarled outright and he felt like she would have patiently waited for him to be done before asking him what was wrong. She dissolved his coarse attitude with her willingness to sit him out and he eventually deflated completely and sank back into couch, letting go of the piece of fabric for the time being.

He looked up to Bulma’s pleasant mother, shrugging briefly. He didn’t have to actually say anything to answer her and he appreciated that about her. Very little was required for her to accept it as a response, but she filled in blanks appropriately. Initially, Vegeta thought that Bulma’s mom was a little... absent, but years of mingling with his wife’s family made him realize she was much sharper than she let on.

“You just seemed out of tune. You don’t usually miss so many stitches and you didn’t eat much at dinner...can I get you anything?” Her voice should have been annoying一beyond doting一but he didn’t find himself nearly as irritated by it as he should have been. She had been the first person on this wretched Earth to actually crash his resistance, he realized. He fought with Bulma for a considerable amount of time, just for the sake of it, but her mother never had to lift a finger or raise her voice.

“No...I’m fine,” he finally answered with words, though he felt like it was only partially true. Fine was relative. Physically nothing was amiss and he had no real issues outside of the big idiot that was somewhere with the kids within the confines of his home一apparently spending the night. Unfortunately, that big idiot was a big enough issue all by itself, but only because he didn’t know how to handle it like a rational damn adult.

Panchy seemed to catch on to his half-truth and took a seat beside him. He didn’t move and she just pulled the orange fabric from his lap, looking over the mess he’d made while he was inwardly combatting with himself. Without another word about it, she started to unravel some of his poorly aimed threads to give him a fresh start. She knew he was impatient and would more likely just rip the whole sleeve again than unthread it. This was why training had always been his chosen outlet, because violence was easier. Being gentle was not.

However, watching her fingers move and easily pull the messy stitches back apart served to calm him marginally. The frustration of starting over was less than the frustration of facing his mistakes, undoing it, and then redoing it the right way. In a way, it reflected way too many of his actions一rather inactions一lately and he found himself just watching her for a while. The black cat perched on his shoulder and he rested his elbow against the back of the couch, pulling his legs up and crossing them.

“Isn’t this Goku’s shirt?” She asked, after she freed the last of the loose thread and shook the shirt out to fold it across her lap. It was far too large for him and much too colorful.

“I don’t have any more shirts to mend,” he mumbled, “and he tore it in training because of the boys.”

“I see,” she seemed to think on it for a moment before she, leaned over to the table to return the needle to its kit. Vegeta didn’t argue, because he knew he was done for the time being. His therapy craft was only successfully putting piercings in his fingers, but at least Panchy caught him in time to stop him from continuing until he ended up destroying the stupid cloth. “When you’re feeling a little better, Vegeta, I can always teach you how to make new things.”

“Woman, I think you just want to make me into a housewife, too, so you aren’t lonely,” he accused, but she didn’t offer any protest, she just giggled and leaned to pet the cat.

“Whether or not that’s true,” she said, as if glossing over it entirely before continuing, “I would happily help you, dear. I think you’d make a fine tailor.”

“Tch,” Vegeta leaned against his knuckles, propped against the backrest on his elbow. She was so cheery that even Kakarot wouldn’t be able to compete with that. “I’m not looking for a career in it.”

“Perhaps not, but I would absolutely support you if you wanted to,” she brazenly took her hands to his face and framed his cheeks in her palms. He let her and barely managed to feign a scowl in response. This woman… “Well, I’m going to go check up on the boys. They were washing up, last I knew. Should I send Goku to you?”

Her question struck him and he actually straightened off his arm and sat up a bit. He wasn’t expecting her to ask him that and he realized that her chatter wasn’t as unintentioned as he assumed it was. She knew he was out of sorts, but he hadn’t had any reason to believe she knew why. If anything, she really shouldn’t know why, because that would look very bad on behalf of his relationship with her daughter一but it never occurred to him before that Bulma probably told her mother all sorts of things that he didn’t consider she might have. He wasn’t going to volunteer a damn thing, but he was going to assume everything from then on.

He and Kakarot had barely spoken at dinner and he was content to let him go with the kids afterwards so he could think about things, but it hadn’t helped. At the rate he was going, thinking on his own wasn’t going to help anymore. Begrudgingly, he knew he had to actually confront it. It’s what he wanted, right? That was the basis of his whole bout of self bludgeoning that session. Well, really, he didn’t want to confront it; he wanted it shoved down his throat in a way he couldn’t functionally object; Bulma style, really. It’s what she did. It’s what he expected Kakarot to do.

Without any interruptions, maybe that’s what he would do.

If not, then he would have to corner him. The very thought of it made him want to start picking fights with himself again, but he just steeled his expression and focused his attention back to Bulma’s mother. “Yes, tell him to seek me out, he’ll know where I am.”

“Okay, dear. If you need anything, don’t you hesitate to ask.” She kissed his forehead, in the motherly way that she seemed to behave with him when no one else was looking, and he just turned his face away a little.

“Hey…” He started, but she just smiled at him.

“I won’t tell anyone,” she poked his cheek and put a finger over her lips, as if swearing to secrecy. Good woman.

“If you ever get tired of this planet, let me know.” Her bubbly laughter helped ease down the twisting in his stomach and he settled back down to watch her meander back out of the room. She set the folded up shirt on the table when she went and he stood up after to grab it, and the rest of the supplies, to tuck them away for another time一when he would be more focused. Kakarot was dumb enough to not ask where his clothing went, he could fix it later.

For the time being, he made his way to the roof. Kakarot could come to him easily enough and he knew that there would be no chance for distraction up there. It was getting dark outside and quiet enough, he had a little more time to think while he waited. This time at least it didn’t feel like a punishment.

Chapter Text

Closing his eyes, Goku found himself reaching out for the familiar pulse of ki. It was constant, thrumming, as if waiting for him. He knew it was waiting for him; Bulma’s mother told him as much. He didn’t immediately run off, though he wanted to jump up and bounce after him. The boys had his attention at that moment and he didn’t want to just brush them off, even if he wasn’t entirely paying attention. Neither of them seemed to care if they had to repeat themselves a time or two while getting ready for bed; they weren’t talking about anything that needed his undivided attention apparently. Goten knew that his father had a tendency to wander off anyway. At least that’s what he heard him tell Trunks. His son knew him well, he had to admit.

It wasn’t that he didn’t have any interest in what the boys were doing, it was simply that there was a lot more going on in his head than he was accustomed to. The boys didn’t need to know that, so he wasn’t about to correct his son about his absent mindedness. Sometimes his quirky traits played to his benefit in unforeseen ways. He could ease away from them, maintaining his goofy exterior and then focus on what was really fighting for his attention. Vegeta.

Even when he wasn’t present, he was demanding. Boy, he didn’t relent at all. Goku just smiled, because he liked that about Vegeta. It was one of his favorite things. Vegeta never let him relax, in one way or another. This time, he could feel it was entirely different. He could feel it in the way his ki was level and drawing; pulling him to his location. Vegeta didn’t generally do that intentionally. The times he did, had been in a fury and Goku had responded to its urgency. This wasn’t that level of untamed, however. It was collected and telling him that he was there, come face me.

Stepping outside, Goku looked around. Vegeta was outside, he knew that much. He followed his aura and it brought him into the open air. He could have teleported right to him, but he found himself less inclined to break the barrier that way. He wanted to come to him in a way he could see his approach. Maybe he was preparing himself, maybe he was letting Vegeta sweat it out by having to see him first. Goku wasn’t sure. Thinking about it, instead taking advantage of the moment, made this much harder. Vegeta meant a lot to him, he had been so close to conveying that without the difficulty of plotting over it. That thinking business wasn’t really his strongest skill and snatching up a moment would have been so much simpler. But Vegeta wasn’t simple and by default, nothing involving him could be either.

That was fine. Goku could be simple for them both.

He took a deep breath, letting the air breathe through his clothes for a moment. Vegeta was close, he could feel him, but he couldn’t see him immediately and he folded his arms while he scanned the area. It wasn’t like he would be hiding, so that really only left for Goku to look up. He couldn’t see Vegeta from the ground, but he could see a balcony door open and it was enough of a clue for him. No one else was on the balcony and there was no light on; and Goku could feel him close enough to touch from where he was standing. Just a little higher.

Without making any word of it, Goku hopped up on the balcony, briefly checking to make sure no one was actually outside after all—even though he knew there was no one outside the building but he and Vegeta. He quietly shut the door. He wasn’t entirely sure why he felt it was important to shut the door, but he made sure it was closed before he stepped away. It felt like he was blocking out the next wedge; he was just shy of sticking a balcony chair in front of the door while he was at it, but the likeliness of anyone coming after them on the roof was just too small. Maybe he was stalling, knowing that Vegeta was just above him and there was no escape. There was absolutely no waving this one off and playing dumb. Vegeta was smart enough to know that Goku wasn’t as stupid as he was just really simplistic. No one takes someone by the face and leans in and then pretends it didn’t mean anything.

Maybe that wasn’t what they would confront...maybe Vegeta was squaring off with him to stubbornly back him into a corner where they could both pretend it was a fluke. Or maybe Goku was spending too much time with Vegeta after all, if his sense of denial was starting to rub off on him in such a way. No. Vegeta would have been much more prickly, if that was the case. This aura Goku felt, while he climbed up the ladder on the side of the building, told him that Vegeta was at a very calm, level state. He was approachable and for some reason, that made Vegeta terrifying in his own way. Goku knew what he was getting when Vegeta was fired up; but here he was, seemingly peaceful under a big blanket of dark sky above them.

Goku stood once he reached the top of the ladder and from his position, he could see Vegeta. He wasn’t that far from the edge, but he was high enough on the slope that Goku still had to climb up a bit to reach him. A slight movement from the seated man indicated that his approach was noticed and that brought an unusually nervous turn in his gut; one he didn’t usually have with Vegeta, but he pushed it away and plastered on a big smile. Approaching him was an art and Goku—while not necessarily an artist—was masterful at handling the craft of Vegeta. Placing a deceptively at-ease grin on his face usually detracted him from taking note of his subliminal manipulation.

“So there you are,” he started, as if he didn’t know he was there when he began his climb. Vegeta acted like he was surprised to see him, with a feigned raised brow and head tilted; though he clearly was not, judging by his body language. He wandered over until he was standing right beside him.

“Sit,” Vegeta grumbled at him, turning his attention off and staring away into the distance. The sun was long gone; city lights and overhanging stars were all that were left to light up the area around them.

Without much protest, Goku complied. Sometimes, he combatted Vegeta for the hell of it—the friction of going against him was sometimes a driving force for both of them, he felt—but at that moment, like there was something much less antagonistic in place. It did nothing to stop the funny twisting in his gut; actually, only made it much worse. However, he wasn’t one to back down once he was faced with a difficult wall and no wall was more difficult than the wall of Vegeta.

Unfortunately, this time, he didn’t know where to begin taking on that wall. Vegeta had the advantage, or at least he would have, if Vegeta was any better at it than he was. The funny feeling he had only persisted because he had time to think about it and thinking just wasn’t his stronger point. Vegeta’s weakness was thinking too much and Goku knew he, too, had plenty of time to do that. They’d crippled themselves before they even got to the battlefield.

“Everything alright?” Goku tried, rubbing his neck and glancing to his side. He didn’t sit too close, for fear to breaking Vegeta’s personal bubble, but he was close enough to reach out and touch him if he needed to. Not that he would need to, but the distance was short and he could see the finer details of his expressions—the way his mouth twitched in response, even just slightly.

“Hn,” was the short response, but that was more than Goku was initially expecting. He expected nothing for a while, because Vegeta had tendencies to ignore his questions outright at times; even though he was told to come find him. That gave Goku the impression that Vegeta was inviting him, but he knew that his mind could change moment by moment. “I was thinking,” he finally continued after a moment, and his tone made Goku itch to fidget—though he managed to fight that urge back down.

“Yeah, what about?” Their conversation was barely a conversation, but it was stiff and he could tell that Vegeta was just as uncomfortable as he was. Really, he wasn’t even sure why he was so uncomfortable. It wasn’t like him to not just come out and say what he was thinking, but the delicate nature of this balancing act with Vegeta had him tiptoeing in such a way that he stiffly responded when prompted and waited for his cues. This was almost unbearable and he wished he’d had a much less scripted opportunity to break the barrier between them—whatever it was.

He never had the chance to gauge Vegeta’s mood after getting his phone back and so he found himself wondering the direction of this tone, anxiously.

“This nonsense,” he leaned forward, resting his arms against his bent knees. He didn’t clarify exactly what he meant and for once, Goku knew exactly what he meant by it. He just pretended that he didn’t. It was easier to pretend than it was to know and have to go right into dealing with it. Roundabout methods provided him with a little more chance to figure him out.

“I thought everything was going pretty okay?” He played it off, waiting for the inevitable scowl he would get. But what he got instead was a tired, unimpressed exhale and a repressed visual representation of annoyance.

“Kakarot, how stupid do you think I am?”

Right to the point, evidently, and Goku knew that there was no beating around the bush if Vegeta was willing to smack right into it. “I don’t think you’re stupid.” I just don’t know what to say this time and I’m not really used to that.

“You must think I am, if you keep bullshitting me,” he accused and turned on him a little, giving him the flattest look. Goku couldn’t help but kinda grin awkwardly back at him. He wasn’t intending to give him any false front, but treading that fine line wasn’t always easy.

“I’m not bullshitting you, I just—”

“Can it, Kakarot. You are a thorn in my side and continue to be so, persistently. I try to make you go away, and you continue to bully me for attention.” He rubbed his temple, as if he was exasperated, but Vegeta didn’t really have the tone in his voice that suggested he was really as distressed as he acted. “But I suppose you could be worse,” he mumbled and turned his face away. Goku almost didn’t catch it and it made him doubletake, sitting forward and trying to catch his attention back in that moment. Vegeta adamantly kept turned away, however.

“...Vegeta?” He braved, scooting a little bit closer.

Vegeta just brushed him off even more and his shoulders tensed. Goku could feel him getting defensive, but his curiosity was so high that he didn’t move away—even when he knew he really should. Nothing was being addressed directly, but it was there; wide open there between the lines. Goku relaxed his clenched fists, realizing his anticipation was starting to get to him. Vegeta had a way of making everything sound like a positive thing, waiting for the “but…” to follow. This was a perfect reason why he much preferred to take opportunities and snatch them without thinking about the consequences.

“A lot of things I’ve thought about you...And felt about you, Kakarot…” He paused, and Goku felt like he couldn’t even breathe for hearing Vegeta talk this way. It was alien and he was entranced by it, so much so, that he was almost petrified in place by the passiveness in his voice. “My years of thinking less of you...and thinking you were an annoyance. Wanting nothing to do with you….”

Goku swallowed and his heart started to riot a little, wondering what traumatic experience was going on outside. He wasn’t even sure, actually. This wasn’t a battle he was used to and Vegeta seemed to be entirely unaware of it. This kind of Vegeta was more alien than any kind of Vegeta he’d ever seen and he didn’t even move or attempt a response. He must have looked stupid, stupid enough for Vegeta to react and Goku had no chance to save himself.

“—And I meant every damn thought I ever had—you fucking buffoon—” Vegeta’s voice suddenly boomed and he found a sudden fist colliding into the side of his head.

He fumbled and rolled, without any grace and no ability to catch himself before he slid right off from the curved roof and took a dive over the edge of the building; skidding across the smooth metal surface and heading right back down into the balcony just below. The loud crash of the chairs under him brought him right back into reality and a loud yelp erupted from him.

“—OW...Vegeta—what the hell—” He whined, yelling up to him when his brain caught up with the sensations his body experienced. The broken chair under him didn’t have a hope in the world and his poor spine protested even harder at the abuse. He at least didn’t roll off the whole building; though by then he could have caught himself before hitting the ground. He was just so taken back by the sudden assault that he didn’t have time to react. Leave it to Vegeta. He clamored out of the wreckage, a little fluffed and ready to throw a fist back at him. He looked up to climb back on to the roof and he saw Vegeta leaning over the edge, looking down at him.

“What the actual hell, Kakarot, you were supposed to fucking dodge that—” He yelled at him and Vegeta looked as startled about it as Goku felt. It was an odd reaction for them both, but the weird atmosphere had them both acting extra stupid, apparently.

“How was I supposed to know you were going to clobber me, you jerk?!” He barked back, starting up the ladder quickly. Vegeta sat back as he closed the distance swiftly; forced to by the intensity at which he shoved his way back up. The defensive position he took indicated a fight and Goku was ready to go, immediately stirred by a sucker punch to the head. Even as Vegeta was balling up his fist to punch him back down for being persistent, Goku was coming right back into his personal space—this time, his bubble be damned.

Neither of them could really do the quiet talk under the stars over such a strained topic and it was only a matter of time before the fight broke out over it, but he really hadn’t anticipated it would be such a cheap shot. Vegeta looked like he hadn’t expected to cheapshot him either, but once he’d done it, he intended to own it.

“You have the nerve to come into my goddamn life, Kakarot—” Vegeta’s voice never completed any syllable beyond that. Despite his half hearted, shell shocked attempt to swing his fist at him twice, once Goku closed the space, Vegeta lost his conviction and the large hand that closed around his wrist stopped him in his place. His fist never made contact. He never stood a chance the moment Goku made it back on the roof.

And it actually was for a lack of trying, because the attempt stopped the instant Goku’s other hand came up and took him by the chin—fingers digging into his jaw and forcing him closer. This was the territory that Goku could work with. Take it by the moment, as it presented itself. He didn’t know how to do it any other way, because he wasn’t that much of a thinker and he didn’t know how to convey things to a person who was. Vegeta was a different type of person, but that didn’t make it impossible. It just made it a much bigger gamble if he was wrong in his method.

But Goku planted his foot firmly over that line and smashed it into the ground on the other side. Vegeta opened the door and Goku jumped through it, whether he wanted him to or not. If he was wrong, then he was prepared for the fight that was about to happen afterward. Cleaning up the mess afterwards was how he operated, however, and he pulled Vegeta right to him and brought his mouth right to his. Unapologetically, Goku took him by the face and smashed the barrier so hard that he was sure they could feel it in the other universe.

Chapter Text

Taking swings at Kakarot was—by no means—a strange concept to Vegeta, but even he had been taken back by the impulse that came over him in that moment; hitting him like lightning. Words were tumbling out of his mouth and his brain panicked alongside them, running through the foreign minefield and defaulting to its best defense mechanism. Hit him, is what it told his body and he hadn’t been present enough to reel it back before he’d done just that. Kakarot’s face was open, and he was vulnerable and not prepared for the assault of Vegeta’s fist into the side of his head. How could he be? Vegeta himself wasn’t even prepared for it. He barely registered the whole event before he was watching the clown skidding back and scrambling to not lose his balance horribly.

He’d failed his endeavor and Vegeta watched him just slide in a messy heap right over the side, listening for the loud crash from below. The sound jarred him from his self made coma and he jumped up from his spot and leaned over the edge to yell at him in defense of himself. Why didn’t you dodge me assaulting you?! He accused him, even though he didn’t even understand why he resorted to that to begin with. It just happened. Words turned into a jolt response and it was all he could do. What was the alternative? Sit there and share his feelings—?

Actually yes, that was the goal, fool. But that goal was trounced by Vegeta’s inbuilt ability to sabotage his own efforts with minimal effort. He swung and Kakarot plunged over the side and he could feel the churning of his ki. Suddenly, the gentle, curious hum that Kakarot had, was flared up and combative and he had himself to blame for it. Not that he wasn’t responding just the same way. Even though he didn’t plan on socking the fool in the face, he was more than ready to do it again just to bandage the trauma of the whole exchange. They were getting nowhere and he knew better than to expect any compliance from himself on the matter. It wasn’t Kakarot’s fault.

It wasn’t Kakarot’s fault at all, and that sunk in at the worst time. He was detrimental to sorting out his own overthinking and when he had the opportunity, he took his fist and shoved it into it without remorse. This was precisely why he needed to be cornered; why he needed to have his moments of confession—or as close to confession as he got—done in the heat of the moment. Because if he had even the faintest of openings to recant, apparently he would do so at all costs; enough to make him react like he’d been struck suddenly with a desperate impulse to sucker punch Kakarot right off the roof.

Kakarot came back up the side and the fight wasn’t one sided this time. Kakarot, once he was made aware of Vegeta’s intent, was very much prepared for him and his prickliness. He had a good footing and no intention of going back down once he came up to get into his face. Vegeta could see the defense line and he made an attempt, but it was weak, even by his own inward admission. Despite the outward growl, the balled fist he tried to throw, and the brief struggle; he was all but watching in third person as the big idiot closed in on him and shut him down.

He may as well have snatched the breath out of him by taking him by the face and pulling him so close. He didn’t get to back out or have distraction save him this time and the months of playing games were over the moment Kakarot landed his foot on the other side. It didn’t answer a single damn question to Vegeta’s paralyzed mind—it actually only served to ask about a hundred thousand more in the seconds he watched the man who somehow managed to fill his entire life in the most irritating ways, continue fill another moment in his life to capacity.

Protests he could have made, should have made, were vaporized within the instant. Kakarot’s face was close to his and he didn’t do a damn thing to intervene. He expected his heart to stop, traumatized by the moment and by what he was letting take place. But it didn’t. He expected anger to follow, for allowing weakness to seep in through the cracks in his armor. But it didn’t. He expected to recoil and attempt to fight him the moment his mouth touched his. But it didn’t.

Instead he got a wash of relief.

Hours, days, weeks of agonizing over the tiniest details rushed back through in a matter of a moment and he forgot them all. Each insignificant factor that he’d combed over until they became personal battles were lost, one by one and Kakarot stamped his win down on them without effort. Kakarot didn’t seem to notice the blackout he seemed to have found himself in as it seemed like it was a mutually shared sensation, accompanied by a prickling at the back of his neck and a spreading warmth in his chest that seemed to crawl upward to his face.

The full system meltdown that took place lasted long enough for him to run short of his breath, breaking contact with Kakarot only when the fool tilted his head to take a breath, resting his forehead against his. Only then did his brain start to turn itself back on and the instincts within him start to systematically switch back on. He determined he wasn’t broken after all, just taken by surprise. The immediate reaction, his inbuilt instincts, to shove Kakarot back off the roof hit him like a sack of bricks; but he didn’t react on it. He couldn’t. Still somehow struck, maybe just in awe of his audacity, or maybe just complacent for a moment, finally having a picture made a little clearer.

There’s no wondering left, it was made pretty clear.

Kakarot’s arm twisted to wrap around him, bracing the awkward position they had—with Kararot still halfway on the roof, one foot still far down over the side, making him have to stretch to meet him. His attempt to draw Vegeta closer offered neither of them anything for stability and Kakarot all but had to finish climbing up on the slanted top to not drag Vegeta down. Instead, Vegeta lost his footing and his heel slid off edge of the roof, making him drop backwards down on the metal panels with an alarmed grunt一the big buffoon topped over on him while he braced his hands flat down to skid to a stop before going over the edge. Both of his legs dangled over the side, but he was stopped—flat on his back and Kakarot was weighing him down, but they were both relatively stable after a moment of silence passed.

That moment of silence ended with a quiet snort and then a chuckle and then laughter that bubbled from the body still laying over him without remorse. He tried to be annoyed and hiss at him, but he found himself dry of that mood. All he could manage was a low, gruff chiding, “Kakarot, you clumsy dunce.”

“Whoops,” he just laughed, lifting himself a little bit to settle beside him and hang his legs over the side as well一laying on his back next to him, but turning his head to smile at him.

That stupid smile just made Vegeta put his hand directly over Kakarot’s face to cover it out of reaction and he turned his eyes up to look at the big empty sky and not the face he was hiding from his sight. He was already acknowledging him just by not throwing him off the roof and flying off into space, he didn’t need to stare it in the face too. Kakarot understood that well enough, he realized, because he didn’t force anymore out of him.

Kakarot took the hand on his face in his own hand and held it instead. That was suitable enough for Vegeta, as long as he didn’t make a big deal of it.

He didn’t. Kakarot knew better.

Neither of them said another word. Kakarot didn’t explain himself. Vegeta didn’t want him to. He realized, with Kakarot absently lacing his fidgety fingers through his, that if he’d tried to explain it, then Vegeta might have had a brain aneurysm trying to listen to him collect the words to do it. Every other time Kakarot had spoken in a sentimental way, it made him curl up and roll away.

Maybe he didn’t want to be handed Kakarot’s feelings Bulma style after all.

“Kakarot,” he mumbled after a few more long moments of cricket filled silence.

“Yeah?”

“I’m not sleeping half hanging off the roof. Too early to turn in anyway. Spar before bed?” Kakarot would not turn him down, not when his mood was this light. He could feel the bounciness in his aura.

“Yeah. I could go for a good fisting before bed.” Kakarot pumped his free fist in the air and Vegeta brain slowly unstuck and he processed that statement with a very long moment of delay before he could find a response.

“...I’m sorry, Kakarot what did you just call it?”

“Huh?”

“Kakarot. What did you just say.”

“...A good...fisti一”

“—Never call it that again,” Vegeta cut him off, immediately, rolling over and staring down at him with a serious face. Kakarot, no, that doesn’t mean what you think it means—

“Wait, why? What’s it mean? It doesn’t mean fighting?” Kakarot’s brows turned together and Vegeta realized he had to have learned that phrase from somewhere, with horror, but he shook that off and rubbed his face, not sure he wanted to dig deeper.

“N...no, don’t worry about it. Don’t call it that, just...trust me on that.” He rubbed his face and sat up straighter, glancing over at him to watch him sit up beside him. “Got it?”

“Yeah, I got it. Spar then? Sounds good. Usual spot?”

“Usual spot is fine for me,” Vegeta nodded, content with staying close to home, tossing fists back and forth in the big open field by the pond.

“M’kay,” Kakarot grinned and then leaned right into his face suddenly, “meetcha there,” and he planted an unapologetic kiss right on his mouth before teleporting away, just missing being caught by Vegeta’s fist that flew at him in automatic response. Vegeta was so distracted by other things, he hadn’t even seen it coming and he bowed up and the hissing started.

“Kakarot一you bastard一” Vegeta howled and immediately flew off the roof in a flustered flurry.

Chapter Text

Despite the usual drive to push himself to get up and train harder, Vegeta found himself lying on the floor of the training room—unmoving. The gravity timer had long since clicked off and he recalled setting it to go idle at an hour. So that easily meant he’d been there for an hour. Just prone, with his arms out at his side and staring up at the dome ceiling of the chamber. The gravity hadn’t been set particularly high, only at about one hundred times Earth’s gravity, so he didn’t feel the pressure the same way he did when he pushed himself to the max. He was easily able to lay there and let his mind wander for that hour and think—and apparently not even notice that the gravity released at some point.

There was no doubt, that this was an improvement, at least, in his method of handling his complex thoughts. Had this been prior to his time with Kakarot in the Time Chamber, he would have probably been slamming his skull into the metal body of the enclosure. Pain never stopped the thoughts, however. He knew that then, but it never stopped him. He had a terrible tendency of breaking himself when he didn’t know how to contend with what his mind was forcing on him. He didn’t choose the thoughts he had.

He didn’t make nearly as many decisions as he liked to pretend he did, actually—as distressed as it made him to admit. He didn’t pick how he grew up, obviously. He didn’t pick the people he had to team up with to survive. He didn’t pick where he ended up living. He didn’t really even pick his wife—she absolutely had the upper hand on that one. And he sure as hell didn’t select Kakarot for anything at all, of any kind. But there he was. The dumb bastard that he tried to blatantly murder on arrival, became the still dumb bastard that he let kiss him on the roof of his own damn house.

And yet, that was not what was on his mind.

The absolutely traumatizing event that should be plaguing his mind for possibly the rest of his life, was actually firmly planted somewhere into a comfortable pocket of acceptance. Perhaps the literal years of agonizing over Kakarot’s existence made the whole damn thing easier to accept after it was finally forced on him. Maybe teetering on the edge of seeing it coming for a while had already given him plenty of chances to have those meltdowns. So when the event finally occurred, it wasn’t nearly the debacle he expected.

No, the new plagues on his mind were purely fabrications of his own doing. The logical components of his brain were able to keep him from making a spectacle, out of what was essentially a high powered hallucination that his brain concocted from nonsense that it put together at random. Just like how the dreams about him still being under Frieza’s foot never bothered him anymore. He knew that Frieza was nothing compared to what he and Kakarot could do now. Those occasional dreams only came from somewhere within as remnants of a shattered past that defined him—and therefore, he couldn’t erase. He could accept those. In the same exact manner, he could accept this strange new twist in his recent pattern of dreams.

He’d be lying to say he’d never had a dream or two with the big idiot in it before, because the bastard had been an integral part of his obsession for strength for a long time. Kakarot was an obsession in some fashion and it was only natural that it reflected in his subconscious. The constant competitive edge was softened under the surface, but it was still there. Enough that a dream or two reflecting it shouldn’t be anything unusual. What would be unusual, was exactly what had him sprawled out on the training room floor trying to process his own reaction and file it away into the same mental folder that he did with every dream he had about Frieza.

Unfortunately, he was sitting on the very edge of stability—where taking his thoughts in the wrong direction could actually place him in the position he liked to be in the least. Vulnerable.

The staring contest he was having with the ceiling was not for the fun of it, but rather because closing his eyes meant the visual stimulation would be redirected and his brain would submit its own images to plague him with; the ones that had him waking up in a cold sweat on the couch that he’d dozed on. He’d only taken a short nap. For a dream like that to take such a hold in such a short moment, was putting alarm bells off in a deeper part of his mind. It was those bells that he was trying to stifle.

Logic. That was what he needed. This was just his brain trying to find something else to stress him out with, because gods forbid he have some quiet time in his mind for a little while. It obviously wasn’t enough to finally come to terms with this part of whatever they were calling he and Kakarot—aside from Bulma’s stupid name for them, because he refused. He definitely needed to be attacked from within and have visions thrown at him inspired by deep seated fears that he probably had all along, but was perfectly content to ignore before.

When he’d opened his eyes, panting and grasping at the air, he’d nearly flown off the couch and tracked down the big dunce; an impulse that horrified him and reminded him that personal attachments were dangerous. Kakarot was a personal attachment. That had never been the intent. Bulma hadn’t been an intention either, but she happened too. The startling difference between them, was that Bulma was relatively safer and less likely to die at the hands of someone trying to actively kill her on purpose. Kakarot was consistently a target for people wanting to end him. Hell, he was one of them. Sometimes, he still considered being one of them, when Kakarot was being dumb enough.

The atmosphere he’d slept in had been quiet and his dreams hadn’t been accompanied by any sound. All he could remember of it was visual and some of the details had already faded; but the feeling in his chest persisted. Kakarot picked fights with stronger people all the time and this dream was no different. The realism of it was what made it so alarming. He could almost feel the familiar shift in air when Kakarot would get himself into stance, muscles tensed and ready to spring. It was so vivid that it was tangible even after he was sitting up. Shaking himself out had taken him much longer than he’d ever admit aloud and he must have stared off into the far end of the quiet living room for a considerable time before he had to get up close himself up in the gravity room.

The attempt to beat the sensation out, only landed him his spot on the floor, contemplating his sudden new feelings. Fear. Loathe to admit, fear was undeniably what he was startled awake with. He didn’t recall any sound in his dream, so he knew he didn’t yell out to him, but he felt his body screaming all the way through his limbs and the alarm of it all lingered like a faint echo. The one vivid image of watching Kakarot being beaten to death should not have been present in his mind at all, let alone have him in an out-of-body state for the majority of his day following the event. But there he was, disconnected by a damn dream.

Kakarot was strong. Perfectly capable of taking care of himself and did not need to be protected by anyone—if anything, people needed to be protected from him. Vegeta especially. He absolutely needed to be protected from Kakarot. This event alone spoke volumes to the brain damage he’d clearly incurred from his time spent with him, after all. Years of batting back and forth with him, unwilling and willing. Kakarot wasn’t a pushover—a fool, maybe, but not going to get punched to death that easily. And yet, his mind had to find a reason to plague him with a scene of it.

To make him watch Kakarot lose so completely and die in a way his dream self apparently couldn’t move to help prevent, left a helpless pressure in his chest that he could only recall feeling the first time he saw Frieza in his final form. It wasn’t like when they fought in the Future for Trunks’ sake, when they were both prepared to die fighting together. It was purely watching helplessly from the sidelines where he couldn’t do a damn thing; and waking from the weight of what that implied, left him with a sensation that he was on the other side of the room from his body and trying to come back to it.

The aftershock sent him into hiding immediately.

He’d ignored the messages from Kakarot that he’d received. He heard the phone ping a few times, alerting him of new texts, but he couldn’t trust himself to respond at the moment. It probably left Kakarot with the wrong impression, but the response he was having to a damn dream was leaving him unable to even think about Kakarot without a prickling sensation at the back of his neck. Kakarot wouldn’t judge him for it. After all, he’d woken up to the same thing from the other man’s end. His panicked nightmare that left him clinging to him in the middle of the night—for as much as it could be night in a white void. He and Kakarot were entirely different people, of course, and he would never allow himself to have that kind out outward reaction; not one where anyone could see, in any case.

The phone continued to buzz from the panel, where he’d left it and he debated on getting up and throwing it off the planet, but that wouldn’t solve his problem. Kakarot would eventually just show up in person with questions and his big dumb face full of concern. If he did that, then Vegeta would probably retaliate with a fight at that particular moment. That would serve to solve nothing; only make matters worse, in fact. Kakarot was perceptive when it was most inconvenient to Vegeta, it seemed, and that would be that inconvenient time.

With that knowledge of Kakarot in his mind, he finally did roll over to push himself up—swiping the phone off the panel and ending right back up on the floor of the training room. Motivation was too much effort at that particular moment and his entire goal was to tell Kakarot to shut up for five minutes and leave him to mull in his despair alone—perhaps not in those exact words. Maybe he should appreciate that Kakarot was alive enough to annoy the everloving shit out of him, but that could be the nightmare expressing itself; he lamented, nose curling as he peeled a glove off to swipe the screen of his phone.

Twenty six goddamn messages appeared on the notifications page.

What the hell, Kakarot. He pinched the bridge of his nose and tapped through the pages of misspelled texts and some pictures and finally found the end of the avalanche of messages. He’d only been ignoring him intensely for one day, not ten. If he had ignored him for that long, he was certain that Kakarot would come looking for him, then he’d have to explain his horribly offset mood to the actual cause of his horribly offset mood. He couldn’t even fathom trying to address his sudden sour shift.

You died horribly in my dream and I’ve realized it could happen in reality someday because you are a fucking moron who might pick a fight with someone stronger than you and I can’t stop you and that is why I am having a meltdown in the gravity chamber, but not a complete meltdown because apparently I have enough capacity to maintain a logical front. But just enough to leave me thinking this whole thing was a terrible terrible idea and I actually changed my mind and I decided I want to go back to hating your guts again, to make this easier and avoid this whole vulnerability problem. Thanks and goodbye forever, Kakarot.

That would never work. He would end up with Kakarot embracing him and he would probably manage one attempt to swing a fist before giving up and admitting defeat—only inwardly, because like hell would he admit defeat to the damned fool where he could hear it.

Kakarot was the physical embodiment of “are we there yet” however, and if he didn’t give him some form of response, he would probably continue to have his phone periodically chiming with incoming alerts. Or end up with notification in person and Vegeta was not in the mood to turn on his usual snarkiness to explain why he was sprawling out on the floor, instead of making better use of his time. Even he had his moments of actual physical worthlessness and he was in the process of a remarkable ascension of that worthlessness that he wasn’t about to have interrupted.

He flicked his fingers across the screen and turned the diction on, allowing him to talk at the phone. Though he couldn’t convey his annoyance through the text it would translate into, he could at least feel like it did. Hearing his own voice scowling at Kakarot would make him feel a little less off put by his clusterfuck of thoughts about him. He took a breath and held the button, “What the actual hell, Kakarot, I have twenty six messages from you and it’s been a day. I am not going to run away, god knows I’ve tried escaping you, it doesn’t work. Go take a damn nap.”

Kakarot would probably only message him even more in response, but the attempt was made. He tapped the send button and promptly rolled back over on the floor. The room was a little warm, but he pushed it out of his mind. The effort required to get up and fix that was much greater than his willpower, so he left it. The gravity was off and the room was quiet; if the floor was a little softer, he probably could have closed his eyes and taken a nap himself. Of course, that would be if his phone didn’t start immediately filling the empty chamber with echoed buzzing from Kakarot’s immediate replies. Oh goddamn it, Kakarot.

Sighing, he lifted the device to turn it off, but caught a glimpse of words that he didn’t understand on the notifications and, instead, opened his message box. Kakarot rambled in multiple parts as usual, but he zeroed in on one particular part that left him with a low descending screech starting from within. At one point he wasn’t even sure if he was screaming in his head or out loud.

‘sorry’
‘just’
‘you usually answer questions pretty quickly’
‘you can answer later tho’
‘but chi chi wanted to know’
‘if you wanted to join us for dinner some time’
‘she makes good food’
‘didn’t know we were at pet names tho, Vegeta’
‘carrot cake huh?’
‘bet chi chi would make that for you haha’

His heart stopped for the entire moment it took him to scroll back up through Kakarot’s babbling to find his own message and comb back over it, freezing with his thumb over the autocorrected word that made him almost crush the stupid little electronic horror show in his hand. Instantly, he felt his previous nightmare replaced by a much greater one, and he actually screamed into the empty space of the training room.

His phone replaced Kakarot with carrot cake when he spoke it.

And he actually sent it.

“So this is what the cause of my death is,” he finally managed to squawk, after the screaming stopped. “Death by fucking humiliation. I, Vegeta, the prince of Embarrassment, obliterated by his own hand. A fitting fucking end. Only I can destroy me, naturally.” He laughed, a hoarse bark turning into a languid scowl.

The phone made another noise, with an icon to show that Kakarot had more things to add to the conversation. No, please do not continue, Vegeta silently bargained; but flicked the whole chat down to see what he just had to add to this. The only word he saw was “recipe” and an actual picture of a carrot cake, and then the phone mysteriously disappeared from his hand. At a velocity at which would require him to ask Bulma to give him a new one, once it exploded into pieces into the far wall.

Several long minutes passed and he sat up, finally willing to move from his previous wallowing. The scattered pieces of the phone had managed to do more than just shatter the evidence of his horrid mistake, it almost made him forget the entire reason he was hiding away in his training cave, avoiding the idiot in the first place. Now he had a whole new reason to replace it.

And he just killed his form of communication before he could even explain it was an autocorrect error.

He laid back down on the floor of what he had decided would be his tomb, since he was never leaving the gravity room for the rest of his life. “Stupid fucking idiot,” he hissed, face down into the floor, never quite figuring out exactly who he meant that toward.

“I hope someone punches you to death after all,” he lamented, trading one trauma for another, in true Vegeta fashion.

Chapter Text

He didn’t even have to reach the door, before he felt the swelling aura behind it and he paused with a hand just about to grasp the handle. A long internal debate preceded his self patdown meant to find his phone and check it, only to realize he’d forgotten it within the house. A slow sheepish chuckle found its way out and he rubbed the back of his neck. He had left that morning, certain he would make it back on time. He told her that he would be home with plenty of time to spare, because she was very adamant that he not be out all day. She had plans and she didn’t want him to ruin them. He didn’t know what the big deal was, but he hadn’t left with the intention of making her mad about it.

Time was not his strong point and he rubbed his hands together, preparing for her brief lecture; but the door cracked open before he could put a hand on it. He almost jumped back—caught lingering a little too long—but he met eyes with a less than dangerous entity in his small son and he exhaled in relief a little. The expression he gave him must have been a pitifully transparent, because Goten shook his head gently.

“Dad, mom is so mad at you, you were supposed to be home an hour ago. And you smell like fish and dirt. She’s gonna have a cow,” the boy’s face turned to a small frown that was almost reminiscent of Chi Chi’s, but it was whiny enough that Goku knew she must have been venting to him for a while. “You better not come in here like that, or she’s gonna really let you have it…”

Looking down at himself, he understood why Goten might say that. She might liken him to a pig for the layer of dirt his clothes were caked in and he had been fishing in the best way he knew how—directly in the water. “Yeah...I had a really good catch though, I brought a lot back…” He suspected that would have been much more appreciated a few hours ago. He certainly wasn’t going to mention that he took a nap somewhere in there. He hadn’t meant to, but the sun was so warm when he was drying off… “I’ll go clean up, can you take the fish in? If she gets mad, just ask her to hold it for me. I’m not tryin’ to get out of it. She knows I’m good for it.”

“Do you like it when mom yells at you?” Goten made a face, like he didn’t understand at all. “Because you could have taken your phone with you. She tried to call you and tell you to come home. You know Uncle Vegeta is on his way here right? She wanted to make everything nice before he gets here.”

A long pause followed and Goku just looked at his son for a moment. The words didn’t really connect all the way through and all he could focus on was a selection at a time. The first one to hit him was the first one he followed up on. “Uncle?”

“Trunks said I could totally call him that, because you guys are like brothers, right?”

Goku just smiled. He didn’t think anyone ever actually told the two boys about how he and Vegeta met. Not in detail anyway. Back then, he hadn’t expected Vegeta to ever really even tolerate his existence, let alone maintain anything remotely close to brotherhood. That their young sons likened them to brothers was actually really something that brought a big warm feeling in his chest. It wasn’t exactly the correct descriptor, he felt, but he didn’t have a word for that. He didn’t really need a word for that. What they assumed was fine with him, and he knew Vegeta would agree. The less they knew, the better, actually.

He reached out and ruffled Goten’s hair, chuckling, “you should call him that to his face and see what he does. I’m curious—wait, you said he’s on his way,” he froze, once the next selection of words decided to process and it sunk in just why Chi Chi was so mad this time. He’d completely forgotten which day she had been planning to have them over for dinner. “Oh—shoot, I better go get cleaned up! Give the haul to your mother for me—”

“You better hurry, mom texted him like fifteen minutes go and I know it don’t take them long,” Goten called, after Goku already took off. Chi Chi did her best to greet guests with a nice, clean home and he knew better than to be standing in it looking like he was, but it was just Vegeta...But even if it was just Vegeta, he didn’t want to disrespect Chi Chi’s home. Bulma had been by a few times, and Trunks too, so it was okay if he looked like a hot mess with them around, but Vegeta was a new face in their home. Goku knew that she would want to at least present it as a warm, cozy place for the first impression. She’d have it filled with the best food smells and Goku honestly thought that enough would be enough to win Vegeta over anyway.

Wait, she’s texting Vegeta...Since when? When did they exchange numbers? Why does that alarm me?

He frowned and put himself on autopilot through his process of washing up. He vaguely heard Chi Chi in the background and noticed a set of clothes sitting out for him, most likely put there for him by Goten. He was busy thinking about Vegeta and Chi Chi chatting outside of him and he wondered about that. What kinds of things they could talk about. Unless Goten meant that she messaged Bulma and she sent Vegeta on his way. That was...more plausible, really. Something about his wife and Vegeta in communication felt terrifying for a reason he shivered a little over—and it had nothing to do with the cold water he rinsed his hair out with.

Any further thoughts about it died, interrupted by the familiar sense of ki approaching—two actually, Vegeta and also Trunks. Bulma was not with them, it seemed, but Vegeta saw it fit to bring his son for Goten. That made sense, the boys spent almost all their time together as it was, and Chi Chi had always left the invitation open for the older boy—provided they stay out of trouble. Goku grinned a little, feeling out their exact location and picking up his pace a little. Vegeta absolutely brought Trunks so he wouldn’t be alone. Despite knowing them relatively well, Vegeta’s social blending skills were still as awkward as ever—even Goku could pick up on that one. He did fine once he was comfortable, but Vegeta had never been to their home.

He almost couldn’t believe he’d finally gotten him to show up. After getting silence from him over the whole...carrot cake fiasco, he’d shown up to ask again and ended up getting socked in the nose. He never asked about that, because Vegeta’s red face told him everything. He just flitted off to find Bulma and asked her to relay the question again and she worked her magic. It took some days, but Bulma had her way with Vegeta. Chi Chi was pleased and it meant a big tasty dinner, so he was pleased too.

“Hi Trunks!” He heard his son’s yelling from the other side and the equally excitable response. They’d arrived and were met by his family, respectfully, as Chi Chi would have it no other way. He heard her muffled voice while he quickly pulled his shirt over his head and put himself together, towel drying his hair. Accidentally, he’d gotten himself out of being directly scolded, though it wasn’t the intent. Chi Chi wouldn’t give him much trouble until she knew Vegeta was well settled into their home as a guest. Bulma probably warned her that Vegeta was strangely cat-like in how he took to new locations. It took him a little bit to get comfortable.

From what he could tell, she brought them into the house relatively easily, and Goku was the only one not present. Well, he and Bulma, but Bulma may not have been coming—he didn’t know all the details, that was Chi Chi’s business. Vegeta was probably glancing around, wondering where he was and slowly boiling at being left with his wife without him there. He could see the sour man’s face so clearly in his mind and it was funny to him. Sometimes he liked watching Vegeta sweat a little, so he took his time once he was certain that he’d already lost his chance to make it into the house and act like he’d been there the whole time. Chi Chi would just have to be mad at him later.

