Posted originally on the Archive_of_Our_Own at https://archiveofourown.org/
works/391884.
  Rating:
      Explicit
  Archive Warning:
      Underage
  Category:
      M/M
  Fandom:
      Merlin_(TV)
  Relationship:
      Merlin/Arthur_Pendragon
  Character:
      Merlin_(Merlin), Arthur_Pendragon
  Additional Tags:
      Alternate_Universe_-_Modern_Setting, American_AU
  Stats:
      Published: 2012-04-26 Words: 5268
****** When the Blazing Sun is Gone. ******
by orphan_account
Summary
     Life is a dreary cycle of work and sleep until Arthur moves in next
     door and breaks Merlin’s stride.
Notes
     Thank you to my wonderful beta rebeccaann08, and planejane for the
     ‘research’ *g*.
     This is written for the glomp_fest, wordgasmic, I know I didn't add
     all the aspects of your prompt but I really hope you like this. Thank
     you for the prompt! ♥
See the end of the work for more notes

From his spot on the porch-railing, Merlin sees the move-in truck pull into the
drive beside his house. The day is bright and hot, sweat pooling and stinging
in the nape of his neck, and he doesn’t envy the men carrying couch after table
after bed up the steps. He shifts, stretching his legs out in front of him,
knowing they’ll be no more tanned by the end of summer than they were at the
beginning of it, but he doesn’t care. Not really.
A vague thought as to who’ll move in this time flits through his mind, but it’s
gone as soon as it’s formed. No one interesting lives in this backward hole of
a town and Merlin doesn’t see that changing anytime soon. He sighs, unsticks
himself from the baluster supporting his weight and goes inside in search of a
non-existing breeze that wouldn’t cool him down anyway.
When he wakes up the next morning, his sheets stick to him like a second skin,
and his palms are slick with sweat when he pushes the hair out of his eyes. His
alarm clock says it’s barely seven AM and already the heat is balancing the
edge of sultry. It will tip over into unbearable before the sun has reached its
zenith and Merlin carefully doesn’t think about the air-conditioned pharmacy he
could’ve been working in, rather than the pancake house and its torrid kitchen
that waits for him to open, has been now for more than six years.
If only things were different, but isn’t that the story of life itself?
It takes exactly thirty seconds after his cold shower to start sweating again.
Merlin pulls on his jeans and black t-shirt anyway, pushing a hand through his
near-dry hair before running downstairs. He’s late and if he doesn’t open the
shop in time, Gus and Geoff will have his hide. He steps into his flip-flops
and when he opens his door, humid heat is not the only thing that knocks the
breath out of him. For a moment Merlin feels devastated, his hand a vice around
his doorknob, the only thing grounding him.
“Oh hi, sorry. I didn’t mean to just creep up your porch like that, but my dog
is in your chair.”
“What?” Merlin says dumbly, blinking away a trickle of sweat. It doesn’t help.
The boy still looks like a hallucination materialized from all Merlin’s sins.
“My dog,” he says, beginning to frown at Merlin, his eyes turning a little hazy
as if a curtain slowly falls behind them. Like he’s thinking maybe Merlin’s a
bit odd. Merlin looks at his large swing tucked in the only shady spot on the
porch and sees a gigantic Irish Wolfhound rocking gently to and fro, head on
his paws, tongue lolling.
“Oh,” Merlin says. His eyes must widen comically because suddenly his porch and
ears are assaulted with laughter. 
“I’m sorry, I’m Arthur. We just moved in next door. Caspar always goes a little
funny when we move somewhere new. At least I won’t have to chase him here.
There’s no chance he’ll run in this heat.”
“Yeah, um. I guess. Look,” Merlin says, “I have to go to work. I’ll see you
around, okay?”
“Yeah,” Arthur says and the frown reappears. Merlin jumps off the porch and
onto his bike and doesn’t look back.
By the end of the week it’s a ritual. Merlin gets up, showers, dresses and goes
outside. He scratches Caspar in the hollows behind his ears and says, “Morning,
bud. Too hot for you too, huh?” and then he’ll take him to Arthur’s house, who
first opens the door in full PJs, then t-shirt and boxers, then boxers alone.
“Thanks,” Arthur says on Friday. His hair sticks to his forehead and he wipes
at the sweat in his neck. “Jesus, does it ever get cooler here?”
Merlin snorts, is already halfway down the stairs. “Not for another three
months, my friend.”
On Saturday night Merlin sits outside because inside the walls heave with
sweltering heat and it makes him feel too large for his skin. The moon is full
and the sky is a pincushion of stars, and, he wonders, how does it go again?
Up above the world so high, like a diamond in the sky.
He doesn’t even jump anymore when out of nowhere, a wet nose pushes against his
palm. He lets Caspar lick the condensation off his empty Coke can. “Does Arthur
ever lock the door?” he asks the enormous shaggy dog, who’s moved from the can
to Merlin’s hand.
“He knows how to open it.”
“What the fuck?” Merlin hisses, his heart thudding loud in his chest. “You
scared the crap out of me,” he says to Arthur, who leans against the post at
the bottom of the steps. He’s wearing a red shirt – football, Merlin guesses,
though he has no clue really – with black lines across the shoulders. It’s just
the right amount of tight across Arthur’s chest and Merlin wants to know if the
material feels as cool to the touch as it seems. Arthur looks casual, easy,
like he’s lived here all his life and isn’t a newcomer at all. Merlin wonders
what that’s like, to have life come to you easy like breathing. And then he
thinks, how he’d like to leave Arthur breathless.
“I kid you not,” Arthur says, taking the steps two at a time and sinking down
beside Merlin. Arthur’s sleeve is soft against his arm. “If I lock the door he
just turns the latch. Too damn clever.”
They sit in silence, Merlin offering Arthur a Coke from the cooler he dragged
outside. Arthur takes it, opens it with a soft click and Merlin can’t take his
eyes off the way his throat works around each swallow. He wants –. He wants.
“Will you go to school here,” he asks, to remind himself Arthur is a boy,
“after the summer?”
“Yeah, senior year,” Arthur says, coughing a little, wiping at the droplet of
coke dripping down his chin.
“Must be tough, moving at the end of high school like that,” Merlin says.
Arthur shrugs. “I’m used to it. I don’t care. By next year I’ll have a football
scholarship and I’ll be done with following my dad to wherever his work takes
him.”
What’s it like, Merlin wants to ask. What’s it like, traveling, following a
dad. Having a dad. He doesn’t though, because the curtain is back behind
Arthur’s eyes, fallen like an interlude in a play.
“What about you,” Arthur asks, “what are you doing here?”
“I’ve lived here all my life. My mum owned the pancake place at the end of the
High Street. Have you seen it?” Merlin asks, not really waiting for an answer.
“When she died, I couldn’t –. I stayed and, well.” He hesitates, wishes he
smoked or something, so he could fill the ridiculous silence with a reason.
“Anyway, if I closed up, Gus and Geoff would probably have a heart attack and
die.”
“Who are Gus and Geoff?” Arthur asks and he sounds amused, so Merlin looks at
him. Looks at the blue of his eyes that are lakes in the moonlight, now,
instead of oceans.
“Oh, just some old guys. Gus will take his coffee black, no sugar and Geoff
always drinks tea with milk.” He laughs when Arthur wrinkles his nose at that.
“They’ll both have the blueberry pancakes unless it’s strawberry season.
They’ve been coming to Pantasia for as long as I can remember.”
“Pantasia?” Arthur says, laughing, baring his throat to the moon and Merlin
could easily believe in that sound being a sacrifice to some ancient goddess.
“We came up with it first,” Merlin says, and he wants to fit his hand around
Arthur’s neck so he can feel the very life of that laughter before it dies.
“What would you recommend when I come by?” Arthur asks and he’s smiling, arms
wrapped around his knees. They are faintly lined with old white scars and for a
moment Merlin sees Arthur as a little boy, running amok in the streets, maybe
cycling or on a skateboard and falling over, again and again, scraping his
knees. Arthur’s eyes are on Merlin’s mouth as if he can see Merlin’s imaginary
cigarette dangling there.
“Don’t,” Merlin says quietly, even though he doesn’t mean to.
“Why?” Arthur asks.
Because I’m more than that, Merlin doesn’t say. He just shrugs.
“Is it because you look silly?” Arthur says and Merlin wants to tell him screw
you, but there is something kind behind the teasing. “Do you have to wear a
silly hat? Short shorts, maybe? I’d like to see that, you in short shorts.”
Merlin stills. Somewhere in the distance a coyote calls above the endless drone
of the crickets and Caspar’s ears prick up. Merlin puts a soothing hand on his
neck and his fingers touch Arthur’s, who evidently is of the same mind. “Would
you?” he asks quietly and Arthur clears his throat, looks away. A faint blush
burgeons beneath his collar.
“I should head back. Caspar, come,” he says, rising to his feet. Caspar stays
where he is and Merlin smiles.
“I’ll bring him around in the morning,” he says, not moving, even though his
ass is sore from sitting on the hard wood this whole time. His swing is covered
in dog hair.
On Monday, Arthur is in a booth at Pantasia, his red shirt clashing horribly
with the orange pleather seats. There is a boy draped all over him, an angry
welt already swelling on Arthur’s neck, and Merlin knows a moment of curious
and unsettling jealousy.
Until he realises Arthur would only be there, like that, for one reason.
He plonks a banocolate milkshake down on the table, spilling some over the
edges, smudging their bill. “To keep your boy toy busy,” Merlin says. “Come
with me.” He walks into the storage room without looking back.
“This is very boring, Merlin,” Arthur says and he leans against the shelf
stacked with Mrs Butterworth. “I was expecting a uniform at least. Or maybe a
hat. With feathers.”
“I own a pancake house, Arthur,” Merlin says, but he’s amused. He sees right
through this. “I’m not a servant in a medieval castle. Who’s the twink?”
Arthur raises an eyebrow, as if Merlin has no right to call anyone a twink.
“Just someone I found lying by the pool.”
“Classy.”
“Why, you jealous?” Arthur asks and he reaches out, hooks a finger in a loop of
Merlin’s jeans, tugs. “He’s a very good kisser, you know.”
“Looks like he has some cannibalistic tendencies to me,” Merlin says but allows
himself to be pulled closer. The storage room smells of caramelized pears and
from now on, that will always remind him of Arthur standing right there.
Gorgeous and secure in the knowledge the world wants him.
“I think,” Merlin says, leaning in a little so he can inhale the mix of
chlorine and sun-pervaded skin, “you’re not really here for my sugar dusted
apple pancakes, no matter how orgasmic they are.” Merlin steps into Arthur’s
space, whose back makes the maple syrup rattle as they collide. There is a
drift of confectionery sugar between the dip of Arthur’s collarbones and Merlin
rubs it away.
“I’m not in love with you,” Arthur says a bit dumbly and Merlin gently laughs
against the ugly mark on Arthur’s neck. He licks it, claims it, his. Arthur
sighs into his hair.
“I don’t know what love is,” Merlin says, “but I know what it’s not. It’s not
letting some brat you picked up at the pool suck on your neck, just to see what
I’d do.”
“That’s not –” Arthur begins and Merlin presses his hips against Arthur’s while
leaning back to look at him. Arthur is hard already.
“Okay, it was,” Arthur admits, knowing there’s no hiding now.
Merlin moves again, then checks himself. “But,” he says, pulling away slowly,
like it hurts, and it does hurt, it aches to distance himself now, “it also
isn’t this.” Not here, not in the backroom of some dingy diner. “Come to my
house, tonight. No, I mean –” Merlin bites his lip and shakes his head. That
isn’t right either. “Arthur,” he says slowly, carefully, “would you like to
come to my house this evening? So we can –, so I can show you, how good it can
be. How it should be.”
Arthur nods. “I’ll,” he says, voice hoarse and he swallows hard, “I’ll be
there.” He leans forward, puts his hands on Merlin’s hips, gently thumbing the
sensitive dips above them, and kisses him on the cheek. Arthur flushes slightly
but holds Merlin’s stare and then disappears into the bathroom. When Merlin
goes back into the diner, Arthur’s boy is gone.
He showers. He eats Chinese take out. He fidgets. He laughs at himself. He
changes his sheets. He showers again.
And then finally, when the end of the day has done nothing to cool its
remaining hours, the moon shimmers her approval and gentles his nerves. He
waits outside, because Merlin always found something calming about the quiet of
the night. How does it go again?
When the blazing sun is gone, when he nothing shines upon, then you show your
little light, twinkle –
The darkness is sweet with the scent of honeysuckle, a Mourning Dove is perched
on a telephone wire and lets one solitary cry. Merlin feels Arthur is there
before he sees him.
"Hi," Arthur says, leaning against the pole at the bottom of the stairs just
like that first evening so long and no time at all ago.
His next inhale is hotter and more humid than the breath of the hounds of
Hades, and still it's the easiest lungful of air Merlin has drawn all evening.
"You came," Merlin says.
"I did." Arthur takes the steps two at a time, as he always does, his flip-
flops slapping his heels. He's wearing a white short sleeved button-up speckled
with drops of moisture. Sweat, Merlin thinks, or maybe Arthur is one of those
people who pulls on his clothes after a shower without drying himself properly.
Merlin feels a thrill that he might find out later.
"What did you tell your dad?" he asks.
"That we're playing Grand Theft Auto," Arthur shrugs, hands pushed deep into
his black cargos, his grin a little sheepish and lopsided.
Merlin laughs. "Yes, because what with paying off this house, the bills and the
mortgage on Pantasia, I have money left to spend on an Xbox." He stills and
looks at Arthur. If he sees pity, that'll be it. He'll tell Arthur he's a nice
boy, but maybe he should go home now. The only part of Arthur he'll touch then,
are the hollows behind Caspar's ears. Because Merlin can carry his pathetic
life around like a knight's sword that drags behind him, he doesn't want to see
it reflected in someone else's eyes. But all he sees is polite boredom in
Arthur's posture. His shoulders aren't rounded with the weight of the world
yet, rather has it stretched out before his feet like all those whose future is
made of college and life yet to come, not yet lived.
Merlin holds out his hand and Arthur's expression changes. It melds defiance
with arrogance like a shield for his fear, as if Merlin’s allowed to see all of
Arthur, apart from that. Merlin waits, the sounds of the night now swelling to
a crescendo the darkness will hold until dawn licks the horizon. Then Arthur
breathes, dipping his head a little and takes Merlin's hand. Follows him
inside.
Merlin closes the bedroom door with a soft snick. Not that there is anyone who
could walk in on them, not anymore, but there's something safe about a closed-
off room. A haven in a storm. Arthur's hand is still in his and both their
palms are damp. He lets go, and all he says while unbuttoning Arthur's shirt
is, "Tell me, at any time, if you want me to stop.”
"I'm not a –” Arthur begins, cocksure, but he stops when his eyes catch
Merlin's. He just nods and leans in a little. Merlin presses his forehead to
Arthur's temple, because his mouth is not the first place Merlin wants to kiss.
He runs his fingers through the sweat-wet hair in Arthur’s neck and squeezes a
little. Arthur steps out of his flip-flops and Merlin tugs down his pants.
"Kneel at the foot of the bed," Merlin says, "and lean onto the mattress."
"What –," Arthur starts.
"I won't hurt you," Merlin breathes into Arthur's ear. "Will you trust me?" He
draws the pad of his thumb over Arthur's bottom lip, making it catch, revealing
the dark wet redness within. It almost crumbles Merlin's resolve not to kiss
him yet.
"Are you going to fuck me?" Arthur asks and the sudden open insecurity wrenches
Merlin the rest of the way into falling.
"God," Merlin says, his voice rough and trembling for the first time, "you
destroy me." He closes his eyes, presses close for a moment, allowing his hands
to roam the expanse of Arthur’s back, feels him shake slightly beneath his
fingers. He inhales the sweat in Arthur's neck, his shampoo, his longing. "Not
today," he adds softly.
Then, Arthur kneels on the floor and bends over the bed. “I don’t –, what are
you going to do?” he asks when Merlin sinks down behind him.
“I’m just going to kiss you, Arthur,” Merlin says, remembering the queasy buzz
he had felt himself, that first time. “It’s no big deal if you don’t like
something. Just tell me and I’ll stop. All right?”
“Okay,” Arthur says and he leans his forehead on his hands, pressing his face
into Merlin’s sheets.
“I’m just going to spread you, don’t be scared,” Merlin says, placing his hands
on the round of Arthur’s ass.
“I’m not scared,” Arthur says, over his shoulder.
“Yes, you are.” Merlin digs his fingers in the firm flesh. “Your heart is
racing.” He spreads Arthur’s cheeks a little. “And you feel a little sick.”
Merlin breathes warm air over his hole. “You’ve seen guys doing this, you’ve
wanked off to it behind your laptop in the dark.” He cools the breath by
pursing his lips. “You’ve wondered what it would feel like.”
Merlin puts his mouth over Arthur’s cleft, where he wanted to kiss him from the
moment Arthur appeared on his doorstep. Arthur sucks in a deep moan and doesn’t
let it out. “Breathe,” Merlin says, not moving his mouth away. Arthur clenches,
pressing into the mattress, away from Merlin. “Relax, take a breath,” Merlin
says, sitting back on his heels. Arthur’s fingers are white around fistfuls of
Merlin’s sheets. Merlin soothes Arthur’s spine with the palm of his hand and
can feel his frantic heartbeat. Merlin leans forward, using his weight to calm
him.
“I want to show you how good this can be,” Merlin whispers in Arthur’s ear, his
mouth wet against the shell. His dick twitches in his jeans with the way he’s
lined up with Arthur naked underneath. But this isn’t about him. “How you don’t
need to have your neck bitten, or your arsehole pounded like a porn star for
this to be good.” Merlin shifts, caresses Arthur’s arms until their fingers
meet and tangle. “I don’t want you to be ruined by some horny seventeen year
old who doesn’t know what they’re doing,” he adds, more to himself that to
Arthur.
“I am a horny seventeen year old who doesn’t know what he’s doing,” Arthur says
and Merlin laughs softly. Arthur’s grip on Merlin’s hands is no longer
desperate.
“I can only help you with the last bit,” Merlin says, smiling. “Yeah?”
“Yeah,” Arthur says and Merlin sits back, spreads Arthur’s ass again, and licks
his hole.
“Shit,” Arthur says, bucking against the bed. Merlin does it again, and again.
Again. He kitten-licks, barely touching until Arthur doesn’t fight his response
anymore but pushes against Merlin’s tongue, moaning softly. Merlin pulls Arthur
back a little, arranging him so his cock isn’t trapped beneath his belly, but
rests against the back of the mattress.
“All right?” he asks again and Arthur nods. “You have to say it.”
“Yeah, I’m, I’m good.”
“Good,” Merlin says, digging his fingers in Arthur’s cheeks and spreading them
wider. “ I’m going to push my tongue inside a little now.”
“Oh god,” Arthur sighs into the sheets. He arches his feet so that the tendons
of his calves stand out sharply. Merlin licks around the firm muscle one more
time and then pushes his tongue inside. He has to push hard, wriggle a little
to make the oh so tight muscle give. Arthur whines a “Fuckfuckfuck,” arches his
back, pulls the sheets loose from their tucked in corners.
Merlin palms Arthur’s balls, rubs his thumb over the ridge behind them and then
tugs them a little, all the while curling his tongue in and out. In and out.
“I’m not gonna last,” Arthur says, and he sounds wrecked, hoarse.
“That’s fine,” Merlin says, “don’t hold back.” He takes hold of Arthur’s dick
and pushes a finger against his hole. “Can I –?”
“Yes, please yes, just, oh god.” Arthur sobs when Merlin pushes the finger
inside, just a little, passage eased by his tongue and spit. At the same time
he sucks on Arthur’s balls and Arthur comes with a shout. Merlin pumps him
through it, pulling out his finger and putting his mouth in its place so he can
feel Arthur clench against his lips, until Arthur’s entire body shakes.
Only then does Merlin feel the pain of his own thrumming erection. “Don’t
move,” he says, his voice as scorched as Arthur’s. “Whatever you do, don’t
move.” He unzips his jeans and pulls out his dick. “God, do you have any idea
–.” Merlin looks Arthur over, the ghosts of his fingerprints reddening on
Arthur’s skin. He is still that hallucination that appeared on Merlin’s
doorstep and Merlin thinks of all the fantasies he’s made of. “Shit, Arthur.”
Arthur looks over his shoulder as Merlin licks his palm and takes himself in
hand. Arthur’s eyes widen and Merlin sees his dick twitch. He laughs, softly.
It sounds fraught and hungry and he braces himself against Arthur’s ass while
he pumps hard and fast. It doesn’t take long before Merlin silently shoots
thick cords of seed all over Arthur’s back as he curls in on himself with the
force of it.
Merlin catches his breath with his face pressed against Arthur’s thigh. Arthur,
who lies very still. When Merlin can see through the hazy afterglow again, he
pulls off his t-shirt and cleans Arthur’s back. “Come here,” he says gently,
crawling up onto the bed and tugging Arthur with him. Arthur goes and lies in a
pool of his own sweat. His face glistens with it, his eyes are lights in the
night and Merlin has to stop himself from saying, how I wonder what you are.
“My mouth is really dry,” Arthur says and he laughs, a small incredulous sound.
“That’s because you’ve been breathing really hard through your mouth,” Merlin
says, running a finger over Arthur’s rough lips. “I’ll go get us a Coke.”
He expects Arthur to have covered up somehow, when he returns. Maybe to have
crawled under the sheets or put his boxers back on. But Arthur is sitting
cross-legged on Merlin’s bed, gently stroking his already half-hard cock and
Merlin’s breath is left behind somewhere beyond the doorway.
Arthur flushes bright red but he looks Merlin in the eye, as if he stubbornly
wants to conquer his inhibitions. It makes Merlin’s knees go weak. “I wish I
had lasted longer,” Arthur says and Merlin sits down in front of him, hands him
the drink.
“Don’t worry,” Merlin says, reddening a little at how shaky his voice sounds,
“you’ll last longer next time.”
Arthur grins at the pink on Merlin’s cheeks, some of his confidence returning.
It’s a bit ridiculous how much that turns Merlin on. “Good,” Arthur says,
opening his can and drinking half of it in one go. He splutters and coughs at
the bubbles burning his throat and then puts the Coke on the bedside table.
Resuming his earlier caress. “Because it’s the moment before I come that I like
the most, not the orgasm itself.” He looks down at his own hands and his voice
drops. “I like the build up, that moment where it feels like I’ll shatter to a
thousand pieces. You know what I mean?”
“Yeah,” Merlin says softly, his own drink still unopened in his hand. “I know
what you mean.”
“Can you show me? I mean it doesn’t have to be now because you already, you
know, did that other thing, but –”
“No,” Merlin says, putting his unopened drink away. “No, I really do have to
show you now.” Merlin takes Arthur’s hand off his cock and pulls at his waist
until Arthur gets it and sits up on his knees. Merlin drops on all fours before
him and opens his mouth, just allowing Arthur’s cock to slide in onto his
tongue. Merlin moves back and forth, without closing his lips around the tip as
he listens to the noises Arthur makes like they are a composition, an ode to
sultry summer nights to come. Arthur’s breath comes in ragged stops and starts
and after a while, he knots his fingers in Merlin’s hair. Merlin looks up,
answers the question in Arthur’s eyes by becoming still and relaxing his mouth.
Arthur is careful, torn between lust and inhibition, until his thighs shake
with it. Then, suddenly, Merlin is done with being careful and he grabs
Arthur’s hips and shows him how to fuck his mouth.
They lie stretched on their backs, Merlin’s sweaty sheets a crumpled heap on
the floor. The moon is high in the sky, shining her light through the window
above the bed.
Twinkle, –
“God,” Arthur groans, “tell me what winter’s like.”
“What?” Merlin says, laughing, pulled from his lazy wonder by this odd
question. He can’t be bothered to move, but turns his head so he can look at
Arthur.
“I’m so fucking hot, it’s ridiculous. Tell me about the winters here.”
“They’re long,” Merlin says. “Four years ago we had snow until May. And I’m not
talking about a few inches. I mean heaps and heaps of the stuff.”
“That sounds lovely,” Arthur says, his hair sticking to his forehead and Merlin
rolls on his side. He has to. Has to wipe that hair away and think of the
moment Arthur will be gone but his pillow will still smell like him. Taste of
him. He thinks of the moment Arthur had really fisted Merlin’s hair and fucked
Merlin’s mouth with complete abandon, choking on words like love and fuck and
more and knows he’ll never forget.
“It’s nice at first,” he says, “but it gets really fucking cold. One year, this
guy threw a glass of water in the air and the drops were frozen by the time
they hit the ground.”
“I saw that on TV,” Arthur says, turning his head, pushing his open mouth
against Merlin’s palm. His eyes flutter closed for a moment. “That was here?”
“Yeah, you wouldn’t believe how freezing it gets.” So cold the earth creaks
with it.
“Still, that sounds good. I can’t wait for winter. We’ll go do stuff. We’ll go
sledding. We’ll build snowmen,” Arthur laughs, pushes himself up on one elbow.
“We’ll –.” He stops. “What is it?”
“Arthur,” Merlin says softly, because he doesn’t trust his voice. He feels the
mournfulness seep out of his pores like sweat. “In a few weeks you start
school. They’ll love you. Fuck, they’ll adore you. This town has never seen
someone as enthralling as you.” Arthur stares at him, uncomprehending. Merlin’s
voice drops to a lonely whisper. “Soon life will take over and I’ll be the guy
you tell someone about because they moan, fuck where did you learn how to do
that.”
It’s how it should go, but already Merlin’s future feels a little bit hollow.
“What are you talking about,” Arthur says, rolling on top of Merlin. They both
pull a face at the slide of sweat between them. “Who could possibly live up to
this? Didn’t you say so yourself, I shouldn’t be ruined by some horny seventeen
year old?” Arthur grins and Merlin wants to take a picture of that smile and
frame it.
“If it doesn’t happen this year, then it will the next. When you move away.”
– twinkle little star.
“You don’t want me,” Arthur says quietly. It’s not a question and Merlin closes
his eyes. How, he thinks, can I explain that I crave you?
“I do,” Merlin says simply, because anything more would just scare Arthur with
its intensity. “It’s you who can’t know what he wants. You’re seventeen,
Arthur. Your life is going to change so many times you’ll lose track. You’ll be
too busy to think of me.”
“You obviously don’t know me very well then,” Arthur says, his breath hot on
the soft of Merlin’s throat. He finds Merlin’s lips first with his fingers,
then with his mouth, confident in being good at that, at least. Merlin closes
his eyes, if they kiss, that’ll be it. There will be no going back, not for
Merlin. He’ll fall and he’ll fall and when Arthur’s gone, the world he’ll land
on won’t be the same.
It’s not like he can stop it, so he gives in, shapes the last piece of him to
fit around Arthur. Merlin knows the change is so permanent, no one will ever be
able to fill the space he’ll leave behind.
They kiss, exchanging flavor of sweet Coke and sweat salt and one another until
they can’t tell themselves apart. Above them the moon moves in a silent
trajectory, keeping an eye on the secrets they share in the dark.
“Sometimes,” Arthur whispers, the admission the only words in hours and hours
of just lying and breathing in the dark, “I feel so far away from home.”
Merlin doesn’t speak, just tangles his fingers between Arthur’s and holds on.
When dawn silences the world for a short hour before it wakes, Arthur stands on
Merlin’s doorstep, hooking a finger in a loop of Merlin’s jeans. He puts his
hand on Merlin’s bare chest and looks down, as if the morning brings back the
inhibitions he lost between Merlin’s sheets. “I meant it,” Arthur says, “you
and me.” He swallows hard as if the words are too thick and yes, Merlin thinks,
we always mean what we say when the words come out of our mouths. “You and me,”
Arthur begins again. He looks up and his smile makes the horizon let go of the
sun, “we’ll make snow angels yet, you’ll see.”
Merlin laughs and Arthur drinks the sound with a kiss.
A woman sits on her porch, rocking back and forth to catch the morning cool.
She hums a lullaby while a child dozes in her lap. Her eyes are closed and she
doesn’t see Merlin cycling by on his way to Pantasia. The melody sways in his
mind all day, but he doesn’t think of the words until he closes up and sees
Arthur waiting for him across the street, sunlight gilding his hair.
Stars fading but I linger on dear, still craving your kiss, longing to linger
til dawn dear, just saying this.
 
