Heart of Fire

Disclaimer: Don’t own it. You know the drill.
Here’s chapter six- Tarneus, meet Goku. (couldn’t think of a better name)


Vegeta never thought that sitting still and thinking about nothing could be so hard.

With thoughts of Kakarot dancing in his head when they shouldn’t be, Vegeta found it harder to concentrate with each passing moment. The second time he felt the other Saiyan, it was like being shocked. The power ripped through his mind and gripped it like a vice. It screamed ‘Kakarot’. Vegeta knew he wasn’t making it easier on himself thinking about why Kakarot had his power level so high, but it was so unnerving he sat where he was and actually forgot for a moment what he was doing and where he was.

The Yardrat-jin in front of him had the nerve to poke him back to his senses, earning him a menacing glare from Vegeta. The Yardrat-jin, who Vegeta later found out was named Firu, wasn’t fazed in the least by the look.

“I don’t know that you really want to do this. If all you’re going to do is lollygag off into space then you’re wasting your time and my own.”

Vegeta didn’t listen to him and tried again to focus, but to no avail.

There was something nagging at him, something quite clear in his head that Kakarot was going to do something rash. Or he was in trouble. Why else would he raise his power level? What was he fighting? Better yet, what----

“Hey! I told you to concentrate or be gone! You think about that man as if you are in love with him, why---

The Yardrat-jin was cut off as Vegeta’s hand wound around his throat.

“Don’t you dare say something like that to me again! I am not ‘in love’ with anything. It’s not my fault your training is so boring and long. I’m not going to say this again. You will find some way to speed this process along. I have the basics of it, all you have to do is teach me how to pinpoint exact locations. You teach me that, and I will gladly be on my way.”

He dropped Firu unceremoniously on the dirt floor and rubbed his hand on his pants.

“That I had to touch you should have never been an option. Don’t push me old man. Just get on with it and I will do my part. This is not a friendly gathering of any sort, don’t talk to me like you know shit about me!” Firu carefully soothed his throat with his hand and sat up.

This was one Saiyan that was not like the other. This one was different, too different for them to be friends. When the other arrived battered and bleeding in an old spacepod, Firu and his people helped him as much as they could and got nothing but kindness in return. But this man, he was not kind at all.

Here he was taking time out of his day to help this ungrateful thing, and all he got was an attitude. Trying to make friends with this one was like trying to adapt to a relationship with a piece of string. Even if there were something wrong with the other Saiyan, Firu doubted they were friends. He wanted to ask but would have rather kept his air to himself.

“I apologize” He wheezed. The haughty Saiyan prince closed his eyes and cleared his mind once again.

Damn thing, telling him he was in ‘love’ with Kakarot. What audacity! Never had he heard something so impossible in his life.

Vegeta might have considered snapping the ugly guy’s neck but then he wasn’t….like that anymore. But if this fool said one more absurd thing like that again, he would very well forget his morals on this planet.

Thinking began to get a little easier now that Vegeta decided it was best not to think about his companion in distress. To think about Kakarot was making him damn hot under the collar.

And why? There was nothing about Kakarot that would make him embarrassed.

So Vegeta shifted his thoughts to the nothingness of meditation and listened to Firu yap on about feeling life.

“You have to be able to know exactly where you want to go, or else you may end up somewhere you’d rather not be.” The Yardrat-jins voiced sounded funny, somewhere between a growl and a child’s voice.

Vegeta listened intently, trying to get as much as he could in the little time he had left. So far, he knew how to move when he wanted, now he had to know how to move where he wanted. The last three days were like three hundred years. Time was slowly humming by while Kakarot was out there somewhere, doing something he wasn’t supposed to be doing no doubt. Vegeta didn’t like idly sitting by, but he had to learn the technique or he might as well spend the rest of his life in space looking. It really was an interesting technique and from what it sounded like, it should have been easy for Vegeta to find him. But it was not going to that simple. There was still the fact that maybe Kakarot did not want to be found. If that was the case, he would not just let Vegeta come and get him. This was not going to be easy, he could feel it.

That and Firu’s hand on his shoulder.

Vegeta glared down at the offending hand and growled, “What are you doing?”