He folded his arms and leaned against the side of the house, trying to decide what to do. He could teleport inside and sneak around or he could just waltz in through the back door and come in as innocently as possible—and bravely dodge the scathing look he knew she would cast him when Vegeta wasn’t watching. Spying a little bit sounded so much more fun than just walking right on in; and getting to peek in on Vegeta trying so hard to be social would would be something worth seeing. So it was decided, he pressed two fingers to his forehead and displaced himself inside the house, but out of the way.

He listened for their voices, somewhere around the area of the kitchen, and pressed himself against an opposite wall—suppressing his presence from Vegeta. If anyone was going to catch him in the act of snooping about, it would be the one most uncomfortable with his surroundings. Not like any of them were strangers, he mused; he was just starting to really get what Bulma meant when she said Vegeta was just shy. That must have been part of it.

“Bulma said she would be by a little later, she was tied up with a project,” Vegeta’s voice was low and stiff, like he wasn’t sure what to say to Chi Chi.

“That could be any time with her, I’m sure. I expected that a little bit. I’ve already got dinner mostly done, so I’ll set aside some for her when she does arrive. I know how you boys eat. And if Goku ever shows up,” she said, his name coming out stronger than any other word in the sentence, despite her lack of tone shift, “then there will be no hope for this table once I unleash you all on it.”

From his spot, Goku could barely manage a few brief peeks around the corner to catch sight of them, ducking quickly when he saw Vegeta’s gaze turning dangerously close to his position as he glanced around their home. He just wanted to watch them interact, but he had to accept listening instead, or risk getting caught. Vegeta was always on guard, and seemed to be expecting him to appear at any moment—or possibly suspected he was already there, knowing Vegeta.

“Where is Kakarot, anyway? He was the one who badgered me so much about coming, and he’s not even here?”

The tangible annoyance in Chi Chi’s sigh made Goku’s rub the back of his neck in reaction, “I tried to call him and tell him to come back in because we had plans, but he’s out playing somewhere.”

“...He didn’t know beforehand?”

“He did, I told him this morning.”

“Ah, his selective hearing in action. If you can’t get your point across in six words or less, you might lose him.”

“You’re getting six?” The alarmed tone of her voice pulled a pout across Goku’s face for a reason he couldn’t explain. “What are you doing that I’m not? I lose him after at least four.”

“I also hit him.”

“...that’s really it?”

“He’s a simple creature. Maybe if you take your shirt off when you do it, he’ll pay more attention.”

“Oh my—.”

“Pops—!”

“Oh you’re still here.”

“Ah—Oh, right….Goten, why don’t you boys go look for your father and bring him back. I’m sure he’s not that far away. And don’t take too long, dinner is soon.” Chi Chi turned to the younger boy and shooed them both away and Goku actually clapped his hand over his mouth to contain the sound he almost made. Leave it to Vegeta to say something so crude. Maybe he was more comfortable than Goku thought. He wished he could see Vegeta’s face, then he could tell and he could see what his expression said, but peeking around the corner risked giving him away. Instead, he shuffled around to listen in from the other side, hearing a chair being pulled out across the kitchen tiles.

Chi Chi was a gracious host, inviting Vegeta to sit and offering him a drink, and Vegeta was being Vegeta—clammed up again and not saying anything that Goku could hear. Now he was entirely alone, once the kids had left them and his snarky wit dissipated with the lack of banter. C’mon Vegeta, she’s not that scary. Goku found himself leaning a little further around the corner than he should have—trying to steal a peek at them when he dared to. He wanted to see better, but if he was caught by Chi Chi, it was all over. Maybe she was that scary after all. Or Goku just knew he was always purposefully walking on thin ice when he knew he shouldn’t.

“I’m sorry about Goku, I really did think he might actually be here on time for once,” he heard her apologize, with a glass making a soft little clinking sound on the table following her voice.

“Don’t apologize for that buffoon,” Vegeta grunted, in return. Goku didn’t need to see him shaking his head with his own two eyes to know that he was, by the tone of his voice. Vegeta had a tone, one saved specifically for him. “He pops in whenever it’s convenient.”

She exhaled loud enough for Goku to actually feel it. “You’re...not wrong. Sometimes, I can’t keep up with him. But, at least I know where he is a good bit of the time. That does comfort me. That at least he’s relatively well looked after.”

“...You’re implying that I’m babysitting him, woman, and I don’t know how I feel about that accusation.”

“I wasn’t accusing you. Just stating facts,” she countered, immediately cutting off any chance he’d have to retaliate, “how is your drink? I wasn’t sure what you’d like. Goku didn’t tell me specifically. He usually just accepts whatever I give him. I suspected you boys weren’t too different appetite wise.”

“It is fine. Kakarot does boast about your kitchen prowess.”

“Oh? Is that so? Well, I am a mother of two boys,” she sounded so spirited and Goku did risk a quick glance to catch a look at her. When she spoke about Gohan and Goten, she always had a glow about her that made him want to look at her. Chi Chi was very proud of the two boys and there was no doubt about it. Her face softened and her cheeks seemed to have the faintest little tinge of pink to them; it always made her look years younger.

“Three, if you count Kakarot,” Vegeta swiftly remarked, and Goku ducked back around the corner at the sound of her laughter—an unexpectedly sudden sound.

“You...are not entirely wrong. Are you?” She chuckled, and suddenly it occurred to him just why he had been a little alarmed by the idea of two of them casually talking to each other. Because this could happen. Her agreeing with Vegeta, meant they would most likely both scold him with equal feverance in the event he did something deserving of one’s scorn. They were actually rather alike at times… Maybe he should have walked in through the front door….

“Dad, what are you doing?”

A voice behind him nearly made him jump clear out of his skin and he shrank back away from the edge of the wall. Immediately he covered his mouth and waved his hands wildly—eyes flying over to the source of the voice, and silently bargaining with him to not repeat his questioning; or at least whisper it quietly. Goten, with Trunks behind him, was standing there at the other end of the wall, with his hands on his hips and a questioning look on his face. Goku only had a cheeky smile to give back and scooted toward them sheepishly so he could whisper to them, “I’m just...waiting for an opening, that all.”

“You’re spying, Dad,” Goten accused, his eyebrows scrunched together, and shaking his head just enough to give an alarming image of his mother that almost made Goku back down out of reaction.

“...just a teeny bit,” he held his hand out with his thumb and finger pressed together, indicating it was harmless. He was only just...seeing how they’d get along for a few minutes. Then he’d go out there and face them both—contending with both of their different probable reasons to be upset with him. He seemed to be really good at getting people going. But, they were both very important people to him, and he wanted to see them interacting for a little while… Goten wouldn’t get it, but he didn’t have to. Goku just grinned a little and pulled his little lookalike closer. “Don’t tell on me?”

“I’m tellin’.”

“Aw, c’mon, don’t be like that—” He frowned, and glanced over at Trunks, who just shook his head, in the same manner of pretending they caught him being bad, and needing to be the adults about it. “I’m not doing anything really awful, I just wanna spy a few more minutes.”

“Mom told us to come find you,” Goten protested, weak against Goku’s naturally casual counterargument of going with the flow and dealing with the consequences in full later.

“And you just pretend you didn’t see me, and come back in a little later and it’ll be okay. Your mom won’t be mad at you, promise. If you let me off the hook, I’ll give you one get out of jail free card, for anything, how about that?” Goku bargained and he could see his son cracking a little. He knew Goten had so much of Chi Chi’s good influence that anything he would ask of him, would be something he wouldn’t really need to use that level negotiation, so he wouldn’t abuse it anyway. Goten was a good, level headed kid for the most part; though, maybe a little bit too easy to sway…

“...Okay...but if mom gets mad, it’s all your fault…” he exhaled and glanced back to Trunks. “...Let’s go…?”

Trunks nodded, casting a bit of a judging eye to Goku and boy did Goku feel it a little bit. Trunks had some of Vegeta him him for sure. “Yeah, let’s go find your dad, Goten. Maybe he fell asleep by the lake,” his voice had such an edge to it, that Goku could even see the tone of Vegeta in him. Ouch.

Goku listened as the two boys left to go search for someone they wouldn’t find outside of the house, and he exhaled with ease once he confirmed that Chi Chi and Vegeta were still in the kitchen and evidently unaware. Their quiet whispering hadn’t drawn any attention and Goku could continue his silent peeping until he found a good enough time to pop in and pretend he just happened to come in, unaware. It wouldn’t be a bad thing for them to be alone for a little while. Vegeta was still a little stiff, but he seemed to find common ground in his exasperation with her over Goku’s antics.

“—shouldn’t surprise you, you lived with him for three years, you know his habits better than most,” he heard Chi Chi say and it made him poke his head around the corner just a little to see if anything had changed. They were still sitting at the table, with their drinks in front of them, and Vegeta seemed to be a little less anxious, but he was glancing around still.

“Yes, and I stupidly volunteered for those three years.”

“It can’t have been all that bad, if you didn’t kill him in his sleep.”

“I considered it, a number of times. Have you heard him snore? He’s like a goddamn tractor,” Vegeta scowled and Chi Chi chuckled.

“I heard Bulma does too. You’re quite used to that, aren’t you?”

“How about you don’t call me out on that, woman. I’ll have you know, I’m perfectly capable of tuning loud noises out, but that doesn’t change that he’s damn noisy. Like a farm animal.”

“I think it comforts you,” Chi Chi decided, without his approval, that her opinion must be the right one. Goku wondered if that was true. Vegeta never did seem to really mind his snoring all that much, come to think of it…

“Nonsense,” he grunted back at her and Goku could feel Vegeta’s inner turmoil from where he was. His greatest foe was right before him and it wasn’t Chi Chi, it was her bluntness. Unfortunately, it presented an atmosphere that Goku had no idea how to come in on. If he walked in right about then, he knew that Vegeta would snap at him. If he came in at the wrong time later, he’d make Chi Chi even madder at him. He scratched his head, listening to Vegeta grumble a bit before finally formulating real words to respond to her, “it would be nice to get a quiet damn sleep for a change, however. You’re welcome to have Bulma if you like loud noises so damn much.”

“Just toss her in with Goku. I’m sure they won’t even notice each other over their own snoring.”

“Don’t tempt me.”

Goku folded his arms and pouted just a little bit. Maybe he would...just wait until the boys came back before he made his appearance...or he realized he just may be in for a two against one more than he expected.

Chapter Text

Kakarot where the hell are you?

Vegeta could not feel him out, despite combing the immediate area for some time. It occurred to him that he was either out of the area entirely or he was hiding. If this buffoon ran off to go train somewhere off the planet, there would be no one alive capable of saving him, and he had a feeling that his wife wouldn’t even make an attempt to rescue him anyway. What the fool was hiding from was likely her anyway, because he was probably aware that he was in trouble. Vegeta had started to parse that Kakarot just liked being in trouble. If he didn’t enjoy it, then why did he go out of his way to irritate her, and him as well, for that matter? There was good news for him, then, because he was going to get socked in the throat as soon as Vegeta caught him alone.

How dare you leave me alone with this. How do I combat this? This is your wife, not my wife. My wife is easy to contend with. She yells at me and I yell back at her. Your wife is polite and fights her battles intellectually— at least does when she’s going up against anyone with any intelligence to combat with, Kakarot. But you wouldn’t know that, would you Kakarot—

He glanced up, his attention pulled back to the sound of her voice, catching her words enough to keep from losing track of the subject. He wasn’t going to ask her to repeat herself, despite the struggle to keep himself from trailing away and losing himself in his thoughts about her idiot husband. What a damn problem this was. Kakarot was supposed to actually be there when this happened; that was the reason he even agreed to it—after Bulma’s gentle pressuring.

“Bulma told me that you like to read a bit,” she said, and he turned his eyes over her face, studying her, as if he was focusing on her mouth to read her lips along with listening to her voice. He couldn’t miss anything being said if he was focused on more than one sense at a time. Don’t be fucking rude, Vegeta. He frowned, not really sure where that internal voice even came from. It damn sure wasn’t his own. He was just decidedly very determined not to be entirely off color to Kakarot’s wife; this woman—after all—had to deal with the big idiot as a spouse. She deserved a proper interaction with an adult.

“Occasionally,” he nodded, in a single word. For such maximized conversation value. Bulma would be so proud of you for your outstanding social interaction today. He resisted the urge to snarl at himself.

“I don’t know what kind of books you read, but I thought I would offer a few of mine to you. You seemed like an adventure type based on what movies you and Goku went to see, but I asked Videl and she actually recommended a few very good Science Fiction books to me for you. Goku doesn’t read, which is a shame, I think he’d like them if he did.” She waved her hand a little, chuckling as she stood to get a few books from a small shelf to bring back to him.

He was surprised for a moment, a little taken back by the thought she’d placed in his visit. He hadn’t expected her to be this welcoming, but she was a very dedicated hostess. Clearly more so than her dumbass husband. He really did not know how to respond to that and she must have known that a little bit, because she moved away, back into the kitchen to get refills for their drinks; to give him space.

For a moment, he watched her. Despite her husband ruining her attempt to open her home with the ideal warmth, she had a very pleasant aura about her that made it very clear that having him there as a guest made her happy. A concept that...confused him a considerable bit. He turned his face down and stared blankly into the pages of one of the books to mask the weird sensation that gave him. He could see how Kakarot found himself tied to this woman, if she gave him this impression. She had a pure, earnest personality. Maybe too pure for his taste, but Kakarot was in need of that. She was probably the best thing that happened to him.

After a few moments, he found himself actually skimming the pages and reading some of the pages of the book she gave him—picking out parts and determining whether or not he could see himself reading it. Whether or not he could read this to Kakarot and have him follow it... Maybe not with this one, big words and Kakarot didn’t always connect, but it was more along his own train of interest. He didn’t want to have to stop and explain science to Kakarot in the middle of a story. It would kill the emersion.

“Does it seem like something you’d be interested in?” She asked him, taking her seat again, once she was certain he was comfortable again.

“I’ll give it a read. Every now and then, your husband leaves me alone and I get to actually do things that don’t involve this supposed babysitting I do of him.”

“Then I get to babysit him for a little bit,” she smiled and he felt put on the spot, despite knowing that was absolutely not what her intention was. She had already made it very clear that his...whatever it was with her husband was perfectly...accepted, but it was very strange to see the complacency here—over drinks, in her home.

“...You really do know I’m not stealing him from you, right? By all means, I don’t want full time rights…” He blurted, nearly taking his tongue out, between his teeth afterwards. What the fuck did I just say? Why do I talk? Kakarot, I’m going to bust your fucking nose when I see you—

But Chi Chi didn’t seem to be offended in the least, once again being far more understanding than either of them deserved her to be. “I don’t worry about that. I know how Goku is. And I know how much you care for Bulma. It’s perfectly fine that you have him for a while sometimes, though. I think it’s good for you both. He listens to you sometimes. He needs another good voice of reason.”

The longer her words went, the more he felt like dying. Whether or not he was actually a good voice of reason was also extremely up for debate. He was smarter than Kakarot, but had just as bad of a habit of letting his hot bloodedness get the better of him. Genius wasn’t worth a damn if he jumped into the fire too quickly to use it. He had zero intention of informing her of that. She didn’t need to know he couldn’t always be trusted with her giant puppy of a husband.

Sometimes I purposefully let him off his leash, Chi Chi. Because I want to fight him. What you don’t know, doesn’t hurt you...I guess.

At the same time, at least that was within the confines of their own bubble. If an enemy was involved, Vegeta had never allowed anyone else a free reign to kill Kakarot without having to go through him first. She could at least trust him there. But he also wasn’t going to tell her that, either. On one hand, he lets him act like a big dumb puppy for his personal amusement; on the other hand, he will fight off his enemies with his own life, because Kakarot is his damn fight and no one else is allowed.

I look so damn unstable. This is so good. I can just see how the rest of them would look at me if they saw me now. You’re doing what with your life now? That low class warrior is your what? What is he even? What do I even call him? Idiot, that’s what I call him. My idiot. He’s my idiot.

Idiot, where the fuck are you, your wife is giving me a mental disorder.

“The boys haven’t found him yet. I wonder if he didn’t actually run off to train…” She huffed a little, turning the subject, presumably from seeing him look like he was fading into the afterlife—if he was to guess that’s what his expression resembled. “That would be a little strange, given that he’d be running off to train with you…”

“Doesn’t he also train with King Kai off planet? Could be be there?” Vegeta raised a brow, vaguely aware of King Kai from brief mental conversation in the past. He hadn’t needed to speak to the Kai for very long to recognize him as someone who was...perpetually exhausted by Kakarot’s antics, but somehow still put up with the odd charm he had. That was far too damn familiar.

“No, I told him to be home, he should have been home. He’s just very absent minded, but he should be back soon. If he knows what’s good for him,” her tone shifted to a vaguely threatening one and he wanted to nod with her intention to put Kakarot’s life in danger for his flippancy to be unaware of his priorities.

It was almost as if by summoning, or perhaps by the tone of her warning, that brought movement stirring from within the house and Kakarot appeared, coming into the kitchen looking freshly washed and sunbaked. The big grin he bore on his big dumb face did nothing to deter the absolutely accusing frown Vegeta threw at him—which did not go unnoticed, if the nervous twitch at the corner of Kakarot’s mouth had anything to expose. His suspiciously timed appearance wasn’t called on, but Vegeta was only resisting the urge to deck him in the throat out of respect for the better half.

“Nice of you to join us, Kakarot.”

“Nice of you to join us, Goku.”

Kakarot visibly swallowed and glanced between Vegeta and his wife, slowly. Evidently, he was set back by the near perfect sync of their greeting. If Vegeta was any less irritated with the tardy bastard, he would also have been a little taken back by the perfect performance of synchronized annoyance, but instead, managed to maintain his mimicry with Chi Chi perfectly—folding his arms and tilting his head just as she did, by watching her cues from the corner of his eye.

It never felt so good to watch the big fool take a step back, clearly alarmed. Good, Kakarot. Sweat about it.

“...Hey...I didn’t realize you’d be here this early...My...bad?” He rubbed the back of his neck and tried to make himself smaller, as if it would get him out of the massive hole he’d dropped himself in.

“I did tell you to come home early today, Goku.” Chi Chi scolded, leaning back in her chair and crossing a leg over the other, managing to lord over him from her lower position.

“I lost track of time, is all. I brought fish back with me. I was working. Promise.”

“You didn’t take your phone with you,” she countered, playing her game of chess with him and Vegeta could see what it was like to have to be Chi Chi for a moment. But trapping Kakarot wasn’t exactly rocket science and Chi Chi just needed a clear head who wasn’t busy raising small children all day long.

“Kakarot, come over here,” he commanded and was promptly met with obedience. When put in a corner, apparently it took very little to keep Kakarot in his place. He was starting to actually understand her method. Adopting it without her presence, however, might take a little more time. A worthy undertaking if it kept this fool in check. The fear in his eyes, told Vegeta that he was fully aware of this.

“...Yeah?” He stepped close enough to Vegeta that he was within arm’s reach, looking down at him with wariness that was well placed.

Vegeta set down the book he’d been flipping through prior and leaned forward, the chair skidding slightly when he grabbed Kakarot’s belt suddenly and yanked on it. The quick and unpredicted nature of his action meant that Kakarot had no ability to counter him and couldn’t act on reflexes to back away fast enough to avoid the result. Vegeta didn’t let go, instead, pulled the piece of fabric right off his body and watched him snap to grab his pants before they fell down. In that distraction, Vegeta took his time pulling the folded front of cloth from across his chest, wide open.

He couldn’t recall ever hearing noises out of Kakarot quite like the ones he made preceding his protests. “Vegeta—wha—”

“You had tanlines before, Kakarot. From your shirt. From working. In your undershirt. In the sun. Which are suspiciously, almost completely faded.”

“I….”

“You took a nap, didn’t you, Goku?” Chi Chi picked up on it, very quickly. The likeliness of Kakarot being too shy to lay out in the sun and sleep in the nude was very very low. Vegeta had seen more Kakarot in the first two days of being in the time chamber, than he’d ever seen of any other living being in his whole life—and that was just because it was his shameless nature. Idiot just sunbaked naked and thought no one would notice, one way or another.

Kakarot glanced between them again, “I don’t think I like you two being together…” The small tremble on his lip almost made Vegeta clock him, but he restrained himself when he heard the boys chattering outside, coming back in.

“Go get your clothes back together, Kakarot,” he pushed him, twisted him away, and then lifted a foot to further shove him back toward the other room—following it up by tossing the fabric belt into this face. “Your wife and I will decide how to deal with you later.”

Chi Chi offered her backup, with a stern nod, and Kakarot sheepishly complied. Arguing was out of his bracket of options and he appeared adequately subjugated. It also wouldn’t look very good on his behalf if the children came in to see him holding his pants up, disheveled, and appearing much more flustered than he could explain in simple—Kakarot friendly—sentences. Vegeta had half a mind to force him to attempt it, but the secondhand embarrassment of watching him stammer stupidly, would kill him.

Instead, the children came back in after Kakarot was already out of sight and Chi Chi greeted them with drinks, like a good, doting mother. She had enough to deal with in Kakarot, but she focused all of her attention to the real children over his antics and that was likely why she didn’t mind that he often wandered off unattended so much. Despite his mentality, he was a grown man and his personality wasn’t going to change. He was who he was. Gohan and Goten had to be raised to not...take too much after him if they wanted the best opportunities in life. Kakarot was something, but perfect was not it. She acknowledged that, but still cherished him for it anyway. He could respect her for that.

Kakarot was...something.

He stood up while she was tending to the boys and followed after where Kakarot had stepped away to, seeking out his ki. Privacy had long since been destroyed since the three years they’d spent in the time chamber, and he leaned against the doorframe of the room where Kakarot was putting his clothes back together. He watched him briefly, before he spoke.

“You know, you earned it, for leaving me alone like that, Kakarot.” Some pleasure came with seeing his muscles tighten, jumping from the sudden sound of his voice. Kakarot turned his head fast enough he almost heard his neck crack.

“A—Vegeta, snuck up on me...No mercy at all…”

“Don’t you give me that. You took a nap on me. I like your wife more than I like you, and that’s why I didn’t slug you in the nose. Because she’s been very courteous and I didn’t want to get blood in her kitchen,” he sneered just a little bit at him and that prompted another very apologetic, meek response from Kakarot.

“...I’m super sorry, really...I’ll make it up to you?”

“You make it up to her, idiot. Anything she asks of you, you do it. At least maintain that for a week without giving her any damn lip, you big child.”

“Alright...But we’re cool, right?” He asked, voice sounding a little caught. It prompted Vegeta to tilt his head up, realizing that Kakarot was much closer than he thought. Was this fool actually worried that he was really that angry over this? Annoyed, absolutely, but if he was mad enough, Kakarot would have been in pieces the moment he returned.

“...You’re fucking dumb, stop taking naps when you’re supposed to be working. You have a phone, remember to take it with you...” he inhaled deeply, stopping himself in the middle of what was about to become a reprimanding that Kakarot’s wife should be giving him. He was sounding suspiciously wifely and it didn’t settle well with him, but Kakarot needed constant reinforcement.

Kakarot didn’t answer and appeared to be only partially listening, instead seemed to be focusing on Vegeta’s face for another reason. He unfolded his arms, slacked by the slight confusion that Kakarot gave him—as if he wasn’t always slightly confused by Kakarot and his behaviors. Unknowingly, he gave the advantage to the bigger body when he lowered his guard and didn’t have the capacity to recognize immediately what had happened until it was already too late.

He was smaller—regrettably—and Kakarot trapped him in a circle of his big damn arms. He could feel his fingers in his back, drawing him against him and throwing him completely off guard. He didn’t even consider biting him. The thought didn’t even cross his mind, when he should have bit his lip and made him think twice about kissing him on the mouth without warning like that—

Instead, he did absolutely nothing about it in the moment, stuck with Kakarot’s arms around him and a hand pressed on his chest as if he had to process the response to push him away. The processing took way too long, but when it did finally decide to load in, his hand curled—taking a hand full of cloth in his fist.

And he socked him in the head with the free hand.

“Kakarot, you’re dead to me—” He hissed, only angrier by the wavering, pained laugh he heard out of Kakarot before he toppled over. “Choke on it—” He snapped at him, whipping around and leaving before he could even look at him twice, wiping his whole face and trying to calm down the rush of blood he just got from it. Anyone who thought Kakarot wasn’t an asshole, obviously didn’t know Kakarot.

“Everything okay?” Chi Chi questioned, as soon as he stepped back in. He made sure not to make eye contact, sitting down and leaning into his arm, hiding half of his face.

“He’ll be a minute. Said he has some reflecting to do.”

“...That’s going to be a long minute.”

“It better be.”

Chapter Text

Despite no cloud above, the air felt like a thunderstorm coming. The odd pressure was different than the sunny sky suggested, contrasting with the light breeze that just seemed to snake through the open field freely. Cool and dry. A perfect afternoon. Nothing gave any indication that the weather would change either, but it wasn’t about the weather at all, he realized more and more, the longer they were sparring out there. Isolated. Just the two of them.

Vegeta’s mood wasn’t sour, so he wasn’t having to walk on eggshells with him or anything. Nothing was wrong at all. The heaviness in the air wasn’t because of outside force; the wind on his face was crisp and when he breathed in, it revitalized him. But every breath began to feel like a rebirth, with a suffocating in his chest. He was annoyed. And he wasn’t sure why. It was a perfect day, but he was feeling agitated—unusually so—and for no tangible reason. Not many things ever really even bothered him, but when they did, he could at least identify them. This time, Goku could not even identify what was building the pressure in his chest.

If Vegeta had noticed, he didn’t say. Vegeta was not the kind to ask directly anyway, and Goku wasn’t in a telling mood. The mood he was in was a snappy one, and so he said very little to Vegeta—which was largely normal once the sparring began anyway. But he felt crackles coming up in his chest that made him want to take bites at him and he was torn between wondering where these needling feelings were coming from and ignoring them for the overwhelming agitation that he was contending with. He could smell the storm clouds rolling in.

Punches that he threw were sharper than usual, aimed higher, and delivered with an underhandedness was that was unlike Goku in a way that seemed to catch Vegeta off guard more than once. Vegeta seemed to catch up to it, learning to dodge the odd manner of his savage style of play for the session. It wasn’t like they never changed it up. If he was angry about it, he didn’t show it in his expression at all. Not a bit. It didn’t seem to even flicker in his eyes or leave any question at all that he might wonder why Goku was going out of his way to try and belt him with more force than he’d do any other time.

It annoyed him. Irritated him. For that unexplainable reason that he didn’t really bother with trying to search an answer for. He wasn’t really, truly angry. That wasn’t the sensation. He was...he wasn’t sure what he was. He was just...pressurized. Boiling. Something was building tension and he felt like he was holding a glass in his hand, watching fine lines web into the sides of it, cracking under the pressure of his fingers; before eventually it would shatter in his grasp. But what was making him like that?

He just…

Needed to relieve the tightness in his chest.

Ease up the suffocating pressure in his lungs.

The blood pumping, racing through his body just,

—wanted to hit Vegeta.

Not spar with him. Not trade blows back and forth, prepared for equal ground. He wanted to smash his knuckles into his jaw and see him try to play it off in that way Vegeta always did when he took a harder hit than he meant to.

The thought should have alarmed him, but it didn’t. He was too overwhelmed by the sudden urge. Vegeta was stretching, not facing him and he was watching him with no discretion at all. The brief interim was meant to keep them from overdoing it, which was what he had started them on. He had been the one who had convinced Vegeta to take more breaks. Vegeta would have been content to keep going until he beat himself into the ground, like he used to, but he had finally settled into a less punishing routine—at least when he was sparring with him.

And he was about to take full advantage of that very fact.

Momentarily, Vegeta had enough faith in the fact that a truce was called and that he was safe from having to have his guard up from him completely. He would normally have been completely correct. Goku had never given him a reason before to believe otherwise. He always been the one to take the most advantage of the downtime and often had to nag Vegeta to do the same. But this time, he kept his eyes trained on Vegeta’s back the entire time he crossed the space between them. His approach was suppressed; his ki kept low and steady enough to give Vegeta the impression he wasn’t moving.

Once certain that Vegeta was unaware, he turned his cautious approach into long, dashing strides and closed the gap between them in the swiftest blur. Vegeta didn’t have the chance to see him before he curled his arm and brought his fist directly into the side of Vegeta’s face with all the force of a dynamite backed hammer. Vegeta became aware of him then, only after he was sent flying from the impact and scrambling to recover from the wild spiral it put him in—only kept from crashing wildly into the ground by his raw instincts kicking in and landing him somewhat on his feet. He lurched forward and hit a knee, clutching the side of his head with one hand.

Even from the distance it created between them, again, Goku could see the blood he’d spit into the earth by his feet—and where it spotted his white glove. He promptly smeared the back of the glove with the red liquid too, wiping his face and recovering from the sudden attack. He had clearly not been expecting it and didn’t even feign blustering his usual haughtiness over being unimpressed by the force of it. The sheer fire behind his snarl when he turned his eyes up, told Goku that he was enraged.

“What the fuck was that about Kakarot?!” He stood, grinding his heels into the dirt. His guard was up, locked like he was expecting him to suddenly attack him again. Trust was momentarily shattered in the space between them. Goku would probably lament that later, but for the moment, it was shoved so far back into afterthought territory that it may as well have not existed at all. He didn’t back down from the intense snarl or the heated spike of Vegeta’s ki, crackling in his direction.

He straightened his posture and wrung his hands out, cracking his knuckles absently. He offered nothing but a passive expression in his response to him, “I guess I thought you could dodge that, Vegeta.”

That seemed to hit Vegeta harder than his fist had, smacking him directly in his face without even connecting to him physically. The snarl that followed was loud enough to have an animalistic feel about it and he could have cracked the bones in his hands from how hard he was clenching his fists. That was exactly what Goku was trying to thread him for; to make him respond with impulsive fury. Not like that was a difficult thing to accomplish with Vegeta. The art of manipulating Vegeta was a relatively fine tuned one, but rarely utilized to this degree.

I can make him do what I want him to do.

“You were the one who called a timeout, then you turn around with this? Taking cheap shots now?! You’re looking for a real fight pulling that kind of shit, Kakarot.”

“Yeah? It’d be the first—real—one I’d have gotten out of you since that day you first showed up then,” he bounced back, keeping his eyes focused on his so intently that he could see the shift in his pupils when the words sunk in and connected with the parts of his brain that flipped every rage switch that had somehow not been already thrown.

“Is that so…” Vegeta’s voice was low, threateningly low; a growl that was almost ferally angry and accented by the pure energy around him. It did nothing but bring anticipation; the thunderclouds rolling like mad and the rain coming around them—despite the sunshine and blue skies. Goku just played on what he knew was a massive insecurity and deep within, he knew it was wrong; but the response was exactly what he wanted. The turmoil that brought his thundering response was what he was itching for and he all but wrapped his hands around it and yanked on it with pure battle lust that he hadn’t felt in that way before.

The desire to hurt Vegeta was so intense that he could barely even register the sensation he was feeling, like flickers across his skin—energy pooling in his chest until he felt like he was overloaded with stimulation. Getting Vegeta to feel the same thing was not difficult at all, but his feelings weren’t cemented in anger. Goku was feeling this from somewhere within that just wanted it for the sake of it, from somewhere ingrained that wanted to inflict senseless violence on him to lift the pressure—to attack him and stop only when he couldn’t anymore.

Vegeta played into it without hesitation.

From the very first counter attack, he made it perfectly clear that he was not intending to hold anything back and that was exactly what Goku’s instincts were yearning for. The sheer force of Vegeta’s fist colliding against his raised arms actually moved him across the field, leaving impressions of resistance from his feet in the earth where he tried to hold his position. Anyone else wouldn’t have the strength to move him like that and that was what made his heart start skipping. Not the excited skipping he usually felt, but the eager to destroy sort that made him counter with the intention to incapacitate.

If Vegeta didn’t move, he would be beaten. There was no intention of mercy.

Had it been anyone other than Vegeta, the fight might have been a short one—Goku was stronger than the rest of his companions by a large margin. Vegeta was durable, he was strong, he was capable of bouncing back with the ferocity that he needed. Vegeta took the fist to his face and shook the blood from his nose, letting himself be damaged for the sake of getting close enough to give Goku a knee to the chest that could have cracked ribs if he wasn’t braced for impact. Goku sucked a breath in, choked from the sudden loss of air, but unwilling to be shaken from his position—grabbing the front of Vegeta’s armor by hooking his fingers down the front chest piece and yanking him closer.

His fist came down and struck him, but it missed the target—connecting with Vegeta’s shoulder instead—and the sharp pain in his skull brought his attention to the fistful of hair that Vegeta had a vice grip on. Before he could retaliate to that, his vision exploded into stars and he stumbled back—fighting to make space between them before the foot connected. Vegeta had headbutted him, despite knowing he’d only hurt himself in the process. The blood dotting across his face only proved it.

Distance was not kept for long, neither of them were going to allow it, apparently. Not him and not Vegeta. As soon as he went back in for him, Vegeta came back toward him with the same vicious intent. The move to dodge was ignored by both of them. Taking the time to back off was too much hassle for Goku and anything that could lessen the damage he could do, was passed over—even if it meant he would take more damage himself. If ignoring the hand that wrapped painfully around his throat to throw him off his feet, meant that he could turn them both over on the ground and drive his fist into his ribs, then he’d take the ring of deep bruises.

Vegeta’s fingers nearly unhinged his jaw for the strength of his grip on his face. He hadn’t let go of his throat, just caught his chin instead and dragged him closer. Vegeta was beneath him, but had enough control to keep them from regaining their footing. Goku’s best counter came in jamming his large hand into Vegeta’s side and sinking his thumb and fingers into his ribs until he could feel them bending. His armor was only as good as his opponent and Goku’s strength was nothing to what he was trying to protect his chest with. If he didn’t let go, Goku would break his ribs and the bruising grip of Vegeta’s fingers threatened to do the very same to his jaw.

He blocked the attempt of Vegeta’s free hand to sucker punch him—taking his wrist and holding his arm to maintain the tense standoff to see who would cave first. Neither of them were resorting to any form of powering up for retaliation. No ki. No super saiyan. No God mode. Raw strength and brawling was what it had devolved into and the first to show any flinching was going to lose the upper hand. Any damage taken was going to be ignored if Goku wanted to inflict more on Vegeta. He bared his teeth a little, clenching his jaw and lowering his face, shifting and stomping his foot down by Vegeta’s head—his other knee still on the other side of his chest.

His fingers were cracking through Vegeta’s armor, but Vegeta would not let go. He would accept Goku tearing open his side before he let him go, but Goku was in the mood to test him on that dedication and he twisted his arm and shoved it to the ground beside them until he could feel the bones threatening to pop. He didn’t have the leverage enough to twist Vegeta’s arm enough to damage it, but he wasn’t comfortable. He was pinned and both of them knew the next move would decide who took the advantage.

Goku played dirty and he wasn’t above continuing to do so, but apparently neither was Vegeta.

The bones of his jaw nearly folded under the stress of Vegeta’s unrelenting hold, suddenly pulling and straining the muscles of his face. Vegeta made the first move and he was ready to retaliate—or thought he was, but Vegeta had taken a much less honorable method of attack that offered him the opening. His face was suddenly his whole field of vision and he was thrown out of his focus by the brief, furious brush of his mouth against his own. Vegeta nearly drove the air out of his lungs and then followed it up with the most magnificently delivered foot to the gut Goku had ever experienced in his life.

Being so taken back by Vegeta’s bold, cheap, move had made him let go of him—he had no choice but to relinquish his position if he didn’t want to be immediately caught in a flurry of punishing blows. Vegeta’s recovery was swift and he was up and after him so quickly that he was right to move out of the way. Seeing him come at him, so angry, so breathless, bloodied and ready to be brutalized without hesitation...set him on fire. Willing to play so dirty if it meant he could draw blood.

Something about it was beyond disturbing, but the measure of his attraction to Vegeta had become a different animal entirely in that moment and he couldn’t even begin to make sense of what the feeling was. He was gravitated toward him in the most violent way he’d ever felt and the pressure he was building felt so close to releasing that he heard himself snarling back at Vegeta. The only one who could alleviate this was Vegeta, required by force—immense amounts of force.

He didn’t block him after, nor did he dodge. Vegeta didn’t do either of those things anymore either once he jumped back into his range. He struck him, and Vegeta struck him back. The strength of their hits got more fierce with every recoil. Skin split, and bruises raised on impact. He turned his face away from a direct punch in the teeth, but caught knuckles in the side on the temple, splitting his brow and spilling blood over his cheek and down his nose. Yet it didn’t slow him down, he blinked through a red haze and powered through it with a direct sucker punch to Vegeta’s otherwise unmarked cheek.

His fists were connecting so hard that they were aching, straining and bleeding from being split from each progressively more brutal crack against the other’s body. Vegeta’s hands would have been the same if he didn’t wear gloves, but his gloves were torn—one of them gone entirely. Blood marked his body in the shape of Goku’s fists. His armor was cracked, his nose was bloodied, and he was persistently giving everything back that Goku gave him.

Every bit of the brutality. Every bit of the itching need to hurt and feel it in return. Having Vegeta’s fist crack him in the chest, knocked the wind out of him, and sent a sharp bloom of pain through him. But it felt so incredibly good that he wouldn’t let himself recover from it, pushing through it and sending it back with the same delivery of savagery.

Opposing legs swiped his out from under him and Vegeta came down on top of him, sluggishly continuing to swing at him as the fight dragged on. Whatever his armor was made of just caved under his repeated bludgeoning and it forced them to roll—several times. Goku bashed his head against Vegeta’s when his arms were too tired to keep swinging and he raised his elbow up and perched against his chest, sucking in a breath. Moving was getting harder for the both of them, but each still managed to take slow shots—a blow to the head, a knee to the gut, a hand around the throat, a slap to the face enough to leave a handprint…

Goku left the impression of his teeth on Vegeta’s lip, and would have to explain that at some point, but the handprints Vegeta left around his neck stopped his train of thought. Nothing else mattered but the next impulse of muscle movement. Nothing else mattered but the next response. Return each action. He struck, so strike him back. Strike harder. Harder.

Push him down and destroy him while being destroyed, it didn’t matter. Everything hurt and he shoved every bit of that away and tunneled his vision to one thing: Vegeta. Strike. Strike. Strike harder.

Take every bit of damage on the chin.

Every breath burned, but he took it in until he couldn’t remember breathing anymore and he punched even when he couldn’t keep his eyes open. He pushed until his body didn’t want to push anymore—until it all finally caught up with him and his muscles let him go, and he sunk beside Vegeta.

The warm ground came up at him so quickly that he didn’t realize he was already laying on it when he opened his eyes and blinked. Vegeta was beside him, panting just the same, arms out at his side and unmoving. He didn’t budge from his spot and Goku didn’t think he was going to—or that he could any more than Goku himself could. The thunderclouds were gone, rolled away, and the rain had cleared. The stormy day that had been his imagination had lifted and the pressure in his chest seemed to fade away. He closed his eyes, turning his cheek back into the stirred up dirt.

He needed a moment to rest his eyes. The energy they burned out was done so quickly and so hard. Everything would hurt once it caught up, he was certain of it. Both of them were beaten severely. He felt sticky blood from his face, his nose and mouth—from cuts on his chest and arms, bruises all over him and possibly even a broken bone or two. His muscles were burning, strained and maybe even torn if he was unlucky for some. But he felt depressurized. He felt better. He couldn’t explain it. But he felt restored.

When he opened his eyes, he decided he would try to get up and figure out how to get them both moving and maybe attempt to drag them both back home. But confusion immediately consumed him and he mumbled, leaning a little on an elbow. The sun was long gone and he no longer felt the breeze—in fact, he no longer felt the fresh air at all. The dirt and grass weren’t beneath him anymore; that was replaced by the soft fabric of a bedspread. He wasn’t sprawled out in a field.

Glancing around, it took a long moment to connect the dots.Time didn’t seem to add up with what he was seeing, as he only closed his eyes for a moment; but when he’d opened them, he was in a bed and redressed. He was clean, bandaged and no longer caked with dirt and blood. He poked and prodded at some of the marks on his arms that he could see—bruises from taking punches. They were real, dark and painful. It was evidence he hadn’t dreamed it up at all. No one else would leave such dramatic signs behind.

“Dumb bastard,” the groggy voice next to him, provided the other proof that it wasn’t a dream. He turned over on his side, facing the other body that was placed beside him and when he caught the look of him—he grinned a little. Vegeta seemed to have the same idea and beat him to the snarky comment, “I’m glad you look as shitty as I feel, Kakarot.”

“Same. I don’t think I want to move for a while.”

“I ought to kick you out of this bed, for starting this shit. I ought to kick you out of my whole damn life.”

“But you won’t,” Goku stuck his tongue out at him, not making another effort to move his body.

“Shut the fuck up and lay back down,” Vegeta decided he wasn’t arguing and Goku took his victory silently, settling again, because he definitely wanted to. Not moving for a long time felt like a good idea and he’d explain himself later. If Vegeta wasn’t asking what his problem was immediately, then he wasn’t going to bother with it yet.

The silence didn’t last very long, but it was not because of Vegeta. The door cracked open and both of them glanced at each other before Goku leaned to look over Vegeta’s shoulder and caught two faces that did not look very pleased with them. He shrunk back down and made a face. That face was enough to tell Vegeta without words who it was and he cringed a little bit. Not one, but both of them. Not just Bulma, but also Chi Chi. Not one mad, concerned wife; but two. A pair of crossed arms coming into the room, once they noticed that Goku was awake. He should have played sleeping, but he had to go and try to identify who was walking in…

“Oh so, you’re finally aware are you?” Bulma spoke first and Vegeta made a face that she couldn’t see, because his back was to her. He was facing Goku, laying on his side with his back to the door. How lucky for him.

“...Hi Bulma….Chi Chi…” Goku greeted, sheepishly.

“Hello, big dumb husbands,” she returned, not even trying to hide how she felt. “So very glad you’re both well. Given that you were brought in, both looking half dead—”

“...About that—”

“Yeah, about that—” Chi Chi stepped in and started to yell at them, unfolding her arms. “Thank goodness for Gohan. If Gohan hadn’t noticed that there was some suspicious stuff going on with you two, he wouldn’t have gone out there to investigate and seen that you were both out there unconscious and bleeding everywhere—. He brought you in so we could get you cleaned up and cared for. You two clobbered each other this severely—there better be a explanation for this—”

“—um...there’s really...not..” Goku didn’t even know where to begin explaining what he’d been feeling earlier, especially since the feeling was already gone. The sensation was alleviated and he no longer felt like he was drowning in pressure like he had before.

“So, you did this to each other, and you’re not even fighting—?!” Bulma seemed almost offended by the prospect of this, seeing them both so battered, laid out like they should have been severely at war over something serious.

“Relax, woman, it’s not that big of a deal, it was just relieving stress, that’s all.” Vegeta grumbled, closing his eyes, but still not facing her. He wasn’t going to roll over and face her and he was probably smarter in not doing so. Bulma was clearly not dealing with their nonsense and Goku watched the wild range of expressions she went through.

He almost wished they had pretended to be sleeping. Neither of them were prepared for the snapback that Bulma delivered.

“For god’s sake, why can’t you two just not do shit like this? Come home and worry everyone to death. If you have to relieve stress that damn bad, just go have sex like normal people and stop being idiot boneheads that come home broken, for crying out loud. Now you can enjoy some reflection time to recover without senzu beans for a while. Sleep it off, idiots.” She huffed loudly at them, shaking her head—accompanied by Chi Chi, who held the same exact expression and the same exact scolding head shake.

The door closed behind them, with an angry, deafening clap in the quiet room. Suddenly, Goku was acutely aware of his proximity to Vegeta. His neck burned up to his ears and he could visibly see Vegeta losing the fight with his expression—turning his face away and losing his color to a tinge of red.

Their brawling had fixed one source of uncomfortable pressure, and in a single instant, Bulma had created a whole new one that Goku didn’t know what to do with. He just rolled over and shoved his face into a pillow and pretended he didn’t understand what the twisting in his gut meant and why both of them didn’t speak for the rest of the night.

Chapter Text

“Honestly, if you hadn’t been out there knocking each other’s heads off, this wouldn’t even be a problem right now, now would it?”

While she wasn’t incorrect, the tone of her voice somehow needled him much more deeply than it usually did. Her being correct wasn’t exactly a blue-moon happening, but he wasn’t out for admitting it, and she wasn’t giving him a reason to want to either. Yes, perhaps they had taken an afternoon sparring to wild extremes, but that hardly deserved this sort of chiding. Of course, his disdain about this whole scenario was largely a direct result of being in pain. It took far too long to even confess to it and her rebuttal was to remind him it was—in fact—his own damn fault.