~fin~
End Notes
     Here_at_LJ
Please drop_by_the_archive_and_comment to let the author know if you enjoyed
their work!
nt way?
Please?” he tries to keep his voice gentle in an effort to not set her off.
 
Vegeta’s eye twitches once in irritation and she exhales through her nose like
a bull. She takes a deep breath and explains in a rush:
 
“Saiya-jin are a combative species; to better meet the demands of battle,
females are only ever prime for reproduction a few times in their life. We go
into ruts. It’s brought about by a surge of hormones from the tail. It’s
painful and induces a mindless drive to mate,” she pauses here, uncertainty in
her sable eyes before continuing.
 
“I wanted to be gone before the rut set in. I don’t want to be anywhere near
Kak- a male when it settles. Before hand, I thought it was simply my tail
growing back, I hadn’t realized...I’ve only ever had one rut before and I
didn’t recognize the signs until the aches started.”
 
She trails off, looks at his face once, then turns away to face the tv once
more while he digests the information. Vegeta looked more uncomfortable than
Boxer had ever seen her and hoping to put her at ease, he reluctantly retracts
his hands to his lap. Her shoulders droop slightly.
 
Boxer tries to ignore the twinge of annoyance in his chest at her near mention
of Goku. It made sense; if what she described was anything like heats some
mammals went into, she would be most drawn to the most viable male. Who would
be, Boxer bitterly lamented, Goku.
 
“Okay,” he breathes. “What do you think you need? Human women don’t...I want to
help as best as I can, but I need your cooperation.” Boxer mentally applauses
himself at the brief flash of relief her face displays.
 
‘Isolation,” she supplies. “It would be best if I were contained alone, kept
away from anyone who would...” she stops and Boxer waits for the tough
admission he knows is coming.
 
“I’ll be in a vulnerable state and not in my right mind. I don’t want to whelp,
so avoiding any men is best.”
 
Another pause.
 
“I’ll need a higher supply of food and water. My metabolism skyrockets. And
nesting?” she cocks her head, and Boxer keeps it to himself how cute he thinks
it is. “Nesting material. The biggest concern is finding a place that can hold
me while I’m in that state.”
 
Boxer’s mind goes to the safe house he’s building for Vegeta. A few adjustments
to the blueprints and it could easily hold her in as well as keep others out.
The house itself was done, but the gravity chamber needed to be finished. He
could complete reinforcing the room and let her hole up there until her rut ran
it’s course. It wasn’t ideal, but…
 
“I think I could have a place ready for you. When does your rut start?”
 
Vegeta’s mouth parts in surprise before she answers.
 
“In about four days. It will probably last about two weeks.” Boxer nods.
 
“Okay. Give me two days and I’ll have a containment room ready to meet your
needs.”
 
The alien nods and an awkward silence settles between them. Boxer clears his
throat to dispel it. Vegeta finally looks at him again and Boxer has to clench
his hands to resist reaching out to soothe her. She wouldn’t appreciate the
gesture.
 
“Vegeta,” he ventures “I - thank you. I know that couldn’t have been easy.”
 
She scoffs and Boxer almost smiles as the tension flees her.
 
“I’m not a coward,” she replies. He nods in agreement.
 
“You’re not. You’re the bravest person I know.”
 
It goes unsaid that he thinks even Goku doesn’t come close.
 
===============================================================================
 
Three days later, Boxer is showing Vegeta her new digs a little early. It’s
about 2 kilometers away from the main house, tucked away in seclusion at the
edge of the property by the wooded area. It’s a sprawling T-shaped one story,
with a wrap around porch on the long stem and one of the arms. The woods
stretch out behind it and extends for about three square acres out. Vegeta is
suspicious of the house as he lets her in, especially when he explains how long
ago he started renovations.
 
“Why?” she asks.
 
Boxer shrugs. “You’re pretty solitary. I figured you’d get on better overall if
you had your own space.”
 
He hopes this admission would calm her, but she only appears more agitated.
Luckily for him, she only glares up at him for a moment longer before opting to
explore, and Boxer releases the breath he’d been holding.
 
There’s only three real doors in the house, two of which lead outside and one
which sealed off the gravity room from the rest of the house. The long stretch
of the house has an open floor plan that sports a kitchen, dining and living
room areas, and a sunroom that looked out into the woods. Opposite the sunroom,
there’s an archway that leads to a forked hall that gives the house it’s T-
shape. On one end of the hall, there’s an ensuite master bedroom. On the other
end is the gravity room. The house is illuminated by lightly tinted skylights.
Overall, it’s minimalist and contemporary and the floor plan provides a free,
unenclosed feeling that he hopes will help put Vegeta at ease.
 
Boxer adjusts the duffle bag full of linens he brought and goes to open the
gravity room for Vegeta.
 
“I’ve got everything programmed on a schedule. Server bots will bring you food
and water and communications will open from the outside every evening so I can
talk with you to make sure everything is okay. Other than that, body monitors
and surveillance cameras are set to passively scan you and only go fully active
when you have unusual readings,” Boxer pauses and thinks.
 
“You can train, but it’s capped at 150 times,” he grins at Vegeta’s surly face.
“Hey, you said you wouldn’t be in your right mind.”
 
He drops the duffel bag and kicks it to the center of the room. He looks over
his friend. She’s been acting more cagey and her temperature rose pretty
quickly the day before. Vegeta being spaced out and unaware was disconcerting,
so he’s glad that she decided to lock up early.
 
“The inside latch is disabled, so once I leave you’re stuck,” he warns and
gestures to the wall.
 
“The computer is touch screen and voice activated. It controls the gravity room
and you can use it to contact me or watch TV - I suggest you play around with
it before you get too, uh -” he pauses and Vegeta snorts at his discomfort.
“There’s also a pull out cot and a small bathroom, so you can shower and
stuff.”
 
He stops and can’t think of anything else to say. He’s a nervous and a bit wary
about ditching Vegeta, even if all her needs are met. He’s done his best and he
knows she can take care of herself, but he’s scared for his friend because he
can tell she’s upset about what her body’s putting her through.
 
“Will you watch?” Vegeta suddenly asks. Boxer frowns.
 
“Watch what?‘
 
“On the surveillance cams.”
 
Boxer’s face flushes and he scowls at her when he notices her trying not to
laugh.
 
“Not unless I get an alert that you’re endanger. I’m not a pervert,” he states
primly and ignores her chuckle.
 
“But you are a man,” she shoots back. He rolls his eyes.
 
“Whatever. You seem fine, so I’m going to work. I’ll talk to you tonight,”
Boxer stretches and makes his way to the door. Vegeta simply shrugs and goes to
preoccupy herself with chamber’s computer system.
 
“‘But you are a man’ what the fuck,” he mutters. He ignores the insidious
thought that she’d never even know if he spied on her or not.
 
===============================================================================
 
In the future, when Boxer will think back on this moment, he’ll wonder if maybe
it’s fate, that they are somehow strung to certain events and certain people in
ways inescapable and thus destined to overturn every other thing that might
stand to challenge them.
 
Four days had passed the first time his smart watch beeps out an alert from
Vegeta’s house. It’s also the day after he’s finally made up with Yamcha. Boxer
had, for once, decided to be the one to fold, knowing their fall out was his
fault. He goes and gets a haircut (he settles on a low pompadour fade and he
looks fucking tantalizing), nabs some tickets to a music festival Yamcha had
mentioned, and proceeds to seduce the hell out of his boyfriend.
 
It works. Yamcha plus good music, hot girls and some molly equals Boxer giving
his long-term partner a reach around while pounding in his ass.
 
He’s just returned from dropping in at the corporate office and is preparing
snacks for an afternoon of Netflix and and chill when the bip bip draws his
attention. He’d been doing well to divide his time between his life and Vegeta,
staying most nights in her living space sleeping on her couch and working on
projects and paperwork he can easily carry out away from the office. It had
been effective at keeping him near but still keeping him plugged in. However,
after his reunion with Yamcha, careful rescheduling had been required because
Boxer knew the other man wouldn’t take to kindly to the situation.
 
Not that Boxer had any plans to share Vegeta’s predicament. He doubted that his
friend wanted anyone aware of what she was currently going through.
 
Boxer checks the time and sees he still has over an hour left before Yamcha is
set to arrive - he’s probably still in bed nursing his hangover. He grabs his
tablet and pulls up the camera feed in the gravity room.
 