Firu cleared his throat and got up “I want you to try to find me.”

With that he disappeared. “Oh, now we’re playing hide and seek! I don’t have time for this!”

“Just find him and test your new ability. Then you can leave. Trust me, none of us are happy to have you here.” Another Yadrat-jin spat bitterly.

Vegeta cast him a wayward glance and his eyes dipped closed. He thought about raising his hand to his forehead as he had seen Kakarot do on so many occasions, but thought better of it and held his hands at his side. What the hell was taking so long to find this old fart? Vegeta had been standing there trying to locate Firu, but didn’t feel an inkling of energy. He could feel a lot of other life forces, but not Firu’s.

“What is he, dead?” His fingers clenched and unclenched in frustration. It wasn’t this hard before, the coot must have been suppressing his energy, either that or he was too weak to find.

“He is waiting, all you have to do is---

“Shut up! I know what the hell I have to do, I don’t need you to tell me!” Vegeta snapped. Who the hell did that thing think it was? Speaking to him as if were some find of imbecile. This was getting annoying, he couldn’t even tell if Firu was alive, but he wasn’t on the planet.

Vegeta was not about to sit back down for another day perfecting the technique, he would just have to go it a little rusty. He was determined to find Firu and leave as soon as possible. Pushing every conceivable thought out of his head, he concentrated on the vastness of space. The Ki signature of Firu finally caught his attention and Vegeta IT’ed over to him.

Firu was waiting for him on a beautiful purple and red planet, sitting on a rock.

“It took you a while to get here but now that you know where you are going, you don’t need me. Alas, I bid you good luck” Firu turned around and walked away. “Not that you deserve it” He mumbled under his breath. Vegeta’s Saiyan hearing picked up the last retort and he snorted, ignoring it.

He found the old man and now it was time to find Kakarot. Firu wasn’t more than a feet yards away when Vegeta turned around. “You, you can read people’s minds and shit like that. Can you tell me where he is?” Firu shrugged but didn’t face Vegeta. “That depends.” Vegeta sucked his teeth “I can’t feel him unless he raises his Ki. He isn’t allowing anyone to find him, he may have a mental guard up or something. I don’t think even you can find him, forget I asked.”

Vegeta poised himself to take off but Firu stopped him in his tracks. “A Yardrat-jins abilities are not limited to the mental barriers of any species’ mind, I can sense where he is right now.” Vegeta stalked toward him. “Tell me.”

Firu shook his head. “I don’t think so. You are on your own now. I can’t tell you exactly where he is because he is moving in space. I can tell you he is in the Konack Galaxy, but you already knew that. He won’t be there for much longer and then you will be back at square one. Goodbye.” He was gone in an instant, leaving the prince standing alone and pissed.

“Tch. That fool!” He would have to find help elsewhere.

“Kai, hey are you there?” No answer. “Kai, where are you?” King Kai answered after a while sounding exasperated. “Oh, Vegeta, sorry about that, I was in the bathroom”

Vegeta’s nose wrinkled in disgust.

That was why he sounded so tired.

“Ugh, I didn’t need to know that. I’m finished my training and have learned the Instant Transmission, do you think you can tell me of any thing about Kakarot?” The King sighed and stayed silent. “Well?”

“Vegeta, it wasn’t longer after we felt his Ki rise before an entire planet disappeared. You know what this means. He…destroyed that planet! This is getting serious, he is evil somehow, I don’t know what he’s doing, but something happened to him in the last few months that caused him to change. I wish I knew what it was. You have to get to him. But I have to warn you that it is going to be dangerous, you’ll have to---

“Don’t worry about me, I’ll handle Kakarot. You just be there to answer my questions. I don’t need your concern. Kakarot will come to his sense when he sees me.”

“Why do you think that Vegeta?”

Vegeta was quiet.

Why did he think that? Kakarot wouldn’t just come gallivanting into his arms like a lost puppy, he knew that. So why did he think that Kakarot would change upon seeing him? It wasn’t like he was special or anything. In fact it seemed like the opposite would happen. If the reason Kakarot left was him, then he would not want to see Vegeta much less go back with him. So what was the point in finding him?