Actually, woman, it was Kakarot’s fault. He started this. I ought to knock his whole head off and stomp on his skull. But instead, we’re here.

Nevermind that he let his anger consume and get the better of him—and quickly let his own saiyan instincts take over and he fully participated in a stress relief beat down. The only reason Kakarot got a pass on his commentary leading up to the savage ass-kicking they gave each other, was that he realized what was even happening halfway through the brawling. Kakarot had some fortune that at least he was culturally aware of what being a saiyan entailed, enough to understand what that nonsense was actually all about. Kakarot wouldn’t come at him like that without a reason. Stupid as it was, it was still a reason.

Unfortunately, the reason did nothing but further complicate his life and he battled with the consequences of indulging it. Even his hard earned mastered art of denial was being stress tested by being in the same room with the giant buffoon. Of course, he played it off with passiveness that made it seem like he wasn’t still lingering on it, but he was going to be stuck on it for a long time. Being that drawn to Kakarot left him stranded in another new place to have to climb out of. He wasn’t prepared for it and it was bullshit that he hadn’t gotten the choice in the matter. Kakarot did this. He pushed them both in.

Asshole.

He adjusted himself in his chair, turning his eyes to Bulma and making an effort to straighten his face out—hoping to not reflect anything going on in his head. She already put too much of her words in his headspace. She didn’t need to know just how many of them stuck and just how bothered he always was by everything. Least of all, by Kakarot. He was there because Kakarot jacked his head up, and he couldn’t seem to alleviate the pain from it. He wasn’t even going to come to her, but Kakarot was the one who eventually convinced him—reminding him that Bulma was smart and probably could fix it.

“Kakarot, tell my wife why you busted my neck,” Vegeta snarled a little, in response to her—shooting a glare at him, without turning his head. He received a sheepish grin and he sucked in a deep breath. The twist in his gut pissed him off, because he found it hard to get mad at him. Every time he looked at him, he caught a brief flash of being struck by him without warning—feeling no hint of the softness that made him usually irritable with him. It was nothing like the image he projected and that alarmed him. He knew it was there, he’d seen that before when he first fought him.

But, he just hadn’t seen it like that. In that way.

Kakarot turned his eyes away from him. He wouldn’t look directly at him when questioned. They hadn’t spoken directly about it. He hadn’t asked and Kakarot didn’t explain and he wasn’t planning to make that exchange a reality with any real depth. Because they both knew. But he wasn’t going to take the heat for it without throwing him out to the wolf that was Bulma. However, it backfired in Kakarot’s unusual response. He seemed to be unable to quite decide how he wanted to answer—quick wit wasn’t his end game. Vegeta was expecting him to whine in retort, but he deflected it with shifted gazes and visible discomfort that he hadn’t anticipated. Kakarot usually bullshitted better than this.

“No,” the idiot actually answered with a plain denial. He folded his arms and did manage a familiar pout across his dumb face, but it was covering as an awkward front to how he really felt in his reply. He didn’t want to answer, because answering possibly would make him have to address a thing or two maybe even Kakarot wasn’t ready to combat yet. Saiyan instincts were less identifiable to him, after all. He had expressed guilt in breaking Vegeta’s neck. Big idiot…

“I don’t care why you two did it,” Bulma rubbed her temple to calm herself before she started yelling at them again. She could do that as much as she needed, as long as she didn’t start making this awkward again. He just barely managed to function from her last choice selection of words—and only when he purposefully bleached them from his memory. “You obviously did a good enough number to mess something up and I shouldn’t have given in and let you two have the senzu beans after all. I should have made you heal the whole way through it.”

“Aw, but that would have taken like a whole month…”

“And you would have deserved that after the stunt you two pulled,” she snapped back at Kakarot, who had been the one to bravely whine at her. He knew better. He was also sitting in front of her with his head tilted back and her fingers gently pressing into the curves of the bones of his neck. She had him moving his head, while she felt around—gauging his reaction, so she could see where the apparent pain was lingering.

She had given them a few days to lay and suffer in their bruised and beaten state before she had finally come in and given them senzu beans to heal up with—only on the condition that they didn’t pull that level of butchery on each other again like that. Vegeta couldn’t really, truthfully, promise that would never happen again. Really, neither could Kakarot. While neither of them promised her, she somehow still bent a bit and let them take the easy way out. Mainly because she was probably tired of them looking pitiful. Because he knew they must have.

“Goku, step back for a second please. I borrowed this, and don’t want you anywhere near it for one, god forbid you touch and break it; but if Chi Chi caught me unnecessarily exposing you to radiation, she’d have a cow,” Bulma shooed him away and he ducked back with his hands up at her swatting. She was not unjustified in her concerns of him being unsafe to an expensive piece of machinery. Unfortunately, it only made I’m curious.

“What is it?” He did lean around to try and peek at it.

“A portable x-ray machine. A very nice, very new, very expensive toy, Goku. So don’t even look at it—,” she barked at him. “When you told me what the problem was, I made a few calls. It sounds to me like maybe giving you the option to heal quicker was a bad idea after all, if it healed in the wrong place. I want to see how badly.”

“Healed wrong…? Has that ever happened…?” What do we do in that case?” He sounded perplexed, and Vegeta was too, a bit. In most cases, the use of senzu beans was limited, because senzu beans were limited anyway. Most of the injuries they’d endured had been healed without any real issues. He’d had broken bones that had set just fine. The concept of a bone setting and healing in the wrong position...had simply never actually occurred to him before that moment. It wasn’t like that wasn’t a thing that could happen naturally. If he were to set a broken limb in the wrong place and leave it, it would heal misaligned. That easily could have explained his problem.

Unfortunately, it being fully healed would complicate it more than if they’d waited for it to heal naturally. For once the benefit was more of a detriment. He frowned a bit and folded his arms while she operated her complicated device to get a better look. She made him lean his head forward a bit, dropping his chin as far as he could stand to. He hissed a bit, but she didn’t give him any time to be sour about it, before she switched his position a little and had him lift his head up, looking as far up as the ceiling. The craning of his neck made him curl his nose a bit. The tension was steep, like his neck wanted to crack but couldn’t.

Turning his head almost felt like torture from the left side, but he wasn’t going to protest. He was more likely to bite his tongue and suffer, than outwardly admit that it was beyond his scope of comfort, but Bulma seemed to read that in his posture—to his dismay. He was stiff and resisted her until she turned his head back in the other direction. She was trying to be quick about it, he could tell by how brief she was with commands, and she didn’t give him a single bit of wiggle room.

“Can you even tell what all that is, Bulma?” He heard Kakarot from some distance away. She told him to back away, even though she was still within distance of the machine herself. He wondered about that and would ask her later, but he refrained for the time being—he didn’t suspect she was too eager to concern herself with that when she was still irritated with them both for causing this to begin with. She would just snap back at him that she wouldn’t be there if he wasn’t knocking heads with Kakarot. Not incorrect, but it wouldn’t give him an answer and thus would waste time asking, anyway.

“I’m not a medical doctor, but I have references enough to know what a healthy neck looks like. At least, what this jackass’s healthy neck should look like. He’s had x-rays done before. I still have those.”

“I have?”

“You have. You were unconscious, but I’ve done a lot to you when you were unconscious for the sake of science.”

“You wha—”

Kakarot made a clicking noise with his tongue and his voice was so cheeky that Vegeta was ready to hit him before he even spoke, “ooh, so that’s how Trunks happened.”

After he spoke, Vegeta grabbed the first thing he could reach that he could identify as not being a medical instrument and hurled it as violently at him as he could manage without snapping his own head off. He hissed loudly, after he missed him, lamenting his poor aim; but requiring his hands suddenly to hold his head back up in place from the sudden jarring motion. The sharp pain in his spine almost brought involuntary tears to his eyes and he wanted to punch Kakarot in the throat with all his might.

“Damn it, Goku—” Bulma took him by the arm and sat him back down, tilting his head back a bit and feeling his neck to make sure he didn’t make it worse. “Don’t antagonize him, you know he jumps at literally everything you do.”

“—Sorry, it just came out—”

“One more line out of you over there and I’ll boot you out, you hear me? I don’t need you dumbasses making it worse. It’s bad enough already. Besides, Goku, like you’ve got any legs to stand on, mister. I’m sure Chi Chi did all the damn work.”

“—Bulma,” Kakarot squawked at her, ready to jump right back, but he didn’t have even a second to collect himself in the face of her wit.

“You know damn well that she runs the show over there. Someone has to keep you in line. You sure aren’t doing it yourself. God bless that woman. Now if I could just get her to bottle some of that dominance so we could spritz it on you like bad dogs when we need it most, that would be great,” she shook her head and took in Vegeta’s scowl. “And don’t you look at me like that, I’ve only done medical experiments on you for the greater good.” She cupped his face in her hands and he only managed to frown more deeply at her. “Oh stop it and be still, I’ll fix you. Then you can go right back to battling your frustrations out in the wrong direction, alright?”

“Woman, if you don’t stop talking to me, right now—”

“Hush, Vegeta,” she put all of her fingers over his mouth and silenced him without any efforts and he was tempted to bite her out of reflex. He didn’t, but she would have regretted silencing him if he had. She was just trying to help him, however, and he couldn’t justify snipping at her when she was attempting to alleviate his pain. Pain that he didn’t help himself in avoiding. Kakarot busted his neck, but only because he regrettably allowed it to happen.

Bulma turned away from him after a moment and faced a black screen. When he felt he was allowed to, he turned his body enough to follow her and see what she was seeing—the white images cast on to the computer screen that were meant to show the bones in his neck. She had physical copies in a folder of ones—presumably—that she’d gotten of him before, and she placed them up beside the computer screen to compare. The difference wasn’t very hard to pinpoint.

Even Kakarot could see it.

“Oh, that looks pretty bad, it’s not supposed to look like that is it?” He frowned, stepping closer and basically breathing down Vegeta’s neck, as if he was trying to see if he would be able to actually identify it with without the use of technology. Obviously, if they could have identified it prior to this, they wouldn’t have needed to go to these lengths, so Vegeta just swatted him away.

“No, it’s not, it looks like a bone slipped out of place and then healed wrong. It’s a wonder you’re not in a lot more pain than you are, Vegeta,” Bulma’s exasperation at them, seemed to turn into a real concern, because now she could actually see there was a real problem. “Why didn’t you come to me, you stubborn man,” she huffed at him, taking him by the chin and mushing his cheeks between her thumb and fingers, glaring down at him. He had very few words to give to her that were an actual answer.

“Aw, c’mon Bulma, you’re scary when you’re mad. And we kinda did it to ourselves…” Kakarot actually stepped in with his internal words, saving him the trouble. He took her lashing for it too.

“Yes and now look what happened, you morons—You broke my husband’s neck and I ought to break yours—.”

“Hey, don’t make it sound like he got any easy handling on me, woman,” Vegeta grunted and could immediately feel her hand tighten against his face. Somehow, her grip was alarmingly stronger than he recalled her being able to manage.

“I’m going to fix you. And then you’re both grounded. Do you understand me? If I even think you’re throwing punches at each other for the next goddamn week, I will...I don’t know what I’ll do, but oh boy, you will not like it. And trust me, Goku, I will get Chi Chi and make sure you regret ever coming back to life, do you understand me?”

Kakarot frowned, looking down with defeat, but in the way a petulant child would. “Why did I get called out separately—”

“Goku.”

“...Okay...But he is gonna be fine, right?” Kakarot’s voice changed from whiny to...actually concerned in the span of a breath and Vegeta’s gaze turned to him. Part of him wanted to scowl at him. Of course he was going to be fine. He wasn’t even incapacitated, just in a bit of pain and largely annoyed. Given time, he probably could adjust to it...Maybe. Possibly.

“Yes, I’ll just have to confer with a doctor and get the bone put back in place and healed right this time. So I guess grounding you for a week is lowballing it a little, because when you come out of surgery for that, you’re not going to be fighting for a little longer than a week. Understand?” Bulma patted Vegeta’s cheek and he would have turned his face away from her if the action of doing so wouldn’t have caused him immense suffering. Maybe he wouldn’t have adjusted.

“Surgery? Can’t we just...rebreak it and then heal it like before?” Kakarot tilted his head and quirked a brow at Bulma like his suggestion was made with real thought behind it—or was legitimately a good idea. It was not, and Bulma’s expression was immediately very stiff and she instantly snapped at him.

“Absolutely not. Don’t even think about it Goku. You’re not a doctor and that could have some serious repercussions. You could paralyze him or worse. I will get a doctor. I will make sure someone who is qualified to do it looks at this and puts it back where it belongs.” Her expression was hard and threatening and Vegeta said nothing, keeping his face flat. But his lack of outward appearance didn’t mean he didn’t have thoughts passing through his head about what Kakarot said.

“Okay, okay,” Kakarot immediately conceded, throwing his hands up, and backing down. “It was just a thought. Surgery sounds like a whole lot…”

“Yes, and that’s what happens when bodies get broken. You people just get used to abusing instant fix-its. Maybe stop doing that. Lord knows, I spent enough time patching this dumb fool up when he first got here, I really don’t want to go back to those days...Stupid.” she puffed at him. He didn’t quite respond with the same degree of a grumble, but it was enough of one to make her retaliate by taking his face in her hands and kissing his forehead angrily before she simmered down. “...I’m going to go make some phone calls to return this machine. Now that I know what’s wrong, I can work on getting with the right people. I’ll have my mom make you boys some lunch, so go back to the kitchen and I’ll let her know you’re coming, okay?”

“Tch,” he responded, but didn’t give her any real affirmative.

She just knew to take it as one and just patted his cheek fondly. “Very good, now be gentle with your head please. No sudden turning, or anything like that and—”

“Whatever, woman, alright. Come on Kakarot,” Vegeta interrupted her, swatting at her a little more when she continued to fret at him. He wasn’t willing to let her sit there and continue to embarrass him relentlessly. She was doing that on purpose; trying to get him to submit to her, and it worked. Mostly. He had his answer for what the problem was and that was all he needed. He was content to let her go on doing whatever it was she thought she could do. He had no intentions of sitting there and watching her, so he wasted no time getting up and leaving.

Kakarot followed him immediately, waving to Bulma before he pulled the door shut behind him and kept on Vegeta’s heels. Vegeta paused—coming to a stop—the moment they were around the corner and out of Bulma’s possible line of sight. He turned his head up as much as he could manage, to meet Kakarot’s gaze.

Unspoken words seemed to be flowing in the brief glance, and the moment of silence stretched for a long while before Kakarot spoke first, “Bulma’s gonna be mad.”

“Not if you don’t fuck it up. Unless you can’t do it. Then don’t. But you were the one who mentioned it.”

“‘m pretty sure I can break your neck, Vegeta. I mean, I’ve proven I can at least once,” Kakarot shot back, folding his arms and giving him a look that made the slighter man want to elbow him in the gut.

“Then prove it again.”

“Alright, gotta go get a senzu bean though. Or this won’t work.”

“Of course, you go do that, and I will wait for you in the family room. There’s no one in there as far as I know.” The boys were busy and Bulma would be occupied. Her mom never left the kitchen. Other than a wandering cat, they should be fine there. Plenty of space and a place to lay afterwards on the couch if it went well. Or a place to lay if Kakarot messed it up and needed to call Bulma to have him seen to by emergency medical personnel. This was beyond a stupid decision, but the idea of surgery for something like this was just...tedious. Weak. He’d rather break his neck again. Or have a giant pair of extremely strong hands do it for him.

Nothing could possibly go wrong with that.

Somehow he didn’t think deeply enough about the possible dangers of it to make him change his mind, and waved Kakarot away, making his way to the family room. He was fully prepared for the fact that it would also hurt. It hurt the first time, but the first time he was hit so hard that he didn’t have time to really feel the full impact of it. It hit more like sharp jolt and then rage kicked in and blew that away. This would hit him and flood in and probably stay with him before the senzu bean would kick in.

That didn’t worry him any, however. Pain wasn’t a stranger and when Kakarot teleported back in, his heart rate didn’t even jump. Nervousness wasn’t even an issue.

Is that because I trust him not to kill me doing this? That’s fortunate, because he better not.

“Still sure you wanna?” Kakarot came back, fist opening to reveal a few senzu beans. One would suffice, but he assumed back ups were just precaution. He was only getting one shot at this, if he failed once, then Bulma was getting her justified ‘you’re right, I’m wrong’ and he would do it her way.

“Break it, Kakarot. Unless you need me to hold your hands?” He sneered a little, coming over to him and directing him over to the couch.

“Oh would you? I really just wanna see you try to play that one off,” Kakarot stuck his tongue out and plopped down on the couch, pulling a leg under him so he had a spot in front of him big enough for Vegeta. “You’re gonna have to face me.”

“You remember the picture right? At least enough to know what to break right?” Vegeta looked him over and eyed the small spot he was supposed to occupy. That was a very close space to have to share with this man. The reason for it outweighed most of the inward awkward objections, but the objections were still there, screaming in his head. How was he supposed to sit this close to this man and fucking function. Fortunately, he wasn’t going to have to do much functioning after they started this terrible idea. He was putting the rest of it in Kakarot’s hands.

Literally.

He wiped a hand over his face and climbed into the spot Kakarot made for him, crossing his legs in front of him a little bit and nearly having to hook one over Kakarot’s own. The space was awkward, but it put him close to him—nearly chest to chest if Vegeta was a little taller—and he could see why Kakarot had selected that particular position. Kakarot could slump his posture a bit and keep his elbows steady against his ribs. That would make holding his neck a little less unstable.

“I remember where it’s at. I’m just gonna lift, and pop the bones back. I’ll hold your head up for a bit though… because if I let you go, then it may set wrong again…”

“So try not to immediately kick your ass, fine. Got it. I think I can handle a little discomfort. Let’s just get this over with, before the woman comes in and tries to stop this.” He steadied himself with a hand on his knee and the other on Kakarot’s shoulder. “I will fucking haunt you if you kill me, so keep that in mind.”

“I’ll just bring you back with the dragon balls, so your haunting will be short anyway,” he tilted Vegeta’s head back a little and the discomfort of it made him close his eyes and block it out. It was about to get a lot worse than that.

Fingers pressed into the back of his neck, feeling at where he knew the bones had slipped, fractured into the wrong place. Kakarot probably wouldn’t be able to really identify them with the exact precision of a surgeon, but he could tell where the abnormality was and the idea was to lift and re-break them and let them reset. It was a terrible, terrible, very bad idea. One that Vegeta knew was possibly among his most lacking in intelligence, but yet there he was. Kakarot was the sort of person who wouldn’t do it if he thought he was going to hurt him and he felt like it would be fine.

Somehow it seemed like no big deal with Kakarot, and that was alarmingly dangerous thinking and he knew it. Trust makes people stupid, and Vegeta knew that was a huge factor he was going to have to sit down and dissect later.

“Put this between your teeth, but don’t bite down right away, yeah?”

The senzu bean was there to make sure he recovered quick and didn’t have to be out of commission for months. And not immediately consuming it this time would at least ensure they didn’t have a repeat performance. Between his teeth, he’d have a chance to hold it until he needed it, but he’d have to make sure to keep that in his mind through the pain not to bite down instinctively. He was fairly certain he could do that, he’d done much more difficult self control oriented things in his life. Pain wasn’t the worst of what he’d tolerated, either.

He took the bean and positioned it in the back of his mouth, between two molars—using his tongue to pad it for the time being. Even then, no real sign of nervousness actually hit him and he wondered if that was a sign of braveness or stupidity. At the point in his life he was at, it really could be either. The sheer level of trust he was placing in this man’s giant hands to not crush his neck and leave him incapacitated was enormous, considering how little he’d trusted anyone previously in his life, with even less important things.

I am putting my neck in your hands and trusting you.

You, who I wanted to kill.

He looked up a him, feeling pressure against the bones in his neck. Kakarot wasn’t going to announce when he was going to do it, because he knew better than to tell him. He was the merciful one, who understood that the sudden flood of pain was probably going to be easier for him to manage than preparing for it to hit him. The logic wasn’t unsound, because he didn’t tense as long as he didn’t know when Kakarot was going to apply the pressure. If he did try to tense, he could end up hurting himself in resistance—especially with how much muscle he had in his neck.

Vegeta’s focused remained fixed on his face, watching his expression and gauging his confidence. Kakarot seemed to have no doubts about this dumb plan and was entirely dedicating his attention to him—no distractions to take him away from his task. He was just giving him plenty of opportunity to change his mind, it seemed; but once Vegeta made a decision, he had the tendency to stick to it. They were already at the point of acting on it, there was no sense in backing out.

After a moment, he closed his eyes and relaxed, exhaling. Once he could no longer see his face, time flowed a bit differently. At least, it felt that way. Whether or not it really did take as long as it felt for the pain to hit him, he’d never really know for sure, but he felt like he had been there for several long minutes before he felt any more significant pressure at all. Then the escalation of intensity came like a crack of lightning and he dug his fingers into Kakarot’s shoulder to steady himself from trying to move away from him.

Of course it was going to hurt, he had already prepared for that. He wasn’t a stranger to pain or being put into painful situations, but the pain of this was unlike anything he had experienced before and he hadn’t given it the credit it deserved. He could have broken the bones in Kakarot’s shoulder if he wasn’t as strong as he was and he was fighting very hard against his own natural reflexes to defend against a reflex to protect himself from harm. He was being harmed, but it was by choice. The hands around his neck were there by his request in the biggest turn of his whole fucking life.

The bones in his neck felt like they were grinding against each other and Kakarot nearly choked him for the strength of his hands drawing his head up, away from his shoulders. The lifting motion made more popping sensations and he had to roll his eyes back and close them tight again to block out the swell of agony that hit him when two fingers seemed to roll over the worst spot in the back. He was almost certain that he couldn’t support his own head if Kakarot let him go. For the briefest moment, he regretted the decision a hundred fold, but it was the traumatic pain that was flooding his system that was doing it.

“I got you,” he heard him say, but he didn’t have the capacity to respond. He hadn’t bitten through the senzu bean, by some miracle, but his teeth were threatening to come down on it. The natural instinct to grind his teeth was overwhelming; so much so that his jaw had a tremble to it from trying to resist. He was waiting for him, but neither of them really knew when the best time would be. They were both winging it from the moment after his hands pried the bones back apart.

The only difference was, he had pain to cloud his decision making skills once it started. Kakarot was leading the charge and he would have to let him continue to lead him from then on. He needed his cues and he had no choice but to lean against him and try not to let the discomfort overwhelm him. His eyes watered and his head hurt—like the worst migraine he’d ever experienced on such a short notice—but he could still move his fingers and he curled his toes. He wasn’t paralyzed by Kakarot’s handling, at least. He was just short of wanting to die, but he wasn’t going to lose his composure.

Sitting still was almost impossible, but he didn’t move much more than to curl his fist into his shirt. His fingers threatened to go right through the orange fabric, but he didn’t let go. It was Kakarot’s idea, he could deal with some holes in his shirt if he was contending with broken bones in his damn neck. Bones that Kakarot put there to begin with. If this idiot hadn’t hit him so so suddenly—

He should be so much more angry with him over it, yet, he wasn’t nearly as angry as he was justified to being. That was the incredibly shocking revelation he’d had in the whole thing. The exhilaration of the brawl had been enough to forgive in the end, but he was not appreciating the aftermath. There was too many things still left to process and he had no chance to get around to starting it before this. Kakarot was interrupting his personal crisis time and that was unacceptable.

He snarled a little, using his irritation to block out the pain, but it could only do so much. The size of his hands nearly cradled his whole neck and head and he even struggled to breathe smoothly around his grip, swallowing painfully before his thumbs shifted and let him inhale properly again.

“Okay...bite down. It feels like it’s back where it belongs, I’ma tip your head forward...It’s gonna hurt, but once you get it straight, it should set back in place...Well...We’re hopin’.” Kakarot spoke but Vegeta didn’t give him any verbal acknowledgment. Too much pain flooded his system and he just obeyed—probably the only time he would without any arguments. The promised relief was more than enough incentive to make him do it, anyway, and he ground his teeth together.

Whether or not the senzu bean kicked in immediately, he couldn’t be sure, because having his head tipped forward almost made him actually exhale a noise that could have been mistaken for a scream if he hadn’t choked it down forcefully—strangling it until it probably sounded more like a severe hiss. Eyes closed, he just leaned forward and pressed his face against Kakarot’s shoulder, still braced by a pair of supporting hands.

He heard his name being spoken, but he didn’t answer. He didn’t feel like it. That was what he rationalized. He needed a moment to deal with the pain. Even he couldn’t handle it all without a breather in between. The magnitude of it was just compressed so tightly that he wasn’t entirely aware that he’d blacked out for a moment, until he heard his name repeated a second and third time with a little bit more urgency. Then he found himself trying to respond just to shut him up, only finding that his responses came at a little bit of a delay from his brain to his mouth. The time lapse felt like minutes, but it probably only took a few extra seconds.

“Vegeta? Hey… Vegeta? Seriously, you’re freakin’ me out, you’re still okay, right?” Kakarot didn’t lift his head, but his fingers twitched at his neck like he wanted to, just to see if there was any clarity in his eyes. He was awake again and had cognizance, but little ability to make a string of words that wouldn’t come out like mush right away. So he just lifted a hand to give him a thumbs up, knowing he’d see it if he put it in his damn face. That seemed to be sufficient for him to settle back down.

Eventually, the pain swelled down and started to clear his head. The healing properties of the senzu bean had kicked in, it just took a little longer for his brain to overwrite the pain associated with having his head unscrewed by a man with gorilla hands; a thing he decidedly did not wish to attempt again if at all possible. He had to sit back a bit and wipe the tears from his face from how badly his eyes had watered in the process. A few deep breaths and he finally got himself mostly collected.

“Shit fucking hurts,” he managed his first words after the start of it and they were breathy and a little ragged. But he swallowed and recovered his tone a bit. “How about you don’t break my neck again, or I’ll bust yours and we can just suffer together.”

“Dodge next time,” Kakarot wrapped an arm around him to let him slump a bit and rest.

“I’m going to end your life when I’m recovered.” The threat was lazy and he didn’t have the energy to back it up, but if he found enough to slug him in the throat, he might consider at least that much. Dumb bastard…

“Well...How does it feel…? In the meantime?”

There was a moment of hesitation in wanting to test it, but once the echoes of discomfort had finally come down to just dull throbbing, he felt he was safe to move his head. Kakarot let go and he cautiously rolled his neck, testing how it felt. There was some stiffness and he didn’t want to push it too far, but he seemed to be able to fully turn his head to each side, up and tilt down. The pain he felt before was no longer present when he made the same motions that caused him the irritation in the first place. He sat back and felt his neck with his fingers, massaging into the previously busted area and not feeling anything unusual.

“...Hm. It feels fine now. So far.”

“Think it worked?”

“I don’t feel like my head’s going to pop off, so...I’d argue, tentatively, yes.” That, of course, could change. He hadn’t realized his neck was broken to begin with, until some time later; but once it was actually feeling better, he noticed a world of difference. The ability to turn his head was suddenly a privilege. “I do, however, have a giant fucking headache.”

“Yeah, but you say that every other time, anyway.”

He took a deep breath, rubbing his temple. Kakarot was his giant headache and he actually knew it. “Kakarot, you—” He turned his head up to snap a comment at him, but found Kakarot’s face suspiciously missing from his view. He blinked, confused and taking a second to parse exactly why that might be, but then the shrill sound of his wife’s yelling immediately clicked as to what happened to the rest of Kakarot above the shoulders. She had him by the hair, pulling his head back so far that he only really had a view of his straining neck.

“Goku—Goku—tell me I’m just walking in on you two being really fucking cuddly—because I just know the alternative answer is going to piss me off so much—” She was shouting at him. Shouting in his face. He could feel the rising whimper coming from Kakarot. Bulma was pissed. She had told them not to, but they hadn’t exactly listened.

“—Choking—”

“Good—Good because you’re better off choking to death this way than the way I’m about to kill you after you answer me—. No dragon will touch you when I’m done—.”

“Woman, calm down,” Vegeta eventually decided to come to the idiot’s rescue. Partially. He wasn’t going to stop her from her brutalizing—she wasn’t strong enough to really physically do anything of significance to him—but he was in some defense of his role in their stupid behavior.

“I will not be calm—” She turned her yelling toward him, but didn’t let go of Kakarot. He was the one who had the brilliant idea initially, and apparently, that made him the prime target of her wrath. “You idiots—You did exactly what I told you not to do! My mom said she hadn’t seen either of you yet, and I just knew—. I leave you alone for ten damn minutes and you go and pull this idiot shit again—. Goddamn it, Goku—.” She pulled his head again and clubbed him in the forehead a bit. “There’s got to be some activity somewhere in this hollow chamber—you big dumbass—”

“It worked—” Kakarot’s voice wasn’t much more than a little defensive whine, and he held his hands up in complete surrender. Bulma always seemed to make him submit, somehow. As usual with Kakarot, he operated entirely on do first and ask for forgiveness later; but this wasn’t entirely Kakarot’s fault, for once. He had been a bad angel on his shoulder, telling him to just do it. He didn’t want to wait around while some doctor poked and prodded at him. The idea of a lengthy recovery also didn’t excite him any. Not for some bullshit Kakarot did. He broke it, he could fix it.

“You could have unscrewed his head with your big monkey hands, you stupid—.You could have paralyzed him or worse—. Do you know how many bones and nerves are in your neck, Goku? Do you know how sensitive all that stuff is in there?” She started to shake him, with what strength she had in her human body.

“—C’mon Bulma, Vegeta’s not that fragile—if he was, I’d have knocked his head off punching him the first time—”

“At least Kakarot has some faith in me.”

“You shut up—. You’re on my shit list too, Mister. You’re supposed to be the smart one. But here you are, over here in Goku’s lap like ‘Break my neck Kakarot, because I’m a dumbass’. Why can’t you just listen to your wonderful wife—”

“I do not sound like that—”

“That’s what you take away from this—. I’m calling Chi Chi. Goku, you’re grounded.” She let his head go, but not without one extra smack to the back of his head for good measure. “I’m telling her what you knuckleheads did and she can deal with you.”

“Wait but—”

“Oh yes, she needs to give you a damn talking to so maybe you won’t make me a widow—. Believe it or not, you buffoon, I sometimes love him and want to keep him,” she butted her knuckles into the side of his head again, huffing from all her yelling. She was not afraid to say anything that came to her mind and Vegeta...wished he was not there to witness it—nearly covering his face for her loud declarations. Honestly—

Kakarot ducked away from her a little, pouting. Perfectly content to run his own mouth without checking his thoughts before he just let them fling out like the unfiltered fool he was; “Hey—Hey—C’mon, I do too—I wouldn’t do anything to purposefully hurt him—”

Bulma paused before she could have let her fist down on his thick skull again and she could have probably hit him another hundred times without any effect—for just how little damage it would do against one with so little brain activity going, apparently. Vegeta was mortified when the conversation ran its context through his sluggish brain.

Why.

As if I don’t have enough traumatic experiences to sort through.

Even Kakarot seemed to realize he’d shoved his whole leg into his mouth with that one and he paused his defensive whimpering and blubbered stupidly at Bulma. He wouldn’t even look down past his nose at Vegeta and that was just as well because Vegeta would probably have Final Flashed him through the entire living room for failing to check himself before speaking. How dare you say something so fucking embarrassing, Kakarot—

“I—I’m gonna go tell on myself—” He announced, before anyone could say anything else. And Vegeta almost praised his one rare moment of brilliance. He knew, for once in his whole life, when to fucking run, and the sudden empty spot in front of him was evidence of Kakarot’s instant escape by teleportation.

Vegeta didn’t move otherwise and just slumped forward, face directly into the cushions. If he was lucky, he would suffocate and none of this would matter. If not, then he would wake up and it would all be a dream. If not that still, then he would spend a year dissecting distressing feelings and tension he didn’t ask for, until he had a giant mental collapse and would begrudgingly go through, probably, his fifth or sixth midlife crisis.

“You feel better now, Vegeta?” Bulma’s voice was not sweet at all. Concerned somehow, but also laced with judgment.

“Go to hell.”

“When you’re done having your meltdown, come back to my work room so I can scan your head again. I know I won’t find any brains in there, but I need to make sure your neck actually is okay before I send the machine back. Idiots,” she sighed, lowly. “I can’t believe you two…”

“Tch,” he grunted at her, turning his face from the cushion. His headache didn’t dull one damn bit and she wasn’t helping, but he knew it was just from concern. So he didn’t offer any further argument. Denying the stupidity of it would be lying. “...I’ll be there in a few minutes,” he eventually mumbled.

“...Thank you. Please try not to slip and break your neck on the way back,” she sighed, patting his cheek, after he’d gone as far as to turn his head to look at her. What a mistake. Everything was a mistake. All of these people. Mistakes.

“Don’t tell me what to do,” he snuffed her, knowing this would probably never be let go of until the day he died for good.

“I wouldn’t want to have to tell Goku you died breaking your own neck out of spite, please don’t,” she hit him with a brief kiss to the side of his face and he nearly swatted at her—for multiple reasons. How dare she mention Kakarot.

“I’ll be there in a minute, woman.” He hissed at her, again.

She thankfully conceded to let him have his moments of mulling in his own despair. He regretted waking up that morning. Regretted letting himself get slugged by a dipshit. Regretted that dipshit entirely. Regretted making dumb decisions that hurt like a motherfucker. Regretted that he’d probably do them again, because the alternative was stupid. Regretted the things he’d have to think about as a result. Regretted most of his existence.

Bulma left him alone to go back to her work room and he was in silence again. Silence except for his thoughts, which were never actually silent, but constantly judging him. No one judged him harder than he did, but his immediate answer to that, was to lay back on the couch and close his eyes for a minute.

He said he’d be there in a minute. He didn’t say whose minute.

Chapter Text

Within an instant, Goku closed the distance between Capsule Corp. and the field by his house. Teleportation had its benefits when he needed to make an instant escape, and he stood for several long minutes with his face in his hands following his blunder. He hadn’t even looked down to see the reaction before he transmissioned away and it was honestly for the better. Vegeta wasn’t very good with handling his goof ups at all. Goku wasn’t sure he was very good with that goof up at the moment either. It was a whole new kind to work out.

He rubbed his face and walked toward his house, with no hurry in his step. He was going to go tell on himself for their very dumb idea and he wasn’t exactly eager to do it. Yeah, he recognized it probably wasn’t the brightest of their ideas, but it did work and everything turned out okay. Even though, for the briefest moment, he had been a little concerned that maybe it had gone badly, but Vegeta bounced back just fine and he wouldn’t have to spend months recovering from an injury he caused. He hadn’t meant for it to happen like that, but unfortunately, he didn’t always reel in his strength in his sudden bursts. He didn’t have to with Vegeta, and he wouldn’t in the future either. Vegeta would be offended if he did—even in the aftermath of breaking his neck.

It did, however, get them into this mess. Or rather, got him into trouble. Sort of. He was pretty sure Bulma was going to be mad at him for a while about it and Chi Chi...he was prepared for her earful—even if he didn’t like it. He wasn’t going to hide from it; in fact, was heading straight to it. That was better than the alternative of staying at Capsule Corp., where he left from, and dealing with implications that fell out of his mouth.

He bit his lip and waded through tall grass, coming out of the brush and dusting his clothes free of the dust. Chi Chi didn’t like him coming in the house dirty—usually preferring him to clean up first—but he hadn’t actually been working or otherwise doing anything worth putting off his entrance into the house. He found himself wishing he had an excuse to linger around outside, but he had nothing. All he had was the really slow walk from the field to the door.

It wasn’t because he was afraid of Chi Chi, or her being mad at him about them being dumb. Undoubtedly, they deserved the earful. It was just a shame Vegeta wouldn’t get the same scolding from her, because he was half of the stupid decision. But, rather, Goku was...regrettably very bad at formulating words and trying to put together ways to tell on himself without making it sound so much worse than it really was. Words got him into trouble all the time and he probably would have been better off if Bulma did tell on him. Then maybe he could go back and be yelled at without having to worry about explaining what he was supposed to be yelled at about.

Of all things to be most concerned about, it was probably the least important. But Goku really just didn’t have the same finesse that, say, Vegeta did. He collected words in his phone to try and help, but all they did was just make him think about people they belonged to. He couldn’t find ways to use any of those words in sentences, because he couldn’t even remember how to say them without sounding them out, half the time. His new favorite word for Vegeta was indomitable. It was a super cool word and him really perfectly.

But when the hell was he ever going to drop that in a sentence? Most likely never. Like most words. They just didn’t flow and he didn’t have a huge volume of them to draw back on when he needed to get a complicated thought out.

He had trouble enough getting around to understanding the thoughts inside his head, without the added efforts of putting them on the outside. That’s why he didn’t always really try to make himself explicitly understood. Telling on himself was a terrible idea, but it was the easier one, when his option was that, or to combat with explaining the other set of thoughts directly. His knee jerk response hadn’t been a lie, it just hadn’t really been one he was expecting right then, at that moment. Goku was honest when he slipped, and he had no choice but to commit when it came down to it, but it didn’t change that the method of execution was extremely poor.

He sucked in a breath, held it, and slowly released it. It helped him think, somewhat; at least enough to get him through the door and into the house without finding an escape route to somewhere else. Running off to King Kai’s planet for a little while would be very easy, but he knew better than to skip away when he was already a few steps away from the goal. Run off now and she’d really let him have it later. Not without reason. He didn’t always make things easy for her. Not on purpose, though, he just had a habit of acting first and pick up the pieces afterwards.

Like potentially Vegeta’s broken neck.

But it worked out.

It also might not have...but it did work out. That had to make some difference, right…?

“Goku? Home already?”

He heard her before he had a chance to fully collect his thoughts and he knew it was going to throw him off his game a little bit. Words were already not his strong suit and starting them was harder than they should be when the subject wasn’t what he wanted. How was he supposed to actually begin the topic? Hey Chi Chi, yeah, I’m home; busted Vegeta’s neck, so, I came back to tell you we did something really dumb.

Apparently, yes. Actually.

“Yeah. We did something stupid because I broke Vegeta’s neck.” The words just fell out of his mouth and he didn’t bother to stop them, because he didn’t really have a solid alternative and he didn’t really know how else to phrase it with the words he had at his disposal. He just wasn’t discreet or poetic. Speaking things as he thought them was just what he did, and that was what got them into the mess to begin with. What if I just break your neck again, Vegeta? How was he supposed to actually think Vegeta would ever go along with an idea that was truly that bad. If he went along with it, could it really be that bad? Vegeta was smart. There had to be some merit to it, right?

Chi Chi didn’t quite understand the context in the way he spoke it, however, and he didn’t consider that, given that she wasn’t there and she nearly dropped what she was holding in her audible gasp of extreme alarm. “Oh—oh Goku—what did you do? Is he alright?”

The processing time on her alarmed question and his understanding of it, was a little longer than he wanted to admit; but it finally did click that she didn’t realize exactly what he meant and he had to backtrack quickly to make sure she understood that he didn’t actually just break his neck and leave.

“No, no—I…” He rubbed the back of his neck and tried not to resort to weak words that wouldn’t really explain it. But they weren’t his strong point. “I knocked some stuff around when we fought before...y’know, when Gohan picked us up. Messed his neck up, I guess… an’ then Bulma took a look at it, and was gonna have it fixed and...we kinda fixed it ourselves.”

“Fixed it...yourselves…?” Her voice was already wavering a little, like she was preparing to be mad about it. She had every reason to be. He was running the phrasing over in his head and every way he tried it...sounded really bad. So he just shot it and hoped for the best.

“Yeah...so I just broke his neck again and we put his head back on like new, and he’s okay now, though.”

Chi Chi stared at him for longer than he was comfortable with and he had to break eye contact, because he knew he worded it pretty badly, but he was honest. That was exactly what happened. It just...happened to be the worst sounding way to put it; but at least it was out there. She’d be able to process it and get her scolding of his poor decision making skills out of the way—once she was done getting over the hurdle of just how bluntly dumb it was. It was hard to cope with just how obviously they should not have done it, but decided to anyway.

“...How did you get that by Bulma?” She asked, and Goku was a little thrown off by that being her first question. He expected her to immediately scold him, but instead, she wondered a very valid question and one that potentially led him further into trouble, actually.

“...We waited until she sent us away.”

Chi Chi closed her eyes and pinched the bridge of her nose and Goku quickly recognized that to be her wind up before going into a lecture. Usually, this action came right before a deep sigh and a very long disapproving look. Sometimes, headshaking accompanied it. Often, she parted her feet and her whole stance changed predictably enough that he could almost mimic her exactly like a mirror if he wanted, to get into that crossed arm pose that somehow made him feel like she was looking down at him from below him.

Boy, he did deserve it; and it was pretty bad if he knew it.

"...I know, it was really dumb we shouldn'ta done it...But to be fair, Vegeta coulda said no, and he's usually the brains of the operation—" he tried to argue, and it was a pretty reasonable argument to make, but Chi Chi wasn't entirely convinced.

"Neither of ya are very bright, Bulma tells me everything, honestly." Her expression pulled a little more of the scolding wife traits out and Goku felt like he should sit down and wait for her to be done. "Maybe it wouldn't have happened at all if you'd have found some other way to deal with all your issues than to beat each other up, you delinquents!" She smacked her palm flat against his chest and left it there—effectively paralyzing him in place just by being stronger in personality than he could be.

"Chi Chi—“

"Maybe Bulma was on to something with what she said, y'know!" she added, her voice still loud and scolding. She knew what she was doing, because Goku felt punished severely; immediately flustered.

"C..Chi Chi—" He squawked at her and fingers twitching like he wanted to run away but couldn't move. He didn't dare to move away from her, because he would be doomed like a dead man if he did.

"Don't tell me that fighting is the only thing you hotheads could do, I'm not a dumb woman, Goku. You do everything else without thinking first!" She took her palm from his chest and turned a single finger to point—jabbing that finger right over where his heart was trying to kill itself. "You do not need to resort to violence, because then it leads to this. Then you come home tellin' me ya broke his neck. Ya know what doesn't result in broken necks?"

"—Thinking. Thinking doesn't result in broken necks—" He immediately responded, knowing she was trapping him. He didn't actually want to answer with anything else. Anything else would derail him or get him in even bigger trouble. He wasn't about to tell her that he was pretty sure that he and Vegeta could find a way to break their necks doing just about anything, he was sure. He also didn't want to let his mind wander enough to think about what Bulma had said before, because then he wouldn't get through the lecture.

She softened at his reply, seemingly satisfied with his answer, even if she knew she meant something else. She was pulling a Bulma move on him and he really wanted her to talk to Bulma less. He pouted and she gently took his face in her hands and pulled him into a light kiss. He puffed at her a little bit, but she didn't seem to mind it, because she knew she won. She usually did.

Goku vaguely wondered if Vegeta had this sort of win-lose ratio with Bulma. He probably did. Zero wins to her many. If he ever did win, he'd wonder exactly what happened and it would feel wrong.

"Very good, Goku. Thinking would help you a lot in the future. Can you do a lil more of that for me in the future?" She patted his cheek, speaking against his mouth while he remained hunched over, frowning at his exceptional loss.

"...Yeah...I didn't like doin' it anyway..." He admitted, folding his arms around her and dropping his face to rest on her shoulder. She was perfectly content with being wrapped up in his embrace, if her rubbing circles into his back meant anything. "He went really still for a sec, and if I hurt him, I don't think I'd have been alright with that...So...Yeah, I got it. Next time, Bulma can fix 'im."

"Goku, next time, don't break him," she exhaled, like Goku missed the whole point of them not causing the problem in the first place. He didn't miss it, he couldn't miss that one. He just couldn't help the instinct to antagonize the response, even if he knew he was asking for it to be turned back around on him. "If you can't behave yourselves, then maybe you should stop training together."

He immediately frowned at the idea. If he couldn't train with Vegeta, then he really had no one else to train with that would offer him the thrill he wanted. He could pick up sparring with some of the others, but it wouldn't keep him on his toes. Only Vegeta could put him down at the same severity that he dished out. "Ah, c'mon Chi Chi, your idea of behaving is a little different than—"

"My idea of behaving would be you not coming home looking guilty like this," she pointed again. "I was wondering how you were going to word it, and you made it sound like you clobbered him and then, crunched his neck and actually didn't see the problem until after. And still don't see the real problem with it."

Goku stepped back and blinked at her for a moment and then wiped a hand down his face. A low groan followed and he turned his face right back into her neck. "Man, you already talked to Bulma before I even got here, didn't you."

"Of course I did. Did ya think Bulma was going to let you get out of that one without putting you under my feet, mister? I just wanted to see how you were going to tell on yourself. You left out the part where she told you explicitly not to do it, you know."

"Er....Well, she told us not to do it, and then we did it anyway?" He backtracked, but he'd already been told on anyway.

"Mmhm, no more of this for a while, please? Both of you?" She turned her face into the side of his, kissing his cheek. Her scolding had worn away and she was still being stern, but he was already as much talked to as he was going to get. Any more and it would just be redundant. Repetition didn't necessarily work with Goku and they both knew it. "Go get him to snatch Bulma's card and go find an unsuspecting restaurant to destroy instead. Go see a movie. Go do less violent things. Do fun things. Do each other. I don't care. Just stop making me worry."