He almost immediately turns it off in a hot rush embarrassment and desire.
Vegeta is naked, nestled atop a veritable mountain of bedding with her hand
looking like it’s lost somewhere between her legs. He’s pretty certain of what
she’s doing, but he has to check since the body monitors are reading elevated
stress and heart rate levels. He looks again, more closely and tries to keep
himself detached. Clinically, he looks over Vegeta, checks her positioning and
looking over the skin he can see for any abrasions and looks again at the
readings from the body monitors.
 
She’s kneeled over her legs in the fetal position, her face pushed into the
nest she’s built for herself. Her right arm is by her head, bracing the woman’s
weight and her back is arched, raising her butt up, her tail limp at her side.
Her left arm is under her body and he can see her shoulder moving, even if her
hand isn’t visible. Sweat gleams on her body and Boxer clicks only a few
different camera angles to try to discern why the alerts sounded before he can
no longer justify a reason for watching Vegeta.
 
The scientist is just about to turn it off when Vegeta rolls over and he gasps
in horror. The bedding and the alien are both damp with scarlet fluid; Vegeta’s
left hand is clawing at her privates in a mockery of what it should be doing.
Her lower belly and thighs are covered in gore as she uses nails like hooks to
rake out the skin of her vagina. With a curse, he’s up and running to his car,
shooting a quick gotta work sorry to Yamcha before the car’s even started.
 
Upon arrival, he quickly capsulizes his car and runs inside, grabbing the tranq
gun and first aid kit he left just outside the gravity room. As the doors
finish sliding open, he looks in for Vegeta and panics when he doesn’t see her.
He steps into the room, the door quickly hissing shut behind him and trips over
something in his haste. The tranq gun slips from his sweat-slicked hands and
slides under the edge of the bloody pile of pillows and blankets. Boxer twists
about to keep it in his sights as he tries to stand, but a weight moves over
him. He realizes what it is that tripped him as small, strong hands tug roughly
at his dress shirt. Vegeta, somehow, must have heard him coming and positioned
herself by the door to ambush him.
 
“Vegeta, quit,” he snaps. He manages to turn around, with her unintentional
help from yanking at his shirt. His friend’s eyes are glassy and alight with
crazed hunger. In person, he can see the gouges the woman had inflicted on
herself bleed sluggishly. The smell of iron is thick, but fails to distract him
from the strangely saccharine scent it’s competing against. Vegeta leans in and
rubs her face in his neck and the smell of her sweat plugs his nose. It’s sweet
and cloying in a way it’s never been before, and he wants to inhale lungfuls of
it, starts to before he catches himself.
 
“You quit,” she mumbles back. She gets frustrated with his squirming and
settles over him more securely, straddling his hips and pushing his shoulders
back. Boxer ignores the interested perk of his dick and pushes back, but his
efforts are in vain. Even dazed and with half-assed effort, her base strength
is still about a thousand times greater than his. He curses his clumsiness and
instead of fighting for a useless outcome against Vegeta, he starts to push his
heels against the floor until his head brushes against her stupid pillow fort.
 
Vegeta, who’d been occupying herself with ripping off the front of his pants
once he’d stopped struggling against her, looks up at him strangely when they
move across the room, but doesn’t do anything to stop him. Instead she nuzzles
- nuzzles! - her face into his bare chest and her scent hits him again. For a
moment, he questions why he’s trying so hard to resist this, can’t find a
reason to continue fighting when Vegeta licks a stripe from his navel to
nipple. His erection is jutting against the fabric of his underwear to rub at
the wetness between Vegeta’s thighs and she grinds down on it, hissing in
pained approval. He can feel her tail sluggishly rubbing his inner thigh.
 
The sound is sobering and Boxer knows, when he gets out of this, that he’ll
hate himself a bit. Vegeta isn’t wet because she wants this, wants him, she’s
like this because her biology is literally driving her fucking crazy. She’d
clawed out her privates trying to make the sensations stop and Boxer is the
lowest fucking trash for getting hard on the sensation of her gored womanhood.
 
Boxer’s head thumps back and closes his eyes; he feels hot and sick. He’s
starting to sweat under the tiny Saiyan and his body goes limp as Vegeta slowly
rotates her hips on his, rewarding his perceived compliance. He reaches back
with both arms, slips them under the blankets and slowly feels around for the
tranq gun; he doesn’t want to alert Vegeta to what he’s doing, but he also
doesn’t want the sensation of the woman he deeply cares for writhing on him to
stop. Vegeta must like the sight he makes because she hums and places a hand on
each of his biceps. She licks another stripe across his chest, this time ending
it by catching his nipple with her teeth before soothing it down with kiss. The
sting makes him thrust up and she lets out a breathy chuckle at the buck,
pushing down to increase the friction.
 
His mild participation seems to soothe her urgency. She slides a hand up his
arm and he stops moving that one, let’s her revel in the sensation of his skin
while her revels in hers. She’s warmer than usual and damp with sweat, but her
tan skin is soft and smooth over supple, strong flesh. He watches her face as
she leisurely explores him, but Vegeta’s focused on what she’s doing. Her eyes
are still glassy, but the crazy, hungry look is gone. Instead, she’s fascinated
as she twines her fingers with his, marveling the contrast of her tan, smooth
digits to his pale, spidery ones. She guides his hand to her face, lays it out,
and he wonders how she knows, wonders if his wants ever played out on his face
each time he stopped himself from doing this.
 
Vegeta pops his thumb in her mouth and sucks hard; Boxer jerks against her at
the feeling, breath stuttering, and she smirks and finally catches his gaze,
dark eyes teasing. He crooks his fingertips just the slightest, stealing a long
wanted carass. She retaliates by swiping a warm tongue over his thumb, before
pulling his hand away from her face until just the edges of his nails graze her
skin. She guides it down her body, pressing it closer the lower it gets and
fuck, what did they teach women in space?
 
His fingers brush her nipples and she shudders and relaxes her grip on him. Her
hand is over his when he palms a breast, but she isn’t coercing him; the motion
is his.
 
He’s the scummiest of perverts, but he knows that once she’s in her right mind,
she’ll shun him out of embarrassment, so he pauses his search for the the tranq
to enjoy the sensation. Boxer is harder than he’s ever been and the woman he
loves is naked in his lap, holding his hand to her chest. He could pretend, for
just a moment, that they’re both here because longing finally coalesced into
action. He drags his hand down, pausing over the tacky feeling of half-dried
blood.
 
“Princess, what did you do to yourself?”
 
“M’fine,” she replies and pushes closer to her friend.
 
“Vege-,” he stops when she pushes his hand down, his fingers skimming
dangerously over the bare skin of her slit.
 
“Look,” Vegeta says, pressing his digits in. He can feel her wetness coating
the pads of his fingers, can smell her arousal. It lends a salty taste the air,
blending with the sweetness of her sweat. Boxer twitches and the hand that’s
still under the blankets finally touches the tranq gun. He grasps it, but
doesn’t make a move to use it. His mind is going hazy and he’s forgetting any
reason he should try to stop himself from taking what he wants from Vegeta when
she’s so intent on giving it to him.
 
Boxer pushes closer to her, seeking her opening and gingerly slipping a finger
in when he finds it. She hums in appreciation, tail wrapping tight around his
thigh. With her eyes closed and head flung back, it’s the most open body
language he’s ever seen on her. His eyes map the terrain of Vegeta, takes in
the peaks of her breasts, the curves of her muscled body, and the crisscrossing
of scars. He looks down to the dip where her body touches his, where his hand
is currently seeking solace in her wet heat.
 
He pushes in a second digit and fingers her lightly - he can feel the abrasions
from her earlier self-mutilation and he doesn’t want to aggravate them. Vegeta
seems to disagree however, grinding against his palm with a frustrated huff. He
adjusts for her, scissoring his fingers before slipping in a third, using his
palm to cup her sex so that she can get more friction when she presses her clit
down. Boxer is rewarded with a hot groan and he leans up to chase it, peppering
kisses across her cleavage before taking a breast into his mouth. Her hands
tangle in his hair, holding him in place as he suckles and wriggles his fingers
against her hot flesh.
 
Using his fingers as a substitute, he mimics the way he’s only ever fantasized
about fucking her. The hand on the tranq gun tightens just as Vegeta’s pussy
clenches on him. Her orgasm hits her, dampening the shredded front of his pants
and making her hands and tail grip him painfully. Tears sting his eyes as he
bites into the flesh in his mouth, wanting to mark her, to put a claim as close
to her heart as he can. He lets her ride out her pleasure, easing his teeth out
of her as her body relaxes. She nibbles at the juncture where his neck and
shoulder meet. Her body still warm and slick, even if she’s calmer than before.
Her tail waves around lethargically before resting on his wrist.
 
It’s easy to ignore the sharp prick of her bite when he shoots the tranquilizer
into her side. She mumbles something as she slumps over, but it’s muffled by
his body and Boxer eases her down back onto her soft nest. Her tail offers
slight resistance when he pulls away from her and turns his back on her
unconscious form.
 
Hastily, the man drops the gun and shoves down the front of his underwear to
palm his dick. The hand he used to pleasure Vegeta is covered in a mix of her
cum and blood, and he licks the salt of her off his skin before slurping the
fluids from his fingers. His strokes are rough and unyielding as he jacks off,
the musky taste of Vegeta and yearning and regret dominating the warm shiver he
feels when he comes.
 
He tells himself his cheeks are wet with sweat.
 
===============================================================================
 
Half-heartedly, he mops up his jizz with the tattered remains of his shirt
after treating Vegeta’s wounds. Boxer knows there’s nothing he can really do,
that Vegeta will still catch the scent of him in the air. He does his best to
clean up anyway before sequestering himself out of the room.
 
Somehow, he makes it to his shower back home without running into anyone. The
water pounds down on him in a heavy torrent, but fails to rinse his sins down
the drain.
 
Boxer is a genius, a billionaire, a charity spokesman, the sexiest man alive,
and now, a cheater and a rapist. Even his oddly open relationship won’t exempt
him from Yamcha’s wrath once he finds out who left the stinging mark on Boxer’s
neck; the other man made it clear that he was supposed to stay the hell away
from Vegeta. And fuck, Vegeta - Vegeta will kill him, no questions about that.
She asked him to make sure no one with a dick, himself included, came close to
her during her rut, and he blundered that badly within the first few days.
 
They both trusted him and he let them down.
 
He finishes washing up and makes his way from the bathroom.  Before he pulls a
shirt on he takes a moment to assess the bite Vegeta left on him because it
hurts a lot more than expected. He’s surprised to find that a large portion of
his shoulder and neck are mottled black and blue. Boxer’s creamy skin is prone
to bruising, but this - this isn’t what his neck should look like from just a
love bite.
 
Whatever. He deserves worse.
 
Boxer rubs some salve on it and hopes for the best. Medical science isn’t his
forte, but he knows enough not to let it stay wet or get infected. He pulls on
his shirt as makes his way down to the kitchen to clean up from before, pausing
when he hears someone there. He expects to find his mother, but much to his
surprise and chagrin, he finds Yamcha instead.
 
“Hey,” he greets. “When did you get here?”
 
“A few minutes ago,” Yamcha replies. “You were in the shower, so I thought I’d
get ready. We can still have our date.”
 
“Oh.”
 
Yamcha quirks a brow, but doesn’t question his boyfriend’s odd behavior. He
returns to what he’s doing, leaving Boxer to stew in his guilt and unease.
 
He’s so lost in his thoughts that he doesn’t hear Yamcha until the man smacks
him on the arm. Boxer starts.
 
“Yeah? What’s up?” he questions. His boyfriend frowns.
 
“I said, did I do that to you?” Yamcha points at his neck.
 
Boxer’s heart leaps and he covers the bruise. He’s kind of freaked out, but
it’s the perfect opportunity to tell Yamcha the truth. He opens his mouth to
speak, but what comes out is a just disappointment.
 
“Yeah,” he chuckles. “Got a hard time for it actually.”
 
Yamcha smiles back and kisses him.
 
“Sorry, babe,” the baseball player hums. He takes Boxer’s hand. “Come on.”
 
Yamcha’s movie pick turns out to be Fatal Attraction and Boxer feels sick
throughout.
 
===============================================================================
 
Boxer slowly makes his way through the murk of the swamp, Raditz’s broad frame
haunching over him. The other Saiya-jin is unconscious, the same poison making
it’s way through his system having already left the other man inert. He
contemplates leaving him, but decides against it. He’s almost at the rendezvous
point, where he’ll get food and medical treatment and leave Raditz’s body in
the latrine for making Boxer carry his fat ass. The garrison that his battalion
had faced had been more prepared than his battalion commander counted on and
the siege for the capital had raged for over three sleepless days.
 
He needs to stop for a moment to catch his breathe and adjust Raditz. Sludge
squelches between his toes, but he’d rather make his way barefoot  than have
this crap lining the inside of his boots. Boxer tightens the cloth that ties
Raditz to him and adjusts the ki suppressor on his neck.
 
The royal warrior could curse Nappa’s big mouth. Because he went and boasted
about Boxer’s rapidly growing strength and how the young Saiya-jin’s squadron
was meeting the planetary quota more rapidly than many other groups, Frieza had
decided it would be necessary to place him on the front lines. To test his
merit and teach him new things, supposedly. And now he was strapped down with
this damn suppressor and a dumbass battle companion.
 
Sweat makes his clothes cling to his body while he continues to make his way to
the rendezvous. Raditz must have gained about fifty pounds since the last time
Boxer had to carry him like this and added onto Boxer’s mounting dizziness from
the poison and lack of food and sleep, the idea of looting and ditching the
other grows more appealing.
 
A soft snap makes Boxer pause.
 
He pretends to adjust his clothes as he turns his head slightly and extends his
senses, looking and listening and trying to catch a scent. There’s no wind to
block sound or carry scent, but the ripeness and currents of the water would do
well to mask anyone trying to sneak up on him. More slowly than before, he goes
forward, anticipating an attack.
 
He doesn’t wait long. Movement catches his eye and Boxer catches the knife
flung at him before using it to parry another out the air. He loosens the tie
that holds Raditz to him and the meatbag drops into the shallow water with a
thump. Hopefully, he’ll drown and Boxer can cut his losses.
 
Another knife flies at him and he catches that one in his free hand and
spinning gracefully, sends it back to its owner. A cry alerts him to his
victory right as clawed hand rises from the deeper waters to swipe at him.
Boxer manages to dodge, stabbing the arm of the person before hauling them out
of the water.
 
His eyes widen. The person before him is child, a few years younger than
himself and obviously high on war paint; the transdermal fluid sticks to the
boy’s chest, turning green skin sickly white. The kid gnashes his teeth and
flings himself at Boxer with a cry, inciting the others with him to attack the
Saiya-jin as well.
 
The battle is a short, but excerting one. Without use of his ki, it takes Boxer
about ten minutes to completely defeat the team of twenty-seven. When it’s
over, Boxer loots them for the war paint and checks on Raditz. Unfortunately,
he’s still alive so Boxer reattaches him to his back. Snatching up a knife from
one of the fallen soldiers, he cuts a thin hash of lines across his temple and
another on his wrist before rubbing some of the war paint on the wounds.
 
He makes his way more quickly than before, adrenaline and the stimulant lending
him some pep. It’s just past nightfall when Boxer makes it back to camp and
after dropping off Raditz at the ship’s medical bay and refreshing himself with
food and a bath, Boxer is able to find himself a private room.
 
Pulling out the his pack, he measures the war paint he managed to smuggle in.
There’s only about three kantas, but if he’s careful, he can make it last a few
months. He carefully siphons most of the liquid into a small nondescript hand
cream bottle. After that, Boxer pulls down his pants and rubs the remaining war
paint onto a cut he makes near his genitalia - so long as Frieza stays away,
it’s the best place to hide the discoloration.
 
Laying down, he closes his eyes and enjoys the high encompassing him. The throb
at his core, being the site of intake, is nice and feels almost visceral, like
a warm vice has wrapped around him.
 
Opening his eyes again, Boxer is given pause. He’s not on a PTO stationed
starship, but rather in a familiarly lit room. There’s a soft nest of blankets
supporting him and a sweet smell in his nose, nothing at all like the stench of
dirty soldiers in a cramped spacecraft. There’s a rustle of movement by his
side as something settles over him. He tenses, ready to fight, but relaxes
again once he realizes that it’s only Vegeta.
 
Vegeta.
 
Boxer quickly sits up in alarm and the alien braces her hands on his chest.
 
“Vegeta, what - ?”
 
She cuts him off with kiss, wrapping her limbs around him. Boxer notices that
the sensation is that of flesh against flesh; there’s not a stitch of clothing
between them. Vegeta’s tongue sweeps into his mouth, her sweet scent filling
his lungs. He moans at the taste of her, sucks at her bottom lip as she pulls
away. He can’t recall why he felt the urgency to flee only moments before. He’s
happy where he is.
 
“You dreamt my dreams and came back,” she whispered against his mouth.
 
“Back?” he replies. Sliding one hand up her back, he cups her ass with the
other and squeezes. Amazing. He pushes her closer and lays back down with her
still astride him and pushes his face into her hair. She smells good, like a
bakery. He’s never known Vegeta to wear perfume or makeup , but he’s glad she
doesn’t. It would be a crime to mask this smell.
 
She hums in agreement and sits up to address him. “You left earlier, but now
you’re here.”
 
The man has no clue what she’s talking about, but her nipples are in his face
and that takes precedence anyway. Licking one, he let’s go of her butt with a
promise to himself to return to it, and cups the other. Vegeta presses her
warm, lithe body closer. Boxer feels warm too, almost feverish, but it’s not a
hindrance. Instead he wants to move, to fill up the girl on top him so that the
feeling is satiated rather than banished.
 
Vegeta rolls them over so that she’s the one her back and Boxer is happy to let
her, settling between her spread thighs and thrusting softly against her. She
arches up a bit and Boxer can taste her satisfaction in the air, sweet like the
smell of her sweet. He mouths along the line of her abs, sucking a kiss into
her navel. Palming at her breast with one hand and himself with the other, he’s
torn between wanting to fuck her hard and wanting to tease her with foreplay.
 
When the alien wriggles impatiently, he makes his choice and sits back. He can
see the protests coming when she frowns, but he quiets her by tapping on her
hips.
 
“C’mere,” he mutters pulling her lower body up. Vegeta obliges him, scooting
down so that he can maneuver her legs over his shoulders. He want’s to look
down at her as he does this to her, doesn’t want to miss a single reaction that
she has to him. He wants to take in everything she has and treasure it.
 
Kissing the smooth insides of her thighs, he takes a moment to check her over
as a flash of recall shows her in a bloody state.
 
