Chi-Chi stood at the sink of the Capsule Corp. building and silently scrubbed away at the dishes from yesterday’s supper. Outside, cicadas buzzed in the warmth of the afternoon. But no sun shone inside the Capsule Corp…

Not these days.

Bulma had been gone for three weeks. For three weeks they had searched her room and belongings for any sort of indication as to why she had left. At first the search had been for a suicide note. Then it became apparent. Oh, it was obvious enough where she had gone. And that was what had Yaumcha in a self-inflicted coma of depression.

She had left with Vegeta.

For her mother, it had been an almost pleasant discovery. She was worried, as any mother would be, but there was a strange lingering smile that seemed to plague her lips whenever anyone spoke of it. She would love to see them get together, wouldn’t she? It had always been on her mind. But it shouldn’t be. Not now.

Chi-Chi let her hands linger in the warm suds. Why? That was the question. But then ‘why’ was the only question these days. Why Vegeta? Why was he the one to save her? And why would Bulma go with him?

In a sick way that made her ashamed for thinking it, it would have made things a lot less traumatizing for Yaumcha had she killed herself. Killing herself was an understandable thing. Or even just slightly so, as opposed to going off with Vegeta in space on some reckless mission. The thought that she was alone in space with another man was one thing…that fact that she had obviously wanted to be was another.

Chi-Chi was angry with her friend. She could not deny that. Why had Bulma done that to Yaumcha? Was she truly so self involved that she couldn’t have seen the consequences? But then, Bulma was not the only villain. Yaumcha had used her, cheated on her, and ignored her for six long weeks. Now the tables had turned, and Bulma was the shallow one, while Yaumcha lay delicate and emotionally fragile. How had it happened?

She still did not know.

Chi-Chi felt Goku come up behind her, his presence warm and comforting. They had needed a lot of each other these days, it seemed. He plopped his head on her shoulder and sighed into her neck. She closed her eyes and leaned into him.

"I miss her."

"I know. I miss her too."

"Goku," Chi-Chi turned in his arms, abandoning the dishes. "Do you think she’s safe with Vegeta? He’s just so cold…"

Goku flashed her one of his infamous ‘everything will be ok’ smiles and it melted her heart. "Vegeta may be a lot of things, Chi-Chi, but he isn’t a murderer. Not anymore. He won’t hurt Bulma."

Chi-Chi nodded numbly into her husband’s shoulder. "This isn’t a situation you can magically fix, is it, Goku?"

"No. I’m sorry."

They stood for a long moment, hugging each other in the dim light of the window. Behind them the bubbles popped and dissipated slowly, along with everyone’s hopes.

Come back, Bulma.

In a tangle of limbs they lay beneath the sheets, completely absorbed in each other, needing each other, fearing each other. Such a strange feeling…

Vegeta felt as thought he was lying beside a time bomb…or a piece of glass. As though at any moment he could come that close to loosing her again, or that if he held her too tight, she would shatter in his arms.

Bulma whimpered and kicked out occasionally, raising his pulse by a few good heartbeats. But the Forae were gone, and her breathing and body temperature had returned too normal. It had been a good three hours since the incident…it had taken that long for both of them to recover.

And then Bulma’s eyes fluttered open, halting the breath in Vegeta’s throat. They stared at each other, their faces not an inch apart, their arms and legs wrapped around in each.

At the same second they both flushed darkly and stumbled over each other trying to untangle their limbs. Vegeta was suddenly worried. Would she think that he had done something to her?

"What…" Bulma looked down at her nakedness and covered it up with the sheets hurriedly.

"You were…the suit was too sticky to get back on." Vegeta avoided looking directly into her eyes. He took a deep breath. "How do you feel?"

"I’m…not sure." Bulma said quietly. "How long was I out?"

"At least four hours. Maybe five."

"You saved me…didn’t you?"

He nodded knowing they were both remembering the bathtub scene only a few hours ago. For him, it had been a terrible and frightening experience in which he realized his feelings for Bulma. For her, it was but a distant and fuzzy memory.

He rose off the bed. "I think it would be best if you stayed in bed for a while. You need rest…it’s going to take you a while to recover from that."

Bulma nodded dumbly, hugging herself.

"Are you hungry?"

Bulma smiled and shook her head. "No." she said quietly.

"What’re you smiling about?"

"Nothing…"

He shrugged and walked toward the bedroom door where he lingered for a moment, considering his options. At last he left her in peace and retreated to the loneliness of the kitchen where he made himself a coup of coffee and delved deep within himself.

Back in the bedroom Bulma did the same.