"Okay," he started, and then his brain immediately scrambled and backtracked on itself, "Wait, wha—CHI—"

She tilted her head back and cupped his face with a palm and kissed him again. He was sweating buckets and she was unaffected; how the hell was this a fair tactic. He wasn't prepared for this type of warfare and he just knew this wasn't Chi Chi's doing at all. She was just doing a remarkable job on the delivery. He could only imagine the suffering Vegeta had to contend with on a regular basis if this was what he faced. He never even thought about anything like that until Bulma opened her mouth—

"Stop. Talking to Bulma," he finally found words and then mushed his face against Chi Chi's.

"If I stopped talking to Bulma, then I wouldn't know how you admitted you love him," she blinked at him, with a smile and big doe eyes at him that made him lose all the blood in his body to somewhere. Not sure where, but he felt like a ghost. He was suddenly reminded that he still had to contend with that and Vegeta. "I mean, a little carelessly, you probably shouldn't do it after you snap someone's neck, Goku."

He whined at her; directly at her. He was far more comfortable with this when he wasn't sure how she would take this. Being on the end of her punishment was more what he was used to—for all of the stupid behavior he'd done. Instead, she approved of, and even seemed to like Vegeta. Something about that frightened and confused him. Maybe he wanted her to judge him a little more for it, not encourage it that easily. But then, he didn't really blink twice about her cozy whatever-it-was with Piccolo. It was really just all the mixed signals he got from growing up and trying to figure out people and relationships and how they worked.

What was supposed to be correct and what wasn't?

I’m old enough to have a granddaughter and I still don't know.

He was probably never going to actually figure it out, if he hadn't already. Especially when it came to Vegeta, in particular. He knew how he felt, marginally, but not how he could even try to handle it. Someone like Vegeta was hard enough to handle as it was without Goku already being terrible at it.

Goku just rubbed his face again and tried not to look as weak as he felt. Hitting things was much easier than thinking about them and that was why he usually left that to other people.

"Chi Chi, what do I do about this—“ He finally looked at her, resorting to her advice. Chi Chi was smart, she knew everything—even if she was way too close to Bulma to be trusted anymore. "I split without even lookin' at him."

"Just be yourself, Goku," she tilted her head. It was obvious to her, maybe, but Goku really didn't want to agitate Vegeta any more than necessary—since it was all his fault in the first place. She saw right through him and looped her arm through his to drag him toward the kitchen. "You don't win people over worrying about what they think. Lord knows you don't with me, most of the time," she rolled her eyes and he felt a brief moment of her scorn flash at him. He earned that. He definitely earned that.

She pointed to a chair that she kept in there and he obeyed her without a sound and sat in it. She had the control and they both knew it.

"Just don't think about it, that usually works for you. Just make sure this doesn't involve being stupid about it, Goku, because I'm honestly going to lose it if you two do something stupid that ends up being a much bigger problem."

"I'm not worried about that... really, I think we've...worked that out. That was totally a once in a blue moon kinda thing, an' next time I'll give more warning before I attack." She shot him a heavy look in between a pause in his speech. "C'mon Chi Chi, you know I can't promise that it won't happen again. It was spur of the moment. I'm really more worried about...dealin' with him handlin' my outburst. He doesn't let stuff go..."

"Now that...Hm. Like I said, just be yourself. He'll get over it, I'm sure...But, maybe you deserve the repercussions of that one," she folded her arms and turned her nose up a little. He could hear the 'serves you right' being spoken in her tone and he groaned.

He leaned against the backrest of the chair and hid his face in his folded arms. He had far too many things tumbling around in his head and he couldn't even send messages to Vegeta to clear his head—the usual victim to his overthinking—because Vegeta was the source of the problem.

"...I'm gonna go work on the field for a lil bit, before dinner," he lifted his head, frowning at his own muffled thoughts. She understood and didn't offer any resistance, if anything, probably happy to let him go work while the sun was still up. He couldn't quiet his head, because it really should be much easier to be upfront and honest without feeling guilty about it, and he apparently wasn't letting it go, but Vegeta was damn difficult. Goku didn't have any issues coming out and simply telling anyone else he liked them.

The only progress he was going to make that day was going to be in the form of some aggressive farming; not toward solving his ease of handling Vegeta. He had only just gotten comfortable being able sometimes sneak a brief, flighty, kiss past him from time to time. That was easy. That was physical. Maybe that was just really all there was to it.

Goku decided he was perfectly fine to leave it at that. He'd said enough, and he really didn't need Vegeta to say anything in response.

The very fact that Vegeta had let him place his hands around his neck and break bones with complete trust, already pretty much told him what he needed to know. It made him feel better about his goof up in front of the man about as cuddly as a cactus.

Still, he punched his fist into the dirt when he remembered a single detail.

...I still have to face him after ducking out, though—

Maybe when he was done with farm work, he'd ask Bulma what Vegeta's kaleidoscopic mood was looking like.

Chapter Text

“So, you haven’t talked to Goku in a few days.”

The words traveled across the room from Bulma, his tender and loving wife. While he waited patiently, laid out across their bed with her family’s stupid cat pouncing across his back, she was tapping away at his phone. He had brought it to her to update it after it wouldn’t work anymore without being handled by her. If it wasn’t for the stupid message across the screen, he might have locked himself away in the gravity chamber for a while and trained until he was done thinking. But, instead, he brought the device to her. His wife who could not possibly do him any harm.

Or cause him any grief, whatsoever.

Except when Kakarot’s name immediately dropped out of her mouth.

He immediately felt an inclination to roll over, but the cat took the opportunity to finally get comfortable and once it was, he was stuck there. He would not roll over and murder the cat, maybe himself, but not the cat. The cat’s untimely demise would not save him from the conversation at hand and, thought he wish he could escape it, he knew eventually it was going to come to this anyway. Bulma was as much of a nosy busybody as Kakarot could be. He was just dumb about it.

“I try not to talk to him ever, but he makes that very difficult,” he answered, leaning on his elbow, and feeling a paw just droop down over a shoulder. The purring started immediately after and he didn’t care about it. He never left the house and this animal was more familiar with him than probably anyone else in the house outside of Bulma’s mother possibly, as much as he loathed to admit how much of a shut-in he was.

“Oh? Then why have you been so moody lately?”

“Just lately? I am always moody,” he countered. She paused in her tapping and squared off with him and, for a brief moment, he knew that she had a hard time with contesting him on that. Vegeta was not one to usually come back with such a bold touch of truth to win a point, but the alternative was admitting a much bigger problem and he was not having that so easily. He was far too stubborn.

“Alright, a point for your team, but you are also avoiding your problem.”

“My problem? I have no problems. Other than the furry liquid spilling over my neck. Damn thing won’t stay still,” Vegeta reached across the front of him and tucked the descending paw back up on his shoulder.

“Deflecting, that’s a sign out of you, usually. I know it’s because of the whole feelings thing gets you running for the hills and all, but by now, you’d think you’d be accustomed to Goku’s level of throwing himself on others. You especially. I mean, that bonding thing you did. That punching each other other to near death. That’s like saiyan sex, right? You shared something there, you’d think you’d be over this awkward, after fightsex blushiness.”

Vegeta slid right off his arm and the cat squawked in alarm, falling with his upper body and plopping right down on his head, clinging to his neck when he landed down into the mattress on his face—alarmed by the sheer bluntness of his wife’s words. Why does he speak to her. Why does he stay and accept these vulgar animals. This woman was the one who started the conversation and he was unwilling to participate in it, but he was not being given even the remote chance of an out, because she knew very well that he was going to be reactionary to her goading. She knew how to needle him in all the right ways. Unfortunately, both of these people—Kakarot and Bulma—knew how to manipulate him with practiced ease, and he was distraught by this power he hated them having. How dare they both.

“Fuck off,” he muffled into the bedding, unwilling to lift his face.

“Point for my team,” she gloated, back to tapping on his phone and crossing a leg over the other and settling back with all of the haughtiness of a woman who was going to win. He couldn’t see this posture of hers, but he knew that was what she was doing. He could feel this posture of hers. For all she knew of his behavior and his habits, he knew hers. She just didn’t have an identifiable weakness to exploit in the same way he did, apparently, and he lamented his inability to find one at the same efficiency.

“Are you done yet,” he grunted again, face turned so he could breathe and speak more clearly.

“Not yet, I have to wait for the software to finish downloading. It could take a few minutes. If you guys wouldn’t wait until your phones are severely bogged down to come to me, it wouldn’t take so long for this to update you know,” she scolded, but he hotly ignored her, folding his arms up under his head, sprawling out a little further. And of course, she started again, “unless, you just didn’t update it because you’ve been avoiding Goku.”

“There is no real avoiding Kakarot, in case you had not noticed. If he wants to make his presence noticed, he will just show up and that’s that.”

“He hasn’t done that, though. He’s respecting your space.”

“That’ll be a first,” he snorted and rolled his eyes a little at the very concept. Kakarot, who had just teleported in on him in the middle of him having a personal crisis or two before, suddenly was consciously respecting his boundaries. What a concept. What a consideration on Kakarot’s behalf to suddenly be willing to be so aware of his personal space when it had never been passing thought before, or at least it hadn’t felt like Kakarot took much time to think before he just appeared in the middle of his traumatic moments. Suddenly, Kakarot was being a good boy and he was supposed to be impressed with that.

The trickling idea that he was irritated that Kakarot hadn’t come around, did start to wedge into his mind and he prompted smashed both of his fists repeatedly into it. How dare he even think a thought like that. He was mad at Kakarot.

Even if he wasn’t entirely sure why anymore. But being mad at Kakarot was practically his life’s easy default.

“You could actually try sending a message to him first, you know,” Bulma tried, earning a glance from the corner of Vegeta’s eye. “You know he misses you. You two are the only ones who can keep up with each other.”

“No.”

“Vegeta, you don’t have to play hard to get, you know.”

The words came out of her mouth and he hated all of them. He wasn’t playing at all. He didn’t play. He was still perfectly mad and...just trying to justify why that was exactly. Kakarot was not bothering him, because he was likely getting himself into some other trouble, as he usually did when left unattended. But what Kakarot was doing was not his problem. Kakarot was not his problem at all for a while and that was a good thing. Kakarot not being a problem was a welcome change. If Kakarot was desperate for his attention after his blunder, he would have showed his stupid face already and acted like nothing was amiss. As per usual. Kakarot was the one who was avoiding him. Not the other way around. She was wrong.

Why should he be the one to break it. Kakarot earned this.

“I am doing nothing and I dislike this thing you’re doing.”

“What thing?” She paused, glancing at him over the screen of the phone, raising a fine brow at him, acting like she didn’t know what she was doing. That lie on her damn, pretty face.

“This...Thing. Whatever this thing is. An unnamed source told me that you used to be excessively possessive and needy and I’d like to see a lot more of that and less of—this thing—you’re doing here. Stop willfully sharing me.”

“I’m just trying to be supportive, Vegeta.”

“Support me less,” he strained on the words, bewildered by her willingness to just let him do what he wanted. He always did do what he wanted, honestly, but she was just practically counselling him at that point of the conversation, toward recovering from his momentary silence with Kakarot.

“Listen, I just know that you’ve had this boner for Goku longer than you’ve ever known me, and I’ve gotten used to that and I’m content with sharing that, because I know you’ll come back anyway…though...wait, who was this source? Was it Yamcha? What were you doing talking to Yamcha?”

He abruptly halted his attention on anything she said past a certain point. “…What the fuck did you just say to me.”

“When did you talk to Yamcha?”

“Do not deflect this conversation, Woman, don’t you dare—“ The poor cat meowed the entire dive it took, rolling off his back when he sat up, unable to restrain his response from her unfiltered words. Her ability to drain all of his rational thought was legendary and he became wholly reactionary. “I have never had any sort of anything toward Kakarot—and if you’ve been talking this absolute nonsense—”

“Oh calm down, I wouldn’t go telling everyone that. They can see this obsession for themselves. And who are you kidding, Mister? We get it, you want to be his rival, but also, I think maybe you have this severe case of you needing him to notice you.” She reached a hand out and pressed her index finger right into his chest. He felt like she shot him. He could have died and felt better than being placed on the spot like she was placing him.

“That’s fucking absurd.” I’m going to go kill myself and bury myself in your backyard.

“Why? You’ve got what you wanted now. You’re pretty much equal ground with him. He cares about you a whole bunch. You have a wonderful, most beautiful, and amazing wife who completely understands that saiyans just might be polyamorous dipshit manchildren who need someone in their bracket to keep them from getting restless for the sake of their family unit. After many discussions with the other wife in concern, she gets it too. There is absolutely no way you lose,” she leaned forward, moving her hand up to his face and cupping his cheek, “so why are you so pissy?”

“Because this conversation is even happening at all—I’m divorcing all of you—” He turned his face away from her hand, but she followed him, putting her cheek to his.

“Goku—” she started, but couldn’t even start her thought.

“Can fuck off,” Vegeta hissed at her, eyeing her from the side. “He ran off after running his damn mouth and hasn’t said a word, that’s his own fucking problem. I’m not going after him. I’m not that desperate for his damn company. If he was that upset by what he said, then maybe he shouldn’t have said it to begin with.”

“...Are...Are you bothered that he ran away?”

“It’s fitting he works on a farm, he’s a big chicken. Oh, he was perfectly fine breaking my fucking neck, but say a couple stupid things and he can’t man the fuck up,” words just fell out of his mouth and he didn’t know where they were coming from. The source of his anger was being forcibly drawn out of him by a mysterious gravity that Bulma seemed to have in her fingertips, apparently. Kakarot’s name as she called him, was apparently the magic word.

He took a steep breath and continued, having finally lost his control after days of bottling his annoyance, “I put my neck in his hands as an interpretation of trust and he can’t even sit through his fucking word blunder. And I’m the asocial one, everyone says. Admittedly, I’m about as social as a fucking log, but at least I have the cognizance to context fucking clues when there’s some—no shit—stuff going on, Kakarot. You don’t fucking kiss someone on the roof after all that back and forth fucking bullshit for the sake of it. And then run away after something that fucking asinine.”

“He kissed you on the roof—” Bulma covered her mouth, blinking up from swiping a notification on the phone she was working on still.

“God—fucking damn it—I’m going to punch him in the throat.” Vegeta backed away from her and rolled over to lay face down on the bed. “I want to go back to hating him.”

He could feel her hand on his back and he snarled briefly at it, but he did absolutely nothing to refute the motion. Something soothed the angry hissing demon within. Maybe he was angry that Kakarot never did show up, but the real issue was Kakarot ran away at all. What a fucking wuss. The man who could face literally anything else—any enemy, any fight, any other dumb shit thing that could come out of his mouth in offense of others—could not face Vegeta for something that was supposed to be a positive thing.

He wouldn’t enjoy admitting he cared about himself either, but Kakarot wasn’t that spiteful. He was just stupid. In comparison to the moral compass of the rest of them, Vegeta was still a questionable gray hue somewhere. If you don’t like someone, he was still in the party of, just fucking kill them.

And at that very moment, he was torn between hunting down Kakarot or just burying himself somewhere. He hated himself more and at least then, he wouldn’t be the first one to approach. He wasn’t going to give in to that.

“Oh Vegeta...Don’t let anyone ever tell you that you’re not complicated…” Bulma gently rubbed his back and he didn’t move. His outburst left him tired and mad—more mad than he usually was, anyway. It left him wanting to stand on the same roof the idiot had the nerve to kiss him on and scream into the night to come fight him. The horrible fact that, if he tried with enough fury, Kakarot would probably come. The temptation to summon him with his willpower of rage was present, just to punch him in his face for making him experience the resurgence of feelings he wasn’t accustomed to again.

No matter how he tried to adjust, Kakarot always upheaved his states of mind.

“I came here to get my phone fixed, not be destroyed. Why do you do this to me.”

“I didn’t mean to,” she leaned over to kiss the side of his face, “but clearly you needed to let it out if you were willing to just spill it all that easily. I’m done with your phone. I’ve actually been done with your phone for a while. If you want it back.”

“Throw it in a fire, I don’t even want it anymore.”

“Oh stop it, yes you do. If you get rid of your phone, then he’ll only be able to show up physically to communicate with you. You’d never escape him, in any capacity then,” she argued, trying to gain his cooperation, but she was having a tough time with how difficult he could be when his sour moods kicked in.

“Guess then he’ll have to stop being a big fucking wuss about this then.”

“Or, you can take the phone and finish the conversation with him directly, hmm?” She said, and he turned his head, confused by the weird twist in the tone of her voice. What did she mean by finish the conversation. Kakarot was never even part of the fucking conversation and he was not going to call him. Unless Kakarot was calling to admit he was a big fucking idiot, Vegeta was having no part of it.

He sat up and eyed her, not appreciating anything about her body language and every instinct in him lit up with suspicion and a sinking sensation of dread. “You better not have been texting Kakarot—”

“Hold on let me unmute him and put him on speaker.”

Acute horror flooded his whole body and he froze in place when he watched his wonderful, lovely, marvelous wife, who would do him no harm, turn the phone around to face him. He didn’t even have the mental capacity to catch and stop himself from covering his mouth with his hands. His soul left his body and anything else that occurred was reactionary. Betrayal was so real at that moment and he glanced up at Bulma, giving her the hardest stare he could without outwardly telling her he thought she was the biggest bitch he’d ever met in his whole life. Would die for her, but that did not save her from that label at that exact moment.

Why.

“V...Vegeta—I tried to tell her to stop—” Kakarot’s voice echoed through the phone. The embarrassment of his own words coming back in his memories almost knocked him off the bed like visions in the last few minutes before death. “She—kept calling me back after I hung up—”

“—Never speak to me again, you fucking coward—” he started to yell, but his voice just let go somewhere in there, due to his sheer shock of being played so hard.

“W...wait, c’mon. I didn’t mean it like that—” Goku whined at him through the phone, the camera shaking a little as Goku moved from where he was, clearly somewhere out in the field, to somewhere less sunny. “I just—didn’t want to make you uncomfortable—I know you’re not...cuddly and stuff… I’m sorry— c’mon, let’s talk—”

“Eat shit—” Vegeta sucked in a deep breath and mashed his hands all over the phone, unable to focus on the buttons enough to hit the big red one with precision enough to end the call. Eventually, he hit the one and then he hucked the phone in whatever direction he could make it go farthest, knowing it wouldn’t break due to its case. Though, at that moment, he would give anything to hear it shatter to pieces.

The level of betrayal.

And really, he should have known. Being played was his secondary pastime next to attempting to rekindle his past hatred for Kakarot.

“—Vegeta, please,” he heard that voice, moments later and he felt his whole body recoil and he rolled off the bed, finally. The cat had the intelligence to recognize the danger in advance, but he was willing to take a victim with him in an attempt to escape if the animal wasn’t willing to move.

“I’m going to murder the entire species that taught you that technique—get out of my bedroom—,” he shouted at him from the far side of the bed, his voice trailing from the floor as he tried to refuse any contact with anyone else. He was actually debating the merits of rolling himself up under the bed, but Kakarot found him before he had the chance to disappear under it. He was small enough to do so, he realized, judging the clearance. Not that a bed would save him. Kakarot would just lift the damn thing to get to him.

“...Hey...let’s at least go fight it out...You said you wanted to hit me right…? We can talk...you can hit me...I won’t run, I didn’t mean it that way…” Kakarot kneeled next to him and Vegeta didn’t move. Not even a bit. How dare this man exist in the same universe as him at that very instance.

“The only one who isn’t on my shitlist right now is a cat. A hope you all know that.”

“I did it for you, Vegeta,” Bulma made a very loud indication that she was blowing him a kiss. She had no apologies for playing her husband. Ultimately, they both knew how long Vegeta could maintain his stubborn streak and she was only attempting to turn it down for him. He technically didn’t go to Kakarot, he didn’t give in. He didn’t lose. It was her doing. “I’m going to leave you two to work this out, okay? You’ll forgive me eventually. I’m very proud of you, Vegeta. You really got your feelings out there today.”

“Go back to hell.”

“Goku,” Bulma turned her attention to Kakarot for a moment as she headed toward the door, and he looked up to her, having gotten comfortable sitting beside him. “Not in my bed, take it somewhere else if you’re gonna—” Vegeta just started screaming in her direction until she left the room, laughing the entire way. She did it on purpose and he absolutely let himself be taken by her obvious bait.

The moment she left, he exhaled and laid right back down on the floor, mentally exhausted to the point of defeat. “Fine, Kakarot. Let’s talk, you assholes win.”

Chapter Text

Goku was silent, waiting for Vegeta to speak first. While he agreed to talk, Goku knew the risks of opening his mouth without being prompted and causing Vegeta some kind of death by extreme mortification, for whatever he might say unintentionally. He’d mean well, but Vegeta had just been slaughtered by Bulma. Even Goku had the sense to recognize the brutal betrayal. Worse so, because he knew he really could have hung up and thrown the phone somewhere off in the field if he actually wanted to get himself out of the situation—and disconnect from the call.

But truthfully, he kinda wanted to see it play out.

Vegeta may have been the Prince of Saiyans, but he was more impressively the King of Being Difficult and seeing him that unfiltered made it much easier to figure out what his problem actually was for a change. Goku honestly thought vanishing for a while was the safest route for both of them at the time, because Vegeta had always been terrible at handling outbursts. Had that actually changed at any point? Goku had doubts, but Vegeta’s explosion over the phone implied otherwise. How was he supposed to know this without Vegeta telling him? And how was he supposed to know when it was safe to chance an approach?

Any other time, Vegeta would tell him to “fuck off” in his exact words. He did it for him, unwarranted. He was doing him a favor! He was being a good boy, or trying to...perhaps also running away from his own feelings being slapped in his face in the spur of the moment too...but Vegeta was the volatile one. He was the one who was touchiest about it. If one of them was going to have a stroke about any of it, the money on the table would easily be placed against Vegeta.

The days of avoiding Vegeta in the aftermath of his slip, had been largely due to his lack of knowing how to approach him. For all his hissing about it, Vegeta seemed to forget how unapproachable he he made himself. Goku might have had better luck in coming back to him, if he showed up suddenly and just clobbered him in the face without warning, but that didn’t feel right to him. Vegeta would be incensed, but probably less incensed than if Goku showed up meekly trying to apologize for his awkward blurt.

Not that it wasn’t obvious, really. It was just that neither of them ever spoke it. Deny it as Vegeta might outloud, he’d be lying to say he wasn’t aware of the deepening bond between them. If Goku was aware enough to need his own crisis counseling from his very patient and understanding wife, then he knew Vegeta was smart enough to be agonizing about it, well in advance.

Vegeta was mad he didn’t come see him. He was mad that Goku fled in the wake of his blunder. And he was sure Vegeta would have a brain aneurysm if he stayed too. Gohan told him about those. He said he was surprised Vegeta didn’t have one of those already. Goku watched Vegeta roll himself over and climb up the side of the bed, wondering what he was supposed to make of the extreme and constantly flipping polar shift that was Vegeta’s moods.

The furrowed brows and turned down lips told him that Vegeta was agitated—maybe a little more so than usual, judging by the faint darkened hue to his cheeks. He was flustered, embarrassed by being placed in a trap that he was backed into without even the slightest awareness. Bulma was far too smart for the rest of them and he should have known better than to sit with her and any object that could be functionally used against him. Bulma Briefs didn’t let anything hang in the air for very long.

“About this nonsense of you running away, Kakarot,” Vegeta started, picking up after his last words. Of course, he was going to make a first pitch and remind him of his instinct reaction to flee at danger. Vegeta was danger if faced with sudden feelings, he thought. And his own embarrassment was a startling revelation he hadn’t been prepared to come forward with, at the time. He’d figured he had a pretty good handle on openness, but Vegeta rubbed off on him a little and some public displays just didn’t feel right.

“I…didn’t know what else to do…” he admitted, sitting on the floor in front of him, looking up at him. Vegeta settled on the edge of the bed, arms folded across his chest. He looked down at Goku and the sensation of being scolded settled in his chest like it did with Chi Chi. Somewhere within him, he felt a prickling desire to antagonize him by calling him his second wife, just then. But he was directly in kicking range and he was trying to get Vegeta less upset, not more. His demeanor just had that same impressive, crushing aura of someone who was going to give him a hard time like Chi Chi—deservingly—did.

“Running away was not it, buffoon—“ Vegeta leaned down a little bit and hissed at him.

“Hey, you say that like you wouldn’t have kicked me if I stayed—” he protested, hotly. Only a brief second passed before Vegeta’s face reflected the accusation and he appeared so offended. Goku scooted just a bit closer in defense, settling between his feet and resting his elbows on Vegeta’s knees. He raised himself up to get closer into Vegeta’s face, unwilling to cower down under him entirely. Vegeta took this as a personal threat and bristled visibly at his nerve.

“I would have, absolutely,” he scowled blatantly at him, reaching a hand out and taking his face in his hand—fingers and thumb digging into his cheeks.

Goku grunted at his firm grip, air puffing over his palm. His brows turned together and his own temper flared up a little to battle Vegeta’s contradictory nature just a little bit. “But then yer mad that I left—”

“Yes,” Vegeta’s expression remained fixed firmly in it’s resolution; that he couldn’t see the problem that there was no feasible way for Goku to have won in any choice he made.

“So next time, you just want me to stay, is that it?” He challenged, watching his eyes flick back and forth. The intensity of that battle went beyond most of their physical bouts and Goku nearly fell backwards, socked in the chest at Vegeta’s blatant response.

“No.”

“I...What, make up yer mind, Vegeta—” He exhaled at him, ready to take a bite out of his hand in frustration at this man. Normally, he coasted along with Vegeta’s ranging moods, but he was being ridiculous even for him. Vegeta couldn’t really call this much of a talk, if he was essentially telling him he had no chance of correctly answering. Like a multiple choice test, where all of the damn answers were wrong anyway! Why, Vegeta.

Maybe it had something to do with rushing over, right out of the field—in a hurry and trying to keep from escalating Vegeta’s fury at him for his collaborative spying—but he was wound up with adrenaline. There was very little warning that he would be suddenly in front of Vegeta and attempting to work out the difficult wrinkles in the prickly saiyan. When he asked Bulma for advice, that was not what he’d meant. Having her trap him into spilling his guts all over the place was like letting an enemy power up, only to see that enemy be severely underpowered and then obliterated in with the first blow.

Unfortunately, Vegeta’s feelings were proving to be...in Bulma’s own text message words, a “clusterfuck”. He didn’t know what that meant when she originally sent that, when she was bullying him back and forth before she put the camera on to make him stay on; but he was getting the picture very quickly. Vegeta didn’t know what he wanted and his anger was framed around Goku’s lack of action, adamantly ignoring his own. Never mind that Vegeta was going to snarl at him for showing up anyway, it appeared. He frowned, steeply at him—corners of his mouth turned sharply down and brows furrowed inward so tightly, that he must have looked extremely affronted for Vegeta to comment on it.

“What the fuck are you looking at me like that for, Kakarot?” Vegeta narrowed his eyes at him and leaned inward a little, nearly nose to nose with him. Goku could see his lip curl in the soft hint of a snarl. Challenging him to fight over it.

“Yer bein’ a bitch, Vegeta,” he shot, knowing he was throwing out the fight words. What would Bulma do, he thought, drawing upon her power in the face of his sudden enemy. He was not prepared for this and he had to play for keeps.

He remembered just how reactionary Vegeta could be at the abrupt hand, cracking into the side of his face. Slapping with the force of a startled man, who probably didn’t expect a word like that out of his mouth, and to his face so straightforward. Throwing Vegeta off his feet proved to be so much easier than Goku actually thought, but that didn’t mean he was prepared for sharp sting against his cheek and the stars taking up the vision of his eye briefly.

“Damn it, Vegeta—” He cut sharply, moving a hand to rub his cheek, once Vegeta moved his own away. The other hand clamped down on his knee hard, and Vegeta actually shifted under his grip.

“How dare you speak that filth out of your dumb mouth, at me,” Vegeta spat at him, getting right back down in his face. Goku was still kneeling between Vegeta’s knees, head tilted back to stare off with him and neither of them were giving even a little bit. Vegeta’s idea of talking was to “gently” tell him that nothing he could have done would have been correct, and then slap stars into his vision. Easy. Maybe clobbering him would have been the easier solution and he could apologize to Chi Chi later for going back on his promise to try and be better. His natural instincts to get riled in the face an opposing force, had him ready to toss Vegeta across the room already.

And yell at him to just admit that Vegeta missed him, already.

I missed ya too, Jerk.

“Yer bein’ an ass—” He got close, nose almost touching Vegeta’s as he snarled back. Vegeta’s fingers were balling up into fists in Goku’s peripheral vision and he was prepared to move and block if he thought Vegeta was going to escalate it any. Leave it to them to turn a talk into a fight, but it wasn’t his fault that Vegeta couldn’t function without making any sense at all. What did he want—?

“You were the idiot who ran his mouth! This would have never happened if you weren’t a loose lipped numb nut!”

“Okay, but it’s not like I asked you to marry me, Vegeta. I mean, it’s not like I can anyway, already did that and I think they frown on marrying more than one person...And I don’t know if I want my last name to be Big BITCH,” he exhaled sharply, heart jumping in his chest, because he could visibly see Vegeta seething. He was not used to the snapback. For what it was worth, Goku was not used to giving the level of snapback he was giving. It was their fight all over again, only verbal abuse instead.

Vegeta swung a fist down out of reflex, knowing full well that it was going to be caught. The words out of Goku’s mouth just hit him at a core part of him that incited a riot and made him do things out of impulse. “It’s all your fucking fault I have to feel anything at all, you mistake of a person—. How dare you ever even look at me again—.”

“You don’t want me stayin’, you don’t want me leavin’, you don’t want me bein’ honest—. What do you want!” He grabbed his wrist, staring him dead in the eyes.

“Get the hell out of my face and get the hell out of my life, forever,” Vegeta snapped, head tilted with his nose turning back.

“Okay, fine, then I will,” Goku retorted quickly, baiting Vegeta in an instant. Calling his bluff. Drawing on the years of Vegeta’s threats and commanding snarkiness. He even made to move away from him, drawing back just a bit—attempting to wiggle his way from between Vegeta’s knees. He found, in a second, that Vegeta snapped his hand right back over his face, like before. Fingers digging back into his cheek and forcing him back into his face.

“Fuck you, Kakarot.”

“Vegeta—Why are you like this—” he muffled roughly through squished cheeks, jaws clenched with his teeth together to keep from biting through the sides of his mouth. Vegeta was telling him to go away, but forcing him by his whole face to remain fixed in place! How much more contradictory could he actually be without yelling both things at the exact same time in his face? He practically was doing that already! Goku was immensely confused and he breathed through his nose heavily, huffing at him in dismay. Hands dropping back to rest on Vegeta’s knees to stabilize himself, poised with his ribs at his knees. Vegeta puffed his chest up at him, trying to appear bigger and more annoyed, but he looked considerably baffled, if Goku was reading the undertone right.

Goku almost backed down when he recognized it, under Vegeta’s exceptional display of ruffled feathers.

“I….Don’t...Know.” He hissed, angry but confused in the same set of syllables.

Goku watched him struggle with his half-baked answer, still stuck in place by the firm grasp that kept him wedged there in front of Vegeta. Did Vegeta realize his feet were turned inward and planted over Goku’s calves—stepping down to further lock him in place? He probably didn’t notice at all. He was busy making faces at Goku and trying to work out the answer to his question for himself. And failing obviously.

Being so abruptly put on the spot, probably left Vegeta trying to catch up and Goku wasn’t helping by antagonizing. But sometimes, Vegeta had to be antagonized to work out his hangups. Sometimes, that meant throwing fists back and forth viciously. This time, it just meant not bowing in at Vegeta’s sharp words and attempts disengage him with sheer contradiction.

For once, Goku....Kinda got it. Now that it was directly in front of him. Thanks to Bulma.

He wrapped his fingers around Vegeta’s wrist and squeezed enough to loosen the pressure off his jaw, and he closed that little bit of distance left between them. Vegeta’s brief moment of paralysis at this, left the opening he needed and he had a large margin to mush his face right up to his, mouth to mouth. Vegeta’s breathing stopped for a moment and he was frozen still in front of him. Goku didn’t even feel him twitch. The wheels hadn’t started turning just yet.

Vegeta was playing hard to get, like Bulma said. Sort of. He was actually playing the game of...Can’t have it at all, because what was he feeling.

Relatable.

The lights flickered on after a minute and Goku saw the exact moment. He felt the exact moment, too. Vegeta woke up in a flash and reacted in an instant and Goku’s vision filled with stars in seconds. The full force of Vegeta’s fist collided with the side of his head and he accepted every bit of it. Not because he wanted it, exactly, but because he didn’t have the precognition to block it. Whatever words Vegeta yelled at him, he didn’t make out, because he had ringing in his ear from the force of his impact.

...He did tell Vegeta to hit him. He couldn’t really be mad at him for the fact that he did, but the burn to fight him tightened in his chest again and he almost rounded back on him. Shaking his head a little, he exhaled loudly and grunted directly at him. “Damn it—Vegeta—” He was about to pick him up and throw him. Jerk—

“You could have shown up on your damn own, Kakarot,” Vegeta snapped over his protest and he shut up very quickly, eyes widening—even as he wiped the little bit of water out of the one that suffered the closest blow.

Vegeta turned his face away from him, a frown so set into his features, that Goku was sure it would stick that way forever. His folded arms, led to fingers that dug into biceps that indicated that he wasn’t really sure he wanted to say any of it.

“Vegeta…”

“Asshole—,” Vegeta cut him off immediately, turning back on him and taking a fistful of his hair. He didn’t yank him hard enough to pull any of it out, but he pulled enough to force him right back into his bubble. Face to face again. “You ran off, like a chicken. Fine. Fair enough. I’d have kicked your stupid ass if you stayed, for being a knucklehead. But how dare you just run off and then not come face me yourself. I should obliterate you. And then let me humiliate myself—”

“...I’m sorry…” Goku rubbed the back of his neck. He was guilty of that one.

“Yes, you are. You big fucker,” he exhaled, deflating a bit.

“Ya know it’s jus’ because I didn’t wanna make ya uncomfortable... I don’t wanna make ya mad at me...An’ I guess I had ta kinda work it out too. It was a slip, ya know.” Goku rested his elbows back on Vegeta’s knees, getting comfortable again—looking up at him. He had been kneeling between his knees the entire argument somehow and Vegeta hadn’t made any actual indication he’d been uncomfortable about that detail.

“...Yeah...Well... I’m not gonna come after you. Not for anything, Kakarot. And I’m not going to say any of this again, so keep this shit in the back of your mind. If you fuck off, then you need to correct it. I will ignore you until we both die. Don’t think I can’t.”

“I know ya can,” Goku smiled, leaning on his propped up palm. He knew, in fact, that Vegeta could not.

Vegeta sensed the undertone of Goku’s comment, both of them knew it; but he didn’t act on it. He just left it to hang there. The tension was weakening with the release of the words and Goku felt a little better about how the exchange went—even if Vegeta had to make it a little difficult. That was just Vegeta, though. He was never gonna make it easy. Not for anything. But in the aftermath of Bulma’s brutal slaughter, Vegeta was probably still a little frazzled.

Without warning, Goku found hands on his face again and he reacted to defend—expecting Vegeta to be going in for another abrupt assault on him after all his mishandling already. But he was caught with alarm to have a face full of Vegeta’s very shortly after the fingers directed the tilt of his head upward. If his heart ever struggled more before then, he was giving it a second challenge. The throbbing in his chest was heavy and loud, coming from his shock at having Vegeta initiate.

Vegeta kissed him. Briefly. But he initiated it. Severed it as quickly as he started it, too, pushing him away and turning his head in any direction that let him avoid eye contact.

Goku smiled anyway, “We cool, ‘Geta?”

“I am, you’re not.”

“....You know what I mean.”

“...Until you do something that will inexplicably piss me off. Now get off me. I’m starting to lose feeling in my feet from sitting with you like this.” He grunted at him and made to shoo his hands and arms off his knees. Goku complied with his demanding request pretty easily, at least appreciative that Vegeta’s chaotic mood seemed to be tempered down. In no short amount of words, the whole exchange was telling Goku he was going to have to get used to contending with that wild contradiction of Vegeta. It was always there.

He’d just never seen it quite so forcefully, before.

Without muttering another sound, Vegeta lifted his legs from over the edge of the bed and rolled over on the bed itself. He then wasted no time in flopping right down on it and turning his back to him. Vegeta didn’t actually invite Goku on the bed with him. Not in any capacity whatsoever did make an effort to tell him he could join him. He didn’t ask, or tell him. He didn’t say anything at all. But, Vegeta did make an awfully pointed effort to roll further over on the bed than was needed, in order to put a full body’s worth of space there. And a nap did sound pretty good.

So he got up off the floor and crawled into the bed.

Chapter Text

Cold water hit his body, unforgiving and by his own intent. He couldn’t make the water come out any colder... and he did try. The knob could have broken off the shower wall for how hard he tried to force a more frigid temperature out of it than what he was already freezing himself with—but any colder and he might actually push himself into hypothermia. At that exact moment, his alarmed brain didn’t really care if he sent the rest of his body into a cold shock. If he didn’t put his body down near into its fucking grave immediately, then he was going to punch all of the pristine white tiles into fragments in his abject horror.

His heart thumped so hard in his chest, that the blood pumping through his body drowned out the sound of the water coming down on him. All he could hear was how quickly his own pulse was racing, and had been from the second he’d woken up just moments before. Never in his life had he remembered clamoring out of bed and into the shower so quickly. Fully dressed, he didn’t care. He had to cool down. Unfortunately, it wasn’t working nearly as well as he had hoped it would. The abrupt splash of icy water only served to wake his half asleep brain out of its stupor. So then he wasn’t even partially in a daze about what had him awake and mortified.

He was fully alert and traumatized.

The deep breath he took came like he was trying to suck his soul back into his body. All in the span of probably a few minutes, he’d gone from curled in the bed—asleep—to debating the merits of drinking Bulma’s expensive imported shampoo. That would not make him feel any bit better about it, however, and only serve to make Bulma angry when she’d inevitably have to summon Shenron to revive him from his suicide by extravagant hair cleansing products. If, of course, that wasn’t considered a natural enough death to leave him dead forever. Was self inflicted death outside of that gray line of questionable qualifiable deaths?

Certainly, that was not what he should be thinking about, but it was a lot more desirable than what had prompted him to scramble out of the bed in the dead of night in the first place.
He would rather be reading every nonsensical word on the back of her soap bottles and drinking them one by one, than thinking about just why he was dousing himself in the coldest water available and still losing the battle with himself over it. Having a large abundance of ki sucked. He’d have to go bury himself in the snow in the arctic to drop his temperature as low as he wanted to, at that moment.

And if he even thought about closing his eyes, he might actually have to hit himself. Closing his eyes meant he could almost bring back the illusions that drove him to roll off the mattress in a wild hurry to begin with. He could see the fuzzy, dim outlines of a face. Though washed in the shadow of a dream, he knew the strong curve of that jaw and the light playing along the ridge of a familiar nose. Very close to his face. Not in a way he’d never seen before. He’d been that close. Kakarot liked to get in his face, from time to time. Even moreso, since they’d closed up their stupid standoff over Kakarot hiding from him.

Kakarot being in his face wasn’t an unusual event, regardless of how much Vegeta scowled at him about it. That wasn’t the goddamn problem. The goddamn problem was the horrendously vivid sensations that the rest of his body suffered, accompanied with the other imagery past Kakarot’s face. The hazy, dim play of light on thick arms, on each side of his body, with hands buried in the bedding beside his head. The vague peripheral implication that Kakarot’s wide chest ran uncovered until his vision lost clarity, left quivers down his spine that made him sputter.

Nothing was gentle about his dream, and that was what woke him up so damn abruptly. He almost had to check himself for bruises. He didn’t want to actually check himself for anything, because to actually look for physical evidence was a full admission that he almost fell for his brain playing such a realistic trick on him. Making him actually experience such a damn thing against his will and have such a strong response.

He was a fucking hot blooded male. That was the only goddamn reason. Admittedly, he couldn’t even recall the last heated dream he’d actually had. The fact that it was Kakarot invading his fucking dreams too, left him wishing he could actually get ice to come out of the shower. He didn’t want to wake up with actual recollections his mind made up of the big fool huffing his name and trapping him in his bed, caught between his knees. If he forgot he was supposed to be forcing the thoughts out, he could feel his fingers digging into Kakarot’s back hard enough to threaten his skin.

If he thought about it another second, he was going to go over there and shove his whole fist down Kakarot’s throat without an explanation. How dare you assault me in my dreams, you fucking animal. How dare you make me have a single inclination about you that isn’t to smack you upside your thick nugget brain case—

‘Just go have sex like normal people, and stop being idiot boneheads!’ Bulma’s voice cracked him directly between the eyes and drilled down into the center of his skull, and he smashed his head into those pristine white tiles until he heard them actually give a little. Bulma, not now. Now of all times. He had somehow majestically swallowed that comment of hers down into a hell of hopeful no return, until that very moment. The worst moment.

But I don’t fucking want to— He argued back at mental Bulma. I don’t even want to be on the same planet with him most of the time, why would I—

You let him sneak kisses on you all the time, Vegeta. And you kissed him of your own free will and volition once, even.

Shut the fuck up, how do you know that— Wait, fuck, you’re in my head, I’m too tired for this. I just woke up, can you at least give me a chance to cool the hell down before you roast me, because I’m already suffering enough, thank you—

Hitting each other viciously was supposed to be enough, so why—. That should have been sufficient in taking care of all of their stress relief against each other. It was clearly just the result of a stupid foggy overactive mind, and not indicative of anything concrete. There was nothing to this but him being in a state of sleep dazed madness. Once it wore off, he’d forget about it like normal dreams usually just faded off into nothing.

Right?

He smacked his face into the tiles again and decided in that very instant he was never going to let Kakarot see him ever again. He was going to go into hiding and avoid him until he died and if Kakarot ever fell into eyeshot, he was going to just kill them both before a word could be spoken between them. Without context.

He’d just finished scolding Kakarot, not that long ago, for running away and hiding; now suddenly he was perfectly content to abandon ship in an instant because of a dream. He would tattoo “hypocrite” proudly on his fucking face about this. A kiss was one thing— This was something else entirely—

The natural progression of things, Vegeta. You’re not that dense.

Bulma, please, I’m asking you to move out and get back into your own head. Mine’s full enough with my own internal screaming, to have to deal with fighting you as well.

You’re being a big baby about this, honestly.

Let me be a big baby about this in peace—

“Vegeta?”

“Woman, I sa—” Wait, that voice wasn’t coming from within, dial it back. He abruptly cut the water off, to break the sound in the small room. She must have heard him cracking the tiles...because, upon inspection, he certainly had broken a few of them. He hadn’t even considered that his movement might have roused her and he must have looked like a lunatic. But she was probably used to that a little bit. He cleared his throat, “I didn’t hear you, what?”

“Are you okay? You jumped out of bed in such a hurry…” She spoke through the cracked door. Thankfully, she didn’t actually enter the room entirely, or she might see that he had his sleep clothes still entirely on—soaked completely through. He looked like a gigantic moron. He felt like a gigantic moron.

How was he supposed to answer that to this woman and not give himself away? She was unfortunately right there next to him to witness his mad scramble. Though, to what extend she actually saw, he didn’t know. She wasn’t fully awake either, he assumed. Bulma slept harder than he did, so he could have easily made it into the bathroom before she actually saw him. Or it was possible he fumbled a bit before he ever got off the bed. The whole damn thing was a blur. Damn it.

“Bad dream,” he admitted, quietly starting the process of peeling his clothes off with a troubling realization that he had nothing to change into in the bathroom itself.

“Okay...Anything I can do? Do you need me to get you anything?” She offered, and he regarded her with suspicion—but only because he was not ready for being teased by her. Don’t do this right now.

But he did need something from her, or have to contend with walking out into the room unnecessarily naked, unexplained. “I need a change of clothes.”

The moment of silence that followed was agonizing. The longer the wheels turned in Bulma’s head, the worse he fared. She would never let it blow over. She still made kissy faces at him behind Kakarot’s back whenever she caught them in the same room together, and he honestly wanted to die of mortification about that already. He should have never blurted that Kakarot kissed him on the fucking roof. In front of her, of all people. But if anyone was going to destroy Vegeta, it was going to be Vegeta himself. No exceptions.

Just say something already, Woman.

“Clothes?” Her voice echoed back at him and he involuntarily cringed, “Why do you need clo—“ she paused and he felt himself freeze in the middle of pulling his sopping shirt over his head. He barely managed to get his head through the neck when she wound up her punch and threw it at him, “oh Vegeta—don’t tell me you jumped out of bed because you had to go and didn’t make it—because, oh my god, if you pissed yourself, I will never never let you live it down—.” She sucked in a sharp breath, voice nearly squealing like she was desperate to confirm.