She’s fine now, clean and safe. There are scratches around her womanhood, but
they’re not the gory nightmare he remembers. Letting it go, he noses closer and
catches her eye as he tongues a slow trail up her slit.
 
He likes her reaction; her shallow breath stutters, as do her hips and she
spreads herself open in encouragement. He does it again, rougher this time and
swabbing her clit with his tongue. Boxer likes her taste and starts to chase
it, suckling and flicking his tongue on the hooded nub to get her wetter before
licking into her pussy to imbibe the juice.
 
His princess is making delicious little noises as he tongue fucks her, gasps
and little moans of encouragement. He has to fight her to keep her still,
pulling her bottom off the ground to remove her leverage. Boxer is aware that
he only does it because she lets him, but he relishes that too, because she let
him.
 
Rising from under her, her tail rests around his shoulders, softly keeping his
face pulled into the cunt he’s currently devouring. He slides his hands over as
much of her as he can, cupping her tits and and tracing up and down her curved
waist as he laps at her. Vegeta braces her weight on her shoulders and grinds
onto his face and he hums at her. Good girl, he thinks, watching her take her
pleasure in abandon. Just like that.
 
He eats her out until he can no longer ignore his aching cock. He needs some
relief so that he doesn’t nut the minute he slides into her.
 
The heat under his skin has abated somewhat and his head feels clearer. He
leans down some, pushing Vegeta’s hips back down. She fights him, like always,
and he has to bite her thigh to get her to stop. Her tail tightens idly around
his neck in retaliation and he smiles at the playful threat. Boxer smooths a
finger along the appendage as he unravels it and lets it twine around his wrist
when he settles her hips on the ground, her legs on either side of him. He
thoughtfully wipes at the juices on his chin.
 
Still sitting up, Boxer surveys the warrior princess lying prostrate before
him. She’s being unusually accommodating to his whims, watching the engineer
with relaxed interest and he wonders briefly what he can get her to do in this
mood.
 
He thumbs at her clit and her tail squeezes reflexively, shifting the bones of
his wrist. Immediately, he retracts his hand and glares.
 
“Watch it,” he growls. “I’ll stop.”
 
“I’ll kill you.”
 
He scoffs and turns his attention back to the juncture of her thighs. His penis
twitches angrily at him, precum beading thickly on the tips. He obliges it and
teasingly, he rubs the head of his dick against her clit and sighs in relief at
the pleasure that thrums through him. It releases a little of building
pressure. He dry humps her slowly for a few thrusts.
 
It takes him by surprise when she suddenly sits up and grabs at him. He stills
slightly and prays he didn’t do anything to suddenly upset her - he doesn’t
think it will be pleasant to bleed to death because she ripped his penis off.
 
She’s not upset though, and gingerly she strokes him, staring hard at the scene
before glancing at him with hooded, uncertain eyes. He doesn’t say anything,
just thrusts lightly into her hand, watching her watch him. It’s arousing, the
way she tempers herself for him, wanting to touch to show affection rather than
to do harm.
 
He leans forward to kiss her again, let’s her taste herself in his mouth.
Resting his forehead on her shoulder, he watches her tentative strokes for bit.
It’s as if he was in pain for so long he didn’t notice until he was given
relief by her touch. The tension drains away with each shy stroke and before
long, he finds himself touching her back.
 
The inside of his princess feels like hot, wet velvet around his fingers. This
isn’t like the desperate probing from before. Instead it’s more of courtesy
call - he wants her stretched and ready to take him.
 
Leisurely, he finger fucks her, brushing the edges of her walls. He doesn’t
feel any injuries inside of her, briefly marvels over Saiyan biology again.
Rocking into her strong grip, Boxer closes his eyes and luxuriates in the feel
of touching and being touched by Vegeta.
 
Soon, Boxer lets himself rest on her, pushing her back down. She bears his
weight so easily it’s almost reflexive and doesn’t resist as when he pulls
away. Instead, Vegeta loops her arms around his shoulders and spreads herself
wider for him.
 
The furry appendage is still loosely wound around his wrist when he takes
himself in hand and guides himself to her opening. The tip of his penis brushes
against her tentatively and he alternates between watching her face and
watching the slow penetration. Vegeta’s core is deliciously tight, and the
state of her sex life, something he hadn’t actually thought about until now,
teases his imagination.
 
When he’s finally sheathed inside her, he pulls away from her tail to brace
himself, and takes a moment to look her over. Her eyes are closed and her head
is arched back, but she doesn’t seem to be in any pain. Or, if she is, it’s the
kind that she bears easily. Dark lashes part to reveal sable eyes and Boxer is
knocked breathless at the hot desire he finds there. His princess clenches and
pushes against him, and Boxer chuckles softly before he begins to fuck Vegeta
in earnest.
 
They’re coupled for a long time, both of them enjoying the drag of their bodies
against each other before Vegeta starts to slip back into the crazed need for
cock she had earlier. With her urging him to come, Boxer finds himself falling
into a similar haze.
 
Before long, he’s pulling back and pulling out, manhandling her onto her hands
and knees. Before she could utter a protest, he thrusts back into her harshly
and pistons his hips. Vegeta cries out, in ecstasy or agony; Boxer is hitting
her deeper, the head of his cock pounding against her cervix. Leaning over,
pressing his chest to her back, he reaches over to strum at her clit. He wants
her to cum again before he does.
 
Vegeta, fucking bless her, is pushing her ass back into him while she bears the
brunt of his weight. Not wanting be outdone by her efforts, Boxer pushes harder
against her clit and nips at her neck where his face is buried. She must like
it; seconds after he bites down again, he feels her squeeze tight around him, a
long, lusty sound rising from her throat.
 
Taking the cue, the scientist begins to fuck erratically, his hips slapping
into her backside. He clutches her tightly where his hands touch her and his
teeth bury in her neck when he cums. Fucking magnificent. Pleasure makes a home
along his spine and he pulls Vegeta closer to him. He continues thrusting,
riding his orgasm, his movements slowing until he’s only grinding softly.
 
Vegeta, having held her position during his frenzy, slowly lowers herself to
the ground. She doesn’t complain when he stays with her, refusing to budge as
he continues his grinding and gentle stroking of her clit. It’s overwhelmingly
wet inside of her, both of their releases having mixed together. When he
finally pulls out, he props her hips up and puts his face at her opening. The
hole, having been stretched to what felt like its limit to accommodate him, has
contracted back to a size no bigger around than a pencil. Boxer’s mouth waters
the slightest bit as he watches pearly liquid slowly ooze out.
 
Dark eyes observe him as he swipes at the cum, pushing it back in as more
escapes. He continues to play with it until Vegeta’s tail, having been slicing
slowly through the air, grips his hand and guides him away. Boxer lets himself
be pulled until he’s lying face-to-face with Vegeta. The alien watches him for
a moment before turning to face the other way, her body relaxing as she lets
unconsciousness descend upon her.
 
The air is heavy with smell of sex and the sound of Vegeta’s soft deep
breathing. As Boxer gazes at her, a dull sense of alarm plagues him - what have
I done? - but it’s hold on him is fleeting and weak. Instead of trying to
follow the feeling, Boxer scoots closer to Vegeta and gathers her body to his.
She allows it easily, relaxed by endorphins and the tug of sleep.
 
He holds her tight.
 
===============================================================================
 
They fuck another three times while he’s there, before Vegeta’s rut abruptly
comes to an end, and all of those times leave Boxer busting harder than he’s
ever had since he lost his virginity.
 
When he joins her in the small shower, he keeps the promise he made to himself
about returning to her ass, licking into her puckered hole until she begs him
to fuck her. He takes her hard in the confined space, upset when the spray
washes away his cum. Later, after the server bots bring dinner, he covers her
in ice cream and laps up the sticky rivulets it makes when it melts. He
memorizes the sound of her unabashed laughter when he nuzzles and nibbles at
her ribs, before she pushes him away to train.
 
The Saiyan scoffs at him when she can only go up to 3x gravity, but she trains
anyway. Boxer is enraptured that she can twist and spring about so lightly
while he’s splayed out on the floor, unable to move his body when he weighs
almost six hundred pounds. He watches her until she decides she wants to play
with him, and then he’s pleading with her to turn the gravity off so he can
touch her. Laughing at his plight, she only mounts him and pulls up his head so
that he can enjoy the view of her legs bracketing his Adonis’ belt. He comes
embarrassingly quick from her riding him, delighting at being helpless under
her control far too much.
 
Sitting astride the man, with him still inside her and plugging his release,
she plays games with him and asks him questions. In punishment, she clenches
her pussy tight and administers light chokes when he loses or tells a lie. It’s
like an extremely sexy version of how they initially became friends. Boxer cums
again and is exhausted by the time she finally turns off the gravity. They
sleep on the cot, her hot body covering his, both of them covered in a thin
sheen of sweat despite the room’s air conditioning.
 
They wake when breakfast comes and, while they’re still under the influence of
Vegeta’s rut, the burning anxiety that drives their couplings has cooled. Boxer
convinces her to be lazy with him after they eat, and she does despite how
twitchy she gets from lack of stimulus. After a while of letting her go stir
crazy from their idle spooning, Boxer decides to throw her a bone. He runs his
hands over body until she’s wet and pliant, and then he’s fucking up into her,
slowly rocking them both to orgasm. Once again, he stays inside her after
cumming, despite never having had that fetish before, and savors the feeling of
Vegeta’s flesh surrounding him.
 
Lucidity comes and goes, but never stays long enough for Boxer to figure out
why he’s having mild panic attics.
 
===============================================================================
 
Planets, when they are destroyed, make a beautiful sight, something akin to a
diminutive supernova. The dust, hot magma, light and heat released by the
suddenly depressurized core stretch out into the vacuum, like the planet is
reaching out to leave a mark in its final moments. From his space pod, Boxer
enjoys the display of light wrought from his destructive way; it’s the last
thing he sees before the gas in his pod finally pulls him into unconsciousness.
 
He’s quite literally kicked awake, slamming into a padded wall with the force
to knock the breath right out of him. Before he can gather himself, hands grip
him by the neck and push him back into the wall. The image of Vegeta, dressed
in all black casual clothes, swims before him; he ponders briefly what has his
woman so riled up.
 
Then he remembers and feels sick.
 
Vegeta must notice the moment he realizes because she drops him then, stepping
back as he fell forward. She glares at him, fists clenched so hard that
droplets of blood are falling down from them. Her body trembles and Boxer
thinks she’s going to hit him again, hopes she does, but the alien only steps
back farther.
 
He can see the moment she pulls on that cold mask, knows that this isn’t Vegeta
his snarky, grumpy friend, but Vegeta the scary, frigid bitch.
 
“Get out,” her voice is harsh, but even.
 
Boxer doesn’t even try to argue, just gathers his clothes - where they’d been
abandoned by the door - and heads out. He hesitates in the doorway, looking
back at her. She seems completely coherent, so in a quiet voice, he tells her
the code she needs to override the inside lock, and hastily departs.
 
Outside Vegeta’s house, he pulls his clothes on and checks his watch. Two days
have past since he lost his fucking mind and Boxer lets out a put-upon sigh. He
checks his pockets, and finds his capsulized hover car, so he pulls it out and
drives home.
 
He’s worried about what he’ll find there. Well over forty-eight hours have
passed since he’s disappeared without so much as a by-your-leave. He’s made no
contact with his family or his work whatsoever. Thankfully, he hadn’t had any
important meetings lined up, but his lack of presence is sure to have made
people talk. He hopes his dad stepped in long enough to calm the chatter and
make sure no one went public with the story.
 
Sure enough, when he walks into the foyer of his home, reeking of sex and
sweat, he can hear his parents and Yamcha, answering the questions from people
who are probably the police. The chatter stops as he makes his way into the
room and immediately, his mom latches onto him, crying. His dad and (likely
soon to be ex) boyfriend greet him with questions of his safety. He assures
them all that he’s fine, yes he realizes how scared they were, no he didn’t
intend to do this.
 
When he manages to escape his mother’s clutches, he sits down, facing the two
cops that had waited out the reunion and mentally braces himself. He answers
all their questions smoothly, handling it the way he would a press conference.
He tells them that he had just gone out for a short, impromptu adventure and
ended up knocking himself out. He goes over the details with them again and
again, careful not to change any details of his story; the man has never been
more grateful for his eidetic memory.
 
Part of him wants to offer himself up, hold out his wrists and say “Here I am!
Arrest me, for I am a rapist. I forced myself on my best friend.”
 
He knows it will be a useless endeavor however, given who and what his victim
is, and so he keeps his guilt to himself. The cops finally leave, advising him
to tell others where he’s going and to be careful. Boxer gives them his nicest
smile and assures them he’s learned his lesson well, shaking their hands and
willing to kiss their damn babies if it will get them the fuck out of his
house.
 
His mother shuts the door after them and turns to regard him. It’s odd to see
Bunny so serious; he knows he can never be described as anything other than a
daddy’s boy, having always been underfoot of his father’s work, but his mom has
always been the better parent at reading him.
 
“What really happened, son?” her sweet voice calls and Boxer deflates, looking
down.
 
The need to curl up in his mom’s arms and let her kiss away his problems is
strong, but Boxer isn’t a child anymore, hasn’t needed to be treated like one
in a long time. He looks back at his mother.
 
“Mom, do you think you can take Dad out? I need to talk with Yamcha,” he
replies.
 
The older woman assesses him for a moment longer before nodding in compliance.
She goes and he can hear her titter away at his dad. Soon enough, his parents
join him by the door, pulling on their coats. His dad claps him gently on the
shoulder, nodding at his son before he leaves. The man is left alone and takes
a moment to prepare himself.
 
With dread, Boxer takes a deep breath and heads back to the living room.
 
===============================================================================
 
After Yamcha storms out, Boxer goes to the kitchen and gets an ice pack for his
face.
 
He had told the other man as much as he could, about the house he made for
Vegeta, about going to visit her after she ‘moved in’, about how the
relationship had changed. He didn’t mention anything about the rut or how it
had influenced his behavior. It wasn’t his business to share and he doubts
Vegeta would take too kindly to being seen as a victim. So instead, Boxer makes
her carry the burden of being a homewrecker, wishing he could take all the
blame.
 
Yamcha had listened in stony silence and then, quite abruptly, slammed his fist
into Boxer’s face. While Boxer had expected the hit, it still took him by
surprise. After punching him, the man had coldly told him it was over and left.
 
Tenderly, he feels his nose as he trudges to his bedroom. Best news of the day,
his nose isn’t broken. Judging by the wet sting of his mouth, though, he must
have a split lip.
 
Boxer ignores the mirror in his bathroom in favor of washing the events of past
two days off. It’s a short shower, the scientist not wanting to waste any time
in fear of being reminded of the last shower he took.
 
Towel around his waist, the man finally looks over his face. As expected, he
has a busted, swollen lip. There’s a gash across his nose where Yamcha’s
baseball ring had cut him and already purple bruises are blossoming on his
right cheek and eye.
 
When he finally takes note of his neck and chest, he groans. No wonder the cops
had seemed so reluctant to believe his story: a ring of red and yellow bruises
cover his neck and his torso is a mottled medley of colors from where Vegeta’s
foot had greeted it. He twists to take in his back. Luckily the padding on the
wall had prevented any bruising there and Vegeta had, surprisingly enough,
taken care not to kick him so hard that she broke anything. Boxer just hopes he
doesn’t have any internal bleeding and gingerly makes his way to bed.
 
What a lovely fucking day, he thinks to himself as he stretches out. Both of
the people he loved had literally left their marks on him and promptly
discarded him after, and now Boxer’s own guilt and self-loathing are taking
their turn to beat him up. Boxer closes his eyes and sighs. He pulls the
blanket over himself and does his best to clear his mind, willing himself to
sleep.
 
He doesn’t dream anything that night.
 
***** {PART II: Germinate} *****
Chapter Summary
     She can't really control herself around him, and that's Vegeta's
     biggest ire. Boxer ignites her.
Chapter Notes
     Sorry about how long this took. There were about five rewrites and
     then a bout of dejection in which I somewhat seriously considered
     putting this up for adoption. I wanted to address certain things
     without making it too triggery for readers as well as make this a
     believable transition of perspective for fem!Vegeta. I'm not one
     hundred percent satisfied, but hopefully I was able to convey this in
     a way that readers find enjoyable.
===============================================================================
 
Heat from the sun pounds down on Vegeta like a hammer against an anvil. She
supposes that there is little else she could be, having gotten so used to being
struck down on.
 
The Saiya-jin princess tilts her head back and allows the star to warm her;
below the bluff she sits on, she can hear the pounding of the water as it
breaks softly against the rocks. She likes it here, the heavy vegetation, the
sharp crags, and the spray of sea. The alien can admit it’s one of the prettier
places this mudball boasts. Actually, no. The planet itself is quite beautiful
and the variety of climates make it interesting. It’s the sentient life that
resides here that fucks it up.
 
Not like that makes it any different from the rest of the universe.
 
Standing and stretching, the alien undresses, taking another moment to absorb
the sunlight before diving into the cool water below. She’s hungry and she’s
hoping to find one of those big, grey fish with the teeth again - the last one
had a lot of meat and almost no bones to pick out.
 
Vegeta had never pegged herself for a coward, but she’s knows that’s what she’s
being; still, facing the harsh reality that awaits her is not something she
particularly wants to do, so she hunts instead. Killing is an easy way to pass
the time until her problems can no longer be ignored.
 
Almost immediately after that insipid blue-haired man left her side, the
warrior woman had taken off, no longer able to stand the stench of their
coupling that lingered in the air. The two weeks that she’d spent away had been
uninterrupted, aside from that one odd spat with Kakarot when the other Saiya-
jin intercepted her on her way to a desert canyon. He might have been alarmed
at the fury leaking from her ki and showed up merely to make sure she didn’t go
on a rampage; either way, she hadn’t slowed, punching him in the gut instead
and inciting a fight that waged for about four hours until both their stomachs
rang out in hunger. He left her then, with a stupid pat on the back, as though
they were friends and a doubly-meant warning for her to be careful.
 
Tch. Idiot.
 
She sought peace by training in the wilderness (although it provided little
challenge if she didn’t get creative), wandering, and hunting to abet the bouts
of furious bloodlust that would seize her. Overcome by one of these fits of
pique, Vegeta had broken her tail off at the base with her hands, leaving her
lower back painfully sore over the next few days. She’d only come across this
little island recently, with its dense jungle and lack of human trash. The
sounds of the ocean all around and the harsh sun bearing down were reprieves
from her own troubled thoughts.
 