* * *

They had four weeks left. Four more weeks until the Psytrim would grow and they could leave. Four weeks had never seemed like such a long time before. But now, someone who he realized he was starting to get attached to was slowly dying before his very eyes, and he had four weeks of watching her suffer to look forward to.

It was the firs time since they had left that he thought about the others back on Earth. He wondered if they had figured it out yet; that Bulma had willingly snuck onto the ship to be with him. He couldn’t help but smirk, knowing that Yaumcha would be beside himself with jealously. He chewed silently and mulled over his plate of sandwiches.

Of course, he had no way of knowing that he was in the hospital because of it.

"Vegeta?"

He spun around from where he stood at the window and saw Bulma shuffling into the room behind him. His eyes drifted over her body for a moment and he took in her frail paling frame. Her clothes were beginning to hang off of her shoulders. Or was he just seeing things?

"You shouldn’t be out of bed." He frowned.

She stopped in the doorway, a few feet from him, and shook her head. "I feel fine, now." she looked down at the floor and dug her slippered heel into the linoleum. "I wanted to thank you…"

Vegeta turned back to look out the window. "It’s nothing."

"You saved my life." She argued. "It wasn’t ‘nothing’."

Vegeta turned back to her. "Of course I saved your life, woman." His eyes narrowed. "Did you think I would just sit there and watch you die?"

She shook her head mutely. "I guess I don’t know…what I thought you would do…" she sighed and bit her bottom lip chewing on it tensely. "You’ve never done anything nice for anybody and now…all of a sudden you’re enduring festivals and practically starving yourself for my sake." She looked up. "When we get back to Earth, you’ll have saved my life twice."

He was silent as he listened to her. "I suppose I will have." He agreed.

Bulma left the doorway and advanced quickly to him. "You’re avoiding my question, Vegeta." She said, anger in her voice. She stopped beside him and looked defiantly into his eyes. "Answer me."

"I don’t know what you’re asking."

She glared and tore the cup from his hands, slamming it down on the counter beside him. The action startled him momentarily and for a second he merely gaped at her, his usually witty mind at a loss for words.

"Don’t play dumb with me!" she cried. "You always avoid what you don’t want to admit! Ever since we’ve been here I’ve been trying to get you to say it and you won’t!" Vegeta stared at the tears that brimmed on her eyelids. "So I want you to answer me now! I want you to tell me why you’re doing this for me! I want to know so that I can understand this stupid feeling I get whenever I’m near you!" she sucked in a breath. "Because I’m tired of loosing sleep over it."

Vegeta, the ship, the universe and everything seemed to come to a standstill as Bulma stood inches from his own face and waited for the words that she needed to hear. He could smell lavender perfume on her neck and he listened to the tiny hiccuping sobs that tried to escape her mouth but were denied. He lifted narrowed ebony eyes to her own. He took a deep breath.

"I don’t know."

Bulma stared. For some reason, though he completely deserved one, he didn’t get slapped, and it was an even stranger thing that he had been expecting not to. Bulma’s huge blue eyes wavered as she narrowed them at him, spilling tears down her cheeks. "Then we’re not going to get anywhere." She clenched her fists and stepped back from him. "If you don’t know, and I don’t know, we’re a stalemate, aren’t we?" she forced a laugh. "So we’ll both stand in our trenches and continue to let this gap lengthen? We’re just going to keep running out of them at each other, exchanging blows and getting nothing out of it except pain…"

Vegeta impulsively reached an arm out to her but she flinched back from his touch, her tiny frame quivering. Her head slumped forward and she stared at the ground, tears dripping onto the linoleum, hair hanging down her face.

She looked back up at him. "I hope one of us figures it out." She whispered with another tight-lipped smile. "I’m going to bed. Goodnight…"

"And the truth gets me in shit again…" Vegeta muttered as he watched her flee from the kitchen. Moments later he heard her door slam and the muffled noises of crying. He remembered all the times he had seen this very same scenario happen back on Earth with her and Yaumcha. Yaumcha had always went after her, and the crying had always subsided after mere moments of him being with her. Would the same thing happen, if he were to go after her now?

But I am not her mate.

"Why does it matter to you!?" Vegeta yelled after her, his voice a roar that vibrated in the vast space of the ship. "You’re another’s property anyway!"

Vegeta barred his teeth and slammed his fist into the kitchen counter, shattering the coffee cup into five porcelain chunks and sending the plate of sandwiches toppling over the edge. They landed at his feet in a pile and he scowled down at them, kicking them viciously out of the way.

He didn’t feel like eating anymore.