Oh god damn her.

And stupid him, for letting her shrill antagonizing get the better of him; because he nearly slipped, scrambling out of the shower to close the distance and fling open the door the rest of the way and stare right up into her face—brows screwed together so tightly they might fuse all by themselves. He nearly hissed in response to her goading and she didn’t even blink, but to start giggling.

“Woman—that is not what fucking happened—at all, how dare you even remotely suggest—.”

“Did you take a shower in your sleep clothes?” She cut him off before he could continue with another word, looking down between them and catching the very telling detail that he had his arms still buried in the wet mess of his nightshirt. He hadn’t yet finished extracting himself from the article when he’d thrown the door open—apparently more concerned with her horrid assumption than covering up his current state in any capacity at all.

“No,” he stared her dead in the face, and told her the exact opposite of what they both knew was the truth.

“...Vegeta, what in the world is the matter with you? Are you feeling okay? Are you sick?” She had the nerve to look concerned, reaching out for him with her small, dainty hands to touch his face. Her mistake, honestly. She shouldn’t have approached a wild animal and he raised his arms and hooked them over her head to close them around her. Sopping shirt and all. The shriek that left her mouth was enough to take his mind briefly away from what had him traumatized to begin with. The whole body shiver he could feel coming from her, brought some amusement to him. “You’re—freezing—Vegeta, what the hell—,” she squalled at him.

“I hadn’t noticed,” he feigned ignorance, pretending he couldn’t see her trying to squirm away from cold wet mass of his shirt bunched across her neck and back.

“W…—what, the hell you didn’t—you big damn weirdo—,” she hissed and bowed her back, trying to move away from the cold, offending garment. Eventually he bestowed some mercy, and dropped it from his hands, to the floor at her feet. But the damage was already done and she was going to have to change her clothes as well.

“See, now look what you’ve done, you’ve ruined it for both of us now.”

“I did—,” she put her arms around his neck, digging her fingers into his skin. “You were the one who flew out of the bed on a stupid mission to shower with your clothes on, you big moron—I came looking for you to make sure you were dying or something and this is the thanks I get?”

He bristled at her, defensively. “I don’t believe you for a second. You’re not that sweet. I’m not fooled, woman. What are you actually after? You could have easily left me to my business, you usually do—,” he grunted right into her cheek, close to her face and attempting to demonstrate his willingness to just bite her if she kept antagonizing her. They both knew he actually wouldn’t do it, but the display of threat was necessary when he was feeling cornered. And he felt extremely cornered. Trust no one, especially not Bulma.

This bitch will kick you when you’re down. Perfect and ruthless, but he could drown her and die with her at that exact moment and feel no regret.

“Okay, fine, asshole—,” she actually did retaliate by biting him, instead; a nip to the cheek in the manner he’d threatened. He inhaled and tightened his grip on her, nose curling in absolute dismay. How dare—, “I came to check up on my stupid husband, and make sure he wasn’t going to drown himself over his Goku boner. But I’m very proud of you for handling it, Vegeta. Even if your method is fucking stupid—.”

He froze, like his blood ran colder than the water out of the shower. Forget dying with her, she killed him before he could have the chance to kill them both together. A murder took place and he wasn’t even the one to commit it. How was that fair at all.

The true horror was he couldn’t deny it without lying.

He nearly took a full step back in response, but for reasons he couldn’t even comprehend, her grip felt like an iron vice. No, please let go.

“No one’s judging you,” she had the nerve to speak the words directly to his face. Right there, near his ear—where he couldn’t pretend he didn’t hear them.

“I am judging me. And I’m going to go bury myself. So release me or I’m taking you with me.” There was no part of this exchange that did not leave him feeling mortified. He had no control over any of this. The absence of authority over his own goddamn mental imagery, turned over to the rest of his body and betrayed him like no other fucking betrayal in all of his life. Maybe he was having a stroke and he wasn’t fully aware of it yet. He’d seen Kakarot naked more times than any person ever should have to, after three years in the time chamber; and only now was this cropping up?

Fuck you, Kakarot, for refusing to leave me alone, even in my dreams—

“Evidently, your method didn’t work, Vegeta, I’m sorry; but honestly, I’m not gonna go through the effort to round up the dragon balls to revive you in the middle of the night,” she whispered, but it sounded so loud in his ear that he was very tempted to bite her whole face.

“My method was just fine—” he snapped, only to catch sight of the raised brow from the corner of his eye, and see the disbelief on her face. It took him the longest pause on Earth’s ugly history to realize exactly why she was giving him that look. He dropped his face into her neck and snarled. “It was going just fine before you came in and fucked it up—,” he muffled.

Her cheeky snort, just shy of a laugh, left him ready to pick her up, throw her into the shower and put the icy water on full blast. But she had power that he did not. Control of the situation. “Honey, you were fucking it up all by yourself. Now stop killing your blood pressure. Finish stripping off your wet clothes and come to bed. I’ll take care of you. And we can go the fuck back to sleep and I’ll even let you pretend this never happened.”

“...It was a fucking dream and none of this happened.”

“None of this happened,” she repeated after him, and he hated every single second of caving to her compromise.

But he did.

“...Fine.”

Because if he didn’t, he was going to be in that shower for the rest of the goddamn night, and no amount of professional construction was going to be enough to fix the tiles in that bathroom.

Chapter Text

“I’m bored.”

“Well, then go home already,” King Kai replied to his whiny declaration with a not so subtle hint of annoyance. Goku always acted like he didn’t notice this faint backdrop of irritation, but he knew it was there, well enough.

He dropped in, uninvited, for very little purpose other than to have a place to process his thoughts, somewhere other that wasn’t home. Far away from Earth, he thought maybe he could organize better. That turned out to be very far from the case, though. Organization was better left to thinking men, like Gohan and Vegeta. Those two would do much better with the kinda backdrop that King Kai’s planet gave. Something about the small world left him with an anchorless sense and he came to reinvigorate himself, more often than not to the Kai’s dismay, naturally.

But despite feeling rearing to go, physically, he was just not quite together in the head. The odd displacement made him restless, but unwilling to do anything about it. He showed up there, to fix the problem, but found himself at a loss for what to do with himself there. Surely some training would fix it? He thought so...but just didn’t feel like it. Well, that was a problem. Training and farming were his usual sources of stress relief, and he’d already decided that being on Earth wasn’t helping.

If being on Earth didn’t, help and being on King Kai’s planet didn’t help, what was going to help? Talking to Vegeta, probably. Finding out why he was suddenly being so...Vegeta, again. He hadn’t done anything wrong that he knew of—and he’d thought of every possibility. Well, was trying to run through every interaction he had with him since they’d cleared the air. He thought they had been in relatively good standing, and really, nothing felt out of place.

But damn it if Vegeta didn’t appear to be avoiding him like he was a plague. At least in person. He’d answer his messages. He even picked up when Goku called him. And was even still reading to him over the phone! So what was causing him to suddenly vanish when Goku showed up in person? Vegeta left the room as soon as Goku was in it, and made no efforts to come back. Vegeta had his moods. Goku was more than used to those, and a week or two of that wasn’t exactly unusual. Vegeta decided at random, sometimes, when he wanted to be touchy; but after nearly a month, he was starting to think he’d actually done something wrong.

If he had, Vegeta wasn’t telling him. He was trying not to be mad about it, because he really couldn’t be. Vegeta wasn’t ignoring him entirely. They were almost done with an entire novel in that month. It was just... being in person made Vegeta disappear and Goku couldn’t figure out why. He could not get close enough to investigate and piece together Vegeta’s issue. He frowned, annoyed by it.

What gives Vegeta. You tell me to do things, and then you don’t do it. Jerk. What about that runnin’ away thing—

He grumbled, brows turned together and his hands clamped down over his knees tightly where he sat. Focusing was hard when he kept going right back to why he was at King Kai’s place. Couldn’t think of what he did to make Vegeta so distant, when he was distracted by being annoyed with him for being a...what was that word? Hypocrite? Hypocrite. That sounded right.

Maybe if I just teleport directly to him, and punch him in the face, he’ll have to pay attention to me.

That would definitely make him mad, at least. Goku would then have to explain why he’d showed up out of nowhere throwing hands at him. Sorry, Vegeta, I just thought you weren’t close enough to me for too long.

That sounded really...unsound, when he thought about it that way. Even he recognized that.

“Goku—!”

He jumped at the sudden noise and blinked, nearly throwing himself back in catching the looming view of King Kai in his vision so suddenly. “—H-hey!” He stammered, with hands up in defense. “What’s the big idea, King Kai—?”

“This disrespect! Come to my planet and then ignore me while I’m talking to you!”

“I wasn’t ignoring you—“

“Then What did I say, Goku?” His face moved closer and Goku felt himself shrink back.

“...I was ignoring you...but I didn’t mean it—.” He quickly added and immediately felt King Kai’s scorn come down on him with magnified intensity. “I was...Just…”

“Ignoring me! Honestly, will you just go home? You have been doing this since you got here,” the kai grumbled, his antennas twitching. His voice barely maintained a calm level, despite his rising blood pressure. Goku knew that his presence spiked the kai’s blood pressure when he was around for too long...But honestly, his blood pressure shouldn’t matter all that much. He was dead— Hmm... Oh right. Sensitive topic...

“Sorry...I just….don’t really gotta good place to sit an’ think at home. None that get me anywhere...Not that I’m gettin’ anywhere now… But...I was thinkin’ I could at least get some exercisin’ in while I was here.” He stretched his arms behind his head, cracking the knuckles of his fingers when he bowed them back a bit. “At home I gotta work...or I can’t focus…”

“You aren’t focusing any better here, now are you?”

His shoulders sagged at the question that came shot right back at him. King Kai never let him have it easy, but usually he could just roll his anxious needling right off. For some reason, hearing it thrown down on him so blatantly, made him frown distinctly. He was frowning at Vegeta. But Vegeta was nowhere to be seen. He wish he was, because Vegeta deserved to be frowned at. He deserved to be very, very frowned at.

I thought we had it figured out…

But Vegeta was the one being distant and strange this time, and if they played by Vegeta’s rules, then they’d never resolve it...Vegeta was never going to address it. He was never going to come forward, despite being the one running away. What was his problem—

“You’re not going to figure this one out, from here, Goku,” King Kai’s voice broke through his train of thoughts again and he exhaled softly, with an absent nod. He knew he was right. Escaping Earth and trying to piece it out at a distance wasn’t going to do anything but make him want to show up unannounced and pounce Vegeta violently. He was getting more and more tempted; to just show up and coldclock him. Give Vegeta a reason to be mad at him, if he was. Or make him explain why he was being...such a bitch again if he wasn’t.

Goku had never used the word bitch so many times in his life until the last few months with Vegeta.

The gears in his brain turned slowly, but they caught up after a few moments and he blinked after a long pause. He tilted his head up and caught eyes with King Kai for a very delayed moment before the lights clicked on, one by one. Wait a minute! How would King Kai know what he was trying to figure out—

“King Kai wha…” He unlaced his fingers from behind his neck and braced his hands on the grassy ground beneath him, looking up at him with the widest eyes. The hairs on the back of his neck stood when it fell into place.

“Goku...don’t think I don’t see all,” King Kai loomed over him, despite his short stature. When he was sitting on the ground, and feeling small, King Kai was a towering force. “And this nonsense you have going on with Vegeta—”

He couldn’t let him finish his sentence.

“You know about that—!?” He yelled, nearly throwing himself off the ground and toppling right back over, to land closer to the kai’s feet. “You’re spying on me—King Kai—!?” He sucked in a sharp breath, fumbling to get on his hands and knees and look up at him with such dismay. Such betrayal!

“Of course I do, you numbskull! If I don’t watch you, then who will! You don’t watch yourself! You go out and get Beerus ruffled at a moment’s notice! I have to make a habit of making sure you aren’t out being a nuisance!”

“Y...yeah but...I’m not being a news stands—I’ve been good lately, and I, eek—” He squawked loudly, with his face suddenly so close to the leaning Kai’s, that he choked on his own words. There was no playing around with him on this matter, not that day.

“You did that on purpose, Goku. You know exactly what I’m referring to.”

“Alright, maybe. But, okay, yeah, maybe I do, but I have been good, King Kai! You didn’t gotta go snoopin’ around!” He threw up his defense, now frowning at his own mentor. If Vegeta wasn’t there to be on the receiving end of it, then he would just channel it elsewhere. Not the same kind of frown...but it would be good enough. At least until King Kai caught him in the mouth with another suckerpunch he wasn’t ready for.

“I wasn’t snooping around just to see your silly nonsense, Goku. Until it got interesting. Then, maybe I did tune in a bit more,” the short god rubbed his chin and gave him a nasally laugh. Goku immediately ran through his head every event that King Kai could have witnessed and he wondered just which ones he might have peeked in on at random—. The stuffy laughter and dry snort led into a cheeky comment and Goku, almost covered his face. “A real spectacle, witnessing his expression, as alarmed by hitting you off the roof as you were being hit.”

“You...saw that...huh…?”

“Hmmmm. And you deserved every bit of it.”

“Wha—what do you mean I deserved every bit of it—what did I do to deser—” He was interrupted swiftly by a finger being jabbed into his cheek and then directed upward. Toward the halo hovering over the kai’s head. “—‘s got nothin’ to do with this—! That’s not fair! An’ s’not like I did it on purpose, King Kai—.”

“If you ask me, he should have socked you right off again, a few more times. Maybe he’s avoiding you because you’re a nuisance, Hmm?” He postulated, his short arms folded and his antennas flicking with some wonder. Goku’s jaw slacked a bit, staring up at him a moment before snapping back up—teeth nearly clacking together in the action. King Kai could see him, why not Vegeta too? Did he know something that Goku didn’t? Aw man…

“Wait—is he really avoiding me on purpose? Are you spyin’ on him too, King Kai—?” He shot up on his feet, now towering over the short god. His taller stature didn’t lessen the sudden power the mentor held over him. “What the hell—that’s—Master Roshi kinda stuff—!”

“Oh?” Somehow the chuckle he got, and the tilt of the buggy god’s face made him want to shrink back. “Is it now? Just what kind of things are you planning to do, Goku?”

If he ever felt King Kai’s disgruntlement about being killed by him—even if accidentally—in full force, it was in that very moment. The Kai didn’t hate him, but he definitely held a touch of bitterness about the glowing halo over his head; and if his method of vengeance about still having it was in finding some weakness in Goku and exploiting it to death, then he’d certainly found an unexpectedly effective one. To even Goku himself, who stared down at him, waving his hands in an immediate sense of denial—in defense of himself and on behalf of Vegeta, who would obliterate the both of them if he knew about the conversation even taking place.

“T—that’s not what I mean—” he took a deep breath and shook his head. “I’m just sayin’! Ya shouldn’t be lookin’ in on people—.”

“And you shouldn’t be bothering me out here for no reason!” His voice pitched and he yelled back at him, loud enough that Goku could feel the wind coming from him. “You aren’t going to fix your problem out here, go home and fix it there! You’ll be here forever if you think sitting here and thinking about it is going to get you anywhere!”

Goku puffed air into his cheek, a steep pout setting into his features—knowing King Kai wasn’t wrong, but not happy about it. He hadn’t gotten anywhere… but if he went back and did something about it, then he was giving in when Vegeta wouldn’t have, if the whole scenario was reversed. Should he just let Vegeta avoid him in person forever, until he figured out his problem? Especially when Vegeta wasn’t even ignoring him entirely? He still maintained contact. He didn’t have any real reason to be as ruffled as he was, but...he was! He had no concrete proof, no, but he could feel it. He could tell something was going on and Vegeta was going to be Vegeta about it until one of them cracked.

Goku was significantly less patient between the two of them.

“King Kai—,” he turned his eyes back to him, his brain clicking onto an idea, suddenly. “You know what his problem is don’t you? Can’t ya give me a little hint?” If he was spying on them, surely he knew something? He leaned close to his face, but quickly had to back away, once the yelling started again. Yikes. Maybe not.

“Absolutely not! I’m not following every little thing you idiots get yourselves into. Even if I did know. Which, I do not! I would not tell you! I’m not going to help you, when all you have to do is go home and fix it yourself! You don’t get cheat codes, Goku. Figure it out on your own!”

“But King Kai—I need cheat codes with Vegeta—he keeps changin’ the rules! One minute he tells me one thing, the next minute he’s doin’ the exact thing he tells me not to do! I am confused! I need a training mentor for handlin’ this man!”

“I am not that trainer, Goku—! Go home!” The voice got even louder, and Goku had to step back, putting his arms up in defense. “You aren’t going to sit here and disrupt me for this—if you want a solution, then it’s right back where you came from! You aren’t even training here, I can’t even keep your attention, what good are you even doing here?”

“I...was trying—.”

“No! No more, go—right now. Go back and take care of you business, Goku. And don’t you dare come back to me until you’ve got a clear head, free of this nonsense!” The Kai jabbed him in the chest and he shrank back, dazed a bit at the shocking forcefulness on display. Clearly King Kai did not want him lingering any longer, and no amount of pouting was likely to make a difference. His frown deepened, but he stepped back and held his hands up in surrender.

“Alright...Okay. I’m goin’. I don’t know what I’m supposed ta do, though. If you ain’t gonna give me any hint, I’m just going back and I’m gonna slug him and then see what happens, ‘cause Vegeta ain’t ever gonna meet me in the middle, an’ talkin’ to him gets me hit anyway, so I may as well just hit ‘im first.” Surely, Vegeta responded better to words with fists, anyway, right?

“Try using your brain for a change.”

“I’ve been tryin’ and I have no ideas. Vegeta is the one who does that thinkin’ stuff. If he were here, he’d have an idea, but he’d not gonna tell me what’s up his butt, now is he?”

King Kai rubbed his face, blatantly, and Goku’s brows turned together tightly. Did he miss something? “Have you ever considered asking him, you fool?”

“No. Why would I do that?”

“Idiot—! Just go! If that’s your solution then I’m sure you’ll stumble your way right through it, but if you take two seconds to think before you jump in swinging, I’m sure you’d find a much more effective method for dealing with the type of opponent you’re facing.” The portly god rubbed his chin, with a very strong implication laced in the meaning of his simple words. None of them told Goku anything at all, though. What effective method could he use against Vegeta, when he didn’t know what the battlefield was? He still thought punching him in the face was the quickest, easiest approach.

“I’m not good with talkin’, I’d rather just clock him…” He rubbed the back of his neck and glanced away, before eying him suspiciously. “An’ I thought you weren’t givin’ me any advice anyway.”

“Goku,” a low warning voice and Goku took the hint quickly. He generally feigned ignorance in knowing when it was too much, but King Kai’s nonsense tolerance was nonexistent. “I will give you one direction, and that’s to go where he is, right now. I’m not giving you any more cheat codes, and I better not see you here again until you wish me back to life!”

“I will King Kai, I promise… Stuff just keeps coming up—.”

The stern stare prompted Goku to just press two fingers to his forehead and search out the familiar ki of his current nemesis—Vegeta’s stubborn inability to meet him in the middle on anything, despite having a whole episode over it. Goku wasn’t one to make a big deal about those sorts of things. He disappeared for long periods of times on friends, going off to do his own thing; but for some reason, distance from Vegeta—in any capacity—set wrongly with him after that talk they did actually have. Nothing good came from taking a step forward to take two back. He wanted to fix whatever was making Vegeta avoid him, but that could be anything at all. Even if it was just to make him yell at him viciously in person again. He was sort of into that kind of bullying anyway.

With the focus of Vegeta set in his mind, he displaced himself from the kai’s world and put himself right back on his. He didn’t, however, put himself directly in Vegeta’s line of sight. He didn’t want to be immediately seen by him. The approach was just as important with Vegeta as knowing what he was going to do after it. Knowing what Vegeta was doing, would also change his method of going after him, and he pressed himself against a wall with his ki suppressed and listened intently, just outside what he knew to be Bulma’s workshop room. Vegeta was in there with her, he noted, when Bulma continued in the conversation they’d been clearly in the middle of having.

“My mother is so excited, Vegeta.”

“No kidding,” Vegeta’s voice came flat from the other room, following Bulma’s. “She’s hasn’t stopped cooing about it, and I’m sure you’re just having a fucking field day.”

“Well, it’s not like we weren’t already thinking about it. It’s just a little sooner than we planned, and mom wasn’t expecting it.”

Vegeta’s grunt sounded like it came through grinding teeth. “Have you finished telling everyone and their extended family about it?”

“All except Goku, of course. Chi Chi said he was out at King Kai’s. So I’ll have to wait until he comes around.”

“You can’t go a full conversation without bringing up Kakarot, can you? “

“I’m sorry, Vegeta, I’m just very excited myself,” the tone of Bulma’s voice shifted a bit, into the familiar pitch she turned to when she was teasing him. “I wanted to thank Goku for his contribution—”

“If you say a fucking word to Kakarot—.”

“I was kidding, I wouldn’t throw you under like that, but if I knew all it would take to get another baby out of you, would be you struggling with your obsessive Goku Boner, I’d have taken advantage of it so much sooner. Maybe steal his orange gi and dress up like him.” Goku could feel her digging into Vegeta, now. “I don’t think I could take a punch like he could though, but I could probably hit you a few times, to get you in the right frame of mind.”

“W-woman, fuck off. You said you’d let me pretend it never happened—.”

“That was until you left behind evidence.”

“I should have left this planet, is what I should have left.”

Goku listened to them, going back and forth, from just around the corner; and the longer he listened, the more he felt his face getting warm. He didn’t quite understand what the hell Bulma meant by some of what she said, but other things she was saying left him with a terrible mental image he didn’t ask for. He had no idea how he was directly involved in this, but it was clearly enough to get Vegeta flustered. And Bulma called it an obsessive what—?

And was Bulma saying she was pregnant—? Good for her but—

“I’m going to the gravity chamber. Call me when you’ve decided to stop ruining my life—,” Vegeta’s voice cut his thoughts suddenly and he realized he had to move away quickly or get spotted. If Vegeta saw him there, then he would have more of a fight on his hands than he’d ever be able to recover from, he was sure. At least, he knew where Vegeta was going. That would be a safe place to corner him, if he could bring himself to corner him after what he just heard.

Because suddenly, it made sense why Vegeta was avoiding him. Vegeta was easily ruffled by things like that. He couldn’t even talk to him without punching him multiple times in defense of himself for even the slightest embarrassment. Not even counting Vegeta’s response, Bulma left him with a bit of vivid imagery that had his mind wandering while he discreetly followed Vegeta. If he was smart, he would leave him be and act like he was never there at all...and figure out how to ease back into Vegeta’s orbit. But, he was decidedly not all that smart.

King Kai’s words did echo through his mind. Take two seconds to think, and you might find a more effective method. King Kai knew what he was going to come in on. Just how was he supposed to use that to his advantage?

Goku waited until Vegeta was closed inside the gravity room, to teleport in.

He had an idea, and it was probably a very bad one. But that didn’t mean he wasn’t going to go headfirst right into it anyway. He was told that was a bad habit of his.

Vegeta didn’t even have a second to prepare for him; because Goku materialized in so close, that he was boot to boot with him. No fists could be thrown, because Goku had him trapped and unable to wind back and have any room to swing. To Vegeta, he must have appeared like a lightning strike and that was really the best method of attack; because Vegeta didn’t even move. Paralyzed, Goku caught him off guard and he ran with it.

Took his face in his hands and—instead of punching him in the mouth—like he originally planned, he kissed him instead. One aggressive suckerpunch to the face that Vegeta couldn’t ignore.

Chapter Text

When Vegeta stomped away from her, leaving her workshop in route to his training room, he did so for the sole purpose of maintaining his composure while his brain bounced around different thoughts. He had to restrain himself from snapping that she was referring to this thing by the wrong name. Honestly, if she was going to heckle him, the very least she could do was call him Kakarot when she mocked him. This “Goku Boner” phrasing of hers made his nose curl, and half of it was easily because he would never call him by the name the rest of them did.

He wasn’t quite sure if that upset him or not.

The other half of the problem was obvious in itself, but he was almost over it. Not seeing the buffoon for weeks on end gave him plenty of time to sort himself out, so maybe he wouldn’t immediately slap him in the face on sight—out of sheer instinct. Was he coming to terms with it, or was he just pushing it out of his mind until he could pretend it wasn’t a thing anymore? Bulma barely let him pretend. Her near constant jabs at him served to keep him nice and fresh about his...responses to Kakarot.

Dealing with it was a whole different issue, however. Accepting that Kakarot kissed him from time to time was a difficult enough process. Admitting he was fine with it, was a whole mixed bag of emotions that he didn’t have time to unpack—so he usually just threw the whole suitcase in the closet and shut the doors. He did the same damn thing with Bulma when he first decided to remain and try to make that work.

And see how that turned out? She preferred nice and open, walk-in closets. And threw his luggage all over the place inside of it.

He grunted and shut the door behind him as soon as he was in the chamber, sealed away where he couldn’t be bothered. Another session of mental processing would put him another step closer to figuring out what he actually wanted to do about Kakarot. He had already fought for weeks with the startling conclusion that the big son of a bitch was… ingrained in his life with the permanence of a terminal disease. He would die with Kakarot, but fight him until the very goddamn end.

To continue to behave like the...pissy little bitch he was, as Bulma so gently put it, at one point...would not really help him anymore. Maybe if he just showed up at his doorstep and punched him in the face, he’d feel better and more normal about it. That required leaving his own home and actually going to him. What a damn chore Kakarot was turning out to be.

Make me fucking feel things and then making me fucking—feel—things.

He grimaced and punched numbers into the panel to set the gravity. Punishment wasn’t going to be bone breaking, but enough that he wasn’t going to be able to relax in it; make himself focus enough that he’d have to run himself through his usual course of stress relief. Five hundred times earth gravity just wasn’t really what he was feeling when the only issue he was having was really that he felt required to self deny. Argue and fight for the sake of it, until it was so second nature he didn’t even think about it before he retaliated to every damn step of progress.

That’s why you smack him in the face, instead of talking to him properly.

If Kakarot wasn’t so damn persistent, he’d have lost him a long time ago.

What a thought.

...What a thought.

A thought he didn’t like suddenly having.

What if he—

His quick tilt toward paranoia lost its foothold when he turned to the sudden presence of ki in the room with him. Kakarot didn’t hide himself even a little bit, he just flooded the room with his aura, appearing directly in front of him. The flash of orange hit Vegeta’s vision so sharply, that he almost couldn’t parse the reality of the situation until he snapped his head up to look him dead in the face and attempt to say anything in quick reaction. Nothing made it out of his mouth.

Not only did he have no actual words queued up to speak, but he found his face taken by Kakarot’s big hands and his mouth suddenly occupied by anything but words. Kakarot kissed him.

That wasn’t unusual anymore, but not like that.

Kakarot had never kissed him like that. The subtle aggression; his fingers pressing into his jaw, and teeth nipping his lips, were all elements of Kakarot that he knew weren’t going to be given to anyone else. He’d break Chi Chi’s jaw if he put his hands on her like this, but he knew Vegeta wasn’t delicate. Kakarot’s hold on him was a distinct, loud refusal to be ignored.

Stunned paralysis left Vegeta with no means to counter him and his whole brain suffered a long, drawn out moment of attempting to reboot itself to process this abrupt invasion of his space. The shut down of his brain left his body to take over and react without any interference; with zero supervision from his common sense—or any sense at all. The cortex that dictated that he needed to be constantly on guard and in self denial, took a dive in the shut down and he subconsciously tilted his head up to actively participate.

The grip on his face loosened when it became apparent that he wasn’t going to clobber him immediately, and Kakarot’s gigantic hands slipped from clutching his face to hovering around his neck and shoulders. Vegeta thought he was going to let him go, but he hadn’t. Instead, he settled so close that the inside edges of his feet trapped his—effectively boxing him there. He would have been extremely startled if he had any presence of mind left, but his temporary insanity took him so far away, that he barely noticed Kakarot smashing every personal boundary he had in place.

The hesitation to respond with his own hands, left him with his fingers twitching at his sides. How was he supposed to respond to this sudden shift in his thoughts? Kakarot had literally come out of thin air in the middle of his extremely unsettling shift of thoughts and shattered his attempt to sow the seeds of doubt. Damn it, Kakarot didn’t even allow him a chance to attempt to start agonizing over a fictitious concern. And he hadn’t even started training—how the hell had Kakarot just appeared?

What was he supposed to do with it? It stunned him, leaving a tremble at the tip of his fingers and he reached for the edge of the panel behind him to lean against it. The natural instinct to fight like hell collided with the part of his brain that left him...thirsty for whatever imposed the vile images of Kakarot that started this whole awful standoffishness he had going on to begin with. He spent so long battering it back, that this was like having it smashed back into his face like a harsh bitch slap.

Even his inner Bulma was fucking silent, this time. Nothing was surfacing to rescue him, and stop him from licking his lip and drawing Kakarot further into what he never even asked for in the first place. Maybe he was relying on it being a damn dream again—a mortifying concept, that such a thing could be a repeat offense. But that was a weak attempt, because he knew the pressure of him in the room couldn’t be anything less than real. With his guard dropped so sharply, he hadn’t had even a chance to agonize properly. Kakarot was just there, with his tongue in his mouth and no apparent consideration for consequence.

He knew he didn’t need to consider consequences anymore, when he played him just right. Loathe to admit, Kakarot had learned him. Vegeta would do nothing if he was cornered, with no time to think about what Kakarot was doing. If he had the capacity to consider it more deeply, he’d have been furious, but Kakarot’s hands wouldn’t let him keep his head on straight. Every time he thought he had a hold on where his thoughts where, big hands moved—gripping his body and keeping him crushed right up against him. He was left acutely aware, once again, of just how large large Kakarot’s hands were, when his big fingers pressed into his ribs and trailed around his whole body to his spine.

He nearly jumped out of his whole physical form at the shudder.

The entire thing was absurd. For him to be so flighty about it was nothing short of silly. It wasn’t like he’d never had close contact with another person in his whole damn life before—so what the fuck was making him act like a fool? His refusal to lift his hands in response was baffling, and his fingers curled the edge of the control panel. The physical contradiction was absolutely wild. Stubbornly, he resisted to return any of the handsy business that Kakarot had started, but he participated more than willingly in getting a taste of his tongue.

If Vegeta wasn’t confusing to Kakarot before, then certainly he would be by the time he was done robbing him of his breath—if he ever decided he was done invading every bit of his personal space. Kakarot never seemed to be done challenging where that line ended and that was the only reason he ever got anywhere; which came as a horrifying smack of reality that Kakarot was actually the productive one.

Because I can’t get my shit together and figure out what the hell I’m doing.

“Stop thinkin’.”

He felt the vibrations from the low sound against his tongue, and the brush of air that passed over his lips forced him to make eye contact. For a moment, he wished he hadn’t because being struck by intensity he wasn’t accustomed to, knocked him far out of his comfort zone. Dealing with Kakarot was so much easier when he was being stupid and aloof. Giving him faces like that left him at a huge disadvantage.

“Don’t tell me what to fucking do, you bastard—,” he barked against his mouth, threatening to bite his lips and failing to follow through. He could have chewed his whole face apart in his usual hard-set denial, but nothing in him had the will to break the corner Kakarot pressed him into.

“Y’don’t gotta be so bitchy, Vegeta,” Kakarot mumbled back and mashed his mouth back into his until his teeth collided with his; nothing gentle about it at all. A touch of annoyance even seemed present, by the appearance of fingers gripping Vegeta’s jaw suddenly. He could have pulled himself out of his hold if he wanted to fight him, but he would have needed to use some force.

Vegeta snarled, exhaling through his nose and curling a lip. He had no desire to acknowledge that his brutish handling was more desirable than before and he caught his tongue with his teeth briefly. A standoff that lasted so short of a time that Vegeta may as well have not counted it. How was he supposed to know Kakarot was going to have such wild shifts in tone so quickly? How was he supposed contend with this? He was supposed to be the one experienced with the tactical planning, but Kakarot’s mind games with him were becoming far too fucking advanced.

Or he was just so good at going with the flow, that he his Idiot Savantism was becoming God tier.

Kakarot abruptly had his whole head drawn back and both hands back to his face, holding him in place. His stance was so solid that Vegeta could probably have punched him directly in the chest and not have moved him. Kakarot was usually a touch more giving than that, but he wasn’t budging even slightly and Vegeta couldn’t find a functional response. Kakarot’s method to make him think less was working and he’d agonize about it if he was still thinking.

But the edges of the fingers of one hand hovered just shy of touching him back before he knew what he was doing. He’d touched him before, but the implication of this kind of interaction meant throwing out a whole slew of baggage he held onto...for what reason exactly…? He kissed him plenty of times, as if that didn’t already mean he’d gotten over his issues with this big fool. What was the fucking problem—

He never had this particular problem with Bulma.

Well, no. Physically not. He had the same ten year internal dramatics with her that he had with Kakarot. Only it was a whole lot easier getting physical with someone before the emotional baggage piled up, apparently. He was fairly certain he’d planned to never deal with Bulma again after he first left, but then a few years of mentally punching himself straightened him out.

Maybe you should have just slept with Kakarot first and been done with it.

Unintentionally, he bit Kakarot’s lip, in response to his own thoughts. Before he knew he’d done it, his fingers gripped his shirt and pulled it from being tucked into his pants. His attack on his mouth didn’t offend, but rather encouraged the big idiot instead. He was completely unaware of the internal crisis Vegeta was having in his stages between moments of having no thoughts and being flooded with them. He’d rather not think at all. That would have been so much easier.

For once, he could have been satisfied with having the mental capacity of Kakarot. Just go with the flow and fuck the consequences. That seemed to work in his favor all the damn time. But Kakarot didn’t have a block in the way of anything.

Vegeta spent years trying to decipher what his malfunction was, and maybe it was just Kakarot himself. Kakarot was like a damn infection that wouldn’t let him go.

He fumbled with his damn shirt until he got his hand under it, touching bare skin. The warmth coming off him cemented that he was real and Kakarot wasn’t a dream. The bruising grip on his jaw was enough to tell him that, but his hold on Kakarot did more to make it connect. He needed to have control to convince himself.

His fingers dug into his back a little and Kakarot exhaled, letting him have a moment to breathe. His heart was racing. This fool came out of nowhere and had him scrambled. He didn’t even have the usual capacity to be incensed about it; that would take some time to wind up. All he had going for him was knee jerk reaction and responses based on his current physical and emotional state. The worst combination he’d ever known to experience in his whole life.

“How dare you make me feel anything for you,” he hissed at him, sucking his breath back in the second he recognized the words left his mouth. He moved to recoil, but Kakarot wrapped his arm around him so his one arm was trapped—still under his shirt. He could have escaped if he really was determined, but they both knew his struggling was for show.

Kakarot’s wide eyed expression nearly left his face burning, however, and he tried to turn away from him. Kakarot was the one who made the audible blunders, but Vegeta let the words go with little containment effort.

He slid a palm back on a panel and exhaled loudly at Kakarot, closing his eyes at the face that was tilted right up against his still. Escaping was hardly feasible, when Kakarot was quite nearly on top of him, but it quickly became a non-issue when a mechanical voice registered somewhere in the back of his mind. Somehow, his brain was able to come out of the fog he was in and understand what he was hearing long enough to recognize the immediate danger before it went into effect. If only he’d had the recognition to notice it before it had activated in the first place.

Then maybe the gravity wouldn’t have turned on in the first place at all.

But when the gravity shifted upward, the two of them toppled over damn near instantly. The most fortunate part of it all, was that Vegeta had the awareness not to break anything on the way down, but he didn’t land in the most graceful way imaginable—flat on his back and puffing for breath for a moment, when the collision into the ground knocked the wind out of him. Additionally, he also had Kakarot on top of him; straining at the excessive increase of gravity, on his arms and knees, trying not to crush him.

“...D...Damn i..it, Vegeta— What did you set this thing to—.”

“You have no right...bitching after you—” he took a steep breath in the heavy gravity, “came into my domain—.” He was still coming out of his mental paralysis, and being pinned to the floor was not helping him feel in control at all; but his previous words were suddenly forgotten quickly.

“You were ignoring me, and I was gonna make sure you couldn’t!” The muscles in Kakarot’s arms were flexing and fighting, but he was putting all of his attention into Vegeta, where his priorities seemed most important.

“How the fuck was I ignoring you, I talk to you every goddamn day!”

“You wouldn’t even stay in the same room with me. I thought we were okay!” He had no reason to yell, but he was yelling, his face red and looking down at Vegeta, needing to pant just to keep his breath.

Vegeta was struck with the image of Kakarot in his dream, hovering over him in the same way and it nearly made him lose the air out of his lungs, forgetting the gravity issue for a second. He was both angry for it and thankful for the pressure. It was the only thing saving him from Kakarot catching on to what his presence was doing to him. He could excuse it all on the gravity. Or could have if his fucking hands hadn’t acted on their own. He could have gotten away with murder if his hands hadn’t fought with the gravity to pull him down by his shirt. There was no way he could argue that it wasn’t entirely intentional. That was intentional.

Kakarot’s body down on his was crushing, but strangely welcome. He was just small enough to Kakarot, that Kakarot could straddle him without putting him under duress in the upscaled gravity. His big arms cradled around him and he mushed his face right into Vegeta’s. It took him some effort to settle in a way that wasn’t straining himself or suffocating Vegeta, but Kakarot found a way to relax against him. They both knew the gravity chamber was set to automatically disengage when it detected no motion for a certain period of time.

Vegeta also knew it was voice activated, but he neglected to make mention of it. Kakarot could probably teleport them out, if he wanted to; but he neglected to offer the solution. Evidently jamming his tongue down Vegeta’s throat at a hundred times earth’s gravity was much more appealing.

He had no option of thinking too hard about it when his body was under such strain while being simultaneously assaulted by Kakarot. They had to bounce their attention between keeping themselves from being flattened into the floor and lazily nipping at each other between panting for breaths after lengthy obscene kissing.

It definitely didn’t solve his damn problem for why he avoided Kakarot in the first place, but it did feel nice. He needed to talk to Bulma to figure out what the fuck to do with this, but for that moment, he could deal with laying under the pressure and messing around a little. Do no thinking for a bit. Kakarot’s method could do him good for once.

Chapter Text

“I said I was sorry, Vegeta…” He apologized, again, rubbing the back of his neck and turning away from the intensity of the glare being shot toward him. Somehow, Vegeta managed to fill him with the same kind of dread that Chi Chi did when silence was the response to something stupid that he’d done. Being yelled at was much easier to handle, he was so much more capable of handling that; but the quiet, seething meant that the level of disappointment was immense enough that words were not enough to adequately express yet. They made Goku feel remorse for the action extremely quickly, and that was an unusual response to his deal-with-consequences-later sort of behavior usually.

But it really had been an accident, and he didn’t mean to make him angry. Vegeta’s time bomb of patience only ticked so long before combustion, however, and he didn’t take very well to having it blow up in his face—and this time it was as literal as figurative. Goku usually could handle the diffusion process, but he snipped the wrong wire himself this time and had to stand back and survey the damage in live time—monitoring his own blast damage.

“You fucking dunce,” Vegeta hissed again, stripping off the outer layer of shirt, tinged with splatters of red, and balling it up in his fist to smush it into his face. Goku didn’t even try to dodge it, because he felt like that would only serve to make him more angry. “You had one job—I said hold this and you—.”

“I didn’t know it was going to explode—“

“It’s made of plastic, Kakarot—God—damn it, you are covered…You’re going to have to change your damn clothes, idiot. You’ve been like this for years. What happened to self control?”

“Oh like you’ve never accidentally overdone it—” Goku grumbled, wiping his sticky hands on his red stained shirt. The plastic in question was a bottle, and Goku did frown a little bit about that. Their training session from the day before seemed to stick with him. Vegeta seemed to have calmed down, but Goku was still a little more excited, he realized. When Vegeta passed the poor plastic bottle off to him, he grabbed it tighter than the bottle had the strength to resist and it popped like a balloon.

“I’ve never done this before, no, you fool,” Vegeta batted him in the head with the wadded up overshirt, but it wasn’t in any real threat. If Vegeta was seriously enraged with him, he’d have left him entirely. He was more like...Chi Chi mad at him. Or rather, exasperated. Possibly unsurprised by the event, but annoyed nonetheless. Vegeta tended to be much more visible angry on the exterior than he really was on the inside.

And really, Vegeta’s snapping at him was remarkably less prickly than usual, Goku noted. Vegeta had his outburst and began to mop up the remnants of the red drink with the shirt. Under no circumstances was he ever going to say out loud that Vegeta had some of Chi Chi’s tendencies, but Vegeta had some of Chi Chi’s tendencies. He puffed up real quick but smoothed back out.

Goku thought it would honestly be hard to be in a bad mood when they were doing so well. He didn’t have to tell Vegeta he knew anything. Vegeta never asked him why he showed up and just assaulted his face. The gravity in the chamber ended up taking so much energy out of them, just keeping up with it, that they fell asleep in there. Even Vegeta couldn’t wake up mad with his face being mushed. They even got up and then trained like hell afterward, and that felt just as great. He was fired up.

And Vegeta wasn’t avoiding him at all costs anymore. He huffed around and said it was because of Bulma being pregnant and Goku let him have that. Whatever kept Vegeta from getting flighty again, he’d be fine with.

Maybe that had been why he was still a little too ramped up. He had gone so long without Vegeta that he’d been hungry for his attention. His lack of ability to come down sometimes made itself very apparent. They weren’t training, they’d just come out of seeing a movie—courtesy of Bulma begging them to get out of the house for a while. She seemed just happy to see Vegeta out of whatever mood he’d put himself in. Goku was starting to learn how to identify those pretty well.

Vegeta’s mood was...good, even if he was barking at him still. No matter what words he was throwing at him, his angry grumbling was really just part of what made him Vegeta. He tried his best not to grin directly at him, because that would only get a roaring new round of his growling, but he did hold his hands up and chuckle mildly at him in defense.

“Come on, idiot,” Vegeta grabbed one of his arms, nearly ignoring his cowering. With him held by the wrist ultimately, Goku watched him with some curiosity, the whole way, while Vegeta pulled him through the busy food court just outside the movie theater. Fortunately, they’d already seen the movie, for what little he could actually remember of it. There was no real rush to do whatever Vegeta was stomping them off for, but it became quickly apparent that Vegeta’s insistence to look presentable took precedent to anything else at that moment.

Goku smiled a bit following him through the first place that sold apparel, because Vegeta would deny it to the edge of their universe that he was just as vain as Bulma. The two of them probably had a vanity ritual that overlapped. Goku could almost imagine Vegeta applying her lipstick for her if he let his mind wander too long.

He barely took the time beyond rolling out of bed, but he knew Vegeta wouldn’t let himself be seen with him looking like a complete disaster. He’d actually come dressed in something other than his orange gi...and of course he made an absolutely mess of himself. But he made it all the way through the movie and did so without tearing off the sleeves. Chi Chi would be so proud. Vegeta was not proud. He was scoffing him. But Vegeta was always scoffing him.

Vegeta dragged him through to look for a suitable replacement for the light blue shirt he was already wearing. From the way he immediately started to thumb through the selection, it became quickly apparent that Goku wasn’t getting much of a say in what he was getting to wear; but that was fine too. He wasn’t picky about what he wore, that was Vegeta’s business. Vegeta was the one who had to put too much thought into everything. He couldn’t let anything go without running it over his brain at least five times before he committed to it—with the small exception of adrenaline backed, battle hotheadedness. Both of them were super guilty of losing their their ability to make rational decisions then.

But Vegeta’s decision making for whether or not he wanted to be kissed or what shirt Goku got to wear had about the same weight, apparently; and Goku folded his arms and watched him pull one out and try to gauge it next to him. He wasn’t quite sure what Vegeta was doing at first, but it occurred to him that Vegeta was so much smaller than him in volume that he wouldn’t be able to just blindly grab something and expect it to work for him. Goku never did his own shopping, really. Chi Chi was usually happy to take care of that—since he couldn’t be trusted to dress himself outside of his usual training clothes.

“Try it on, I don’t know how your arms will handle it. If it fits. You’ll wear it.”

“Awful assumin’, thinkin’ I even like it,” he challenged him, though his tone was too light to suggest he even really meant it. He didn’t care and they both knew it.

“You’d run around naked if given the chance, Kakarot, now shut up and try it on.”

“Fine,” He stuck his tongue out and made a very blatant effort to start taking his shirt off right there—knowing full well that’s not what Vegeta meant, but he was trying to set him off just a little bit. Maybe. Sometimes Vegeta did make it a little too easy, and after a month of putting up with being neglected, maybe he was going out of his way to pay him back for ignoring him so intensively in person.

“Not here, you fucking animal—, go to the fitting room. Have some damn decency.”

“Like anyone would be lookin’ but you, Vegeta. An’ I think the only person who’d have a problem is you, huh?” But he stopped picking the buttons of his shirt and grinned a bit, taking the shirt out of his hand.