Her days are filled with monotony and her nights are filled with dreams about
strawberries and a much younger Kakarot. It drives her mad.
 
She doesn’t find any of those large fish (she makes a note to find out what
they are), but she does catch a few of what she recognizes as sea turtles, a
long, ugly eel, and a large flat fish with a whiplike tail. She gorges herself
on the meat before bed, not bothering to cook anything aside from the turtles,
and uses the blood as a means to rehydrate, too lazy to go to the river she
found.
 
About an hour later, she’s jolted awake, stomach heaving in rebellion. Vegeta
manages to make it to some shrubbery about six meters away before she’s forced
to her knees, vomit spewing violently from her mouth. Shivers from cramped
muscles rack her body, for minutes or hours she’s unsure, until there is
nothing left to release but bile and then dry coughs. She places a hand on her
flat, cobbled belly, willing it to be still. Swiping angrily at her watery
eyes, the warrior rises and makes her way back to camp to gather what little
she brought.
 
She supposes her problems can no longer be ignored.
 
===============================================================================
 
It’s quiet, aside from the sound of a keyboard clacking in the scientist’s lab.
Vegeta mentally scoffs at how unaware the man could be of his surroundings,
thinking how easily she could kill him if she wanted to. She probably would,
except then she would have to deal with this alone. No, there would be no easy
way out for him - he deserves to suffer too.
 
The scientist has little speakers covering his ears, unable to hear or see her
as she stands just behind him in the shadows. It used to be fun for Vegeta to
sneak up on him and scare the wits out of him, so she reaches out to grab the
back of his chair and yank him around to face him. Boxer gives an undignified
squeak as he’s turned around, eyes wide as they meet hers. A man crooning about
a runaway lover fills the room when the plug is yanked out of his computer and
she pulls away from his proximity.
 
“Vegeta!” the teal haired scientist gasps, “Where the hell have you been?”
 
The proud princess ignores his question in favor of looking at his screen. His
face evokes bitter fury, so she finds the best solution is to forgo looking at
it.
 
“What are you doing?” she asks instead. Boxer frowns at her for ignoring him.
 
“I’m arranging for shipments of food capsules to go to West City food banks,”
he replies. “What have you been doing?”
 
Again, Vegeta ignores him. Nothing she does is any of his business, certainly
not anymore. She turns her back to him again.
 
“I’ll be in my room,” she states primly. It’s the most civil invitation to talk
she can give him. If he’s too stupid to take it up, that’s on him.
 
Her room is as stark, neat, and unwelcoming as it has ever been, but Vegeta was
never one for harboring worldly possessions. The only things she really owned
was the threadbare uniform and broken armor from Namek that she kept tucked
away in the closet. Although she had liked the house, she didn’t want to return
to it - it stood as a mausoleum for one of her biggest fuck ups yet. She much
preferred the barrenness of her old room and the militaristic comfort it
provided.
 
The alien princess goes about her business, showering and getting ready to
sleep. She’s exhausted and the bed beckons her like a good, hearty meal. She
doesn’t wait for Boxer - she doesn’t care what he does - but she needs some
small creature comfort to discuss her dreaded condition. By the time the
scientist makes it to her room, Vegeta has tucked herself in and has her eyes
closed.
 
Lingering in the doorway, Boxer shuffles his feet a bit, unsure of what to do
until Vegeta gets annoyed with his uncertainty.
 
“Are you just going to stand there and gawk or are you coming in?” she snaps.
Boxer jumps at the sound of her voice. Clearly, he had not expected her to be
awake.
 
The scientist shuts the door behind him and quietly makes his way to her desk
chair. He doesn’t say anything after he sits. Vegeta can hear him fidgeting,
but she refuses to look at.
 
“Vegeta,” he pauses, nervous. “Vegeta, are you -?”
 
“Yes.”
 
Another long pause. The silence is nearly palpable and Vegeta wonders if she
could hear the man’s heartbeat if she focused hard enough. Minutes pass as
Boxer digests the information. She doesn’t think he’s surprised by it, but more
that the fuckery of it all is no longer so surreal to him. She waits and, with
a deep breath, he finally speaks up.
 
“What do you want to do?”
 
It’s her turn to pause. Vegeta hadn’t really thought about it, but then, had
she really needed to? The tenant in her womb hadn’t really registered with her
because she didn’t want it to.
 
“I want it gone.”
 
===============================================================================
 
After their talk, Vegeta picks up her training where she left off, utilizing
the old gravity chamber and pushing the machine to it’s limits. She only leaves
to eat or shower or demand the occasional repair or deal with the medical exams
Boxer insists upon; she’s taken to sleeping in the gravity chamber with the
machine settled to 200x - rarely does simulator fall below this number. The
drag on her body is a distraction and a burden and a punishment. Vegeta had
fucked up and she would not let herself forget it.
 
It should have been obvious to her that her rut could have affected Boxer.
Nappa had warned her about staying away from him and Raditz during her first
rut for that very reason (something Raditz had been unhappy about, but alas,
Frieza would have killed her if she had gotten pregnant then), sending her away
to deal it in solitude. And Kakarot’s whiny brat was proof that Saiya-jin’s
could effectively breed with the trash on this planet. Still, Kakarot was a man
- how was she to know that Saiya-jins and humans had enough in common that the
native males here could go into a rut frenzy? The bite on her neck tingled.
 
And that. Vegeta scowled. She refused to even look at the meanings behind the
unhealed mark Boxer left on her neck the first time they coupled or why she’s
been dreaming his - and she knows they’re his because she would never be so
unambitious as to waste a dragon balls wish on strawberries - dreams ever
since.
 
You bit him first, her traitorous mind supplied. He was only answering the call
of your dreams.
 
Vegeta’s angry frown deepened as she practiced a perfect crescent kick. That
was his fault too. She warned him to stay away, that she wouldn’t be in her
right mind. And she hadn’t been. What other reason did she have to initiate a
pact with him? He was a pervert and she wouldn’t have touched him otherwise.
 
Vegeta’s isn’t unaware of Boxer desire for her, she just doesn’t understand it.
From what she’s always known, men take what they want from those too weak to
stop them - other men, women, kids - and they took it painfully. To be strong,
you had to be ruthless, and she’s never known a weak man for long. Her fists
whip through the air quickly, ending with a sharp, solid snaps.
 
But Boxer wasn’t ruthless. He made her things, provided her with shelter and
food, stood vigil by her sickbed, and when she had been more acquiescent, he
gave her his time. He did it all without her needing to ask and never demanded
anything in return. Those aren’t the things you do with someone you want to
fuck, those are the things you do with really good comrades.
 
He made Vegeta uneasy.
 
Frustrated, the Saiya-jin goes to the controls and ratchets the gravity up to
500x. She wants to put Boxer out of her mind, to ease herself away from any
thoughts concerning anything that wasn’t her training.
 
Immediately, she feels sluggish and pained. The sudden jump in gravity means
she now weighs over five thousand pounds when before she was only around three
thousand five hundred. The drag of almost a ton makes her bones creak and and
her ears pop. Her head aches from the pressure, but Vegeta forces herself to
push through the shackles of her body and move. She’s not weak, she’s never
been weak. Even beaten down and taken by Frieza, a position that would have
made lesser being break, hadn’t made her weak.
 
The princess activates the training bots too. She needs to focus, and what
better way to hone your concentration than fighting for your life? Death
battles had never failed her, or let her down, or betrayed her.
 
The increased settings only ran for about a minute into her warm up before a
loud beeping noise sounded. Boxer’s face filled up a previously blank screen.
 
“Vegeta, could you come up to my lab for a minute? I need to run through some
things with you.”
 
Silence. Vegeta does twenty more perfect push-ups - the slow, painful kind that
has her nose brushing the floor and her back in neat, crisp line. Boxer watches
her with increasing ire and Vegeta bites back a smirk when she hears him suck
his teeth.
 
“Vegeta, come on or I’ll activate the emergency shutdown.”
 
Tch. A middle finger and a ball of ki are flung at the screen.
 
“Asshole,” the alien mutters and shuts down the gravity chamber, letting
herself enjoy the slow release as her body readjusts. The training bots, having
whirled to life when she destroyed the screen, retreated to their stations in
the wall. Vegeta takes her time settling; she would never admit it, but since
she’s been doing her best to avoid Boxer and the drama of her current
condition, she’s nervous to go seek him out and address it. After the chamber
is off, she idly makes her way to the scientist’s lab, literally stopping to
smell the roses a few a time and taking about ten minutes longer to arrive than
she normally would.
 
The effects of her dawdling are evident before she even opens the door, sensing
the irritated flaring of Boxer’s ki out in the hallway. He’s glaring intently
at the door when she arrives, hunched over with his hands clasped in his lap
and his foot tapping impatiently. Sitting up immediately, he shoots her a
sarcastic smile.
 
“How wonderful of her highness to finally grace little, old me with her
presence,” he croons. Vegeta’s eyes narrow at the antagonism, but refuses to
let him get to her.
 
“At least you’re appreciative,” she deadpans and sits down in a rolling chair
some feet away from him. “What do you want?”
 
Immediately, he sobers up and slips into professional mode - Vegeta would be
impressed if she didn’t hate him so much at the moment.
 
“I know you’re preferring the idea of an abortion,” he starts and the alien has
to stop herself from tensing at his casual mention of the pregnancy. “I’ve been
looking into human methods of inducing one and going over the medical charts I
have on you and the Sons to find the safest and most effective one.”
 
Vegeta nods at him to continue when he takes a pause.
 
“And I don’t think any of them would work,” sensing her growing irritation,
Boxer shoots her a dirty look so she wouldn’t interrupt and continued. “Trying
to chemically induce one would be too risky because of the unknown variables -
the effects that it could have on your endocrine system if we used hormones or
vitamin c overdoses to cause contractions in the uterus may or may not be
permanent - if it even works. As for more physical methods -”
 
“The child’s defensive ki would render them useless,” Vegeta completes,
recalling the scans that Boxer had been concerned about the last time he did a
physical. A heavy feeling settles at the base of her spine, sending a spike of
panic and dismay through her, even as her face remained blank.
 
Boxer nods and pulls up something on his screen. “So now, I’m consulting you.
Is there anything at all that you remember about Saiyan pregnancies and
abortions? I know you once mentioned something about birthing pods.”
 
Vegeta shakes her head. “The pods were used a means to bolster the populations
while the battalion units remained intact. None of the females on the field
would be pregnant or in a rut, and we would still have the ability reproduce
safely since the fetuses would be grown in a nutrient rich environment. I doubt
your planet’s technology would have the proper extraction means.”
 
Boxer looks away from the files he’s scrolling through to shoot her an
affronted look. “Test tube babies aren’t anything new on Chikyuu, Vegeta.”
 
“No, they’re not,” she agrees. “But aren’t those brats typically grown from
stem cells or extracted haploids? And then put into a surrogate womb. Saiyan
woman aren’t like that. We only release a few ova in our lifetimes and unlike
the females on your planet, they’re created just before our ruts. We don’t have
them at all times. Also, the zygotes were extracted mere days after a confirmed
fertilization on Vegeta-sei, before ki defenses could go up. Same with the rare
abortion.”
 
“A luxury we don’t have,” Boxer deflates and stops rapidly reading what’s on
the computer screen. He pinches the bridge of his nose. “Fuck.”
 
“Fuck indeed,” Vegeta nods in agreement. “But then, that’s the reason we’re in
this bullshit, isn’t it?”
 
Boxer looks up at the bitter tone and gazes steadily at her; he’s sporting that
unreadable expression he often has when dealing with her and Vegeta hates that
she has no idea what that tender, exposed look is supposed to mean. The stench
of guilt roils off of him and his voice is soft when he addresses her.
 
“I’m sorry, Princess,” he murmurs and Vegeta internally winces at the
affectionate way he always uses her title. “This is my fault. I know you hate
me, but I promise you, I will fix this.” He looks determined, the way he always
does when faced with a particularly daunting challenge, reminding the Saiya-jin
woman of one of the reasons she allowed him to consider her his friend at all.
He’s a fighter.
 
“Come on,” he smiles tiredly at her. “Tell me more about Saiyan prenatal
medicine and family planning.”
 
She does - what little she can recall that made sense from Nappa’s reminiscing,
but she can’t help but feel they’re on a fool’s errand. That heavy feeling
sitting on her spine reaches out, stretching it’s cold fingers and settling
along her engaged nerves like a monstrous centipede. Vegeta doesn’t think this
will end well for her or the little source of ki growing in her belly.
 
===============================================================================
 
Light kisses trail up her back as she runs her tongue along the apex of the
club-goer’s thighs, the pretty woman’s breathy moans stuttering as she watched
Yamcha bite hickeys along the back Vegeta’s shoulder. Her pelvis thrusts up
into Vegeta’s face, annoying her briefly, but Vegeta uses her larger frame to
press the woman back down. Yamcha helps, leaving his partner to yank the
woman’s arms up and securing them quickly to the headboard; his naked frame
towers over her diminutive form once he’s done, plundering her mouth in a
manner similar to how Vegeta plunders her cunt.
 
The sight makes Vegeta ache, hard and heavy, and she sits up to pull Yamcha
into a kiss, running her tongue along the edges of his lips so that she can
deposit the taste of the woman’s sex in his mouth. Yamcha moans into her mouth,
rubbing a finger along the split of Vegeta’s ass and gripping Vegeta’s aching
length to guide her back to the woman.
 
“I want to ride you,” the baseball player breathes, “While you ride her.”
 
Vegeta wakes with a scowl just as she’s pushing into the other woman, and with
a violent motion, tosses the heavy blanket covering her form to the floor. She
blames proximity to Boxer for this - on the one night she decides to stay in
her room rather than the GR, she is slammed with one of his nasty sex memories.
Sweat and some other wet substance she wishes to leave unidentified, have left
her groin slick and aching, so she goes to the bathroom to take a piss and run
a shower. Moments later, lukewarm water runs down her body in rivulets as she
curls up into the fetal position on the shower floor, leaning against tiled
wall. Her eyes close as she lets the shower wash away the grimy, disgusting
feeling left by Boxer’s memory in her dreams.
 
Perverted-ass man.
 
The Saiya-jin lets her head roll back, the spray of water a soothing feeling
against her face as she thinks over her predicament. It is obviously not
lessening with avoidance as she had hoped it would - instead, it seems, the
longer she kept herself away from the scientist, the more intensely she lived
out his moments.The dream tonight has fostered her own memories from her time
with him during her rut, making her feel even more sick with hate than she
would have if it were just the dreams being vivid. And judging from the guilty,
shadow-eyed looks Boxer cast her way when they did manage to see each other,
she doubts things are much better on his end of the spectrum.
 
Another reason she’s avoided him. Knowing Boxer, he’d want to discuss the
things he’s seen, curiosity and his innate desire to fix things likely to drive
him to interrogate her into violence. Vegeta doesn’t want to know which moments
of her glorious past Boxer has had the chance relive. She doesn’t even want to
think about his inane, lecherous life, so much simpler and kinder than anything
she’s ever known, let alone hers.
 
It’s these bites , she thinks, running a tapered finger along the slowly
scarring ridge near her clavicle. They’re fucking us up.
 
Mating marks. What a trite fucking joke.
 
Granted, not a joke Vegeta understood very well, having never paid much
attention to Nappa’s waxing poetic or Raditz’s surly outbursts on the subject.
It was something Vegeta never intended to explore, having no desire for one and
fully expecting to be dead long before she did. And now, here she is, in
possession of one and all of its unwanted side effects. The least of which
being the dreams and desire to be in constant contact with the man who shared
the burden with her. Reaching out for soap, Vegeta manages to avoid looking too
closely at her still flat abdomen and the true source of her slowly encroaching
terror as she lathers up.
 
As much as Vegeta is trying to hold it back, the dread is building up fast and
the Saiya-jin knows she is only one bad moment away from snapping and doing
something incredibly drastic.
 
Rinsing off, Vegeta gets out of shower and lets her ki and the cool air coming
from her open balcony dry her as she stares at her reflection. Dark eyes
flicker down her naked body, focusing on her navel and the strong ki announcing
the life behind it. Tentatively, her hand hovers over the area, heating up with
malicious intent as her own, stronger ki gathers in the palm. How easy it would
be, to end this farce, and move on with her life. And yet - her hand curls into
a fist, the dangerous ki dissipating as she goes to get dressed with sharp,
angry jerks. Vegeta has never been a coward, but this entire situation has left
her floundering, terrified into avoidance and denial.
 
Like a damned coward.
 
Vegeta sits on the edge of her bed wearing exercise clothes and the faint edge
of hysteria. Soft giggles fall from her mouth, so she clutches her head
tightly, trying and failing to reign in her reaction. Oh god , Vegeta thinks
irrationally, I’m going to be a parent.
 
She’s tired. And probably really into her hormones now. That’s why she’s being
so unreasonable. Wishing idly for a bit of war paint to drown out her thoughts,
the alien instead decides to go get coffee. It’s only an hour before she
usually gets up to start training anyway, so she might as well take advantage
and get a headstart on her day.
 
So distracted with her thoughts when entering the kitchen, she didn’t even
notice Boxer sitting at the island until he muttered a soft greeting. Glancing
over at him from the corner of her eye, Vegeta nods her own greeting - while
silently chastising herself - and fills a mug with coffee before joining him,
sitting at a stool opposite the man. He has his own cup of the bitter, black
liquid and considering how worn he looks, it’s direly needed.
 
“You look like shit,” Vegeta converses, taking a sip of her drink. Boxer coughs
out a sharp laugh.
 
“Thanks, Vegeta,” he replies, eyeing the the mug in her hand. “You know
caffeine is bad for babies?”
 
He goes quiet as dark eyes assess him, a flush overcoming his pale face.
“Sorry,” he muttered. “I’ve just been doing a lot of reading on the general
topic lately. I don’t think - that is -”
 
“Whatever,” Vegeta cuts him off and takes a couple of large gulps. “Not like I
care.”
 
“Right,” the tall bluenet deflates. He’s quiet for a long time after that,
seems to be contemplating something while they each sipped at their mugs.
 
“I’m sorry.”
 
The sentiment surprises Vegeta for its randomness and the Saiya-jin finds
herself scrutinizing the scientist’s tired face.
 
He kind of reminds her of Zarbon; a lot of height topped off with a pretty face
and a charming smile that works hard to hide a wicked mind. Both were also
similarly vain and annoying in their confidence to inspire awe with their
beauty. But she had killed Zarbon because his type of wickedness was the kind
that called her to death and left the bitter salt of hate on her tongue. Boxer
- the fucking bastard - might just survive her.
 
“What for?” she questions mildly.
 
He stares at her in a disconcerting way. “Are you serious? This whole situation
is my fault.”
 
Vegeta snorts. “Of that, I have no doubt. You’re acting incredibly bitchy just
for that though.”
 
Boxer continues to stare at her as if she was the one with faulty logic and it
was starting to piss Vegeta off.
 
“What?” the Saiya-jin snaps.
 
“Vegeta,” Boxer starts. His ocean-like eyes seem to glow in the barely there
light of dawn as he looks at her, guilt and concern making them limpid.
“Vegeta, I raped you. Doesn’t that - don’t you hate me?”
 
It’s Vegeta’s turn to stare at the scientist. He honestly thought -? It’s such
a ludicrous concept that Vegeta almost laughs in his face, but the man’s
earnest discomfort gives her pause.
 
Boxer’s actions and thought process don’t make any sense to Vegeta. Yes, Vegeta
blames him for his stupidity, but the oversight is her fault. The fact that he
really believed what happened constituted as him raping her was so beyond the
scope of what Vegeta considered normality that it was...alien. He had no idea
what real rape looked like.
 
Vegeta does laugh. A true belly-bursting, breath-stealing laugh and Boxer looks
torn between wanting to laugh himself and getting angry at her dismissal. He
must choose anger, since a moment later he snaps at her.
 
“What the fuck is so funny about that?”
 
“I do hate you,” Vegeta snorts. “But that wasn’t rape, believe me.”
 
“Yes, it was. You weren’t in your right mind to consent to anything.”
 
Vegeta frowns at his insistence. “If that’s the case, than I’m just as guilty,
right?”
 
“What are you talking about?” Boxer’s genuine confusion wiggles past Vegeta’s
frustration and the woman eyes her Chikyuu-jin counterpart.
 
Of course, Vegeta realizes, he doesn’t understand. It didn’t even occur to her
until after the fact that what occurred between them could even be possible. He
was running with even less information than her, and he’d done astoundingly
well with not hounding her about the memories he was no doubt reliving in his
sleep. No wonder he had no clue.
 
“It was the rut,” she decides to confess. “It affected you too. So I may hate
you for not staying away, but I don’t think the whole thing was your fault.”
 
He’s quiet for a time, absorbing the information and Vegeta realizes the error
she made at the moment he takes a fortifying breath. The alien goes for a sip,
hoping, impossibly, that if she takes a long enough quaff of her coffee that it
will stave off the man’s questions about the connection he’s undoubtedly made.
 
“Is that why I dream about you?”
 
Vegeta gives him her dirtiest glare at the question. She is admittedly
impressed when he glares back instead of cowering the way he once would have.
Finally, she places the mug down on the island top, fighting the urge to smash
it.
 
“I don’t know what the hell you dream about, stupid man.”
 
“You’re lying.”
 
Vegeta grits her teeth and reconsiders breaking the mug. Instead, she slips
behind her emotionless facade, the face of the unbreakable ice princess she is.
 
“How could I know? I’m not psychic.”
 
“I dreamt about Freiza. He was touching my cheek and telling me he saved my
life. That my services and my body were now in his because he owned the life
they were attached too.”
 
“Show me loyalty, Vegeta. I saved your life when I kept you at my side,” cold
fingers trailed up from the young princess’s shoulder to cup the side of her
face. “Don’t I deserve something for that?”
 
The Saiya-jin clenches her fist and the sound of shattering ceramic fills the
air. Hot coffee covers her hand, but Vegeta ignores the bitter brew to send a
heavy look Boxer’s way. His pounding heart thuds a rapid beat in her ear and
encourages the surge of rage that filled Vegeta at his words.
 
“Shut. Your mouth,” her voice is low and deadly. A warning for the scientist.
 
A warning he chooses not to heed. “I dreamt about watching a planet get
destroyed from a space pod. Vegeta, that’s not something I’ve ever done, it has
to come from you. Just tell m-”
 
Vegeta has him slammed into the wall, her hands clenching sporadically around
his throat, before she has time to process her reaction. It would be funny, to
see a man the same height as Kakarott being held aloft against the wall by
someone who, in normal clothes, looks like she couldn’t lift a feather let
alone a man twice her size, if the atmosphere wasn’t so tense. Boxer doesn’t
look away from her angry glare, his own fury making him brave despite the very
real danger clamped around his neck.
 
“Put me down,” he orders. Vegeta pulls him away from the wall momentarily, only
to hurl him back into it. The breath leaves him in huff. He doesn’t make a move
to fight her off, but his scowl doesn’t let up. He doesn’t let up and his
audacity to keep pushing at Vegeta’s boundaries pisses her off more than
anything else ever has.
 
“Fuck you,” she snarls. Boxer leans forward as much as he could in her grasp,
anger making his handsome face into something ugly.
 
“Again, Princess? So eager for my cock already?”
 
Jerking away, Vegeta releases him as though he burned her. It wasn’t far from
the truth. His very presence left her heated, with anger, with lust, with so
much feeling, that it made her crazy trying to constantly downplay her own
natural reactions to him. She loathed him, almost more than she’d ever hated
Freiza or Kakarott. They never did this to her, made her feel anything other
than cold determination. They burned her in a way that left a chilled rot on
her heart, like dry ice had made it’s way through her veins.
 
Boxer just burned her until she was consumed. Nothing left.
 
The scientist steps forward to fill the gap she’d left, his proximity making
her skittish. She hates his height, his fucking broadness which he shouldn’t
even have since he spends so much time doing nerdy shit, hates how someone so
much weaker than her can make her feel so powerless. He leans down to glower at
her, hands curled at his sides, his eyes never leaving hers. Boxer stands so
close that Vegeta can see his nostrils flare when he inhales her breath.
 
“Well?” he hisses. The scent of coffee wafts over Vegeta and her eyes flicker
across his face. A beat of silence passes between them and then Vegeta is
wrapped around him as he lifts her body, their lips crashing in their mutual
need to punish the other.  He swipes his mug and her own shattered mug off of
the kitchen island, planting her ass on the countertop. His hands grip at the
sides of her face tightly and Vegeta can feel the bite he left on the juncture
of her neck throb in response to him, angering her even more.
 
She bites at his lips, gripping his shirt until she can hear the fabric
complain under the stress. Boxer grunts in pain, pulling her closer and
grinding his erection against her warmth, thrusting harshly, wanting to vent
his frustration on her form. Vegeta pulls harder on his shirt, ripping it off
and slides her tongue over his bleeding mouth, tasting his anger and desire. It
reflects her own, but he doesn’t deserve anything of her. It’s not fair, how he
can derail everything she’s worked for, with such casual dismissal of the
brutality that comforts her, and still make her want him.
 
The alien leans back when he pulls away, gives him room to brush bloody kisses
across her jawline and neck, to sweep a warm tongue over the still unhealed
bruise of his bite from their last coupling. It sends a tingle through her body
and the zing is enough to snap Vegeta back to reality, giving her a moment of
pause in the fog of lust that clouded her mind.
 
She pushes him away and he stumbles back a few steps, catching himself on the
sink counter. He’s panting and shirtless, blue hair dishevelled, lips kiss-
swollen and red from the cuts her teeth left, watching her with heated
wariness.The creamy expanse of skin across his broad chest calls for Vegeta’s
attention, so she closes her eyes and grips the countertop until it creaks.
Sliding down to stand, she turns away from him and opens her eyes, staring at
the adjacent wall until she can collect the scattered bits of her composure.
She can see him straightening up in her periphery, running his hands through
his hair and picking his ruined shirt off the floor.
 
“Vegeta,” he sighs. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t ha-”
 
The woman turns away from him and walks out of the kitchen. She doesn’t want to
hear his platitudes or excuses. She had training to get too.
 
===============================================================================
 
Vegeta spends the next two days sequestered away in the GR and trains until her
body is screaming for relief. She only comes out when she senses Boxer’s ki
remain stationary outside the door for five hours and she gets tired of his
distracting presence. Opening the door, she peers down at the man who fell back
at the sudden lack of pressure.
 
“What do you want?” she mutters.
 
He swiftly scrambles to his feet and faces her, eyes drinking in her sweaty
visage. Vegeta viciously squashes the concern that sprouts up when she notices
the bruise-like circles under his eyes and his sallow complexion. His sleep
patterns are none of her concerns and frankly, he deserves the troubles that
keep him awake.
 
“Hey,” he greets and cuts to the chase. “I think I have something. If you still
want to terminate.”
 
The two gaze at each other for a moment, before Boxer sends her a beatific
smile. “Come on,” he gestures for her to follow.
 
Sedately, Vegeta trails after him as he leads her to the medical quarters of
the compounds private laboratories. Vegeta would never tell him, but she finds
his R&D set up to be pretty fascinating; he kept his personal and most revered
research near his home behind security technology that no human would be able
to penetrate and his more public-ready projects at the main labs in West City.
Sometimes, she wonders if she falls on that spectrum of personal research or if
she’s something different.
 
Swiping them past the most secured areas, the man guides her to a private
examination room. Vegeta vaguely notices the same medical equipment from the
last of their encounters, as well as some new instruments on a small metal
tray, and watches him warily while he sets up. Boxer notices her careful
observation and sends her a confused look.
 
“What?” he asked. Vegeta quirks a brow at him.
 
“Are you going to explain anytime soon or am I wasting my time?”
 
He scowls at her, but says nothing as he motions for her to take a seat on the
cushioned exam bed. She does, sticking her feet in the stirrups and recalling
with a shiver the last time he had her do this and he stuck a weird tube inside
her to take pictures of their child; it hadn’t been pleasant and Vegeta had
been less than gracious with him afterwards. The Saiya-jin immediately moves
her legs and lets them hang, watching Boxer pick up what looked like two
bracelets and a remote.
 
“Okay,” he starts and she listens carefully. “Our biggest issue last time was
that with the baby’s ki level being so high we couldn’t physically remove it.
Another point of contingency I thought of is that your own ki might be playing
security guard.”
 
Vegeta nods, hating the suggestion, but the biology made sense. Just because
she didn’t want the child doesn’t mean her body wasn’t going to act like she
didn’t. It would foster the little parasite until it was removed.
 
“So what’s your solution?” she asked. He grins at her and holds up the
bracelets.
 
“Ki suppressors! It was kind of a duh, no shit, Boxer moment, but I had to
fine-tune my instruments. These are for you,” he gesticulates at her wildly for
a moment and after some apprehension, the Saiya-jin holds out her arms so he
can click them into place.
 
They’re made of conductive metal and some kind of clear polymer through which
she can see what look like little lamps and wires running through it. She
admires the sleek and surprisingly light design, shaking her hands a little to
test the sturdiness.
 
“Stop, stop, come on,” Boxer interrupts her investigation. “I want to finish my
little show and tell.”
 
Vegeta gives him a dirty look but stops. He wiggles the little remote before
pressing some buttons on it and immediately Vegeta feels heavy and cut off from
the world. She can sense Boxer through her normal senses, but the fluctuation
of his ki and emotions that she can normally sense are cut off and muted. She
doesn’t like it.
 
Boxer puts on what looks like an old scouter and turns it. “Power level...holy
shit is that normal?”
 
“What?” Vegeta asked, alarmed.
 
“What’s your regular power level?” he questions. Vegeta shrugs dismissively.
 
“Haven’t checked in a long time. Probably a few million now, but I usually
suppress it.”
 
“Uhhh, okay. So, a power level of about fifty - is that normal for babies?”
 
“It’s high, especially for a fetus this lowly developed,” Vegeta purses her
lips in thought and points out. “It might still be my own leaking out.”
 
Boxer scoffs, offended. “Don’t underestimate my craftsmanship. It is specific
to your ki frequency and secures it like a damn brigade inside your body. Try
to flare out or something.”
 
Vegeta tries to hit him with a small ki blast and is surprised when the power
she has doesn’t even stir at her command. Her frown causes Boxer to crow in
delight and he laughs at her.
 
“So, as stated, superb craftsmanship means that the fetus is sitting around
fifty at this moment,” he reaches onto the metal tray and grabs what looks like
laser pointer. “This is a ki disrupter. It was really important for me to lock
down your own ki so that it wouldn’t get caught in the crossfire. Basically
what will happen is that this little thing will obstruct the ki flow in the
fetus - if we do this enough times, the ki will actually turn on itself and the
fetus won’t be able to grow, dying off and causing your body to abort naturally
- you’ll miscarry.”
 
“Sounds painful,” Vegeta mutters to herself. Boxer overhears and shakes his
head.
 
“I don’t think so. I did a few test runs on lab rats and they all just died of
heart failure in their sleep. They were fatigued during the disruption sessions
- there were only about five, by the way, don’t worry about it being a
hindrance to training - but they didn’t seem to disturbed,” he frowns. “Unless
you’re talking about the miscarriage part? Because I’m not sure then, women
here are a little different.”
 
Vegeta shakes her head. “Let’s just start.” Boxer raises his eyebrows,
surprised, but nods in agreement. Turning on the the disrupter, he raises her
shirt and gently starts to move the device over where the power level is
concentrated. She pretends not to notice his hesitation or the slight intake of
breath he makes at the first touch of his technology on her skin.
 
It’s a slow, quiet process. Vegeta tries to sense the diminishing power of the
child on her own but with the bracelets humming on her wrists she can’t. The
powerless feeling makes her feel sick and she is relieved when Boxer finally
calls an end to the experiment.
 
“Same time tomorrow?” he asks. Vegeta nods and Boxer’s eyes rove her face for a
moment. “You did great, Vegeta. Next time, I want to check the vitals, so
prepare yourself for the,” he whistles and pantomimes a stick being inserted
into a hole. Vegeta rolls her eyes.
 
“Bah. Whatever. Get these off.”
 
Once he’s removed the ki suppressors, Vegeta flares her aura a bit, relieved at
the easy control she wrests over her body again. She shoots an uneasy glare at
the bracelets, hateful of their existence - those things were dangerous for a
warrior such as herself - and makes a note to destroy them when this whole
farce was over. As she follows Boxer out of the room, she can’t help the hollow
sensation left in her chest at the lack of glowing power in her womb.
 
===============================================================================
 
Before Boxer can do anything annoying in an attempt to retrieve her, Vegeta has
already made her way down to his lab and is waiting for him in his office. When
the man enters, yawning and grabbing at his keycard, Vegeta takes great delight
in the startled jump he makes when he notices her presence.
 
“What the fuck! What the fuck?” the scientist clutches at his chest, glowering
at her. Vegeta gives a small wave and stands, holding back her laughter and
maintaining a stoic visage.
 
“Ready?” she inquires and the scientist nods sharply, still clearly annoyed
with her. The pair is quiet as they make their way to the medical wing, silence
settling comfortably between them. The chatterbox’s ability to know when to
shut up was an important factor in their volatile friendship, as Vegeta was
sure that she would have killed him out of annoyance, useful or not, if he
didn’t have it.
 
They arrive and without prompt, Vegeta settles on the table and holds her
wrists. Boxer gives her a blank look.
 
“You have to change, you know that, right?”
 
“I could easily kill you, you know that, right?”
 
Boxer crossed his arms and looked at the flimsy gown on the chair beside him
pointedly before turning back to her. Scowling, Vegeta hops down and keeps eye-
contact when she, deliberately slow, peels off her training clothes. Cheeks
flushed, Boxer looks away, turning his side to the alien and staring
unwaveringly at the floor until he heard her get back on the exam table.
 
“Asshat,” he murmurs and begins the set-up. “You are so lucky that I was
willing and able to learn how to do this stuff so quickly, you know. Otherwise,
you’d have some other fellow poking around down there.”
 
“If it weren’t for you poking around down there, I wouldn’t here,” Vegeta
replies in a syrupy tone. Boxer goes quiet, the guilt obvious on his face.
Still on with the rape thing, Vegeta thinks, but she doesn’t bother trying to
comfort the man. It’s not her job.
 
Bracelets in place and a towel covering her lower regions, Vegeta turns to face
the sonogram, as Boxer once told her, trying to make out the vague outline of
the creature living inside of her. Soon enough, a steady and rapid pounding
sound fills the room, and Vegeta dazedly realizes that it’s the heartbeat of
her child. She glances down at Boxer from where he is seated between her legs
and observes the brief flash of pain on his awestruck face before he swallows
and turns to face her. Quickly, Vegeta averts her eyes back to the screen,
stoicism firmly in place.
 
“Anytime now,” she states.
 
“Right,” Boxer sighs out. Moments later, the icy, static sensation of the ki
disrupter is running over her tummy.
 
Vegeta watches the screen raptly for any changes, but it seems that nothing was
occurring. After about twenty minutes, however, the rapid sound of the beating
heart begins to slow. Eyes firm on the screen, a moment later, Vegeta sees a
sharp contraction of a little white blob and her eyes are instantly focused on
it.
 
Thumpthumpthumpthump.
 
She observes as the little thing contracts again.
Thumpthump. Thumpthump.
 
She listens as the heart of the unborn Saiya-jin begins to slow steadily and
she wonders for the first time if what she was doing was the right choice.
 
Thumpthump. Thump. Thump.
 
Fuck.
 
“Stop,” Vegeta orders, knocking the disrupter out of Boxer’s hand and onto the
floor where it flickers off. The man leans back with the sonogram stick in hand
as she climbs down, surveying her bewilderedly.
 
“What the hell are you doing?” he questions, dubious.
 
“Going back to the GR,” she replies, yanking off the gown and grabbing at her
spandex shorts. Silence follows her declaration. And then -
 
“Why?!”
 
“I changed my mind.”
 
“You changed your - what the hell Vegeta, do you even realize how dangerous
that was?” Boxer is on his feet now, brow wrinkled in disconcertation as he
gazes at her.
 
“No,” she finishes getting dressed and holds out her arms. “Take these off.”
 
Boxer glares at her, not moving. “What the fuck happened, Vegeta? I thought you
wanted to terminate the pregnancy?”
 
“I did. I changed my mind,” she shakes her arms. “Now take them off so I can go
train.”
 
“No! What the hell? Can’t you take a minute to talk to me? What happened?”
 
Vegeta lowers her arms and steps into his space. Meeting his gape steadily, she
addresses him slowly, as if he were a child, and repeats herself.
 
“I. Changed. My. Mind.”
 