“I’ve seen you naked more times than I’ve seen my own wife naked, probably, Kakarot. I spent three damned years in a sufferable white void with you that I can’t erase. Nothing about you is a goddamn secret. But that doesn’t mean the rest of this establishment has to see your big man tits, now get the fuck in there and be snappy about it.”

The words out of Vegeta’s mouth nearly made him bark, because he didn’t think the man knew just how much like Bulma he sounded. He had to tell her the next moment he got. He could have plucked his word choice out of her mouth. It made arguing with him for the sake of it so hard when he was fighting the urge to cackle at him and being pushed behind a changing room curtain—hearing Vegeta’s hissing and barely catching his red face from the corner of his eye in the process.

He must have realized what he said.

Goku turned his face back just briefly to take a second look, but had a hand in his face, shoving him in. He chuckled and submitted, working the buttons off his dirtied shirt—careful not to damage the new one so Vegeta wouldn’t hiss at him about that too. He could already tell it would be a little too small, because his arms were too large. Any flexing would probably split the fabric all apart, and the buttons at the top would barely make it together—with a dangerous threat of popping. A few sizes up would probably be perfect, but he was out to get under Vegeta’s skin a little bit.

He shrugged the curtain out of the way and stepped out, glancing around to find his target already picking the replacement for his own damaged shirt. It took only two steps for Vegeta’s attention to shift and another second for his expression to morph through several different states before he forced himself to smooth it over to something he could contain. Goku saw the brief eyebrow arch, though and he had enough awareness of Vegeta to know not to blatantly grin at him. That would give away that he was doing it on purpose this time.

“Whatcha think?”

“... it would be fine if it was a second skin. I gave you several sizes larger. How are you this much bigger than me…” he muttered, rubbing his chin for a second and coming over to him to check the tag at his neck. “Go back in. I’ll bring you a bigger one.”

“M’kay,” he nodded, watching Vegeta’s eyes for a moment. They had a brief partial distance that was common when he slipped off to think too much, but somehow, he blinked it away quickly and pushed him away abruptly. It took Goku by surprise so much that he put his hands up in defense and backed away to retreat to the changing room again. Vegeta had some defenses up and he hadn’t prepared for that. Hmm.

Vegeta wasn’t unaffected, he just wasn’t going to react out in the open, because he wouldn’t let himself be exposed. All right.

He could work with that.

“This one should be a better fit, it’s three sizes up, so if this doesn’t fit those arms, then you’re out of luck and you need to get a different fucking body,” Vegeta grunted at him after a moment, and Goku reached out from inside the little dressing room to pull him in. No one was around. He couldn’t feel anybody within a reasonable watching distance, it was fine. Besides, he already came up with the perfect excuse that Vegeta couldn’t argue against. Even though he tried, “Kakarot—“

“I can’t get my arms outta the first one without rippin’ the sleeves. Think ya gotta help me.”

Vegeta paused, making direct eye contact with him and exhaling with a steep grunt. “Honestly? If you knew it was too small then why did you put it on anyway, you thick nugget—.”

“Because ya told me to!”

“Since when do you listen to me, Kakarot? You can’t just pick and choose when you do things for the sake of convenience,” he scolded him, despite the efforts he was already making to pull the fabric from around his biceps. He’d stuck himself nice and snugly into the shirt; maybe a little on purpose.

“Eh...why not? It gets me what I want, don’t it?” He tilted his head a bit and leaned back to let Vegeta wiggle the fabric free. Once the first sleeve came loose, the second one slid off easily and the opened shirt came down off his shoulders in a clearly startling conclusion that Goku just goaded him into stripping him intentionally. The expression to cross Vegeta’s face was so far away and alarmed by the realization, that he almost looked angry about it—in typical Vegeta fashion, with his face showing a reddening hue.

“You—,” Vegeta started, but faltered when his eyes flickered between them and the lack of distance Goku left between them. He wiggled his toes and sidled the inside of his feet to settle right against the outside edges of Vegeta’s.

“Yeah?” Posed as a question, but he gave him no actual time to answer with anything. Instead, he mushed his face right down into his and silenced his alarmed squawk before it could really sound. Vegeta’s presence of mind to not be caught in public this way, overtook his instinct to smack his fists into his face abruptly. Goku knew it and relied on it. Catching Vegeta off guard was necessary to getting an advantage in some of these fights.

Vegeta did not hesitate to bite his lip in response, but that did nothing to stop him, really; and the momentary shock vanished pretty quickly if the responding tongue had anything to say. His attempt to put his hands to Vegeta’s face, however, were absolutely thwarted with a swift slap on the wrist—without even breaking contact against his mouth, Vegeta denied him. He nearly breathed a pout against his lips, but the threatening rumble coming from Vegeta paused him in the action. His apparent victory had not been won just yet.

The determined stubbornness of Vegeta was one of his most quantifiable qualities—that was how Gohan worded it. He’d said that Vegeta would shoot himself in the foot to prove a point. He definitely wasn’t going to back down just because Goku tricked him into undressing him and getting caught by his mouth. He was definitely going to get smacked in the mouth later for it, probably, but the satisfaction of having him trapped was worth the punishment later. Though, he had expected him to hiss at him instead.

It was throwing him off, that Vegeta wasn’t playing the way he was supposed to.

He almost didn’t catch the hands that were still moving while he was distracted with wondering what was going on with Vegeta—wondering if he was broken or not. Months of Vegeta’s flightiness didn’t just suddenly stop, he was doing something and he didn’t have the brain power to function his tongue and his brain at the same time to understand what his goal was.

But Vegeta wouldn’t let him touch him. Every time he attempted to put a hand on him, he had fingers grabbing his wrist and taking a firm hold, keeping him locked in place. Sure, he could shake right out of it, but he was too baffled to offer resistance. His brain funneled his energy into one action at a time and his interest was much more intensely directed at keeping his lips to his and his tongue in his mouth; in Vegeta’s mouth.

If there was a real door, instead of a curtain, he would have backed Vegeta right up against it; but he had no leverage to move him. Not without exposing their bad behavior—and if he did that then Vegeta would let him have it. As it was, the changing room already felt a little cramped, but they both managed to not smash elbows into the walls; an impressive feat when Vegeta seemed to be focused on running his hands up his arms and tracing his fingers along muscles that Goku hadn’t even thought about until he had Vegeta’s fingers edging into them.

He couldn’t help the involuntary reactions to move his arms where Vegeta seemed to want them. Maybe he didn’t notice, maybe he did and just didn’t care. The relevance of it didn’t matter, because he checked out of anything that wasn’t directly in front of his face, for the most part. Vegeta’s boldness was a definite reason for him to have blinders to everything else. The curtain could have been drawn back and he was fairly certain he wouldn’t have seen it; though Vegeta would have quickly changed tunes if that happened.

When he almost thought he could turn his attention, eyes wandering down with a tilt of his head, Vegeta bit him and nudged his face back up. He muffled against his lips, and lost his train of thought. He didn’t notice that Vegeta’s fingers even existed after a bit. He wasn’t paying attention to his hands at all. They weren’t stopping him anymore, but he’d long since given up on trying to counter him. His hands remained at his sides, fingers twitching in response to Vegeta’s display, almost like he knew he would be reprimanded if he attempted to retaliate.

Pulling Vegeta in with him seemed like it would be an effortless little game that he could win quickly and move on about the night with, but he was finding that Vegeta wasn’t going to let him secure a victory that easily at all. Maybe he’d finally gotten used to being so close to him...in which case... That meant his leverage was gone. Goku found himself faced with a new threat of Vegeta’s intolerance for his nonsense, and he pouted against his mouth.

Vegeta ignored Goku entirely and smoothed the fabric over his broader chest. He hadn’t even realized that Vegeta had gotten his arms through the sleeves, let alone that he’d pulled the buttons through on the new shirt. Goku had tricked him into taking off his shirt, but Vegeta had stealthily put the new one right back on when he was too distracted by him. A faint smirk of victory curled at his lip, and he could feel it against his own mouth. Even more so when he felt the wisps of declaration, immediately upon breaking contact.

“You’re a fucking sucker,” Vegeta mouthed, voice low, but not too low for him to hear. “Think you can pull a fast one on me, Kakarot?” He wasn’t actually asking him, and he didn’t answer. He was more or less stunned into place by Vegeta’s turnaround. What happened—.

Vegeta watched him, eyes dark with the lack of light, but Goku could see the glint of his triumph. Without anymore whispers, Vegeta pulled his own new shirt on in the cramped changing room and worked the buttons closed. He had every intention for them both to wear these clothes out of the building and it became apparent when he took ahold of Goku to search out the tag from his shirt and make it visible.

“Don’t ruin these clothes, Kakarot. Or I’m going to send you home,” Vegeta tipped his head up to growl the words to his lips.

“...I said I was sorry—,” he repeated the words again, but quieter, finding himself a little more cornered—and threatened by the thought of having to face Chi Chi with freshly ruined laundry so soon.

“Good, now get out,” Vegeta grunted and pulled him by his fresh new shirt, already testing the durability of the new buttons. Vegeta wielded all the power at the moment and his feet carried him where Vegeta directed, right out of the tiny changing room that he was attempting to be cheeky in—but failed somehow. He somehow got swatted down in his own game and that had him confused. Vegeta was cheating—

Or maybe Vegeta was just starting to actually play the game for once and he wasn’t used to that. But that seemed unlikely, given that Vegeta took forever just working out how to adjust to being kissed. His harmless little displays messed with Vegeta for so long before he finally stopped losing it each time. He couldn’t possibly turn around on him so quickly after one big exchange… could he? Vegeta did way too much of that thinking stuff. It had Goku straining his brain trying to figure out the change.

He frowned and paused.

A whole second elapsed between the physical sensation and his brain connecting the dots for him to understand that when he left the small room Vegeta reached out and attacked him from behind. Not literally, but in a way that nearly made him bark at him. The noise came out more like a squawk, however, because he knew Vegeta would howl at him if he caught the attention of anyone else, as they were both coming out of the changing room together. But how was he supposed to restrain the alarm that shot through him at the hand that he felt take a large grab on his backside without warning.

That was a Bulma scale of assault—

There was no way that was not a Bulma consulted plot of attack—

He didn’t come up with this on his own—He could not have, he absolutely could not have!

Goku didn’t find words fast enough to babble anything at Vegeta before the attacker in question found his words first, having let go quickly enough to play off the whole action like he hadn’t just done it at all. He just glanced up at Goku dismissively and pulled the fabric of his shirt smooth over his own chest. His hands were back in his own territory and certainly not bothering Goku in ways Goku couldn’t conceive.

He hadn’t imagined that.

“Is something wrong, Kakarot?” Vegeta questioned him, and Goku swore he heard his voice waver a little, but he couldn’t focus on it enough to determine if it was his imagination or if he was hearing things. Vegeta spent way too long fiddling with the sleeves on his new shirt, but he also held his head high and kept gaze locked with his, unwavering—determined not to lose.

“...Nah. We’re good. Just. Yeah,” he cleared his throat and straightened his own new shirt out absently, looking in any other direction—doing his very best to ignore the remnant sensation of having his hand curled in the seat of his pants.

Dang it, he attempted to sneak a victory from Vegeta and Vegeta full force suckerpunched it right back out of him. Now he had to really be on guard.

“Alright, then let’s go, idiot. We have things to do and unless you want to starve, you better hurry up,” Vegeta threatened. He did have Bulma’s card and her permission to bring the misfortune of their hunger on the restaurant of their choice. Vegeta would leave him behind in a second and he knew it. He was almost still too thrown back by Vegeta’s counter attack to immediately react and had to jump at his words to follow after him.

But the prospect of food wasn’t what had his heart thumping; it was prospect that Vegeta was starting to play back. He knew how Vegeta could be when he got into his competitive moods, but this was a whole different kind of competition.

Exciting.

It was very exciting!

Chapter Text

“When I told you to just grab opportunities and run with them, Vegeta, I didn’t know that’s where you were going to take it—,” her words came through a myriad of chuckles, nearly causing her to choke in the process. The breath she sucked in before continuing, gave Vegeta enough time to rub his face and attempt to bring down the heat. She hadn’t exactly told him what to do, but her...advice, hadn’t been exactly wasted, apparently. “Chi Chi is telling me that Goku came home and immediately started yelling about you playing dirty—.”

She was looking down at her phone, thumbing through messages coming in from Kakarot’s wife and he could see them flowing in from the corner of his eye. The amount of characters and the occasional emoji symbol told him that Bulma wasn’t exaggerating for once. He fought with himself to restrain the smug sensations attempting to reflect on his face.

“Serves him right,” he grunted at her, putting his face into the pillow beside her. She was sitting in the bed, with her knees drawn up. He didn’t bother to give her space and rolled on to his side to tuck his arm over her lap. He could no longer see the texts coming in on her phone, but he could still hear them, and he could now feel the way her body quivered with her giggling.

“How was that opportunity, Vegeta?” She snickered, and he didn’t look up when he felt her leaning over to try and make eye contact with him. Her fingers ran through his hair and he exhaled loudly at her in response, but made zero efforts to stop her. Despite the heat of his face, he took his damn victory.

“I’ve come to the conclusion that I need bigger hands,” he answered absently, and closed his eyes, pressing his face further into the fluff of the pillow. He knew he shouldn’t egg her on, but sometimes he couldn’t help himself and he felt some degree of victory to hear his method of attack had some aftereffect.

Bulma cackled enough to make their bed tremble a little more and she turned toward him just a bit, wiggling her way down to get into his personal space. He made some uninspired noise of dissent toward this, but he felt no real dismay. The feelings he tried to present outwardly were too difficult to make real, when he was experiencing too much..satisfaction. Keeping his face out of hers surely kept her from seeing it, but she didn’t need to see to know he wasn’t really growling at her about anything. The scowl on his face was a hard pressed attempt to hold back his smirk at Kakarot’s reaction.

“Why don’t you try both hands next time then?” She snickered and lifted her whole leg up to hook over his hip. This woman lacked any class when she was descended into her full lounging mode, but he allowed it. Before long, she wouldn’t be as mobile to roll about like a wild beast, so she may as well enjoy it while she could.

“His guard will be up, I’d never manage both hands,” he answered, as if the topic didn’t have such implications behind it.

“It’s Goku, you think he’s really going to expect double hands from you?”

“He might,” he turned his head back, scoffing a little at her. They both knew that Kakarot was already taken back enough by this one unusual move. For him to do it twice…? He could possibly get away with that trick twice. Kakarot might wisen up after that. The real question being, would be bring himself to do such a thing? The lack of class he’d have to have, to go to that extreme. That was taking Bulma tactics to levels far beyond his reach. He was not prepared to ascend to that state.

He could easily walk away from the first one, with Kakarot too paralyzed by his audacity to say anything. Twice and he’d have to actually own it, in person.

“You’re thinking so much harder than he would,” she chuckled at him, but looped an arm around his neck and wiggled to lay across him. “Goku’s super easy when it comes to you.”

“And what makes you say that?” He leaned on his hand, propping up to actually maintain eye contact—possibly a terrible idea, knowing the way she was spinning this conversation.

“Because Goku shrugs most stuff off, honestly! He wouldn’t be at home huffing at Chi Chi about your ass grab shenanigans if you didn’t catch him wild, y’know?” She smirked directly at him and he would have choked on his own tongue, if he hadn’t already expected something like that to come out of her mouth. He’d built some immunity to her lack of tact, but yet, still his face burned a little at her bluntness.

“Are you going to start calling this that, because I’m going to protest,” he managed that retort, and nothing else.

“What? Ass Grab Shenanigans is the most fun sounding thing you’ve done lately, Vegeta. I’m almost jealous. You’re leaving me out of all of the fun.”

“Your idea of fun is questionable,” he slid off his hand and proceeded to put his palm right over her face, so she couldn’t look at him anymore. Her grin was going right through him, because she knew his buttons better than anyone. If he let her have too much wiggle room, she’d gain ground and he couldn’t throw that early. That he’d found a wedge to finally throw a sucker punch back at Kakarot, felt like a short victory, but he knew he that it would come back at him somehow. Kakarot was as fiercely competitive as he.

Maybe Kakarot didn’t take it as a direct act of assertion, but that’s exactly how Vegeta would have taken it.

“You have the upper hand, Vegeta, you should take advantage of it,” she rolled right over him, until she flopped to the other side of the bed and could curl against his hip—effectively making herself the big spoon in the brief moment that he was incapacitated by her wild bed rolling. This woman did these acrobatics in her sleep all the time, and he was more than used to this. At least when she was awake, he didn’t have to defend from her kneeing him. He did, however, find her legs wrapping around his waist and he exhaled steeply, turning his head back to glance at her with a half lidded gaze. What was she up to?

“Woman, you’re troublesome. Should you be this invested in what my extracurricular activities with Kakarot are?” If she wasn’t, he would be up to his eyeballs in chaotic thoughts with no outlet to sort them, but he had no plans to come out and tell her that. He had only just started to sort out one of his major factors in dealing with this business with Kakarot. He needed to be bullied into contending with it and his wife was the biggest bully he knew—he just had zero intention of going about it directly. If everything he did wasn’t roundabout and undercut by his own ridiculousness, then he wasn’t having it. Apparently.

“I probably shouldn’t be, but you’re so difficult that it interests me greatly,” she ran her fingers through his hair, fondly and he scoffed her—didn’t stop her any, but scoffed her nonetheless. “Well, you are! You and Goku circle around each other like big teenagers who want to get handsy. But you’re still in perfectly open denial about Goku; and Goku’s aggressive but he’s a dunce, so he gets halfway through you and then you backstep him.”

He was grateful that he faced away from her, at that moment, because—while she wasn’t incorrect—he lamented hearing it so straight forward. He was glad that she also thought that Kakarot was a dunce; but Kakarot’s lack of self awareness to stop himself before he did most of the things he did was maybe accidentally fortunate. If Kakarot wasn’t annoyingly persistent, he would still be bashing his head against the gravity chamber floor instead of punching back—if that’s what he could even call it. It was his competitive nature at play, not that he’d actually become comfortable.

Certainly not that.

“You have the ball in your court, Vegeta, take a shot with it,” her voice drew him and he held his breath, almost as if he was attempting to will her implication away, or ignore it outright, but failing miserably for the curiosity the tone of her voice arose in him. She had some ideas in her head and he did and didn’t want to know what they were, simultaneously. Nothing about what she might think, could possibly be wholesome or classy, but she did know Kakarot quite well. Vegeta might be a fool to ignore that advantage.

That’s what he told himself.

He convinced himself, in tilting his head back to look at her, that it certainly had nothing to do with her feeding his ego in just the correct way to keep him going.

“And what exactly should I do with it?” He dared to ask, making the briefest eye contact and stretching his body back out to lay flatter on the disheveled bed. None of the blankets would survive the constant fumbling around, but Bulma’s attention was nowhere close to where the linens were anyway, and she reached across him to grab the phone she’d dismissed in favor of her sudden cuddling. He watched her with a brow raised, while she wiggled and rolled to get into position next to him. What did she need her phone for? She was not going to call Kakarot, was she?

No, she knew he was more likely to eat the phone than speak to it.

“You have his number, and you have the element of surprise,” she wormed herself a little closer to him, but not enough that her shoulder or arm fell over his— even turning on her side just a little so she tilted up a bit on her elbow. “If you wanted, you could probably just, knock him totally dead, without even lifting a finger, Vegeta,” she laced her voice with a sweetness that put alarm bells off in his head—even though the words sounded appealing in every syllable. Damn, she knew what she was doing.

“...I already dislike whatever you’re plotting,” he grunted, taking note of her toying with the hem of his shirt. If she thought she was going to distract him, she was sorely mistaken.

“You don’t have to do anything. You don’t even have to say anything at all,” she smiled, and toyed with the phone for a moment, looking right back to him with big fluttery eyes and a curled smile of pure mischief.

“Then what exactly can you be having me do that would accomplish anything against Kakar—,” he cut his own words short, watching her arm extend in the air above them. Only then did he notice that the phone she had in her hand wasn’t her phone at all; it was his. The touch face of the phone showed the moving reflection of the camera screen and he opened his mouth to make a noise at her, but failed several attempts before he managed anything resembling words. “You’re going to kill him with laughter.”

“Wh—Vegeta!” She lowered her arm enough to shove her elbow into his chest, even if that barely amounted to much from her noodle arms. “He’s not going to laugh, you knucklehead. You send him pictures all the time! It’s the same thing, except, you just gotta make some eyes at him. Maybe save the dick pics for down the road when you’re less shy.” She wiggled her eyebrows at him and he audibly groaned at her.

“One, that’s incredibly classless. Two, what will this accomplish against Kakarot? And three, I have no idea how the fuck to make ‘eyes’ at anyone.” He immediately blocked every word beyond that particular statement out from his mind, permanently. What an unsavory creature.

“It’s three that’s holding you back, isn’t it.”

“Yes.”

“Listen, I betcha anything, Goku gets just as fired up as you do. He’s into hard-to-get little gremlins,” she tipped her face to his and he lightly threatened to nibble her cheek. He wouldn’t truly take a bite out of her, but he would certainly make a show of acting like he was going to. “The kind of ‘eyes’ you give someone like Goku…? Hmm. Give him those, Fight Me, Kakarot, Eyes. You know the ones. That’s what you two bond over. Challenge him, but...do it sexily.”

“I cannot see how this is going to do anything but make an embarrassment of me,” he took a deep breath, pinching the bridge of his nose.

“Do you trust your loving and wonderful, smart and beautiful wife, Vegeta?”

“Only as far as I can throw you,” he answered, knowing exactly what he said.

“Excellent,” she kissed his cheek and patted his chest, moving out of every bit of the frame of the picture that she was clearly going to help him take. Why had he allowed himself to get roped into this mad idea? Clearly his mental Bulma was conspiring with the Bulma on the outside and both of them trapped him into this terrible ploy. He absolutely could not, and would not, take personal responsibility for the decision to go along with this one.

Admitting any interest in knowing Kakarot’s reaction to this plot, was a felony crime all by itself.

But he was interested enough to let her frame him in a photo—not as though he’d never sent Kakarot photos with him in them, but generally he’d had an excuse to subject the image with. The feline companion that napped with him served as his reason, generally, as he didn’t have many noteworthy things to send to Kakarot in return for his continuous flood of pictures. Kakarot lived in a sprawling landscape. Vegeta preferred not to leave to go into the city, when possible. And this…’selfie’ thing his wife and son spoke of...made little sense to him.

This fool sees me nearly every day when I’m not shunning him, what is this going to actually do?

And yet, he scooted with Bulma’s guidance so she wouldn’t appear anywhere in the frame—prepared to reach and tap the screen himself to snap the picture. He had a single moment of victory and decided to ride it into absurdity? Sounded exactly like him, if he didn’t lie to himself. But, for the first time, maybe letting the moment run away with him for his ego high, would benefit him. He wasn’t going to die if it turned back on him. This wasn’t a life threatening battle. The world wasn’t hanging in the balance. He wasn’t going to face destruction. Kakarot was just an idiot, not an enemy.

He’s not an enemy.

Bulma’s fingers eased from the phone, and he took the device into his hand. He barely noticed her let him take the reigns. She’d shown him enough angles in the few minutes of laying on the bed for him to get the idea that this woman really took far too many photos of herself, but at least this talent of hers had a benefit to him one time. He’d never have figured any of this out by himself, he recognized, tilting the screen up and remembering that he had to look at the camera not the screen if he wanted to make an effective picture. He was only taking one, damn it. It was going to count. Bad or not, once the button was pressed, that was it.

This was much easier when a cat was involved.

With an artificial shutter click, the phone recorded the image and he withdrew his arm. If he stopped to think about it too long, he knew his face would start burning again and make him recant the whole event with his self doubt, so he tapped the little message button without letting his brain catch up. He keyed three words and pressed send.

“...Did...you actually just send it—,” Bulma’s voice filled the silent moment immediately after and he set the phone face down on his chest and glanced at her.

“If I’m going to defeat Kakarot, I have to think like Kakarot. That is, not think at all.” The argument seemed more sound in his head than it did when the words passed his lips, but he couldn’t undo his moment of madness—not that he had any intentions of undoing it. While he had given Kakarot something to use against him, he had every reason to believe that he would do nothing with it. What could he do that wouldn’t incriminate him as well, anyway? Vegeta had made it perfectly clear the message wasn’t accidentally sent to the wrong person, by the way he’d written his message, too.

“I just didn’t think you were going to go right for it,” she rolled back over on him, once she was no longer a threat to any frame of photo taking. “What did you say?” She raised a brow, and tipped the edge of the phone. Clearly, she wanted to flip the phone over and peek at it, but not if he’d didn’t want her intruding. She’d see it eventually, because he didn’t care to hide whatever was on it. She knew what he got into, because she was the one who did the maintenance on it and she was naturally nosy enough to look through anything that might interest her. All he ever did was talk to Kakarot, anyway. And sometimes Kakarot’s wife.

He raised an arm and rolled a bit, plucking the device up and tilting the face toward them. The backlight came on to reveal the message for Bulma to see his simple greeting to Kakarot. All it said, short and sweet, “Fight me, Kakarot.” Just like she’d said. The picture accompanying it hardly matched the implication of the words, but maybe it was worth the trouble of looking like a Bulma style poster girl for the reaction.

“Oh, he’s replying,” Bulma perked a bit, moving in to the screen and pointing to the little pulsing dots, and he’d come to identify that what she was saying was the truth. The moving dots stopped after a moment, and then continued...only to cease once again, with a long pause after. If Kakarot was going to reply, clearly he couldn’t figure out what he wanted actually say. “Or was trying to,” Bulma snickered,” seeing quite clearly the same.

Kakarot never took a second thought before he popped off with his words, so what would stop him this time? For a brief moment he wondered if he should feel silly.

The moment passed, by a buzzing sound of the other phone—Bulma’s—next to them. She scooped it up with the continuing noise—a telltale sign that someone was texting her a flood of messages at that moment. She said nothing to Vegeta, but he already had a good idea who that might be, from the moment he caught the glance of emojis. Ever since Kakarot had been given a phone and had learned a rabid overuse of these damn icons, he’d infected his wife’s texting with them, according to Bulma. She only confirmed his initial thought, slowly grinning with her eyes flicking down the messages, “Ho’ Boy, Chi Chi had a bit to say.”

“Well?” He wanted to take her phone from her and read it himself for his embarrassed impatience.

The smugness she had when she looked over her texts made him want to drown her in the bed pillows for a moment. “Well, I’ll fill you in on the rest of it later, but the long story short, is that Chi Chi said Goku got your message and she says he was mumbling about you cheating. Then he threw his phone. You know how impatient Goku gets when his brain gets tangled.” She giggled at him and sat up, patting his chest gently, “also, you probably shouldn’t have picked those words, because she said he’s coming for you.”

“He’s what—.”

“Better go, before he ends up catching you here, Vegeta. I’m not having you battle animals fighting in my bedroom,” she kissed his cheek and he responded by nipping back lightly with teeth, just barely grazing. Just enough to express dismay at the mess her tomfoolery got him in. “Oh you stop that,” she immediately patted both of his cheeks, “you aren’t convincing me you’re upset when you’re smiling, now go play.”

“I am not smiling— .”

“Don’t make me take a picture, now shoo.” She waved him off, even kicking her leg up at him so he might be encouraged to leave before the demon they’d unleashed arrived. That Kakarot hadn’t just instant transmissioned into the room only told him that he was being given a chance to see him coming. Next time, maybe he’d choose his words a little more carefully, but Vegeta never did anything short of going full scale or nothing at all. He shouldn’t have expected Kakarot to take “Come Fight Me” as anything other than literal.

“Fine, but when I get back I’m throwing you off the bed.”

“If you get back,” she wiggled her eyebrows at him and he pulled the blanket and threw it over her, so he didn’t have to see her face anymore. Vulgar creature. Without being affected by it, she threw it back off her face and looked at him before he even reached the window—his decidedly quickest method for exit. “Hey— You gonna send me your slut pic too?”

It took everything in him to keep his face straight at her blatant remark, but he managed to remain calm and unlatch the window. The window swung open and he perched in the frame, ready to jump out and play tag for a minute before squaring off with Kakarot on the fly. Glancing back at her, he got his face cool enough to smirk at her.

“No, get your own. That one’s Kakarot’s.”

“Rude—.” He could hear her huffing when he jumped out of the window, feeling Kakarot’s approaching from the distance.

Chapter Text

“So you’re just going to take a leisurely bath now, are you?”

“Well, you’re the one who threw me in,” Goku yelled back to the man sitting at the smooth, rocky edge of the pond he drifted in. He’d been previously smashed right down in it—not so gently tossed down from high above the clouds. “The water’s pretty nice,” he shook the droplets from his hair and out of his eyes, grinning in his direction while he kicked his feet to keep himself floating. Vegeta hadn’t escaped the water either in their scuffle, but he’d climbed back up to perch and wring the water out—feet still dangling over, enough to dip into the pool.

“You should have dodged me, then,” Vegeta countered, kicking his foot up to spray him with a thick mist. It didn’t bother him, because he was already soaked, anyway. He was already in the lake! But he definitely took the challenge and paddled closer to him in response. Vegeta watched him down the bridge of his nose, keeping his chin high and his arms crossed, even as Goku swam right up to his knees.

“Ya sucker punched me, cheater,” he splashed him, even though the spray of water only made it as far as his thighs due to Vegeta’s vantage point.

“You’re not incorrect. You are a sucker. And I did punch you,” Vegeta edged forward and lifted a leg, digging his heel against the crook of his neck and shoulder, shifting his weight to shove him under the water. Goku watched him do it, and even knew he was about to have his head dunked under; but for some reason, he didn’t think to stop it. Instead, he just sucked in a breath and let Vegeta sink him for the moment, choosing the opportunity to wiggle to the side and worm his arms around Vegeta’s leg—popping back up from the water, even closer to him.

“An’ another thing,” He inhaled in a sharp breath, as soon as he broke back up to the surface. “If yer gonna play dirty, so’m I.”

“You played dirty before I did, Kakarot,” Vegeta, exhaled through his nose deeply enough to sound personally affronted by his accusation.

“Wha! No way, not yer kinda dirty! You used both hands!”

“I have no idea what you’re referring to, you were sparring distracted, and that’s hardly my fault,” he countered, tilting his head to one side and eyeing him. “Honestly, to think I would resort to such tactics.”

“I know what you did, Bulma.”

Vegeta’s head snapped toward him and he arched forward closer to Goku. Finally, that got his attention and Goku couldn’t help but smirk a little, because Vegeta either had to admit it was Bulma who influenced it or claim it as all his own doing. Neither of which Vegeta would want to do. The curl of his nose further proved that he had to pause and let his brain run its laps over the options for how he’d come back at him after that. Goku’s toothy grin only grew wider, the longer Vegeta paused in their momentary square off. This man’s biggest weakness was thinking too hard and Goku didn’t say how he was going to play dirty. He knew exactly how to dig at his brain.

“Don’t flatter yourself, Kakarot,” Vegeta finally managed words, sneering through every one of the syllables—even if Goku didn’t take him seriously for his irritability. The slight twitch of his lip and cheek left too many tells on Vegeta’s face that he was trying not to smirk back at him. “You hit your head coming down here, clearly; if you believe that I would play vulgar tactics to gain an advantage.”

Denial method instead, huh?

Goku pressed his cheek to Vegeta’s knee and eyed him with the clearest disbelief he could manage. He had to come out of the water a little bit to maintain his embrace around Vegeta’s bent leg. The temptation to pull Vegeta into the water, in the manner of a hungry swamp beast, arose in him, but he squashed it down. Seeing where Vegeta would go with it would be much more interesting than cutting it short for his impulses. For now.

“Ya gonna lie like that... crazy,” he puffed against his knee, boldly. If he had been willing to lift his cheek from touching Vegeta, he would have shook his head in emphasized disbelief—just to egg him a little further—but he’d gotten comfortably perched right there. Not that he needed to add any more fuel to the fire, Vegeta flared just as he expected at his goading.

Well, maybe mostly as he expected. He hadn’t quite expected Vegeta to tip off the edge of the pond and wrap his legs around his neck. Two thick calves dipped around his shoulders and heels dug into his back. He nudged his face into his thigh and at that moment, he couldn’t help his innate reaction to having his neck circled. At least this time, he meant to do it lightly, with only teeth grazing and playfulness behind it, and not in a huge chomp—like he did when he was assaulted by an enemy.

“—Bitch did you just bite me—,” Vegeta barked, but did not release his hold on him entirely.

Goku muffled back at him, “Did you just call me bitch?”

“Did you—don’t say that, it sounds weird out of you.”

“Not my fault you’re cheating and then making accusations, Vegeta. Like I would ever bite you,” he strained to peer up at him from the corner of his eyes, at his position. If Vegeta wanted to be that way, he could be that way too, Vegeta was much less cheeky about it than he was, he thought; because he made an effort to say it while prefacing a clear effort to take another nibble out of his thigh—mouth open and teeth ready to sink in just enough to get Vegeta’s attention.

“It would be a real shame if we had to revive you because I killed you over this, Kakarot. Your friends would have a lot of questions,” he squeezed his hold on his neck, but Goku could still manage enough words to stir the pot a little more.

“Died between your thighs. What a way to go,” he huffed, testing the pressure of his teeth and just how far he could bite before Vegeta would jump. The wet fabric clinging to his legs would be the only reason that Vegeta wouldn’t have teeth marks peppering his skin, and Goku had half a mind to take a handful of his pants and tug them down just to make sure he did leave his impressions behind. He’d never get far enough doing that, so instead, he braced his arms and slid his hands from Vegeta’s hips, all the way up his back.

Vegeta’s retaliation could have been a coin toss between response to his words or his actions. The tightening of his muscles threatened to send him to the next life, just barely leaving him able to suck a few breaths in—if only because Goku would absolutely sink his teeth all the way in and Vegeta knew it. The sacrifice of breathing was well worth the chance to drag Vegeta off his advantageous perch. With his fingers dug into Vegeta’s sides, he couldn’t wiggle his way out of his grasp easily. Sure, he could put up a fight and force his way out if he wanted, but once Goku got a good strong grip and committed to sinking them both, Vegeta would be more likely to come after him than run away.

The rush of cold water that came up around them made Vegeta loosen his choke hold on his neck, and he was positive he heard Vegeta beneath the surface of the water yelling at him through the flurry of bubbles. He kicked his legs to drive them deeper under and dislodge Vegeta’s neck hold. He didn’t let him get away for anything, however, taking advantage of Vegeta’s disposition to wrap his arms all the way around him. Thought, the leg that wrapped around his and the heel that dug into his thigh, took him by surprise. He expected Vegeta to resist him a little more—just because that was Vegeta’s nature—but instead, he recognized Vegeta’s intention to force himself upward in his grip. Even captured, he couldn’t let Goku outdo him.

Fingers curled in his hair and pulled with the force that nearly made him yell—forgetting for a moment that he was under water. Instead, his neck gave to the pulling and he allowed himself to follow through and go for Vegeta’s face. Big streams of bubbles escaped between them in the collision, and Vegeta nearly took a bite out of his lip attempting to gain the upperhand. But the short notice Goku had him on when he pulled him under the surface, left Vegeta with little time to stage a counter strike.

In the hazy swirl of water, Goku could see one of Vegeta’s hands feeling out the wall behind him and reaching upward—a clear sign he needed to bring him up to let him breathe. He, too, started to thirst for fresh air, and he kicked them both up. Breaking back to the surface, Goku heard the sharp draw of breath from Vegeta as soon as his head was above water. That deep draw was to recharge the long moment of being deprived of air and he expected the very next breath from Vegeta to be yelling.

Well.

Can’t have that.

He barely had given himself the time to catch his own breath, choosing to push Vegeta back against the smooth rock instead. The slope into the pond left just enough of an edge for him to hike Vegeta up and pin him to it, coming out of the water only enough to hook his fingers into any wedge in the rocks that would keep him from floating away from him. In doing so, he nearly crushed Vegeta beneath him, silencing any string of hisses planned for him. If compressing the words out of his chest didn’t do it, then the follow up of smashing his mouth down on his certainly did. Vegeta couldn’t yell at him if he couldn’t make the words—growl at him, sure, but as long as he couldn’t start barking, then Goku wasn’t in trouble yet.

That was definitely how it worked.

Vegeta’s fingers pressed into his cheek; his thumb digging into his jaw enough to break a weaker man’s bones. He didn’t stop Goku from his actions, but his grip on his face left enough space between them in brief moments for Vegeta to take deep breaths, sweeping a rush of air over their tongues. His panting slowed, but the furious grip on Goku didn’t. He even picked up in pulling his hair viciously. Nothing about Vegeta was all that gentle, but Goku had forcibly plunged Vegeta right off his comfortable pedestal and into the cold, wet depths. He had some right to be prickly; none of it would be any fun if he took it in stride.

Then for a moment, nothing outside of the sensation of Vegeta’s thighs around his hips registered in his brain and he nearly reacted to grab him again. He had to remember that his hold on the ledge kept him in place and to keep it, meant he had to relinquish some countermeasures on Vegeta. His one hand had a firm grip on him—large hand nearly wrapped around him under his ribcage, pulling the fabric of his shirt tightly to his chest. That left him with little ability to change his position without moving away from Vegeta or just taking them both all the way back into the water again.

Vegeta knew that, opening his mouth and puffing a breath between them, mumbling a noise to catch his attention—a difficult feat when his attention span was tangled by the legs closed around him. They were locked, with his heels nearly grinding into the back of his thighs to keep his firm hold on him. Vegeta was more limber than he let on.

“Kakarot,” warm air passed over his tongue, and Vegeta’s teeth grazed his own, “I take it the water needs to be a little colder, does it?”

“Wh...,” he paused, moving back just slightly to look Vegeta over in an attempt to discern his meaning. The answer wasn’t in his face, however, and he nearly lost his grip on the ledge when his brain caught up with how the rest of him was reacting. “That’s—,” he sputtered at him. “Cheater—.” Vegeta’s hold on him was as much pinning him, as he was pinning Vegeta and his only possible course of action would be to plunge them both back down the rest of the way and shake him off. But, he didn’t want to do that. Even if Vegeta’s intentionally tightening hold, pressing them closer, left him more exposed than ever.

“Honestly, Kakarot, have some control,” Vegeta tilted his head away to talk down at him, though the wobble in his voice diminished his sense of composure. Goku was sure that if he turned his head and pressed it against Vegeta’s chest, he would be able to hear his heart killing itself in there. And he was probably avalanching through thoughts wildly, but he hadn’t stopped Goku. Having control with Vegeta never got him anywhere, and starting now wouldn’t either.

Go big. No one goes home today.

“Nah,” he answered, tightening his hold and single handedly lifting Vegeta a little more out of the water. He had no leverage as long as he didn’t have both hands. Yeah, he could teleport them out. He could fly them out. He could do a lot of things to move Vegeta. But he didn’t feel like doing any of those things. Anything else would break the hold he had and he might actually die afterwards, so he was going to make it count!

Vegeta’s fingers moved from pulling his hair to raking down his scalp and into his shoulder. When Goku made the move to tilt his whole face into the crook of his neck, Vegeta had no choice but to release his grip on his cheek and jaw. Instead, he tangled his fingers back in his hair and sharply yanked. With a steep breath into his neck, Goku opened his mouth and bit him.

“You bitch—.”

“Don’t make me throw you, Vegeta—,” he huffed right into the impression of teeth he left behind, making every intention to run his tongue along the outline of it. Even as he made the threat, he continued his efforts to drag Vegeta up the rest of the slope, just a short distance off from where he’d originally perched in the first place.

“Do it then, Kakarot,” Vegeta challenged, fist pulling tightly, but not enough to make him see the stars he saw in the first tug. He knew he wasn’t going to throw him, because he would have to move away from him, and Vegeta wasn’t loosening his leg hold either. He’d have to fight Vegeta to remove him.

He kicked for footing—something to get let him climb back out and have his arm back. Getting his limbs to function when Vegeta arched his back and turned his hips to tighten his hold, was like trying to do math equations from his son’s book while being slapped. With closed eyes, he breathed into his neck and waited for Vegeta to stop distracting him, so he could focus. He opened his mouth and committed to adding to the teeth impressions he already left.

Vegeta kept moving under him and Goku took far too long to consider that Vegeta, of all people, was doing it on purpose. He’d been too used to flipping the coin of whether or not he would be getting slugged for even getting too close, that the concept didn’t seem plausible. But then...he did know Vegeta had determination when he made up his mind. He had used both of his hands in the middle of a friendly spar, after all…

With what little willpower he still had, he wrapped his arm around Vegeta and fumbled for the best footing he could to hoist them out, slowed by heavy wet clothes. The muscles in his arm were screaming for reprieve and as soon as he was free, he fumbled to his hands and knees over him, Vegeta still hadn’t loosened his leg grip a bit, even if he’d had to let go of the rest of him in moving them out of the water. Instinctively, he moved to scoop him up and sit back with Vegeta in his lap.

His placement, put Vegeta right in his face and he grinned a little bit, suddenly aware of his own low panting. But he wasn’t the only one stirred up by it and Vegeta’s flustered scowl and loud exhaling against him when he leaned to kiss him, told him the win was still his. Or maybe he could call it a draw. A rematch could be in order.

“No more cold water to fix that, eh, Geta?” He teased, earning him whatever he’d receive from Vegeta. Both of his arms circled low around him and he held him close, not bothering to restrain himself from the obvious intent to grind against him. It felt too good not to and the catch of Vegeta’s breath confirmed he wasn’t alone. The bruising fingers that snatched Goku’s face back away and turned his attention where Vegeta wanted it, did nothing to staunch his actions or the upturned curl of his lip.

Vegeta straightened his back and looked directly at him with the authoritative measure that only he could manage, despite a deepening red overlay overtaking his features. His knees shifted a little wider to let him sink a bit closer. The fabric between them simultaneously made it immensely frustrating and enticing. His fingers itched. But Vegeta’s hooked legs around him weren’t going to let him just throw them all off him yet. Cruisin’ toward that rematch.

“You were right, Kakarot,” Vegeta took him by the face, sinking his weight against him enough to make him hiss back at him. “You are going to die between my thighs. And I’ll let you explain it to your friends.”

“Gotta make it worth it then,” he licked his lip and took a firm hold of him, appreciating that his hands were large enough to Vegeta’s body to really wrap him. The whole thing would be a fight, clearly emphasized by Vegeta’s refusal to let Goku take any easy lead on him, but he wanted to be there. Otherwise Vegeta wouldn’t have drawn him in for a kiss while he had his jaw in his grip.

Vegeta was going to make it a difficult fight playing dirty like that.

Cheater.

Chapter Text

“So, man, you’ve really been busy then, huh?”

“Yep, but Chi Chi’s off with some thing Gohan’s doin’ and Vegeta’s bein’ dragged around by Bulma. An’ I can’t really do anything when it’s raining this hard.”

Krillin, his best friend, balled his fist and socked it into the side of his shoulder. The feigned, offended shake of his head morphed into a casual shrug—one familiar with him and his antics. Krillin knew how he operated and that he could just appear unannounced at any time. Goku meant nothing by it, but that didn’t absolve him from being heckled about it from the one who could do so the best.

“I see, so I’m just a last resort, eh, Goku?” He was smiling about it, at least. There was no harm meant.

“Aw, c’mon, Krillin. The last time I came over, I almost knocked yer head backwards and Eighteen still looks at me funny.”

“You coulda held back a little, yeesh,” he rubbed his face and Goku could see Krillin remembering their brief sparring session, and just how sharply his knuckles felt connecting into his jaw at a snap—faster than the smaller man could register in time to dodge away from. Goku was just far too out of Krillin’s skill range, but he valued his friend’s skill, nonetheless. He took it to the face and he woke up...relatively quickly afterwards. That was pretty good!

“I was, though! I go way, way harder on Vegeta,” he curled his fingers and made a fighter fist, emphasizing his willingness to put the smackdown on him with real intention. Vegeta wasn’t afraid to take a punch to the face, but Vegeta was on his level and he wasn’t...human. Hitting Vegeta had an element of communication to it that he didn’t have with any of the others. The measure of his strike could send a message to him that none of the others could interpret the same way. When he struck Vegeta suddenly, with force like a comet, then Vegeta knew he was going for a traumatic beatdown that no one else could survive. Vegeta knew it before Goku even knew that’s what he wanted, most of the time.

Or sometimes, he just wanted to flick fists around and dodge him until they got tired dancing around each other. Vegeta took longer to understand that one, because being playful with him really threw him off his game. But he was beginning to develop into a dangerous opponent.

“Yeah, but he’s practically Goku proof. The rest of us aren’t,” Krillin shook his head. “I am surprised he’s spending so much time training with you. He’s...not social. You know?”

“Ya just gotta know how ta handle him is all,” he shrugged, receiving a skeptical look from his longtime friend. Maybe the idea of him being able to wrangle a personality like Vegeta’s was unbelievable, but everyone else put too much thought into it. He found him much easier to handle if he didn’t do any of that. “Besides, if he gets too mad, I just hit him,” he added cheerfully.

Krillin rubbed his face, “I...I believe that. At least he can handle it.”