His look blackens in cold anger as he searches her face for a moment. Scoffing,
Boxer shoves her away and she lets him, watching as he jerkily reaches into his
lab coat pocket. The bracelets on her wrists unlock and she removes them,
handing them over to the sulking man.
 
“Do not,” he snarls as he snatches them away, “come to me saying you changed
your mind again.”
 
“Okay,” she nods. That was fair.
 
“Okay,” he snips and turns away, cleaning up the room. Vegeta silently watches
him for a moment, hesitant as to whether or not she should say something,
before she leaves the room silently and heads back to the gravity room.
 
===============================================================================
 
It’s quiet in the kitchen when Vegeta goes to get a water bottle, but the
presence she senses a mere ten feet away in the den has her making a viciously
dour expression. Yamcha.
 
With Boxer, apparently.
 
They were probably doing that thing where they got back together after a fight.
Vegeta honestly had no idea what they did or even why the two men did anything
at all with each other, considering that half the time she’d been here they’d
been broken up. She contemplates leaving through the backdoor and just
levitating to her balcony to avoid any awkwardness, but she’s already inside
and the inefficiency bothers her. Further, Scarface apparently hadn’t noticed
her come in - his ki hadn’t fluctuated the way it normally does when he notices
she’s around him.
 
Mind made up, Vegeta silently makes her way to the staircase, ghosting by the
entrance of the living room as she does.
 
“So what, she just changed her mind?”
 
Vegeta pauses mid-step, curiosity getting the better of her. Apparently,
instead of their usual melodramatic drivel, they were talking about her.
 
Interesting.
 
Ki suppressed to something that wouldn’t even rival that insipid black cat’s,
Vegeta leans against the wall and slides down to the floor, ears tuned into the
conversation going on just past the doorway she’s hidden behind. She doesn’t
bother to think about why she’s eavesdropping in the first place. Recon is
recon is recon - Boxer had completely frozen her out since she changed her
mind. It was annoying, but it’s not like he wasn’t being as accommodating as he
usually was. He still carried out any tasks she took to him, but his manner
was...lackluster. As though she wasn’t even really there.
 
It was bothersome and she wanted to know why he did so.
 
She hears Yamcha scoff. “No offense, but that doesn’t sound like her. I
honestly didn’t think that bitch could be concerned with the well-being of
others.”
 
“Shut up. It’s not like you even really know her anyway, you never gave her a
chance.”
 
“Because she’s a psychotic, murdering homewrecker! Boxer, sh-,” Scarface cuts
himself off and Vegeta’s recently clenched fists loosen. “Boxer, you’re right.
I never really gave her a chance. But if we’re going to be brutally honest, I
think you’ve given her too many. How many times are you going to let her treat
you like this?”
 
Boxer sighs in response and Vegeta doesn’t think she’s ever heard a more world-
weary sound.
 
“It was her choice, Yamcha. Besides, I really didn’t think she’d ever want to
go through the pregnancy, so I just sort of resigned myself to that. Then she
flipped the script on me and I just...” the scientist trails off and silence
reigns over the air awkwardly for a minute.
 
“Look, you want the kid, don’t you? I mean you were eyeing cradles and adoption
agencies before we broke up.”
 
“Yes. But again: Vegeta’s body, Vegeta’s choice. Besides,” he adds bitterly,
“It’s not like he was conceived under the best of circumstances.” Vegeta’s
palms go clammy at the possibility that he might share the information about
her rut.
 
“Tch. You’re never going to tell me the details of that are you?”
 
“No.” The spying Saiya-jin is surprised. She was sure that Boxer was going to
bitch about how fucked up the situation was.
 
The two men are silent for a moment and then Yamcha asks. “It’s a boy?”
 
“Yeah,” Boxer replies, his voice subdued. “I noticed last time. He shouldn’t be
far enough along to tell yet, but I guess Saiyans have a different gestation
period? I don’t know, there isn’t enough info to compare.”
 
“Did you tell her? Maybe that’s why she changed her mind. Maybe she started to
see him as a person rather than a personal inconvenience.”
 
Boxer chuckles darkly. “I think she’s just been in denial until now. I really
don’t know. It’s not as if she really wanted me. Not the way I want her. Sorry,
not trying to rub salt.”
 
“It’s fine. I’m not happy, but I’m not going to hit you again. So what’s the
issue now? You know what you’re going to do?”
 
“No!” Vegeta hears a soft thump and can assume Boxer just threw himself on the
floor. “That’s a big fucking problem too. Before it was clear, I wasn’t going
to get to be a father, fine, at least I can make up for it to Vegeta, because I
knew she wouldn’t want to be a mom. But now? Do I get myself ready for
fatherhood? Does she even want me to help? Is she just going to kill him off in
a different way? I’m stranded in the middle of the sea with no way to navigate
myself out of this mess.”
 
“And you love her.”
 
Silence follows Yamcha’s declaration, this time uncomfortable and rife with
unspoken apologies. Vegeta herself is left shocked at the blunt way the
baseballer so blatantly declared that statement. And surely it was false? Boxer
wanted her, but it wasn’t anything Vegeta wasn’t used to. A lot of men had
wanted her, to break her and to claim some kind of ownership of her in someway
- the vast majority had been rebuffed harshly.
 
Boxer groans, sounding pained. “Yamcha...”
 
“It’s fine. Like I said, I’m not likely to punch you again and I did come back
wanting to be friends. I’m not even surprised, I saw it coming.”
 
“Yamcha, I don’t - I just...” Boxer flounders as he tries to come up with what
to say. His ex scoffs.
 
“I might not be as smart as you, B, but I’m not dumb. You were never so eager
to please me and I can’t recall any point where you looked at me the way you
look at her, even though she’s the biggest asshole I’ve ever met.”
 
“That’s not true. I love you!” Boxer protests.
 
“Still?” Yamcha asks.
 
“Of course,” Boxer replies and Vegeta doesn’t recognize the feeling in her
chest at his next words. “I’ll love you until I die.”
 
It’s quiet except for the sounds of shuffling bodies, and then Yamcha’s voice
breaks the silence in soft intonation.
 
“More than her? Enough to leave her alone if I come back one hundred percent
committed to you and giving you the family you want? You won’t look back on her
and regret?”
 
Boxer is quiet and Yamcha lets out a bitter chuckle. “You see?” he sighs. “She
got you somehow. That crazy bitch made you love her.”
 
Vegeta slips away to her room after that declaration. She stayed far too long
anyway.
 
===============================================================================
 
A black abyss, darkness enveloping her body. The sound of her own harsh
breathing as she runs. A vortex, causing dizziness and bile to gather in her
throat. Kakarott appears, his back to her and slowly he turns to face her, dead
eyes meeting hers before he smirks. Mocking her and Vegeta screams his name in
anger, rushing to attack him, but he disappears right before her foot can make
contact with his smug face. Panting and frustrated, she turns to find the
purple-haired future boy standing before her, startling her with his presence.
Overwhelmed by her hatred, she leaps forward to punch him, but he too
disappears before she can make contact. Angrily, she whirls around, looking,
seeking, seething, but then both men appear before her again, side by side,
united as a golden aura radiates from them both and Vegeta has never felt so
frightened or overcome. The brilliance blinds her and she tries to power up
herself, to fight it, but her strength falls short as they both glow brighter,
burn hotter, pushing her into the darkness and onto her back.
 
Tears well up as she tries to sit up again but her body is heavy, leaving her
prostrated, arms spread as she peers up...at her naked self.
 
This other her smiles wickedly down at Vegeta’s prone figure, taking the hard
length of cock into her body as she straddles Vegeta’s elongated form. Slowly,
she undulates her hips and pleasure rips through Vegeta’s body, despite the
pressure holding her in place. Looking around, Vegeta makes out the familiar
structure of the large gravity room she’d spent her rut.
 
“You’re pathetic,” other Vegeta laughs and Vegeta’s eyes snap back to her. She
doesn’t think she’s ever seen herself this way, so unburdened and happy.
“Completely at my mercy. What if I decide to kill you?”
 
Her other self leans down, brushing her nose just below her ear and breathing
out. A warm surge of emotion rushes through Vegeta, and it’s all
unrecognizable, painful but not unpleasant. She gazes up at the bared Vegeta
who sat on her lap like it was her throne, so relaxed and at ease and
voracious, and Vegeta hungers with an appetite whetted on lust and affection
for her.
 
“I’ll probably die happy,” Vegeta responds to the other version of herself and
her voice is not her own. It’s deep and familiar, the cadence of the sentence
fostering a sense of deja vu in her mind. Vegeta circles her hips again and
clasps a heated ear in between her teeth before running a soothing tongue over
the sting. Her breath is warm and intensifies the ecstasy traveling through
Vegeta’s nerves when she whispers in her ear.
 
“Want to play a game with me, Boxer?”
 
Sweat clings to Vegeta’s brow when her eyes fly open and she rolls over with a
long groan, trying to catch her breath as the pleasurable surge of her orgasm
sends her muscles into an excited state. Taking deep breaths, the woman tries
to calm down, resisting the urge to reach down and touch herself, to prolong
the luxurious feeling slowly fleeing her body. The bite on her neck throbs
fiercely, leaving her shivering in the wake of ecstasy and agony.
 
A dream. A nightmare?
 
Exhaling roughly through her nose, Vegeta sits and runs a hand through her
short, spiky hair, gritting her teeth against the angry flare of pain the
movement jostles from her bite. She takes a glance at the clock on the
nightstand - 2:13 A.M. - and then at the calendar next to it, marking off the
days as they approach two different circled dates. Reaching down, Vegeta rubs a
hand over her belly, now holding a firmness that is different from its usual
kind. She hasn’t ‘popped’ yet, as the books she’s read say she will, but she
can feel and see the differences in her body more and more as each day passes.
 
She hates it.
 
Despite knowing that it was her choice to keep on with the pregnancy, she can’t
help but feel resentful at times. Like when she has to readjust her entire
training schedule and spend precious time that could be used working out or
sleeping or eating to research what to expect as she fosters this parasite. Or
the time she wastes doing medical check ups with the doctor Boxer signed to
confidentiality with lots of money and the threat of total discreditation for
noncompliance. Or the time she spends fretting in front of a mirror, watching
her body transform and feeling for the healthy glow of her son’s ki with her
own, like some sort of vapid, instinctive beast.
 
And yet...she scoffs and stands up, heading to the door. It’s still too early
to go do any real work for the day, but she could go get a snack and wander
around a bit until the fatigue of pregnancy and hard training overcomes her.
She grabs a large container of sliced strawberries from the fridge and pours a
fair amount chocolate sauce in it from a new bottle. The concoction is usually
Boxer’s go-to, something she knows because she’s seen him eat it numerous times
and she relishes the thought of depriving him of it - again - when her fork
pierces through the first berry.
 
Pettiness tastes delicious, and her mood lifts as she walks around the Briefs’
large estate. The house is nice, nothing at all like the cramped barracks she
was used to in space. The only places she can think of that could rival it were
her childhood home and the castle that the Ice-jin prince who once owned her
would spirit her off to whenever the mood struck him. Biting through the hard
shell of chocolate at the unwarranted thought, Vegeta’s attention is caught by
the light spilling out of a door left ajar at the end of the hallway and Vegeta
goes forward to investigate.
 
She finds Boxer sitting at a desk, typing away at a computer, a large stream of
numbers and words flying across the screen in front of him. A decanter of brown
liquor and a crystal tumbler half filled with the same stuff sit on a tray next
to him. The Saiya-jin approaches him quietly, still eating his chocolate
strawberries and intending to scare the shit out of him.
 
To her surprise though, he turns around to face her, eyes immediately drawn to
the container in her arms and the fork in her mouth. He scowls.
 
“Are you the reason those keep missing?” Vegeta can smell the alcohol on his
breath, but the scientist doesn’t appear to be drunk. His words were coherent
and not slurred, at least.
 
It’s the first full sentence he’s said to her since the day in the clinic and
Vegeta has no other response except for shoving another berry in her mouth.
 
His scowl darkens and Vegeta has to bite back her grin. In a small effort to be
cordial, she places the container on his desk by the alcohol, pushing it
towards him, and then takes a step back, looking him over. He looks bad, for
him, tired and grumpy like a frazzled feline. The scientist and the alien gaze
at each other until Boxer reaches out for the container and starts to eat them,
turning away and effectively shunning her. Vegeta feels a bit disappointed at
the mechanical dismissal of her presence and a rebellious spirit flares within
her. She snatches the container back in flare of belligerence.
 
It shocks her when he suddenly rises and whirls to face her, smacking the sweet
treat right out of her hands, unmindful of its destination as he glowers down
at her.
 
Reflexively, Vegeta’s ki rises and her hand shoots out automatically to hit
him. Her arms lock just a breath away from his chest, palm flat. She can feel
Boxer’s heart beating under her checked blow and watches him as he looks from
her face to her hand on his chest and back. She pulls back on her ki, hoping to
take the sudden tension between them with it. He licks his lips before he
speaks, voice low.
 
“What the hell do you want, Vegeta, hm? You came in here to bother me.”
 
Shame and resentment warm Vegeta’s throat, settling lower into her belly as she
tries to come up with an answer. Why did she come in here?
 
The small woman lowers her arm and shrugs.
 
“I was bored and curious,” she replies. “Not that I need to explain myself to
you.” She tries to keep her tone light and nonchalant, but it falls flat to her
own ears, so surely Boxer must not be fooled.
 
He isn’t.
 
“Who else would be in here?” the heir snaps. “The fucking tooth fairy?”
 
The Saiya-jin scowls. “Some kind of fairy,” she scoffs and begins to turn away.
Boxer grabs her arm and, gently as could in his mood, swings her around so that
the curve of her bottom hits his desk, rocking the decanter. She lets him,
fighting back her rising temper, lest she starts to fight back against him and
accidently kill him. The odd pair glare at each other, chests rising raggedly
when Boxer moves forward and cages her in with his body. Her neck aches
distantly, and she wonders if his is flaring in agitation as well, if his body
cries out to lessen the proximity between them as hers does.
 
“What is that supposed to mean?” he growls.
 
Vegeta tilts her head and blinks in mock vapidness. “What do you mean?” she
asks sweetly. “I don’t understand, I’m not from around here.”
 
He snorts and smiles, unamused by her antics, his head falling forward as he
shakes it in building frustration. “What did you mean, Vegeta?” he peers up at
her, his eyes level with her chin from the way he’s slumped over.
 
“Scarface is back, right? I’m sure the two of you are off constantly doing
perverted shit together.”
 
Boxer stares at her, his brow crumbled with disconcertation. “What? Since when
has that bothered you?” he dismisses. She averts her gaze from his.
 
“It doesn’t. I was just annoyed with you,” she grouses. Vegeta withdraws into
herself, pulling her body inward. She wants to leave and be away from the blue-
haired man at this point and his continued scrutiny makes her uncomfortable in
the wake of her dying ire.
 
“Bah, whatever,” she huffs. “I’m leaving.”
 
Grabbing at his forearm, Vegeta moves it out of the way in preparation to
leave, but is unprepared when Boxer uses the movement to cup her chin with the
same arm. He turns her face, tilts her head just so, and then his lips collide
gently with hers.
 
Anger and lust swarm Vegeta. Her body betrays her, responding to his touch
immediately, hungrily, turning to him, arms and legs wrapping around him like a
vine when he pushes her further onto the desk.
 
Encouraged by her enthusiasm, Boxer bites her bottom lip, then sucks the blood
from the broken skin, and Vegeta moans at the exquisite shiver the sharp pain
sends down her back. His hot mouth departs from hers, their breaths mingling
briefly before he pecks her mouth softly, once, twice, a dozen times. The
gentleness contrasts sharply to the rough treatment of before and it leaves
Vegeta unsure and wanting.
 
His lips begin to skim her chin and jaw in a flurry of kisses and he cradles
the back of her head, holding her steady. The tempo of the pecks slow, become
sensual. He buries his nose in her hair while he nibbles on her earlobe. Vegeta
tips her head back, making space for him and granting him access to her
vulnerability.
 
A warm thumb rubs circles on the bite on her neck, sending an impulse through
her that settles in her rattled chest and seeded womb and damp loins. Vegeta’s
whole body is combusting and she grips the scientist by his teal locks, tugging
him closer so that she would not burn alone.
 
Warm and teasing, his voice whispers in the skin of her neck unbidden.
 
“You’re jealous.”
 
The phrase is a parasitic earworm. The warrior finds her eyes spring open,
unaware of when they shut as she gazes up into the man who has moved so that
his face is mere centimeters from hers. She licks her bloody lips and his eyes
are entranced by the movement. Ignoring the lust altering her judgement, the
alien narrows her eyes and studies him. The heat from his hands from her neck
along her arms until he is loosely gripping her wrists and Vegeta must wonder
if he knows what his body language insinuates.
 
“What?” she inquires.
 
“You said you didn’t understand. About the fairy comment,” he looks down,
suddenly shy. “You’re jealous. And trying to push me away so you can deny it.
It’s why you’re being mean.”
 
The alien woman scoffs. “Jealous? What reason would I have to be jealous of
you?”
 
A small, nervous smile tilts his mouth. Cyan eyes peer up at her through dark
lashes. His grip tightens around her wrists and he unwraps her arms from around
his neck - and Vegeta only now realizes he is still caged by her limbs - to
bring her bare hands between them. Fascinated, Vegeta watches him skim his lips
along her digits, kissing the back of each hand tenderly.
 
Her face is crumpled in confusion when he finally looks back at her. The alien
can smell his apprehension and his pulse drums a rapid tempo under his skin -
his bodily reactions leave her bewildered.
 
“I know you’re not jealous of me,” he starts. “But I do think you’re jealous of
anyone who has my attention.”
 
He brings his head up and holds her gaze steadily. For the first time that
night, Vegeta takes in the tired lines that mar his perfect face and it occurs
to her that he is as tired as she is.
 
“I can’t sleep,” he murmurs. “It used to be sporadic, a few times a week, but
now it’s everytime I fall asleep; I dream these scenarios that I know I’m
plucking right out of your head.”
 
Vegeta begins to shake her head, pulling her hands from his grasp. “No,” she
denies. She continues to shake her head when Boxer cups her cheeks and leans
forward to press a kiss to her forehead. He pulls her into him, his large hand
crowning her head as her face is pressed to his chest, the scent of pine soap
and engine oil and Boxer clinging to her olfactory nerves. Vegeta cannot find
the strength to push him away.
 
“I want to know these things about you, but I want it to be because you told
me.”
 
“No,” she snarls into the fabric of his sweater.
 
“I wanted you to need me, I went to you when I knew I shouldn’t have because I
wanted you to know you could rely on me.”
 
“No!” The alien still cannot move away.
 
“I’m so sorry, Princess. I wanted you, all this time. All of you. And I hate
how it happened, but I’m not sorry that it did.”
 
“No!” she howls and flings him to the ground.
 
“No, no, no,” she rages, like a child, her aura flickering about her wildly.
Glaring down at the man who calmly watches her tantrum, she grabs the crystal
decanter and throws it down to the floor mere inches from him. He flinches, the
eye closest to the breakage winking shut tightly. A shard must reach him, for a
thin line of red appears on his cheek.
 
Boxer stares up at Vegeta as she wails.
 
“I don’t want this. I don’t want you, I don’t need you, fuck off!” she shouts.
“I don’t care about your stupid little wishes, I don’t care about your
childhood adventures, I don’t care about that fucking Namekian or how stupid
Kakarott looked as yearling. Leave me alone!”
 
Bitter tears sting her eyes and she is furious, wanting badly to break
something. Vegeta stalks towards Boxer and, before he can move away, she grips
his arm tightly. He hisses in pain and squirms a little, trying to maneuver the
limb from her, but she squeezes harder until a creaking can be heard and Boxer
freezes.
 
“Vegeta,” he pleads softly. “Let me go.”
 
“Why? Why should I? You did this to me! YOU ruined me! I should kill you!”
 
“I know,” he responds gravely. “I can’t change that. But please let go.”
 
She glowers, teeth bared at him, but he only cups her neck with his free hand.
Vegeta wants to snap his fingers off when their tips smooth over his bite
decorating her throat. Instead, her hand begins to blister his captive limb,
but despite his wince, he continues to gaze at her steadily. She cannot
comprehend the meaning or weight behind the look. The alien only understands
that it is heady and tender and possessive in a way both like and unlike
Frieza.
 
“It’s these,” he murmurs. “They’re messing us up. We aren’t supposed to be like
this.”
 
It’s exactly the same thought she’s had before. The Saiya-jin princess flings
his arm away in disgust at the evidence of how he festers inside her head.
 
“I know,” she snaps. “You were just supposed to be some mildly entertaining
Chikyuu-jin who followed my orders.”
 
He grins.
 
“Whatever you wish, I’ll grant it.”
 
“Stop,” she doesn’t know what she means, but he does and his look turns sad.
 
“Except that. I can’t give you that.”
 
She pulls away from him and he takes advantage of the space to rise to his full
height. She kicks the discarded container of dessert fruit.
 
“Why not?”
 
“I don’t know how.”
 
She side-eyes him, a cruel smirk on her lips. “Aren’t you a genius?”
 
He scoffs, self-depreciative. “Apparently not.”
 
They are quiet for a moment and then Boxer exhales loudly.
 
“I love you.”
 
“You’re an idiot.”
 
“I want the baby.”
 
“I’m incubating it, aren’t I?” The waspish reply makes Boxer smile lightly.
 
“I want you.”
 
She shakes her head. “You’re no different at all.”
 
The scientist breaches the gap between them, hesitantly reaching out. He hugs
her when she makes no move to attack him. His pale skin is battered where she’d
grabbed him, but he shows no fear when he invades her space. His apology and
his affection are found in the way he holds her.
 
She closes her eyes, relishes in the warmth he radiates. How odd. She could
kill him with a careless blink, but being encircled in his arms make her feel
like she is safe within a fortress. Ridiculous.
 
Finally, she gives him her offer. “I’m going to leave after. I’ll only return
to fight the androids. Not for any other reason,” she warns.
 
Boxer’s quiet, digesting her words. He peers down at her.
 
“And until then?” his tone is cautious, but hopeful. Almost a full minute of
silence passes before she tilts her head back, catching his eye.
 
“I’ll want you back.”
 
And she reaches up, pulling him down to her height. Their kiss tastes like
candied berries and bloody almosts.
 
At her acceptance of his affections, Boxer crashes on her like tsunami,
clearing the large surface of his desk to lay her back on it. He crawls over
her, his kisses turning hungry and savage when she meets him blow for endearing
blow. He licks her lips for permission, so she swarms his mouth her tongue. His
fingers tangle in her hair, pulling her head back so he could plunder her mouth
and her hands tug at the front of his sweats, breaking the drawstring so that
the waistband is loose enough for Vegeta to wrap her hands around his penis.
 
With a moan, Boxer unlatches himself from her mouth, dragging his head to rest
against her chest. Sliding one of his hands under her shirt, he gently traces
the curve of her breast as he watches her jerk him roughly. If it hurts, he
gives no indication, instead rubbing his head up her shoulder like a cat, until
he rests his chin next to the bite he’d left on her flesh months ago. He mouths
at the mark.
 
“How do these work?” he mumbles. His voice is becoming the sleepy, sinful growl
that made her wild the last time they were like this. He regards her with half-
mast eyes. “Mine won’t heal either.”
 
Her hands tighten briefly at the mention of the bite she’d given him and his
hand goes to cover hers as he nips at her clavicle in rebuke. The scrape makes
her gasp lightly, their fingers entwining as he helps her stroke him to full
mass.
 
“Fondness between comrades sharing a rut,” she volunteers lowly. “I don’t
really know how it works, I was never all that invested.”
 
“Of course not,” he smirks against her. He jerks her towards him so that their
cores align and pulls their tangled hands from his trousers. He begins to
thrust  against her, sliding her shirt up over her breasts with his freed hand.
 
“Fondness, huh?” he murmurs. He presses a kiss to a rapidly pebbling nipple
below him. Vegeta cards her hands through his hair, tan, scarred fingers
entangling silky, sky locks. Her nails scrape his scalp when he sucks on
mouthful of her breast, and he must like it because he moans around the mound
and grinds his erection against her harder.
 
Vegeta feels the apex of her thighs slicken with the want she has for this man.
Her legs wrap around him, guiding his thrusts so that each one sent a jolt of
pleasure through her clit. Leaning her head back so that it fell off the edge
of the desk, she can feel her body clenching up with warm euphoria, finally
releasing when Boxer lightly grasps her neck and scrapes her sensitive nipple
with his teeth. Vegeta bites her already bloody lip when she comes, but kisses
him back eagerly when he moves to capture her mouth with his.
 
“Fuck,” he mutters into her mouth, his breath mingling with hers. Vegeta
wonders as she breathes in, how much of him she ingests when they do this, how
much of him is already in her, swelling and consuming all that constructs her
as it grows. They separate long enough to shed their clothes, his naked form
kneeling between her splayed thighs.
 
Boxer rubs himself against her, coating his dick with the residue of her
orgasm. Vegeta can smell his precome mingling with her juice, grows wetter
because of it, and wetter still when he growls at the slickness. The tip of him
breaches her and he circles it slightly before pulling out. The hand not
holding his cock steady moves to thumb at her clit. Vegeta hisses when he
breaches her again, a little more than just the tip and she clenches around him
tightly, making him hiss as well.
 
“Fuck,” he repeats. “Princess.”
 
He pulls almost all the way out, then slams into her roughly, pushing her up
the desk and Vegeta almost laughs in relief. The Saiya-jin reaches for him,
pulling his lips to hers so that she could taste his hunger for her. She wraps
around him again, legs and arms holding him close while he fucks her almost
violently, but when she feels herself began to squeeze too tightly, she pulls
away.
 
The scientist takes advantage of her retreat, drawing back and enticing her
onto her belly. Cheek and chest and knees pressed to the hard wood of the desk,
Vegeta nearly splinters it when he shoves back into her moist passage. He leans
over her, hips snapping sharply against her ass and Vegeta pushes back, needing
to feel him, needing to have him, own him. It’s a power, unused and new to her,
that she has over him and the delicious sting it carries comes with how it
reflects the power he has over her.
 
Angling her head, the Saiya-jin pulls him into another kiss, biting his lips so
that the coppery taste of his blood mingles with hers. With a grunt, the blue-
haired man slides his right hand under her torso, gripping her bitten shoulder
so that his thumb is pressing hard against the mar. He kisses her back
aggressively, tongue battling hers in a bloody scrimmage, yanking her body
closer by the hold he has on her and fucking her so hard the desk shakes.
 
Pleasure builds upon itself and rises like a heavy tide in Vegeta’s body and
she adjusts slightly, bracing herself at an angle that has him pounding against
the spot between her G-spot and cervix. It hurts, but in a way she craves. Toes
curling, the princess meets his heavy, angry thrusts with ones of her own, her
pleading cries taking the form of his name when she breaks their kiss. Heavy-
lidded blue eyes stare down at her face, taking in and memorizing her pleasure,
before clenching shut.
 
And then, in a burst, warmth coats her insides as she shudders, her orgasm
overcoming her at the same time his does. Boxer presses his sweaty chest to her
back, not quite collapsing on her and Vegeta can feel his heart thudding
against her shoulder blade. He presses his mouth into her hair, not quite
kissing her and breathes in her scent. The pain that always radiated from the
bite she had has subsided and, as little as she understands about mating pacts,
she knows that the next time she looks it will finally be scarred over.
 
She knows his will be the same.
 
===============================================================================
 
Boxer is more tolerable in their interactions now that she’s given to
temptation and fallen into this travesty with him. She moves back into the
house he’d built for her and each night, he takes her to bed as though he
hadn’t been building the ship for her departure earlier in the day. He is
content in this temporary relationship, doing his best to keep himself
preoccupied by her affection.
 
The warrior princess is less idealistic, keeping a sharp eye on her schedule,
grading each passing day by how productive it was. They seem to fly by the
closer she draws to her ‘due date’. She accommodates Boxer’s wishes for her to
see a physician, and even takes the supplements he supplies, understanding his
worry that they might have harmed the child in some way when they’d attempted
aborting.
 
She says nothing and doesn’t help him when he happily begins to put together a
reinforced nursery in his home, only half-listening to his design plans and
offering listless sounds of agreement whenever he asked her opinion. Unaffected
by her apathy, he continues to nest, and Vegeta finds it highly bizarre that he
feels such a strong drive to do so when she mostly just wants proprietorship of
her body back.
 
The two of them are an odd pair.
 
Sometimes, Vegeta thinks he wants her to be as excited as he is, feels his
frustration when he fucks her like he can make her feel what he does if he can
just slam into her hard enough, long enough. He ties her up, uses the ki
suppressors on her, he blindfolds her, doing whatever he can to hide her
ability to easily leave. He comes inside her more often, like he wants to seed
her again, like he’s desperate to inject something of himself into her. Other
times, he’s tender and sensuous, trying to gentle love out of her. Vegeta would
feel bad for him if his desperation didn’t smother her.
 
She wants him. She won’t bother denying that. But anything else of the
confusing myriad he stirs in her, she refuses to touch. It changes nothing of
her plans; she’s still leaving, she’s still going to return only to defeat the
androids and Kakarott, and she’s still going to conquer this planet and take
back her power from the PTO. There’s no time for sweet kisses and rocking
chairs in her future.
 
The scientist is just too stubborn and spoiled to see that.
 
===============================================================================
 
Giving birth hurts a lot more than Vegeta expected it to and even with the
incredibly strong painkillers streaming through her body, Vegeta can just
barely hold back the scream threatening to claw itself out of her throat. Teeth
grinding from the force of her clenched jaw, the woman’s vision goes spotty as
she bears down on her lower body, clenching her stomach and pushing for all
that she’s worth.
 
“That’s it,” the doctor speaks up, “Just a little more, he’s crowned. Get his
shoulders out and you’re done, little lady.”
 
Resisting the urge to kick him in the face, Vegeta throws her head back and
squeezes the railing of her bed tightly, the metal warping under the force.
Vegeta can hear Boxer’s voice as he encourages her to push and she wants to
snap out that she is fucking pushing, dumbshit asshole, except she thinks if
she opens her mouth nothing aside from a bloodcurdling shriek will come out.
 
A bloodcurdling shriek does ring out and for a moment, Vegeta thinks she might
have failed in her goal not to make a single sound during her childbirth, but
then she notices Boxer has moved down by the doctor and is cradling something
bloody and wet in his arms. A slimy, fluid-covered tail wraps around the man’s
forearm and he seems entranced, cooing down at the wailing baby as the doctor,
nonplussed by newborn’s unusual fifth limb, concerns himself with the
afterbirth. Vegeta let’s her body relax, deciding to give the obstetrician five
minutes to finish before she did kick him in his face. Little lady, she thinks.
Fucker. Eyes closed, she listens in as Boxer and the lone nurse wash off the
squalling brat, the scientist’s deep voice murmuring comforts all the while.
 
It’s done. Time’s up.
 
Vegeta must have fallen asleep, because she opens her eyes to find herself in a
different room, in a regular bed, a clear polymer crib by her bedside and Boxer
sleeping in a chair within arms reach of them both. She stares at the man for a
moment, his handsome face peaceful in slumber and then drags her gaze to the
small frame in the crib. His brown tail curls lackadaisically, fist clenched in
his sleep. Unlike his father, her son looks angry, pouting gruffly as he naps
away his first few hours of life. Her lips twitch in a small grin as she takes
in his scowling mug, so obviously like her in this respect.
 
Quietly, the Saiya-jin princess stands up and pauses to take stock of her body.
She is sore, her back and lower body all aching for reprieve, but she stretches
lightly and carefully moves between Boxer and her son, eyes flicking back to
the scientist to make sure he was still asleep. Confirming that he was, she
focus on the sleeping baby, drinking in his appearance unwaveringly before
reaching down to lift him up.
 
He’s so light. His lack of substance makes Vegeta nervous of her own potent
strength. As gently as she can, she adjusts him so he is more secure, but the
movement jostles him causing him to mewl out quietly.
 
Shit.
 
Panicked, Vegeta guides him to the low neckline of her gown, shrugging it out
of the way so she can pop her nipple in his mouth and hopefully muffling his
cries before they roused Boxer. Thankfully, it works. The boy shuffles around
in her arms for a bit before gripping the front of her gown tightly and
suckling greedily at her breast, and Vegeta has to chuckle softly at how
unequivocally Saiya-jin that is.
 
She lets her son feed without protest, deciding that this is one other small
thing she will do for him before she leaves him to his father for good. As for
the other things she will do for him…
 
Rubbing at his lower back, she sends a small, soothing flood of ki through her
fingertips to the base of his spine, numbing the area, before gently sautering
off his tail with a heated blade of ki. The small, furred limb falls to the
ground and she eviscerates it, catching her son’s limpid blue gaze once the act
is over. He watches her intensely through a sleep-heavy stare and Vegeta tells
herself that she is being paranoid about his judgement.
 
“That’s sad,” Boxer’s low voice rumbles from behind her. “I thought Trunks’
tail was cute.”
 
She turns to face the new father. He’s watching her oddly, much more sharp-eyed
than he should be. Vegeta suddenly feels awkward, being watched so intently by
the two males. Turning away from Boxer, she shrugs, uncomfortable with his
scrutiny and wishing that the brat - Trunks - would finish so she could cover
up, despite the numerous times Boxer has seen her in various states of undress
by now.
 
“I won’t be here around for the next full moon, so that was just in case he
happens to look at it.”
 
Boxer is silent after her declaration and then Vegeta can sense him moving,
coming to stand behind her, arms slipping around her form. His head rests on
top of hers and she scowls momentarily at the invasion of her space until she
notices the way he trembles and his breath hitches. She’s uncomfortable,
standing there in his embrace while breast-feeding, the entire scene feeling
like some bizarre alteration to reality. This isn’t what she’s made for; Vegeta
was born of the blood of fallen enemies and the spirit of battlefields. She’s
meant to be a warrior, not a mother and this little slice of domesticity makes
her feel like a con artist.
 
Still, she lets Boxer take his comfort from treating her like some stuffed
animal and lets Trunks take his fill despite how greatly she wanted to suddenly
fling them both away due to the sheer sense of wrongness of it all. She lets
Boxer guide her back to the bed, where she sits, propped up by pillows and
holding her son while Boxer lies beside her, arm thrown casually over her lap
so he can stroke both of his loves. Reclined, Vegeta tries to relax into the
moment.
 
Finally, Trunks unlatches and, sensing her uncertainty, Boxer takes him,
holding him so that the baby’s head was propped on his shoulder and patting
gently at the boy’s back. He watches her as he does so, knowing eyes on her
frame while she readjusts her gown.
 
“When will you go?”
 
She shrugs at the question. “Soon,” she replies. “As soon as I’m able.”
 
“Will you keep in contact?”
 
Vegeta is silent for a moment, looking away. These past few months haven’t been
all awful and, aside from sex, the two have rekindled their friendship to where
it once was, and she had been tolerant of his digging before. At the very
least, she could be available if he had questions about Trunks. She nods.
 
“I doubt you’ll be able to handle the brat.”
 
Boxer snickers quietly. “I handle you.”
 
She shoves him lightly, careful not jostle the sleeping bundle in his arms.
 
“Take him. Go sleep,” she orders. “I’m tired of looking at your ugly face.”
 
Scoffing in arrogant disbelief, Boxer rises carefully, stroking Trunks’ back to
keep him calm. “I’m the sexiest person you’ve ever met, Vegeta. And the
smartest. This guy lucked out getting my genes,” he shoots back at her when he
exits.
 
Rolling her eyes, Vegeta lies back down. She should catch a few hours of rest
before she leaves, so that her mind is sharp when she leaves. The Saiya-jin
puts herself to sleep, running through a mental checklist, counting off the
supplies the ship was stocked with, from fuel to food and reminding herself to
check the built in GR when she rises.
 
In a few hours, before even the sun wakes, Vegeta is up and changed into a
recreated jumpsuit and armor, preparing to leave. She has to finish her
training in space, away from all the distractions here that were making her go
soft. She needs to go back to how she was, craves it now that her reprieve is
over. The alien doesn’t bother to check on the only two men in her life she
actually likes, sensing their sleeping kis coming from the compound - she’ll be
back anyway, she thinks with a savage grin.
 
There’s a big fight on the horizon.
 
End Notes
     Lisbeth Salander is the main character from The Girl With the Dragon
     Tattoo series.
     If you don't know who Tony Stark is, think about your life and think
     about your choices.
     Fatal Attraction is a movie about a married man whose one night stand
     leads to the woman stalking him and his family. Given Boxer's
     actions, I thought it would be ironic to make him watch a movie about
     a man's cheating having adverse effects.
     This work is without a beta, all mistakes are my own. Please let me
     know if you find any. Also, first time writing smut, how'd I do?
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