He paused to grin, before finding anything else to say. The sound of Krillin’s wife closing a door broke his train of thought, if he really had one. When she came out into the family room, he shifted to comfortably wave at her, upon approach.

She raised an eyebrow and gifted him with a modest greeting in return. From the moment she walked in, the perplexed quirk of her brow told him that something else was on her mind and she didn’t waste her time coming out with it, putting one had on her hip and the other holding a phone that she was glancing down at with a curled lip. She had a very Vegeta-like expression...honestly.

“Marron’s started on her homework. I can’t believe this is the level these kids are at. I just got off the phone with Seventeen and it offends me that he understands this better than I do. He’s a park ranger, what does he need math for?”

“Isn’t his wife scientist?” Krillin shrugged, offering something at the risk of her piercing look.

“What difference does that make? She’s the brain then, not him. He’s a knucklehead and always has been.”

“That’s all super useless math though,” Goku offered, remembering Gohan’s books looking like abstract art to him. He could count and that’s as much as he ever used.

Krillin patted his shoulder, “It’s not useless, Goku, you just don’t do much thinking anyway…”

“Thinking is super useless too,” he shot back at him. “Ain’t done me any good.”

“Poor Chi Chi…”

“He’s right, Krillin. The only math you need is basic. Unless Marron wants to be an engineer, she’s not going to need letters in her math equation,” Eighteen gave one last look of grief to the face of her phone, before setting it down on an end table and folding her arms.

“Hon, the math you use involves money, and you’re very good at it. But I get the feeling your brother isn’t as interested in bending Hercule over for his pennies all the time.”

“Excuse me—.”

“Yer gonna land yourself in the doghouse, Krillin,” Goku snickered at him, earning a bullied look from him in return.

“I’m surprised you know what that means.”

“I’m pretty good at landing there, myself,” he thought of not only Chi Chi, but Vegeta also. Vegeta shutting him out was a much harder door to pry back open, and much easier to get slammed shut on him.

“Heh, I bet you are,” Eighteen turned her scowl into a bit of a smirk and he couldn’t help but give her a cheeky shrug. She leaned against the wall beside the door and looked them both over for a moment. “So, what are you two up to? Not often that you just appear.”

“Weather’s bad, and I’m the backup plan,” her husband answered, but with a tone of mirth. Krillin didn’t get mad at him for being him, in that way. Sometimes, he just got caught up in everything else he was doing at the time. He didn’t forget his friends, he just...forgot to remember to go see them for long periods of time. “You really can’t leave Goku alone for too long. He was just telling me about his thing with Vegeta, but I guess he’s busy.”

“Oh? Finally come out of the closet with that one, hm? Good for you,” she smiled, directly at him and he blinked at her for a long moment. The understanding of her implication slowly wound up and then slugged him like Vegeta’s fist. If it wasn’t for Master Roshi and his loose grasp on language, he might not even recognize what the whole closet business meant. His teacher had a penchant for off color comments that he didn’t care to curb and Goku didn’t bother to ask for clarification on any of it, but he paid more attention than others gave him credit for when others—like Gohan—admonished Master Roshi for the things he did say when children were present. So he understood it enough to start shaking his head from behind Krillin. With Krillin slightly in front of him, he couldn’t see Goku waving for her to stop; but her words had already flown out and caught his friend’s attention.

“Come out of the…,” Krillin turned and he immediately dropped his hands and looked off in another direction to try and find anything else to feign interest in. Vegeta would have a stroke and he’d never get that door back open without tremendous begging for him to believe he didn’t tell them himself. “C’mon, you’re making it sound like it’s some sort of secret affair, Eighteen,” he laughed and Goku itched to rub the back of his neck.

He refused to look at Krillin and didn’t say anything. Eighteen didn’t come to his rescue either, because she wasn’t really aware of what they were talking about before she came into the room and he didn’t suspect she was the merciful type. If he was going to climb out of the hole of suspicion, then he’d have to do it himself; but he just didn’t say anything immediately, attempting to actually think before he spoke. Thinking didn’t work for him, he decided, because taking too long promoted his friend’s interest even more.

“...Hey, I was kidding, but uh, wait, is there actually something going on?”

“Uh…” Goku hadn’t figured out his words yet, and finally looked at Krillin, sparing a briefly accusatory glance at Eighteen.

She didn’t miss it for even a second.

“Hey, it’s not my fault you didn’t make it clear what you were talking about,” she folded her arms, and postured herself in a way that made Goku itch to fight her at that moment. She’d probably take swings at him too if they weren’t in their house with their daughter in the next room.

Goku glossed right over Krillin’s question and went after his wife as a means to ignore answering it directly. “Who even told you—?” Couldn’t be Chi Chi, she wasn’t that type; but if Bulma was out there telling people...Vegeta was going to leave the planet once he found out and there’d be no tracing him. He’d hide his ki and then run away to another universe. Vegeta didn’t like having his sense of control pulled from his fingers. If anyone else was gonna know, then he’d have to be privy to when and who got that information—

Goku didn’t need next level education, or a deep philosophical analysis, to put that together about Vegeta. It took—him—forever to be allowed to know he was in that sort of relationship with Vegeta.

“No one had to tell me, I have two functional eyes, Goku,” she tilted her head back, flicking blonde strands of hair from her face. Her body language challenged him to contest her, but he couldn’t play dumb enough, apparently. “Just because the rest of your friends are thick nuggets doesn’t mean I am.”

Goku took a deep breath and leaned against propped knuckles, tuning out Krillin’s weighted stare going right through him. He couldn’t really fight Eighteen with a loaded hand when she left him so few openings…

“Yeesh, no wonder Vegeta gets touchy that you beat him up. Ya sound just like him and he probably hated that.”

Eighteen’s face contorted in reaction to snap at him, for just a short second, before smoothing back out. Her arms dropped and she brushed her hair back with a hand before putting both of them on her hips and staring him down sharply. “I almost fell for that, Son Goku, but I’m not Vegeta enough to overlook what you’re doing. You’re obvious, and that isn’t my fault.

If she was Vegeta, it probably would have worked. His reactionary nature meant that Goku could slip himself out of sticky situations, but if she could catch on to them from the limited times she’d have witnessed them interacting at a distance, then he couldn’t skirt around with her. He had nothing he could say in response, and simply frowned at her.

“Don’t look at me like a kicked puppy, I’m not sympathetic.”

“Hey, uh…” Krillin waved for his attention, and he tried really hard to maintain his eye contact with Eighteen to prevent having to explain it, but she openly waved her hand in the direction of her husband in clear display that he had a friend to attend to and did so, with a smile on her face. Man, he could never let her and Vegeta in the same room together on a united front.

“Yo,” he finally slid off his propped arm and gave his friend a strained cheeky grin, put to the test by Krillin’s deep look of suspicion.

“Am I being pranked or what?”

Goku had the chance to scoop his way out of this slip for a second time, already wasting the opportunity to redirect Eighteen’s assumption, and Krillin set him up to laugh it off and wipe the whole scene off until it would come back eventually in the future. Except, he blinked at Krillin slowly and missed the beat for it. Instead, he returned the question with a scratch to the head, as if he couldn’t understand what he’d be pranking his friend over. Only hindsight offered him recognition of his misstep. Vegeta would smack him through a mountain for it, someday.

“No, unless Eighteen’s got plans for you later...In which case, sorry for you man, she’s mean.”

“You’re just dumb,” she remarked under her breath, but not enough that he couldn’t hear, even with her face pressed into her hand.

“I think you just like mean people, Goku…” Krillin folded his arms, glancing his face over. “Like Vegeta, apparently.”

“Uh.”

“I didn’t think you’d cheat on Chi Chi though…”

Goku watched Krillin’s eyes shift from him, moving away to anything else. He quickly reacted to correct him, not wanting him to get the wrong idea. “Nah, she knows about it,” he shook his head quickly, not really making any efforts to contain what came out of his mouth before he let it pass through whatever filter he might have in his brain. The last possible moment to feign ignorance had instant transmitted itself to another universe and he just waved goodbye to it without even trying to stop it.

“She kno—Goku... you...you’re not kidding…” Krillin turned in his seat and looked back to his wife, like the expectation for her to finally give in on the joke was there; but she had nothing to offer. She buried Goku to start, so she would only throw him deeper if she was going to add anything. He didn’t give her the chance.

“It’s a long story, but it’s fine. Chi Chi and Bulma understood and were okay with it before Vegeta even was,” he explained, rubbing the back of his neck and taking a deep breath. Even he kinda started to put things in place before Vegeta did, and Vegeta was supposed to be the smart one. He still was the smart one, but maybe all those smarts led to his downfall when it came to putting himself against other people who weren’t held back by something as simple as social interaction. Goku jumping Vegeta’s boundaries had become a performance art.

“And you’re...really not pranking me.”

“Nah.”

“...Alright...I guess I never really thought of you being into guys,” he raised a brow at him, looking over at him; his expression more perplexed than anything else.

“It’s nothing like that. I mean, it’s just Vegeta,” he offered, not really thinking about what he was saying; only biting his lip after the fact and silently glad Vegeta was nowhere to be seen.

Krillin shook his head and waved his hands abruptly, almost appearing embarrassed—though Goku didn’t really get why. He hadn’t done anything wrong. “I mean, if it was...like that, you know, that’s alright too. I didn’t mean it that way. You’re fine or whatever. You do what you do Goku, you always have.”

“Take a breath, Krillin, you’re fine. He’s not catching you quick enough to be offended.” Eighteen stepped forward to put a hand on his shoulder. “Nothing’s changed, has it, Goku? This has been going on for quite a while, am I right?” She nudged the conversation along and he blinked at her slowly, taking in what she was saying and then nodding his confirmation. “See? Relax.”

“Just…” Goku put his hands together and made an appreciative display to both of them— mostly to Eighteen, the decidedly ruthless one of the two. “Please don’t tell Vegeta ya know? Or...anyone really? He’s kinda Vegeta about stuff an’ I don’t wanna have ta get punched off another rooftop ta fix it.”

They both looked at him for a stagnant moment and he knew they had zero understanding, and tons of questions about what that meant, but he elaborated on none of it. Maybe they recognized it was better for them that the less they understood what it took to unpack Vegeta, the better it was for them. Only a few people were determined enough to crack open Vegeta’s exterior. Bulma had as forceful of a personality as Vegeta; and Goku was stubborn enough to fight Vegeta. The rest of them…? Maybe not as much.

“Don’t worry, I...can pretend I heard nothing,” Krillin gave him a weak punch to shoulder, through a chuckle.

Eighteen, however, slid her hand from her husband’s shoulder and leaned closer. Her face came close enough to Goku’s that it nearly made him lean back in his seat; yet he stubbornly maintained his position, because it felt like a challenge. He learned one thing, if nothing else, Krillin’s wife was an opponent he wasn’t sure he was ready to combat when she had too much knowledge. She was too dangerous.

“So, how close have you two gotten?” She asked in a low, suggestive voice that almost escaped him and he kinda wished it had, because it caused him to visibly react. He couldn’t play dumb when his automatic reaction gave him away and made him choke.

“I…” He felt warm and turned away from her, heat creeping up to his neck with a briefly startling recollection of Vegeta’s legs wrapped around him. She didn’t actually require an answer from his mouth—words weren’t necessary when his face said it all, apparently.

“Babe....Honestly, that’s more than I want to know…”

“You can cover your ears while he tells me the juicy details then,” her smirk widened and Goku cracked and leaned away from her in defeat, flopping sideways on the armrest of their couch. Her amused chuckle followed and a moment later, he felt her hand patting his back gently. “Really, good for you two. Be more discreet in the future. I won’t tell anyone, but I won’t have to when you’re painfully apparent.” She gave him another pat and then moved away from the both of them. “I’m going to go prep for tomorrow, have a good visit boys.”

“Oh yeah, after you’ve murdered my best friend.”

“Now Vegeta won’t feel lonely in his defeat by me,” she chuckled the entire way out of the room and Goku picked himself up when he heard the door close behind her.

“I’m...Uh...I’ma….”

“You can go, Goku,” Krillin smiled at him, waving it off harmlessly. “Not used to it, but every now and then, it’s nice to see you lose handedly.”

“Your wife’s merciless…”

“Yeah, she’s great. So, I’ll see you on the next blue moon, yeah?”

Goku grinned at him, feeling a little elated, despite the wild shifting of the visit. He held a hand out, fingers curled to a friendly fist—knuckles knocked to his friend’s to seal the deal that he’d show up when he showed up. As he always did. He came unannounced and would leave, just as accepted as before. Even with Krillin learning things he wasn’t really prepared to tell him. Hopefully, one day the rest of them would let it roll over just that easily. The biggest obstacle, would always be Vegeta, of course. But for now, at least one secret was well tucked away. He trusted them.

“Yep, I’ll see ya ‘round, Krillin.”

Chapter Text

The phone beside him crawled itself along the table and he was more than aware of its slow progress—moving by the snail’s pace given to it from the near constant hum of alert vibrations that Kakarot was forcing upon it. Oh yes, he was aware of the notifications and he could see the face of the device letting him know that his contact was, indeed, attempting to make contact.

He was just not making a move to reach for it until one of two things occurred: Kakarot paused in his flood of chatter for more than five solid minutes, or the phone actually reached the edge of the small table and became endangered enough of falling, that he would be required to rescue it.

The rescue was required first.

He exhaled and finally reached out to see what the hell Kakarot wanted, because evidently, he couldn’t function one entire train of thought into a singular message. It required twelve. He sneered at the bright light in his face and pet the suddenly stirred cat back down to its place, squished into his side. He had to move the couch cushions just enough to disturb the feline, and gods forbid he do that.

The cat was clearly displeased that the big buffoon had bothered their peaceful nap time, to the backdrop of some TV show about Ancient Alien conspiracies—which Bulma couldn’t seem to understand why he watched at all. Apparently there was something absurd about an alien watching shows about alien theories. It was just one of those days. And Kakarot was shattering the peace.

‘Kakarot, 1 message not 20.’ He tapped on the phone, texting the words before bothering to scroll up and recap this fool’s afternoon, apparently. For some reason, he deemed it necessary to make a diary of his day out of his text messages to him, and Vegeta lamented not stuffing the phone under the couch cushion. If he’d done that, though, he’d find Kakarot teleporting into the living room before long to wonder why he hadn’t responded after too much time had passed. His messages could be quickly summed into Kakarot’s report of the weather and something about Chi Chi being out, and he was alone.

And bored.

‘Take a nap then.’

‘I alrdy did that tho. Wat’r u doin now?’

Vegeta wiggled his fingers into the furry butt of the cat digging its claws into his thigh—as if to threaten him that he better not be planning to move away from his spot for the sake of Kakarot’s neediness. He really didn’t want to move from his spot; though he could sense from where he was, that Kakarot was needling for his attention. He knew well enough from all of his time in dealing with him, what Kakarot’s neediness actually looked like. He could be thick in the head sometimes, but Kakarot wasn’t all that great at being discreet. Even he could piece together his intentions.

‘Nothing.’ He answered, leaving little for him to cling to, but curious to see what he would go for. Vegeta could easily just state his position, but he had plenty of time to waste. He already knew exactly where Kakarot’s wife was, because she was with Bulma. He listened just enough to Bulma’s pregnant gushing about baby clothes to know at least where she was going and who she was going with. She had dropped the cat on him and told him to behave himself and he went right back to sleep with a wave. If Bulma was with Chi Chi, then she would be safe from anything outside of the supernatural. No human was going to lay hands on Bulma and not get snapped in half by Kakarot’s wife if she was present.

‘Watchin’ Trunks or somethin’?’

Vegeta raised a brow, slowly. Odd question. ‘He and Goten are with your eldest, I believe.’ He had the house to himself and the cat. Kakarot knew that Goten wasn’t with him, already; and the boys were nearly always together. Honestly, he had to wonder why Chi Chi didn’t just drop Kakarot and the boys off with him, but maybe Gohan had made these plans with the boys long in advance and she had recognition that the two of them were grown men who should be able to handle themselves and their own companionship. Clearly, they’d been overestimated.

‘Kakarot, what do you want? Just get it out, you’re being mousy and it’s pissing the cat off. Do you want to piss the cat off?’ He accented the text with the visual flavor of a picture of a disgruntled furry cat face with a tail proofing more than usual in the background.

‘Aw dont be mad’
‘can i come over?’

Vegeta blinked at the response, bringing the phone closer to his face to trace his eyes over each word like maybe he saw them wrong and needed to reassure himself of his accuracy. But he hadn’t incorrectly read them, and Kakarot had actually asked for permission. From somewhere deep within, a defense mechanism sprang to life. Kakarot never asked for permission. He asked for forgiveness. And not even always that. He just showed up when he wanted to, caused chaos, and left Vegeta in his wake.

He narrowed his eyes at the device and took a moment to consider his response. The cat yelled at him from his side and he absently patted down its ruffled fur until it quieted; only giving him the occasional soft meow instead.

“He’s stupid, I know. You don’t have to tell me.” He muttered, thumb flicking on the keys. His texting was slow, but Kakarot wasn’t busy. He could wait, as punishment for interrupting his whole afternoon of doing exactly nothing. ‘I am not going to train with you today Kakarot.’

‘Thats ok.’
‘i’m not feelin it’
‘Anywy’

The suspicious meow and claws in his thigh prompted him to lift the cat closer to his chest. “How are you being pissy about something you can’t even see,” he grunted, brushing fluffed fur with his fingers. “Can you just feel his dumbass energy?” He raised a brow at an animal that wouldn’t respond, but seemed to be on his wavelength.

The cat, perhaps, served as a distraction from needing to respond immediately. If Kakarot didn’t want to train and he was asking permission...then what the hell did he want? Did he actually want anything in particular at all, was the real question. He wanted Vegeta’s attention, but what kind of attention. What exactly would Kakarot be getting out of coming over to where he was, to do exactly what he said he was already bored of doing?

‘You’re just going to be bored over here instead of over there,’ he responded, watching the little icons appear that signified that Kakarot was already responding. He had no intention of training, made no plans to go anywhere, he wasn’t reading anything, and food wasn’t a consideration for at least a few more hours. Kakarot had nothing to actually benefit in being near him and being just as bored.

He just likes being around you.

But that’s stupid, he shook his head and made a face at the phone. The concept shouldn’t really be all that fresh to him, given the mess he and Kakarot waded through in the last few years—or at least years to them. The passage of time in Chamber and those months after, made for a strange ascension of character in the eyes of those who looked hard enough, when seeing how he and Kakarot interacted. They almost looked like friends, he curled his nose a little.

‘well’
‘can I, tho?’

Kakarot persisted.

Vegeta found difficulty in saying no when he asked it simply, in such a way. Acute awareness of being manipulated, and yet he went right along with it. He sent the simplest, ‘fine’ he could thumb, before tossing his phone. Maybe it wasn’t manipulation at all, but just behavior of grown men behaving like people who could ask and, in return accommodate a request. Maybe his instinct to think he was being manipulated came from that being his only experience with others in the past, or maybe he knew Kakarot’s kind of manipulation was a kind he didn’t actually...mind.

His cat companion stirred and hissed, hair standing up before legs sprung to leap the little animal away from him—spooked by the static jolt of energy that Kakarot gave off when he popped into the room out of nowhere. He would have to make nice with the cat later. Because Kakarot did ruin a good thing they had going, and he glanced after the black blur, grunting at how quickly it disappeared. He made no efforts to move his position except to turn his eyes back up to Kakarot and give him every bit of his usual attitude.

“You ran the cat off, Kakarot.”

The intruder had absolutely no hint of apology for it, and smiled a little. He leaned over him a little, putting a hand on the back of the couch. If this had been a year ago in the present time—even less than that—Vegeta would have socked him out of instinct, or blasted him into orbit. He’d been conditioned to not see anything Kakarot did coming toward him as a real threat.

“Tell ‘em ‘m sorry,” the big fool had the nerve to say apologetic words and not sound sincere about it.

Vegeta scoffed him, not even moving his arms from their resting place, cradled under his head. His position was not to be compromised by a buffoon. He acknowledged that Kakarot bridged himself with his arm, and wasn’t blind to how he was dipping closer to him. He could move, if he really felt the need; or put his fist in his nose for thinking he had the right to show up, scare the cat away, then bend over and think he could kiss it away.

Luckily for Kakarot, his offense at being kissed by a big idiot had lessened a point that allowed him to accept him turning his big, stupid face against his and planting a short one right on his mouth. Vegeta sensed no deeper intentions, just Kakarot being Kakarot—with his lips turned in a goofy grin against his for the brief moment he gave him his ridiculous greeting. He was trying to get under his skin and fluster him a little, but Vegeta refused to let him have any ground on him outside of the faint bit of warmth in his face that he couldn’t figure out how to stop.

“You come into my home and behave like a creature…” He started, but still made no efforts to move. Not even to protest the knee he felt dip the cushion of the couch by his thigh. Making himself comfortable, the cheeky bastard.

“You invited me,” he stuck his tongue out, and Vegeta almost tempted himself to bite, but couldn’t bear being that undignified. Yet.

“Actually, you asked and I permitted you. Which is my folly, I’m aware, but I don’t have to be pleasant about it.”

“Eh, if you were pleasant about it, you wouldn’t really be you, huh?” Kakarot’s grin widened until it reached his eyes. Vegeta wanted to slap him for being sufficiently barb tongued enough to come back at him that quickly.

He exhaled loudly, and deeply. “You’ve ruined my pleasant nap with my napping partner. So you have to pay for the emotional damages and take responsibility. An apology is not sufficient. So lay the fuck down and stop making a nuisance of yourself,” he pushed his palm into Kakarot’s face to emphasize his incredible seriousness in the matter. Kakarot only resisted long enough to lick his palm and make Vegeta dig his fingers into his whole face with a grumble before letting him go.

From there, fortunately, he had his cooperation. Admittedly, Kakarot was a lot more to lay under than a small furry cat; but having Kakarot’s arms wrapped up under him and his head resting on his chest when he finally found where he wanted to settle, proved to be really favorable conditions to nap in. Kakarot’s muted snoring had familiarity, though he could somehow still hear the cat’s betrayed meowing from somewhere.

He’d have to make some kind of apology. That was his last thought before he let the dull jingle of a silly show about aliens put him back to sleep.

Chapter Text

“Kakarot,” Vegeta’s voice carried a tone of necessity that he didn’t usually have, at least not in the way it sounded this time. His sharp way of saying his name prompted him to immediately home in on what followed. He had a reason for calling his name, not just to throw hands or words.

He had come over, finishing up with his work early and needing to give his phone over to Bulma at her request. Of course he gravitated immediately to Vegeta, maybe train a bit; but Vegeta had something else going on, evidently. “Yeah?”

“What’s your wife’s dress size?”

Goku almost fell off the chair that he perched the wrong way in—leaning his folded arms on the backrest and straddling the seat itself. He watched Vegeta in the kitchen, making them food; just sandwiches, but they looked really good and he was extra hungry. He’d almost been distracted enough by the prospect of food not to question what Vegeta wanted his wife’s clothes sizes for. It was just weird enough of a question for him to not think about food for a minute.

“Why do you wanna know what Chi Chi wears? An’ I don’t know. She doesn’t tell me that kinda thing anyway,” he offered, rubbing his neck a little.

“Doesn’t tell you? Have you never taken her clothes off before?” Vegeta’s look of dismay made him slightly defensive.

“I’ve taken yer clothes off before, an’ I couldn’t tell ya what yer dress size is either, y’know,” he watched for Vegeta’s face to tilt to the red hue it did when he was blindsided by his back slapped comments; fainter than usual, but Vegeta never failed.

“Damn it, Kakarot,” Vegeta threw the slice of deli meat in his hand at him in reaction and he didn’t hesitate to catch it and put it right into his mouth. It was given to him and he was hungry. The dismay being displayed didn’t go unnoticed, Goku just pretended he didn’t see it. “I’m asking an important question.”

“An’ I don’t know. And you didn’t say why.”

Vegeta growled loud enough that Goku didn’t have to listen for it. “We’d like to get her a dress to wear for the stupid party Bulma is having, but I...we can’t do that without knowing what she wears.”

“Why don’t you have Bulma ask her?”

“Discretion means nothing to a buffoon like you, I know this from experience. Fool, I don’t want her to know we’re acquiring this for her until we gift it to her. Kakarot, teleport back home and go get one of her dresses.”

“What, I can’t,” the words came out of his mouth with a little bit of alarm and maybe fear. If Chi Chi caught him stealing her clothes, she’d be mad and also have a lot of questions. Questions he’d have no answer for, unless he told her why he needed them...and if he did that, Vegeta would be mad at him. “She’s doing the laundry and I can’t really just sneak out with anything when she’s in front of it all.”

“The one thing you’re useful for and you’re not even useful for it,” Vegeta exhaled, rubbing his temple. He appeared considerably annoyed by either his unwillingness or inability to see to his request. Goku had no plans to offer, so definitely unwillingness. He’d just have to find another way to get what he wanted that didn’t involve him— Vegeta abruptly crashed his train of thought. “Fine, take me with you, I have to return a book to her anyway.”

What.

“Wait—.”

“I’ll keep her busy long enough for you to grab something and bring it back to me, just fold it in with some training clothes and she’ll never know the difference.” Vegeta took in his distressed expression about as quickly as he ended his words, but he left him no wiggle room to back out. Vegeta put his foot down with the force that rivaled his dismay at being caught by Chi Chi in stealing her clothes. What an awful place to be…

“Kakarot, maybe if you paid better attention, you wouldn’t need to do this. I just need one that I can get measurements off. You can return it immediately after.”

“Can’t you just kinda, guess? She’s not that much different from Bulma—”

“You and I know your wife is more athletic in her build. If I went off Bulma’s measurements, she’d probably be miserable. Stop being a chicken shit, I’ll go grab the book I need to return. If I come back and you’re gone, then I will go there my goddamn self and wait however long it takes for you to show up and watch you fucking squirm to explain why I was waiting for you for hours when you said you were coming to see me.”

Goku frowned, more accurately, pouted. Chi Chi knew he’d come to see Vegeta. and if Vegeta turned up at their house alone, looking for him...then she would have a lot of questions that he wouldn’t have an answer to. He didn’t like it when Vegeta decided that getting what he wanted was the only option, at all costs. He used vicious tactics and Chi Chi was far too close to this one to make Goku willing to gamble his hand against. That was a two against one he was not equipped for.

So he stayed put, waiting for Vegeta to come back. At least he was nice enough to leave him with the sandwich in the meantime. Goku knew that was partially to keep him there, but he took the bribery nonetheless. He was stuck there as soon as he recognized Vegeta wouldn’t be argued with. If he was going to have to go steal from his own wife’s personal belongings, he’d rather have food in his stomach while he did it. Chi Chi probably wouldn’t be mad at him, exactly, if he got caught and could tell her what he was up to; but he couldn’t, and that was the real problem.

Just don’t get caught, that’s all.

He chewed down the last bite and submitted to Vegeta’s demand, waiting right where he was. Running away would be so easy, but facing him later wouldn’t and he wanted to stay in his good graces for a little while. He thought the whole thing was kinda silly, but Chi Chi would probably be very happy to have that sort of surprise too…

Aw man…

“Are you done Kakarot? I gave you more than enough time to eat that, assuming you didn’t swallow it whole.” Vegeta came back into the room, book in hand and ready to go.

“Yeah...but we really gotta, like...right now?”

“Yes,” he held out his hand for him to take it and Goku pouted even more steeply at him. Vegeta never offered his hand willingly—only just when he wanted him to do something, did he make it easy. Probably because he knew that Goku would quickly submit to the prospect of having Vegeta show any softness that readily. His hand closed around Vegeta’s smaller hand without any resistance on his behalf.

“If she catches us and flips out, I’ma tell her it was yer idea,” he mumbled, placing two fingers to his forehead in preparation to teleport them back to his own home.

“Simply do it correctly, then, Kakarot.”

Teleporting them had more appeal than responding to him, so he chose to do that instead of return any words. Vegeta gave him a simple task. Go in there while he had her distracted and borrow one of her dresses. Hopefully, Chi Chi wouldn’t sniff out their ill intentions immediately. She was smarter than both of them put together, after all.

“Chi Chi,” he called as soon as he turned the door in. He could feel her in the house, knowing exactly where she was and tracking her movement toward them from the room. She was still working on the laundry, just as he left her earlier. “I’m home,” he greeted, waving when she came into view.

She opened her mouth to ask why he was home—he only knew this, because her brows were turned together, accenting the quizzical expression she brought with her. Seeing Vegeta must have either answered her question or made her pause long enough for Vegeta to get his words in first.

“Kakarot has no suitable training clothes at our place anymore, so we’re swinging by so he can grab something and while he’s doing that, I thought I’d bring this back to you.” He took a few steps past Goku and tossed him a side glance that nearly made him frown at him in plain sight. Oh sure, Vegeta had a quick plan to take Chi Chi’s attention away for a moment, but how was he going to manage his more arduous task? Who knew how long he’d even have to collect something suitable. Goku knew nothing about clothes other than the requirement to wear them and that evidently some clothes aren’t appropriate for some situations.

“Oh, wonderful. I have another one ya might like, if ya finished that one and enjoyed it.” Chi Chi held an arm out toward him to direct him toward the kitchen, where she had a small bookshelf set up for when she would cook and wanted to read in between. With as much time as she might spend in the kitchen, it really made sense she would fill empty moments with something. Now she had someone to share those interesting reads with. Goku could tell that alone made her happy.

“Certainly. Kakarot, go get what you need, we’ll be in the kitchen,” Vegeta announced to him and the slight curve of his tone commanded a secret mission be accomplished while he was playing the role of distraction. Vegeta would let him have it, if his efforts were wasted, so he put on his most sincere face and gave a confirming wave—immediately making his way to the bedroom to see what he could fish out quickly. If he took too long, Chi Chi would just come after him and unearth his clothes for him and then he’d have to contend with Vegeta’s scorn for messing up a single simple task.

His training clothes only came in bright orange, so he couldn’t act like he had no idea where they were in a pile of clothes—giving him even less time to mess around with his search. Fine, he’d just have to get in there and grab the first thing that looked like a dress and let Vegeta deal with it. The whole thing seemed silly, when he could just ask; but he was so adamant about surprising her.

Within a moment of stepping into the room, he located his clothes in the laundry. If his only goal was his gi, then his mission had been accomplished on first glance. But he quickly stepped in to sort through the other garments. More of his things were in the pile she was working on, and he nearly turned around to pull something from the closet. He might get punted into another universe if he brought back her tiny nightclothes, but more of those things were taking up the pile. Surely, he could get measurements off her underclothes. Except, Vegeta might be the one to kill him if he came back with a pair of Chi Chi panties for measurements.

Chi Chi would also send him to his grave if she found out. That was Master Roshi level behavior. No dragon would bring him back upon finding out why he was sent to the otherworld…

He turned the whole pile over and pulled his gi out, not bothering to fold anything. If he had intentions of wearing it, then there would be no real reason; and it served as a secondary purpose to have his clothes in a messy heap in his arms. Anything he took of hers, he planned to stuff in between the folds of his clothing, just as Vegeta suggested. Then he could quickly duck out without her being aware and later he could just bring it back with a casual, “whoops, this got mixed in there.” Perfect way to avoid getting in too much hot water.

With some fortune, she had one skirt, a shirt and a small dress in the pile. Her pink blouse was her favorite and it made him smile a bit, holding it in his hands. She looked pretty in pink. Vegeta looked good in pink too, actually. Maybe he just liked his favorite people wearing that color. Maybe he liked pink. He snorted and stuffed the material between his pants and top, careful not to let the cloth peek out. Maybe he’d present it to Vegeta and ask him to put it on. Watch his face turn the same color.

Wear my wife’s clothes Vegeta, they’d look good on you.

He almost laughed, but held in it so he could return to the kitchen and act completely innocent—of both his actions and his thoughts.

Vegeta had a book cracked open, listening to Chi Chi give him a summary on it. His expression always showed everything he thought, at least Goku could see it that clearly. If Vegeta didn’t have interest in something, then he saw it clear as day; but Vegeta never showed that with Chi Chi. When she discussed something with him, he had attentiveness and absorbed her opinions. That both made him smile, and terrified Goku. His developing camaraderie with his wife gave him power that Goku could never attain: the ability to bring Chi Chi into things and make Goku behave. He needed them both for that sometimes, but maybe not...at the same time.

“If you think you’d like this one, please take it with you. I want to hear what you think,” he heard her finishing her synopsis just in time to turn to him approaching. “I see you managed to find what you were looking for. I hadn’t gotten to putting everything away, but you’ll bring ‘em back in tatters anyway. If you bring ‘em back at all.” She shook her head at him, but had a faint smile on her lips to contrast her folded arms. She’d long ago gotten used to him stumbling back into the house in tattered rags where his pristine gi had previously been.

Maybe if Vegeta didn’t throw full blasts or throw him into mountain sides, it wouldn’t be that way. Though, perhaps he could be just as bad, leaving Vegeta in only about half of his spandex and boots at the end of a particularly hard training session. Maybe sometimes he just wanted and excuse to strip him down a little bit. A little battle damage looked good on him.

“I’ll do my best, but I can’t make any promises,” he curled the rolled cloth under his arm and laughed right through his hidden bad deed. Stealing from his wife to give to Vegeta had such a terrible connotation to it. He almost wanted to get caught so he could see her reaction if he were to just say, “I’m giving your clothes to my boyfriend.”

“If you boys need anything, you know you can come ask me. I will feed you. Provided you don’t come back in pieces.” Her hands moved to her hips with a stern look. She never let him forget that time they beat each other unconscious. Or the time he broke Vegeta’s neck. Twice in one day. Bulma had the same admonishment for their intense episodes, and sometimes she’d watch them training—laying on her lawn chair a bit of a distance away. Just to make sure they weren’t killing each other by accident. At least she knew it wasn’t on purpose anymore. She did like to tease Vegeta about his dramatic shift from attempted murder to—in her words—battle husband.

Vegeta scowled at her for it, but he liked the term. Sure, it had a silly ring to it, but it didn’t give him a weirdly unfitting feeling like lover did. Vegeta wasn’t...mushy enough for that. Goku wasn’t mushy enough for that, but he rarely ever thought about himself with those sorts of things. Vegeta might be the one more likely to stew on a single word and let it disturb him if it clicked the wrong way. If he ever did teased Vegeta by referring to him as his ‘boyfriend’, he might taste Vegeta’s fist smashing into his mouth. Though, that threat did entice him a little.

Being punished for his misdeeds seemed to appeal to him more and more, the longer he remained in Vegeta’s presence.

Fight me, you small, stubborn asshole.

“I’m sure we can go one session without Kakarot overdoing it, can’t we, Kakarot?” Vegeta also folded his arms after clapping the book shut in his hands.

“Actin’ like you ain’t just as bad is disingenuous, Vegeta,” he puffed at him, brows turning inward, then arching to make certain that he could recognize how little Goku believed in Vegeta’s dismissal of guilt for the same crime. If provoked, Vegeta would go out of his way to throw back everything Goku gave him with a high interest tacked on top of it.

“I’m surprised you even know what disingenuous means, you buffoon. Who did you leech that from?”

“Gohan, but it’s valid, innit, ‘Geta?” He leaned just a little bit, so he had to look down his nose at Vegeta—presenting a nearly direct challenge. Vegeta never did let his shorter stature get to him, but when Goku made any attempt to tower over him, he did get heated, and got right back in his face.

“I’m not at your level of dumbass, Kakarot, don’t insult me,” he growled up at him, face so close that he could feel the heat of his snarling. Chi Chi expected this of them, because Vegeta’s prickliness had come with him from the very beginning. After she’d finally figured out that they just threw hands as a form of companionship, she didn’t bother to intervene anymore in their episodes. She probably agreed with Vegeta half of the time—and that still concerned him deeply.

“Yer not up to my level of much, Vegeta.” He held his hand, palm down, over Vegeta’s head at about where Goku’s height topped. He could feel Vegeta’s fist clenching, that’s how prickled he sensed him getting. No, he didn’t care about his height, but he did care about being on the receiving end of any of Goku’s snappy retorts.

“You have that much more mass to waste space with, that can’t be helped. The universe doesn’t seem to let you stay dead for long.”

“Look who’s talking,” he countered and then chose tempting fate, instead of letting Vegeta fire something back. Lifting his free hand to Vegeta’s chin, he tipped his head back just a little more and planted just the lightest kiss on his mouth. If Vegeta wasn’t ready to slug him before, then he would be afterwards—and honestly, he expected a fist to come at his face for it. He found himself a little thrown off by the book that clapped the side of his head, instead. Avoiding that assault may have been easier, if he hadn’t been distracted by Vegeta slipping him tongue without warning. What an underhanded tactic—

“Kakarot, you dirty bastard, right in front of your own wife,” he scoffed at him, withdrawing; though book still raised to take another swing if he felt like it.

“S’not like she don’t know. Bulma tells her everything.”

“It’s true, she does,” Chi Chi nodded, shaking her head in the fashion that their antics just gave her more things to worry about than actually bothered her. One silly comment could lead to a brawl if they were in the right mood. “And Goku has no concept of personal space, you should know by now.”

“Trust me, I fucking do.” He breathed deeply, putting a hand to his temple. “I could give him back to you forever and save myself the trouble.”

“Oh no, I’m not taking all the responsibility for him. I have so much less to fuss about when I know he’s got an adult with him, most of the time.” She smiled widely, puffing her chest a little in declaration.

“No one appreciates my suffering quite like your wife, Kakarot,” he shook his head, but he wouldn’t directly back talk her any more than Goku could. “Let’s go, I’ve acquired an itch to punch you in your face.”

“Do ya ever actually scratch that itch?” He puffed, following after him the moment he started to walk.

“No. It just makes me want to do it more,” he offered, stopping briefly to turn back to Chi Chi, with the book held out, “I will give this a read and report back.”

“I look forward to it. You boys don’t hurt each other too much,” she waved back, letting them go without too much of a fuss. Their bickering had been so easy to fall into, that Goku almost forgot what they’d really come for and he almost made it to the door without a hitch, before her voice stopped him in his tracks—spiking his heart rate in that very instance. “Goku, hold on for a moment.”

He took a breath and spun around at her command. Her eyes dropped to his arm and he wanted to just run out the door like a threatened animal. He hadn’t actually prepared an excuse for if he did get caught immediately. “Yeah?”

“I think ya took my clothes in yours by mistake,” she approached him and he nearly clamored for the excuse she gave him. He planned to use that to bring them back to her, but he’d take it right then, when she offered it.

“O..Oh? Yeah?” His eyes dropped down to the little spot of pink that showed, from where he must have shifted the ball of clothes in his wit battle with Vegeta. Chi Chi couldn’t feel the ki spike from Vegeta, but he could. And his palpable irritation made his skin prickle. So close to getting away. “Ah, I haven’t even noticed, I just grabbed the first set I saw.” Not entirely a lie. It had been the very first gi set he saw. He just didn’t intend to include that shoving her belongings in between his was entirely on purpose.

“I don’t think these will do you any good,” she laughed, blissfully unaware. She took the garment roll from him and gently shook her clothes out of it, giving his things back to him in a much neater pile. “You wouldn’t even fit them, I’m afraid. Besides, pink just isn’t your color.”

He took a sharp breath through his nose, and wanted to remark that, yes. Pink was absolutely not his color. But he didn’t really want to explain the reason why he felt so strongly about that on himself. It brought a sour sensation to his stomach and he felt that in Vegeta too.

“Pink on Kakarot might make me want to kill him,” he commented and he didn’t intend to explain it either—treating it as their usual banter.

“Alright you two, go a whole breath without threats, we all know you don’t mean it anyway,” she draped her shirt and skirt over her arm and ushered them to make their way. No fighting in the house, she’d always said, and Vegeta felt ready to clock him. For probably a few reasons.

He stalled a little, leaning to kiss her on the cheek and accept the cheeky face pat she gave him in return. That worked only for as long as it took her to start shooing him away; and then he had to submit and follow Vegeta out the door.

The instant the door closed, he saw the snap of Vegeta’s head to his direction and the hand that moved out toward him. “Take us back, so I can bark at you risk free,” he hissed just loud enough for Goku to hear. Goku puffed his cheeks a little and took his hand without argument, and directed them back to Capsule Corp by the same means he brought them to his house. Instant Transmission gave him no time to prepare himself for his hissing, really.

The second they rematerialized back at Vegeta’s home, he had the front face of the book slapped against his head once again. And a book clubbing him wouldn’t sting if anyone other than Vegeta did it. But Vegeta knew how to make things smart.

“Ow—,” he yelped sharply.

“You damn clown. I gave you one simple task,” he admonished, looking threatening for someone who had to look up at him. Chi Chi had the same effect. Maybe he just liked feeling threatened by people he had to look down to cower at. He even caught himself so distracted considering the fact, that he almost forgot to stop Vegeta before he went full scale into yelling at him.

“Hey— c’mon give me a whole second before you declare me a failure.” After a moment of his hands up in defense of himself, and asking for a moment to let him explain himself, he reached into his gi. From the folds of the clothes he was currently wearing, he withdrew the other garments he’d stuffed into his shirt in a quick moment. “Look, I didn’t know if I was gonna make it out without her catchin’ me, so give me some credit. Though, if you even breathe a hint about this in front’a Master Roshi, I’ll send us both to the afterlife. Because I don’t need him thinkin’ I’m takin’ after him.”

“...Did...you steal your wife’s panties?”

Bra too, to make matters worse for him. “You wanted something to measure, if this ain’t good enough—”

“...It’ll do, but if you breathe a damn word about this entire incident either…”

“Our secret, because she’ll kill me if she finds out and then I have to take you with me. ‘Cause I’ll tell her you put them on in a heartbeat.”

Vegeta made to swing the book at him again and he had the better reflexes that time to catch his arm before it connected. “The fact that no one else realizes what a shithead you actually are astounds me,” he gritted, face turned up and scrunched tightly at him. Dismay taking over all of his features.

“I save all’a it for you, ‘Geta.” He smiled and dipped his head to kiss him again—without the audience. The sudden teeth taking a bite of his lip did not surprise him one bit. He practically asked for it.

“Fucker. Let me to go so I can get a measuring tape. You can take them afterwards and have the pleasure of trying to sneak them back in without her noticing. Fool.”

He hadn’t quite figured that one out yet, but he’d deal with that one when it came to pass. His mission was accomplished.

“And you can figure out how to explain how you got her dress measured perfectly for her,” he countered and the following clap of Vegeta’s other hand against the side of his head was worth that very brief look of dismay he undoubtedly saw cross his features.

Vegeta was going down with him, one way or another.

“Get in the house.”

He blew a kiss at him and barely escaped Vegeta swatting at him again when he complied and went for the door.

Chapter Text

“Hey, let’s take a break, yeah? I’m thirsty,” Kakarot spoke in the empty air, following another of Vegeta’s swung fists that failed to meet its mark.

He was prepared to continue, but Kakarot effortlessly switched from a combat stance into a recreational one; and in such a way that Vegeta lost his drive to go after him for even suggesting they stop. Their practice had barely started by the standards of their usual sessions, but he’d be lying in saying that he didn’t struggle to keep up with Kakarot’s pace that day. His eyes moved slower than the rest of his body and his head took more effort to keep upright than he ever usually thought about. The pressure behind his eyes radiated through his skull and throbbed harder whenever he moved in any position that wasn’t standing up and perfectly still. Even so, he could work with it. To cancel training because of a headache? How absurd.

Kakarot threw a bottle of water at him and he took it without complaint. Maybe he just needed more fluids and a little longer warming up. If he avoided getting clocked in the head, then surely it would go away on its own. Kakarot himself was a headache and he worked through that just fine—and he had no painkillers to take the edge off Kakarot.

Kakarot gasped a deep breath of air after drinking nearly a whole bottle in a shot. “Whew. I think I could use a little more practice with agility today,” he offered, “what do ya say?”

Agility training, with Kakarot, usually came down to a high stakes game of tag. The first time the big idiot suggested that kind of training, Vegeta scoffed at him just a little bit. Vegeta spent quite his share of time dodging Kakarot enough to know that he couldn’t fucking escape, so what good would playing “you’re it” do? Turned out that catching Kakarot could be much more difficult than he initially considered—of course once the rules were amended to disallow teleportation, it became much less infuriating and more of a competition. When they started loudly counting how long the other was taking, Kakarot had even proven he could count to numbers higher than with assistance of his finger and toes. Whoever had the higher number, decided on what lunch would be.

With the steep throbbing in his skull, he knew Kakarot could outstep him; but, being punched in the face sounded like the greater of two evils. “Yeah, whatever,” he grunted at him and took a swig of cold water. “But I’m not counting today, I don’t feel like it.” He ran it under the tone of being too annoyed to bother, but he really just didn’t have the energy to perform two mostly mundane activities at once. If Kakarot felt any disappointment from it, he didn’t show it.

“Yeah, that’s fine. I was thinkin’, more like, back and forth. Y’know, takin’ turns n’ stuff.”

“Kakarot, if you wanted a dance partner, why didn’t you just say so,” he found himself chuckling under his breath, eyes closing to focus out the weird tilting the world had when he looked around him with too much focus. He needed to relax. A tall goddamn request of himself, to himself.

“Well, ya are wearing the attire for it.”

He snapped his eyes open at him, just so that he could narrow them at him. “I wouldn’t ask you to dance with me for anything, Mr. Two Left Feet.” He could just feel in his spirit, those big feet stepping all over his. Kakarot could be agile, but he also had shown Vegeta his perfect capability of being a clumsy disaster. When Kakarot once bit him in panicked retaliation, instead of having some fucking grace about getting out of his neck hold, he knew he what he was dealing with.

“Hey, I bet I could dance just as good as you could,” Kakarot puffed at him like a big child. Not that Kakarot didn’t have the potential skill to do any physical activity—with some practice—he just did not have the patience if that activity didn’t stimulate him in the right ways.

“The Fusion Dance hardly counts,” he waved him off, before resting his fingers over the bridge of his nose. “Because honestly, that shit looks ridiculous.” He’d seen Goten and Trunks doing that nonsense enough to know that a grown man with that much leg would look like a clown—appropriate actually.

The crinkling of a plastic bottle pulled his attention and he found himself much closer to him than he’d been a second ago—and with a hand extended out to him, expectantly. His eyes turned from that hand, trailing right up to a stern, determined face. Kakarot’s eyebrows were turned together and he still looked as though he was puffing up in defense of himself. “A’right, then show me.”

Vegeta stared at him for a moment, a pretty long moment, actually. Had he actually gotten under Kakarot’s skin, or was he just being oddly competitive? A hundred different things popped through his head at the same time. He was being mocked? He was being challenged? Did Kakarot plan to throw a punch at him and yell that “sike” word Trunks had been saying lately? He couldn’t imagine Kakarot saying “sike”, but then... maybe he could? Where had his son even picked up that language? And did he even know any dances that he could actually show Kakarot and not throw himself into the sun immediately after? Bulma’s idea of “dancing” couldn’t be described in any other fashion aside from vulgar.

Well, he had learned how to slow dance from Bulma’s mother—apparently he should know something that simple when he’s the husband of someone as important as Bulma.

But did he really need Kakarot to know that he knew how to slow dance?

His head hurt again for an all new reason.

Maybe Kakarot’s years of breaking him down led him to caving so quickly; maybe it was the dull pressure making his eyes feel extra punched in. As long as he didn’t have to consider Kakarot doing anything that Bulma did behind closed doors to the rhythm of a bad song, then there could be no real harm.

He had already given him his hand, by the time his brain was done running its processes, anyway. His own body’s physical betrayal, in immediately putting his hand in his without proper permission from the brain, would not be forgotten. He had to roll with it. Kakarot had been slowly teaching him one unfortunate thing. Just go with it. When in Rome, do as the Romans do, or some shit.

“I will count. Every time you step on my feet Kakarot, I’m going to slap the shit out of you,” he exhaled and threw his own spent water bottle to the ground with their things. Without words, he guided him into how he wanted him positioned.

“Thought you weren’t gonna count? ‘Sides, I get punched for speaking to ya sometimes, I think a lil slap or two just adds flavor.” He had the nerve to snicker at him, where Vegeta could feel the vibration of it against his chest.

“You deserve every one of them,” he mumbled back, keeping his eyes from making direct contact. They looked ridiculous. Vegeta didn’t care for making a fool of himself, but… who was he really making a fool of himself in front of? Another fool? What a tragedy.

Ah, so this is what Stockholm Syndrome is like, he closed his eyes in admonishment of himself. Becoming a prisoner of Kakarot for so long that he’d finally accepted his cursed fate. Well, at that moment, Kakarot’s shoulder acted like a good place to rest his heavy head, and he could pick up fighting his inevitable future later. He needed a bit of a breather, before he took more swings at the clown. And he would be counting every time that Kakarot landed a foot on his.This was clearly an exercise in reigniting his motivation. Surely.

He didn’t open his eyes, listening and feeling worked better when light magnified the ache. He could feel Kakarot’s big hands, not afraid to be firm, but not holding him like he needed to grapple him. Kakarot’s muscles were relaxed, and it somehow transferred to him. Kakarot’s breathing came slow and even, deep breaths that he found himself unintentionally mimicking the rhythm. Blood pumped at an awfully cool resting pace for a man who was ready to train. He’d settled down pretty quickly. Or… No.

Kakarot knew from the moment they exchanged the first swings that Vegeta wasn’t in full form that day. He’d never ramped up all that much in the first place. He’d have probably said anything to lessen the strain on Vegeta’s behalf. It just so happened that Vegeta walked them into an easy out. He didn’t have to do anything but lead, and Kakarot was following—though really, he knew subconsciously, he was following Kakarot’s lead in a whole different dance. That was the dance where Kakarot did step all over his feet, but only to make sure he was still participating.

Humming pulled him out of his thoughts, and he listened to it—the sound coming from Kakarot. Maybe he didn’t like how quiet it was, maybe he thought it was soothing. Maybe he thought Vegeta was thinking too much again. All three were probably correct and he relaxed a little, into the slow sways and weak excuse for “dance”.

“This isn’t so hard,” Kakarot broke his short tune.

“Tch,” Vegeta scowled at him, eyes closed and the weight of his head supported by a shoulder he was only just tall enough to lean against, “stop stepping on my toes, dumbass.”

“Haha, my bad,” he smiled and apologized, despite Vegeta never having started counting.

Chapter Text

“Aren’t you gonna go see how she’s doing, Vegeta?” Goku’s eldest son leaned a little to train his eyes on Bulma as he asked the question. Vegeta didn’t need to answer the question for Goku to know that he planned to stay right where he sat—next to him at one of the many tables she had arranged for her gathering. Something about a “baby showering”, but he showed up for the food and paid little attention to whatever Bulma’s excuse for a party turned out to be. Well, the food and Vegeta.

“She’s perfectly fine in your mother’s care,” Vegeta shrugged, eyes following Gohan’s and then a few steps beyond—where he could see Chi Chi speaking animatedly with her.

Goku smiled a little. As Bulma got closer to her delivery date, he found his wife spending more and more time doting on her—once coming home to swear up and down that she “just knew” that the baby would be a girl. And he learned very quickly not to ask how a woman with no daughters would know that. Clearly, she’d once hoped for a daughter, but eventually accepted that she could spoil a granddaughter instead. Or Bulma’s baby, if she turned out to be correct.

“As long as she’s with her, nothing outside of the extra terrestrial is going to harm Bulma,” Vegeta shrugged, crossing his arms over his chest to comfortably watch Chi Chi move toward her to check her over.

Having a couple kids and being a homemaker didn’t change that Chi Chi had every bit of a warrior mom demeanor—Goku knew it well enough. Vegeta didn’t make an error in trusting her to keep Bulma safe and Bulma, being herself, did love to be spoiled with the attention.

“Besides,” Goku finally offered an addition to Vegeta’s answer, “the girls told us ta go away,” he chuckled and rubbed the back of his neck.

“Can’t imagine why she did that, Kakarot,” Vegeta’s elbow nearly made it into the edge of his rib, if he didn’t see it coming and blocked it with an open palm.

“Dad...did you comment on...her appearance?” Gohan knew the answer; Goku could see it in his son’s expression—by the way his brows turned inward and his mouth slanted with the faint hint of disappointment. Pan, perched in his lap, mimicked the same frown on her father’s face. Impressively, the two had a very strong air of Chi Chi in the moment.

“He said, ‘big looks good on you’ to her and can’t fathom why Bulma, of all people, would be offended,” Vegeta pinched the bridge of his nose.

“C’mon it’s not like she’s gonna be huge forever, it was a compliment for now!”

“To think I defended this damn buffoon. I should have let her just kill you.”

“Y’know she wouldn’ta thought that’d be punishment enough, that’s why she sent me to hang out with you.”

“Excuse me—you—are the punished one?” Vegeta hissed, clearly ignoring Gohan snickering a little from that immediate clap back. He always came prepared to battle Vegeta, one way or another; and Bulma really would kill him—them—if they went off and started a physical brawl. “I should ditch you and lock myself in the gravity chamber.”

“Imagine thinkin’ you can escape me. Innit that right Pan?” Goku scooted in his chair to scoop up the girl sitting on Gohan’s knee. A small hand batted his cheek and her frown deepened. “Aw, come on, don’t side with him. He’s a meanie.”

“Who’s a meanie?”

Goku tilted his head to Videl’s approaching voice and cradled Pan up on his arm so she could see her mom over his shoulder. “Vegeta, he’s kinda a booger.”

“Boog!” Pan squalled and batted his shoulder.

“Oh yeah?” Videl giggled and leaned over to kiss her daughter’s forehead. “Don’t let grandpa teach you to call other people boogers, baby. He’s a booger too.”

“Ouch—.”

“Hah!” Vegeta barked and Goku shifted his gaze to him, a grin creeping over his face. Once he recognized that expression, Vegeta’s demeanor smoothed out exceptionally quickly and his shoulders rose a bit in defense.

“Was that a smile, Vegeta?”

“No.”

“It definitely was, wasn’t it, Pan?” He bounced her softly, listening for her happy squeal to follow.

“He talks to a child with the same level of cognition, I see.”

“You two argue like a married couple,” Videl laughed and threaded her fingers through Pan’s short hair, showing her amusement of their antics in the way the soft smile touched her lips upward in the corner.

“Does this mean I’m sleepin’ on the couch forever?” Goku teased, aiming in Vegeta’s direction, only to earn a dismissive wave. For a brief moment, he saw him close up at the open display of familiarity. Between just them alone, Vegeta could still be that way; but when others were around them, he usually found himself at arm’s length and unwilling to participate in social interaction of any kind. That he’d gotten that much out of him in the open, probably quite a milestone for his progress with Vegeta in general. It meant, at least, that he was fractionally more comfortable in his presence. Either that, or he begrudgingly provided damage control for possible Goku antics.

Pan, cuddled to his arm, batted at him and he turned his face down in her direction. She switched to tugging on his shirt and making small whines by his ear.

“What’s up girlie?” He shifted to hold her in both of his arms and bring her closer to his face. “You need something?”

Her tiny face scrunched at him and little hands raised to tug at his hair instead, not hard, but enough to keep his attention. Little noises came from her, cheeks puckered and making small smooching noises.

“Oh, she’s started doing that because she sees Gohan kiss me when he comes home,” Videl waved off her harmless behavior and found a seat across from them to watch. Goku raised a brow at her and then back down to his tiny granddaughter.

“That so? You want lil kissies?” He hugged her, squishing her close and mushed his face into her cheek. Tiny arms wrapped around his face in appreciation of the attention, but then—as if remembering what she really wanted—she batted her little hands at his face. Drawing back he set her back down on his knee and thumbed her little cheek. “Somethin’ else?”

Pan inhaled and puffed air at him, laying her weight on his arm so she could turn and wiggle her arms away from him—reaching in the direction of Vegeta. Goku’s eyes traveled up to meet Vegeta’s, catching the sheer panic that flashed on his face over Pan’s sudden interest. His interaction with Gohan and his family had never been much more than passing, and Goku knew he never had any reason to interact with his granddaughter.

“I think she wants you to give big smooches to Vegeta,” Videl giggled and reached over the table to take Pan’s hand to settle her. “She just thinks everyone who’s close together should.” Even so, Pan reached for Vegeta. “Pan, don’t bother him.”

“Boog—.”

“Now, listen you—.” Vegeta finally grunted, turning his body to face the girl, looking down at her, looking up at him. His expression steeled, mouth in a straight line and he dropped lower to meet her face to face. “I will not allow Kakarot to behave unseemingly today for your amusement. If you wish for any such display, you must attain it for yourself.”

Goku tried not to laugh, wrapping his fingers around the chair arm and squeezing. If he did make noise, Pan’s intense stare at Vegeta might break and he really wanted to see where it was going—when Vegeta’s ki flickered like he could fly away at any moment, because of Pan’s attention. Possibly, he intentionally aimed to shirk the implication away from him that he’d ever be close enough to Goku to be kissed. No one had to know that Goku gave him plenty of “smooches”, and he didn’t hate them as much as he acted like he did.

Unexpectedly, Pan broke their stare off by squirming in Goku’s arms and grabbing for Vegeta enough to reach and kiss his cheek herself. Big noisy baby kiss, and Vegeta’s face deepened in color for a moment, just prior to scooting back away from her and hunching back into his seat.

“Heehee,” Goku grinned widely and scooped Pan back up to bring her into an embrace against his chest. “Don’t worry bout it, Pan, he’s just really shy bout that kinda thing. He don’t wanna admit he likes it.”

“Shut your trap, Kakarot,” Vegeta snapped at him, but he barely spared him a glance.

“He’s a booger, don’t forget.”

“Boog!” She squealed at him, her head turning to watch the back of his head—because Vegeta refused to turn back to face them.

“Sorry about that, Vegeta,” Gohan offered between Goku’s teasing and her gentle baby babble. “I’m sure she’ll grow out of that before long…” He rubbed the back of his neck in an awkward apology, but Goku did notice that Gohan’s attention didn’t fall with his daughter. Instead, he glanced between Vegeta and Goku himself—looking at them in a way that implied he had deeper thoughts than he planned to speak about openly.

Gohan’s observational skills and way of looking through him, made Goku step back for a brief moment of rare reflection and recount what he’d said to inspire his son’s suddenly very suspicious gaze at them. But he never did keep track of his own thoughts and words well enough to recall everything that actually did come out of his mouth. Vegeta wouldn’t be happy with him if he said too much, but Gohan read him pretty well. Unfortunately, he couldn’t just...ask what the looks meant without giving himself away and risking Vegeta’s wrath.

But Vegeta appeared to catch the inquisitive nature of Gohan’s attention himself, and swiftly brushed it away. “Kakarot hasn’t grown out of his absurdity, and he’s presumably an adult. I’m sure she’s already well beyond his level.”

“Hey—.”

“Quiet, Kakarot, the adults are speaking,” he pointed between himself and Gohan, and then to Pan when she voiced her baby babbling concerns.

“Booger.”

“Boog!”

“Like a married couple,” Videl said again, her smile soft, but meeting eyes with Gohan briefly—as Goku noticed from the corner of his eye. She, too, had the questioning edge to her expression that met with her husband’s. Shoot. He probably had to talk to Gohan, before Gohan made the wrong assumptions. Or, the right assumptions, but under the wrong circumstance.

If only Chi Chi didn’t decide to dedicate herself to Bulma, he might have had an easier way out.

“You know what would be really awesome?” He offered an interjection to change the subject and keep Vegeta from becoming defensive with the tone shift, “more food! Wanna go get some food, Pan?”

“Foo!”

“Dad, she doesn’t eat big people food yet—.” Gohan called, even as he hoisted his granddaughter up and made off with her. She cheered happily at being kidnapped by grandpa, while Gohan rushed after them to make sure he didn’t actually feed her anything he shouldn’t.

He knew Vegeta would appreciate the break from being social and Goku needed to dissect why Gohan looked between them like he knew something was going on.

Vegeta wouldn’t be happy with him if that was the case, but that really wouldn’t be too unusual for him. Still, he did want to try to keep the peace between them. He really began to enjoy the relaxed air between them. Vegeta could be extremely defensive and reactionary, so...he really didn’t want to ruin it.

Man, Vegeta makes it difficult even when he’s not doing anything yet, he thought to himself—finding where Bulma had food and making a distraction for himself in it.

Chapter Text

“There you are, Kakarot,” Vegeta’s voice snapped his attention and he peeked up at him from his almost hiding place, leaning against a tree and facing away from open view. He fiddled with the thin cloth in his hands and made a face at the man approaching. Vegeta figured out relatively quickly where he snuck off to, even when he suppressed his Ki to a considerable degree. He really just did not want to go, but he sort of expected that he had no choice. Chi Chi might skin him if he ducked out.

Honestly, he thought that after Bulma popped her baby out, she’d take a break; but the reality came to be that she found more ways to be busy. Only a few weeks had passed since Bulma went into labor, and she already staged a fancy dinner—naturally using the occasion to brag about the beautiful baby girl she had.

Goku couldn’t help but soften a bit at the sight—and the thought of it really.

He’d been there at their house when she announced that the baby was coming, and while he had nothing to do with any of the process, he was one of the first to see her. The fourth person to hold her after her parents, and his own wife. He never knew that Chi Chi had such excellent midwifery skills. He thought that Bulma would certainly have one of those fancy doctors do medical magic to her and it would be over just like that. Turned out that there was a lot more to it than he recalled from Gohan being born at least. Or possibly, Chi Chi was just very tough in comparison to Bulma. It really made him wonder how she handled Trunks. If he recalled, that boy was a pretty big baby…

As for Vegeta? Well, Goku had a front seat view of watching a man immediately fall head over heels. Not that anyone else would call it that, because not everyone else knew how to read Vegeta. Only the people who mattered did, and they were the ones who could see how immediately smitten he was with his baby daughter. While happy for him, Goku felt a little thankful it was Vegeta having the daughter and not himself. While he’d care for a girl just the same as Goten and Gohan, he wouldn’t know how to be a father to a girl. Though, perhaps—in a way—he just became one, by association. Something something, it takes a village, or something or other. He couldn’t remember the perfect wording, just the idea.

He, his wife, Vegeta and Bulma, basically became a family, didn’t they? So he really couldn’t be too shocked Bulma asked them to come to what essentially became the celebration of her perfect new daughter. Regardless of what reason she claimed, everyone knew Bulma—the woman who threw birthday parties on cruise liners wouldn’t hesitate to make a grand celebration for her child.

Didn’t mean Goku liked dressing up fancy for it. Bulma said he’d only have to keep the overdressed appearance for as long as her formal guests remained—business partners and other people that Bulma basically showed off to. To be her age, looking young and healthy with a new baby…she definitely had every intention to brag about it.

“Can’t I just show up a little later, Vegeta…” he whined, knowing his fussing wouldn’t pass over Vegeta for a second.

“Your wife sent me.”

“Traitor.”

“You could have stood up to her yourself if you really didn’t want to show up right away.”

“I got a better chance beatin’ Beerus with one hand,” he exhaled and stepped from his leaning post and sidled over to him. “Chi Chi wants ta show support for Bulma, but I dunno what me bein’ there is gonna do.”

“For one, Kakarot,” he started, stepping a little toward him and reaching to take his mess of a tie into his hands. He absently started to tie it up properly for him, and Goku watched his hands making a well practiced loop. “Your wife wouldn’t like to be there alone when she has a husband to be with her. All you have to do is be her arm candy for maybe an hour.”

“You sound awfully used to this, Vegeta,” he puffed.

“I’ll have you know, Kakarot, I’m an excellent arm trophy,” he tightened the fabric, adjusting it right up to his neck. “Your presence is just as valuable to Bulma, as it is to your wife...provided you don’t pick a fight and don’t eat the table.”

“It just seems so...I dunno...isn’t it a lot…? Bulla ain’t gonna remember or anything…”

“No, but Bulma will. Let her have it. Once it’s out of her system, then she’ll be back to normal.”

His hands lingered for a moment near his chest, still holding the end of the tie, not really actively doing anything anymore with it. Goku absorbed just how comfortable had become, to be able to linger without a reason—hands not fidgeting, just near him. Once, he would have been irate just to be standing too close, finding reasons to spit vitriol at him for the crime of existing. That side of Vegeta seemed to be a far away ghost of the person now standing close enough that he could almost hear him breathing.

“Besides, if you don’t compliment your wife in her new dress, I will hit you in her stead.” He balled up a fist as if to accentuate the threat—though Goku barely took it as such. A punch from Vegeta was basically punctuation to a sentence. Instead, he folded the fingers of one hand over his closed fist and cradled his wrist with the other, enclosing his threat with warmth and affection—a perfect counter attack.

“If you can hit me, Vegeta.”

Sure enough, the action caused Vegeta to freeze for a moment, staring at their hands before he sputtered a bit and moved to withdraw. No matter the level of comfort, Vegeta would always be Vegeta. If he never called his attention specifically to their closeness, by way of physical touch, then he might have gotten by without so much as a sideways glance from him. But the moment he made Vegeta aware, of course he’d squirm and make an effort to pretend he hadn’t been caught in even a remotely comfortable position.

Almost as if Vegeta had to remind himself to be stuffy, at times.

He’s silly, Goku thought to himself while he tightened his grip, even raising their hands so he could press his lips to his knuckles. His eyes never left Vegeta’s, making intentional contact the entire time, like issuing a challenge for him to do something about it. He half expected him to shove his fist upward and clock him in the face with it; the other half anticipated hissing and thorny words to come at him like a dragon breathing fire. He always expected reactionary retaliation, he just never did know what kind.

Expectedly, Vegeta’s face flushed a little—showing easily in the sunlight; unexpectedly, Vegeta opened his hand to grip his face. His fingers and thumb pressed into his cheeks and forced him to tilt his head. From that angle, he could see the pink reaching the tips of his ears even and he repressed the urge to grin stupidly at him. If he did that, he might have started a fight, knowing how thin Vegeta’s face could be and how quickly he’d jump to defense.

“Kakarot, you are stalling and I’m hardly amused,” his mouth purses to a straight line, face a little tight. “Knock it off and let’s go.”

“No fun,” he pouted, probably looking a little pitiful in Vegeta’s grip. Fortunately, no one else was around to see the display; and he really had nothing to prove to anyone anyway. Vegeta, on the other hand, might have cared—though it didn’t matter anyway.

“You’re just painfully predictable,” Vegeta scoffed at him and Goku nearly chirped back that he was one to talk. However, he never even got the first syllable out of his mouth before his brain registered that Vegeta’s mouth had moved in and silenced him. He still had his face in quite a grip, but he relented enough to allow Goku to respond—kissing him back with a bit of enthusiasm. Not often did Vegeta initiate any form of affection, so he practically melted into his firm grip; probably Vegeta’s ploy all along.

“Cheater,” he breathed the accusatory words against his lips. The strong fingers pressed into his jaw finally loosened and withdrew; then Vegeta withdrew and took the moment with him while he straightened himself out and folded his arms to scold him some more. Goku lost the fight, though and he held his hands up for a truce. “Alright, let’s go.”

“Yes, let’s,” he extended his hand back out to him, pleased that he conceded defeat.

Once again, Goku took his hand—though, this time he did so with a little less mischief in mind. Teleporting made the most sense, of course, even the short distance. Though he did take his hand a little more fondly than he had to, and ran his thumb over his knuckles in a relaxed, easy kind of way. Vegeta didn’t recoil or fight him yet. So he took advantage of it up until the risk of others seeing them presented itself.

He didn’t really care who saw, but Vegeta did, and he let go as soon as they arrived on the other side and sensed everyone’s exact location in the room. Everyone expected Vegeta to drag Goku in, and that’s all it needed to be.

Though being so very hush hush about it, felt...weird.

“Goku! There you are!” Chi Chi’s voice drew his attention in immediately and his eyes skimmed over her. He remembered Vegeta’s previous comment and made a pointed effort to take in the sight of her, pretty new dress and all.

“Sorry I’m late, Chi Chi,” he rubbed the back of his neck and moved to her side. “That’s a good color on ya.”

“Oh,” her pretty face lit up, “well, it was made just for me,” she smoothed it over and posed a little. “By a handsome foreigner, with good taste.”

“Augh,” Goku heard, in the tone of Vegeta’s voice. He could practically hear Vegeta’s thoughts, speaking of regrets. But that was just bashfulness. Goku knew the handsome foreigner pretty well, he liked to think.

“Careful Chi Chi, the handsome foreigner might get a big head about it, if you say it too much,” Bulma chucked, still moving around in her hover chair, baby in her arms. “Nice of you to make it Goku.”

“I was only running behind a little.” He offered, and received a raised brow from her and Vegeta alike.

She let him off relatively easily and reached a hand out to him, shaking her head a little. “Anyway, never mind, you’re here now and that’s the important part,” she waved it off and then reached out toward him, to take his hand. “C’mon, I’ll show you where the food is.” She winked and he relaxed, smiling wider.

“Alright! I can get behind that.” He took her small hand in his and a thought crossed his mind briefly, while walking beside her hover cart.

He could hold Chi Chi’s hand. He could hold Bulma’s hand. But in view of everyone else, not Vegeta’s. He kinda wished it wasn’t that way. But Vegeta had a lot of pride and privacy meant a lot to him.

Still, holding his hand felt nice.

He pushed the thought back down and listened to Bulma talk about her baby. He wasn’t a thinking person, anyway. He didn’t plan to put a lot into this train of thought. It wouldn’t do him any good anyway, since he really had no idea what he’d do with it if he did ponder it.

Leave that stuff to Vegeta; if he even thought that much about it.

No matter, when no one saw them, everything remained fair game and he’d hold his hands as much as he wanted.

Chapter Text

The loud clap of a door slamming shattered the dead silence of the smaller common room where Vegeta lounged. He had a laptop propped up on his thighs and a cat wrapped around the front of him like a needy belt. Between this cat assuming it owned him—and the computer being just the right amount of warm—the furball wouldn’t move until being forcibly tossed off him. Which was well enough, Vegeta himself hadn’t moved much more than tapping keys for the better part of the previous hour. Only when he heard the door, and then saw his teenage son enter the room, did he make any efforts to move. 

Sitting up a little straighter, he leaned to peek at why Trunks came in making a damn racket. 

“Boy, if you break the door off the wall, your mother is going to fuss.” 

Without answering, his noisy son came in and then proceeded to inspect the room as if he were looking for something specific, or evidently, the absence of something specific. He peeked over to the desk and then took a brief glance out the door leading into the bigger family room; only after this inspection did he finally ask, “Is mom around?”

Vegeta shook his head, but couldn’t escape the instinctive reaction to roll his eyes at his cryptic behavior. “If your mother was here, you would know it. Why don’t you go upstairs and find her by reading the damn room.” Bulma didn’t necessarily have a huge ki signature, but any of them could pinpoint her if they wanted. Trunks clearly had something on his mind making him forget that very obvious fact.

Instead of throwing his usual teenage sass back at him, Trunks moved over to sit beside him, facing him and staring at him. “Can I talk to you?”

“I thought you wanted your mother?” 

“I wanted to make sure she wasn’t here…”

“I recognize that teenagers are a weird subspecies of human, but you are being unusual by your normal standards. When have you ever not wanted to tell your mother everything?” He finally found reason to set the laptop down on the cushion beside him and sit back to give the brat his attention. The cat was marginally displeased by the loss of its heater, but Vegeta soothed it before it started hissing at him. 

“It’s…just…” Trunks rolled his lower lip between his teeth and then sank back into the couch cushion. “I don’t…think she’d understand…?”

“Something Bulma Briefs wouldn’t understand?” A brow raised, and his son’s insecurity perplexed him significantly. What could this boy’s mother not understand? Genius to the point of being able to manipulate time and space in some realities (only hindered in their own reality, because they simply didn’t need that technology; and also being forcibly stopped by Whis). She bridged the enormous gap that was Vegeta’s own horrible personality hangups, and squeezed her way into his closed off, nearly nonexistent heart. What could she possibly not understand?

“I…just…”

“You just, a lot. Talk like you want to get the weight off your chest, kid.”

Trunks reached over to collect the stirring cat from Vegeta’s lap, and that gave Vegeta the opportunity to actually stand up and move the computer to a stable, flat surface; it also gave Trunks something to distract his hands with and the boy looked like he needed it. Instead of losing his patience, waiting for his son to get to the point, he reclaimed his seat and leaned back to wait for him to open his mouth and speak. Being around Kakarot so much strengthened his communication endurance, so he could wait for him all day if required. He suspected he wouldn’t have to wait nearly so long for Trunks to spit it out and make sense with it.

“Okay, so,” the boy started, burying his fingers in the cat, and looking down at the furry beast. “What if…I like boys more than girls?” 

“Like being around them, or?” He asked in response, and suspected he read the question wrong, by the way Trunks flinched. “Like in general?” He wanted to tell him to be more direct with it, but his practiced patience let him shut his mouth for the moment. His son didn’t often come specifically to him for these kinds of emotional things. How fortunate that this event occurred after he went through his personal growth crisis.

“I mean, what if I feel stuff for other guys, but not girls?”

“So, attraction.”

“…Yeah.”

“It’s just about that?” He folded his arms, maintaining his relaxed posture. The general human society’s argumentative stance on gender and sexuality didn’t escape him; he simply did not have to contend with it, and found it a bit silly and more so, unnecessary. However, his son’s half human blood, and being in that society, left him vulnerable to their ways of thinking—both good and bad. “You like what you like, and that’s all there is to it. What made you come to me about this and not your mother?”

“I…didn’t know how she’d respond.” He squeezed the cat and it meowed dramatically at him, reminding him to be gentler. “You always talk about…Saiyans and how gender roles weren’t that much of a thing, so I thought maybe other stuff didn’t matter…as much?”

“Well, you are correct. Both men and women’s roles are not decided by physical nature. You fight for and defend what’s yours, regardless of what organs you have. As for extending that to other things,” he paused to take a moment to think about his words, reminding himself to be more tactful here than Kakarot would be. “Who you find complimentary to your desires doesn’t really have a stigma tied to it the way human society does it.”

“Saiyans really did whatever they wanted, huh?” Trunks’ shoulders visibly relaxed after listening to his father’s words.

“And we still do,” he snorted, “look at Kakarot, he picks fights with anything that moves.” And also mishaved in any way he could to ruffle Vegeta’s feathers. 

After a thoughtful minute of silence, and bruising his own lip with his biting, Trunks quietly asked: “Did you ever…?”

“Did I ever what?”

“Have an attraction to another guy?”

“Yes.”

“A—h? Really?” The boy’s eyes widened, clearly not expecting the sincerity or bluntness of his answer.

Vegeta recognized then, that only a little more than a handful of years prior and he’d have had a difficult time admitting his fondness for even his own wife. Several years of inner turmoil, a complete meltdown, several existential crises, and rebuilding his own view of himself (still in progress), gave him the ability to answer his son without shame, anger, denial, or yelling.

Bulma would be so proud of him, and he resisted the urge to curl his nose at her nonexistent presence in the room.

“As I implied before, there’s no real big deal with it. It’s simply not something I go telling everyone, because my business is mine and I don’t find it necessary to include everyone in it. You’re young, and you have shit to figure out. It takes time…as for your mother, just tell her. She’ll be proud of you no matter what.”

“You really think?”

“Yes.”

“…and you really aren’t…upset with me?”

“Do you want me to be?” Vegeta eyed him, as if he were mustering up the intention to look frightening for a moment.

“No—I didn’t want to let you down…you’re so proud of our family line…”

“Boy, our family line didn’t shrivel up and die the instant you realized girls have cooties forever. You’re still here, your sister and mother are still here. I am still here. If you don’t continue it, then so what?” He let his mouth run, relaxing his well intentioned tact for a moment and adopting a Kakarot approach of intense honesty without remorse, finding that sometimes, that method had an advantage. “Continuing the saiyan line isn’t a requirement for you. That being said, I will not be the one to tell your mother not to expect grandchildren from you, you die alone on that battlefield.”

“ Dad—. ”

Vegeta chuckled at the helpless choke from his son, and then reached out to ruffle his hair. “Bulma is one of the most open minded humans I’ve come across, which isn’t actually many, but after spending five minutes on the internet, I can assure you, very many humans have the worst opinions.”

“That’s what I’m afraid of…mom’s famous, what if I embarrass her?”

“That woman has the thickest face on this planet, if she hasn’t embarrassed herself yet, then you have no chance. If anyone says anything to you, they’re not worth your time. You’re born of a royal line, to a prince and a genius. Most humans, in their peak, will have had nothing on you by the time you were already five years old. If human words get to you, then remember, that Saiyans don’t care. We do what we want. And if that’s another man, then so be it.”

“Dad—.”

“Just don’t let me hear it, rather, you better not do anything more than holding hands until you’re twenty.”

“DAD—.”

“Maybe thirty. And they have to beat me in a fight.”

The cat, held in Trunks’ lap, finally broke free and skittered away so the boy could bend over and cover his flushed face with his hands. Despite some well meaning words, Vegeta still derailed to keep it from getting too tied up in feelings. The more words that flooded from his mouth, the stronger the small itch in the back of his mind grew. Telling his son to ignore what other people said, while he also shied away from being open about his whatever with Kakarot…could easily be interpreted as hypocritical. Even if he really did not care what Kakarot’s friends thought. Especially since camaraderie among saiyan groups often led to strange polycules. Mixed, group families, were frequent, even among the saiyan elites. 

So, the fact that he maintained a chillier disposition in public, might have a tinge of dishonesty behind it. Though, he’d argue that it’s simply his personality to be cold when not within the small group he considered to be his. Hell, he was once even considerably icy to his own son until a near permanent death straightened his ass out. Their “friends” probably weren’t ready to contend with a fully mellowed Vegeta. If they saw, for instance, Goku casually holding his hand while Vegeta read a ridiculous book to him, they might not let it go; and being bothered over it, did not make Vegeta eager to involve them.

“What else did you need, brat?” Vegeta shrugged out of his derailing mental train, in an attempt to wash Kakarot out of every damn thought.

“…Ah, nothing I guess. Thanks, I feel better…” His red face finally dimmed back to his normal color. He sat back up, leaning into the cushions without any of the tension he came in with. “I wish humans thought more like Saiyans…”

“It’s better that they don’t, honestly. One Kakarot is more than enough. Imagine millions. ”

“It would be kinda hard to keep us out of trouble then, huh?”

“Insanely, so.”

Trunks laughed, because he really did understand the fortune that came with only Kakarot being like Kakarot, and his sons being relatively tame by comparison. For being children, those kids had been through their share. “Don’t worry, it’s not Goten,” he added into the conversation suddenly, but Vegeta didn’t need clarification, he understood the statement.

“Oh thank the heavens, don't make this weird just yet,” he breathed a little relief and stood afterwards, before Trunks could ask the question his face was implying. “In any case, if you have time to worry about nonsense, then you have time to train. So get up, and get dressed, and let’s see how hard you can hit with all the slacking you brats do.”

“Dad—.”

“Move it, I’m not above tossing you in there!” He prodded the boy with his foot until he finally took him seriously, and bounced off the couch to change out of his proper clothes. Bulma would pitch a fit if their saiyan rough housing ripped his designer t-shirt. 

He watched him disappear out of the room, and committed to waiting for him to return. The sudden nature of his son coming out to him, really didn’t shock him any bit, but he still stood outside of the training chamber and let the whole interaction roll back through his mind. What amounted to a five minute conversation, gave him a lot to think about. 

And as usual, the intrusive thought that was Kakarot came back to be the center of it.

Chapter Text

Had Vegeta been anywhere nearby, at that very particular moment, Goku thought that he might be proud of the unusual self awareness he experienced from the moment he sat down in the warm space of Gohan’s home, with his little family. Even he could identify the odd disturbance in the air—a disturbance that clearly centered around something Gohan wanted to address, but turned out far too polite to just come out and say it. How could Goku not see the way Gohan observed him? When paired with the few shuttering movements of his mouth that ended in silence and his jaw snapping shut—only for him to repeat this tip-of-the-tongue action several times—even someone without eyes could identify an issue. 

He held Pan in his arms, and maybe hid behind her a little. Well, not hide, but definitely used his bonding with her to put off whatever had Gohan sizing him up like he knew something. If Gohan asked him anything, he’d tell him; and maybe he wasn’t prepared for questions just yet. The whole standoff hadn’t really been a new thing, either. Goku really was just great at skipping out of sticky places, and he definitely had done so a few times since Gohan first made eye contact with a subtle question hiding in his expression. That question made its first appearance when he glanced between Vegeta and Goku after a rather animated exchange of theirs. But since Gohan never actually asked, well, Goku never answered!

Vegeta’s influence made itself apparent after all the time they spent together. He learned to read between the lines enough to become unusually aware of the impression he gave—at least to his own family. So he made absolutely certain to not leave a whole lot of room for topics to veer out of a safe zone. Bad enough that Krillin and his wife already knew. If he went handing out their personal stuff to everyone so easily, Vegeta would have a stroke. He didn’t consider it anything bad, and Vegeta didn’t either, but he had to respect that the whole thing was a private affair!

At least he tried. Being discreet was one of his weaker skills—as evidenced by the clearly impending showdown that was inching toward him in the form of his exceptionally intelligent son. 

Why couldn’t he approach his mother about this instead?

Oh, he supposed it wouldn’t really make sense to approach Chi Chi if he suspected she wasn’t already in on it. Or maybe Gohan simply found his father more approachable. But topics about Vegeta had him ready to Instant Transmission to another galaxy. Vegeta might be so proud of him to know he’d have rather been in another world entirely than throwing their business out there more than already.  

He really didn’t want Vegeta mad at him, at least not over this. He had plenty of ways to wiggle under Vegeta’s skin that didn’t involve making themselves into a spectacle. Even if all their friends and family knew, so long as no one acted differently about it, everything could be alright.

“Thank you for coming, dad. I meant to do this sooner, but I had a tight deadline that I got caught up in,” Gohan’s voice pulled him back out of his internal wandering—that thing he only really did when the topic of Vegeta came to mind.

“Pan’s been a good little host in your stead,” Videl offered, making eye contact with Goku in a way that told him that she knew he felt slightly uneasy.  “Isn’t that right?”

“Yep, she’s a real talker,” he agreed, looking down at the girl and nodding with her when she also agreed with him for the sake of it. She liked her grandpa and would chat with him (or mostly at him) for as long as he would listen—that turned out to be quite a while, as he waited for Gohan to come and corner him like a prey animal. 

No, maybe not quite like that, because Gohan didn’t back people into corners intentionally—not like Vegeta would. Vegeta absolutely would have backed Goku against a wall and stared him down (or up, really, being shorter), to get to the bottom of his suspicions. Vegeta would ask directly, practically slapping him with accusatory words. Gohan…would be more subtle, polite. Make implications and then ask if what he implied had anything to do with him. He would make Goku tell on himself if he could and only if that failed, would he then ask him outright. 

“So, Dad,” Gohan started from his place directly across from him. After silent attempts to start that never made it anywhere, Gohan decided he had to get to the point, or they would be having a stalemate all night. Goku also decided, at the same time, that perhaps he could interject and get this over with more swiftly. 

“Wanna go have a chat outside for a bit with me, son?” He bounced Pan a little to keep her attention sufficiently distracted and then made eye contact with Videl to see about quietly passing his granddaughter off so he could chat with Gohan. People seemed to think he wasn’t capable of being serious, and mostly they weren’t wrong—but his animal instincts (as Vegeta called them) told him this time he shouldn’t glaze over it and expect that burying his head in the sand would make Gohan’s troubles disappear.

Gohan nodded, exhaling like maybe being spoken to directly relieved him. He stood when Goku did, letting him take a few extra moments to hand Pan back over to her mother so they could step outside for a bit. Oh he knew that Gohan would immediately talk to her about it after he left, but this exchange in the moment needed to be one on one for both of them. 

He led them out, and then turned to give him a thumbs up, so they could fly up to the roof and sit up there. No need to go too far, just enough to give them a nice breeze and be close to home. Outside, the fresh air would at least keep out the feeling of being trapped, because he never wanted to feel that way in regards to Gohan’s concerns. Topics relating to Vegeta fell out of the usual comfort zones, however. 

“You’ve been tryin’ ya talk to me about something for a bit,” he started, seeing Gohan immediately rub his face in response. “You wanna give it a go now?”

“Sorry… I have been, it’s just, I don’t know how to approach it. I’m…a little shocked you noticed, to be honest. You see more than you let on, don’t you…?”

“Only when yer bein’ obvious,” he shrugged. “So what’s up? If you got somethin’ on your mind, just say it, son.” He prompted, hoping it would push him to get it out there where he can figure out what to do with it. Gohan preferred the gentle approach, Vegeta preferred the methodical and direct approach, but he just wanted it thrown out there like a knuckle sandwich to the face. Then, he can sort it out swiftly, or at least try.

“Are you cheating on mom?” 

And a knuckle sandwich it turned out to be. The weight of the question and subtle accusation just about knocked him off the edge of the roof—so he pressed his hands down to steady himself. “Eh?!” He found no eloquent words, because he didn’t really expect that to be the issue at hand. He thought…

“Well—are you? You’ve been leaving mom for periods, and I know it because I talk to her every day. Goten also says she’s either at home alone with him or with Bulma, and sometimes she’s with me. So…where are you all the time? Don’t say you’re training because we all know when you’re off planet…” Gohan fully turned toward him and weighed him down with eyes full of expectation. Now that he could talk, he intended to lay it all out so Goku had no escape. Even if he didn’t intend to escape. 

“With Vegeta, where else?” He raised a hand in defense of himself, like this answer should have been obvious.

Gohan’s face struggled with containing his expression. Try as he might, he never had been good at keeping a passive face. Goku could identify several different ranges: disbelief, confusion, and… relief? “Really…? With Vegeta. And he’s not covering for you…?” 

“Vegeta would sooner kick me into orbit than cover for me, Gohan. You know this. If you’re worried about your mother, you don’t have to be, she knows where I am. And who I’m with. And what we’re doing.” He added the last part in there with a tone that wanted Gohan to think about it in the way that made the most sense. In the way that Goku knew Gohan already suspected.

A few moments passed, where Gohan said nothing and didn't move; he simply watched his father’s expression under dim light and thought about his words and how he presented them. Goku could practically see all the funny little gears moving around in there, he had the same look as Vegeta when he processed thoughts to then collect into something useable.

“Alright…then…so…you really are with Vegeta that way?” His question came a little more quietly—like he somewhat already knew, but maybe needed to rule out any other possibility first. 

Understandably—without better explanations being offered—Gohan might be upset to find out his father behaved with someone else, in relationship behaviors that should have only been reserved for his mother. Maybe he even thought it would be easier if it turned out to be anyone other than Vegeta. Though Goku couldn’t really imagine anyone else being involved in a way that wouldn’t make it exponentially worse. 

“Yes, well, sort of,” he corrected quickly, before Gohan interpreted that in an extreme way. “I’m not leavin’ your mother, and I don’t love her any less.” 

“Then why…?”

He smiled at him awkwardly, “It’s…hard to explain…”

“I thought that maybe I was just imagining that you two were always acting so close together all the time. Then my brother said something in passing a little while ago and I couldn’t let it go… mom loves you…and I….”

“You’re a good son, Gohan,” he reached over to pat him on the shoulder. “She’d be delighted that you care that much for her happiness. But I promise, kiddo, she knows. As does Bulma. It’s not even a secret. I think they like it when we take the rough housing out and let them have peace,” he laughed, knowing that Chi Chi and Bulma definitely had their pleasant husband-free evenings. 

Gohan watched his face again, sorting out his demeanor to reassure himself of his father’s words. “It’s really…just open like that?”

“Vegeta says it’s a normal saiyan thing. We’re all a big family now, really. It took me a long time to needle him until he decided he liked me, y’know,” he grinned widely, nudging Gohan. “Now he’s makin’ dresses for your mom.”

“W…wait what, he made that?” Gohan’s eyes widened, taken back for a moment. 

“It keeps him calm.”

“Wow, now Bulma’s jokes make more sense…” The mood shifted with Gohan’s words trailing. He brushed his hand through his hair, relaxing a little, and then exhaling deeply so he could settle the turmoil that showed very clearly on his face. “You and mom are really still okay…?”

“Yep. I would even say that you should talk to her. Just to feel better about it.”

“Why haven’t you said anything about this before…? If it’s not a secret to mom, or to Bulma, why no one else? It sort of just makes everything suspicious.”

“Because it’s really not anyone’s business. Vegeta’s a super private person too, so it’s better if it’s just us.”

“The way you two are…it’s going to make people wonder.” As it clearly did with Gohan. But that didn’t bother him, if it didn’t bother Vegeta.

“It’ll be alright. It’s not like he interacts with a lot of people anyway, he’ll tell em’ to fuck off if they bother him.”

“Dad—.”

Goku chuckled in response. Gohan knew his father didn’t talk that way, but Vegeta absolutely did, and maybe he did spend too much time with the proud prince of Saiyans. But being near Vegeta fulfilled some void in him that no one else did, without diminishing the deep bond he maintained with Chi Chi. The rest of them, even his son, didn’t need to understand, just accept. 

“You good?” He looped his arm over Gohan’s shoulder, half hugging the boy who got to being bigger than him somehow. 

“I think so, yeah…I will talk to mom. But I feel better. Still…worried, but I guess at least if the call is coming from inside the house, I don’t have to worry about someone taking you away from us.”

“Yeah, I’m not goin’ anywhere. I promise,” he squeezed him a little and then gave him a hearty clap on the back. “Let’s go back in, I can smell food. Nothing solves problems better than food.”

“I can agree with you there.” Gohan stood with him, leaning back into his half hug, because even if he grew bigger than Goku, he was still his child. And despite the awkward conversation, and tension the whole subject brought, at least Gohan still found he could talk to Goku about anything that bothered him. Trust in his family mattered, that family just got a little bigger is all.