‘I want answers’ That was it. It was only because he had a few things he wanted to ask the younger Saiyan. If he didn’t want to go back he didn’t have to, it was his choice.

“Vegeta?”

The prince popped out of his stupor and replied, “I don’t, I was just saying he may…. I don’t have to time to answers your obnoxious questions.” Vegeta promptly closed the link and pulled his space capsule out of his pants pocket.

He would fly around the galaxy toward Konack until he felt Kakarots Ki and depending on what was going on, it could take any amount of time. He may never raise it again. Somehow, Vegeta had to find another way to find Kakarot, because the way things were looking, he wasn’t going to be able to find him on his own.

“If I stopped him from leaving, I wouldn’t be in this predicament in the first place. I am the fool who should have held on….” Feelings of all sorts were now attacking him from all sides now that he had time to himself. One in particular stood out. What did he feel for Kakarot that made him come way out here looking for him? Surely it wasn’t anything to do with that ‘love’ shit that ugly Yadrat-jin thing was talking about. Vegeta was sure. But he didn’t come out here just because he lost a friend, there was more to it. He was worried beyond belief about the other Saiyan and it was getting on his nerves. He shouldn’t be worried, Kakarot could take care of himself, after all he did blow up a planet with innocent people on it, something the real Kakarot would never do. King Kai said so himself and he was wiser to things like that than Vegeta.

If Kakarot was evil as the bug guy said, then Vegeta was going to have his hands full because he still wasn’t strong enough to beat him. Admittedly, he was always weaker no matter how he tried to best his opponent in any case he was not enough to change his mind. Fighting wouldn’t make things any less complicated, so what would bring him to his senses? What had Vegeta done to make him act this way? There was something missing, a significant chunk of something that needed to be understood before he could proceed.

Settling into the seat in front of the control panel, he pondered training in preparation, if need be. But his nervousness was actually making him feel restless and less inclined to train. Not that he was afraid, but the thoughts in his head were telling him that he should keep his senses open lest Kakarot raise his Ki again. The likelihood of that was small but that Vegeta remembered his idea earlier and decided that it just might work. It was risky if the other Saiyan was evil like King Kai said, who was to say that he would even want to see Vegeta? There was only one way to find out…

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Sticking his hand out of the ships door, Tarneus shot off a blast and took off before the service station was turned to cosmic dust. The planet shuddered violently before giving way to the explosion and disintegrating.

Tarneus smirked ruefully. This was quite fun, he wouldn’t mind doing a few times over to other puny planets. Now that he had discovered just what kind of power his body held, it wouldn’t be hard to take out this entire galaxy given the seemingly endless ‘free time’ he had on his hands.

He was up to nothing in particular and after Dusk was reduced to nothing, he would have the whole universe to dominate.

Yes! Nothing could stop him now. He had whole planets fates resting in the palm of his hands, and nothing stood in his way.

The effort it had taken to power up to what looked to be his full potential in power was well worth the result. He did look different but the transformation was a stunning one. The golden aura that surrounded him when his hair changed color was like being wrapped in blazing heat and power. His Ki went through the roof.

In comparison to the Lais-jins, he was damn near invincible and as far as he knew, he was. There wasn’t a soul in the known universe stronger. At least, that was what his cockiness led him to believe. Dusk was not very far now and so Tarneus figured he would use the rest of the time channeling his not-so-newfound powers.

He cackled dryly, looking at his hands. Hands that could produce enough power to blow a planet to space crumbs. Nothing felt better than being able to do what he wanted and he very well intended to do just that.

He would start with Dusk and work his way around the Konack galaxy until there was nothing left. Killing those people at the service station was just the lift in his spirits he needed.

Eventually he would have to settle somewhere it wasn’t like he wanted to destroy the entire universe. He knew that he could, but that was not reason enough to do so. He would just have his fun with a few galaxies and find someplace to rule over. He was too powerful not to dominate something; his power demanded it.

And so Tarneus had already mapped out what he would do and it wouldn’t be difficult to do it.

When he found a planet with some good technology he would have to get another ship. This one was cramping his style. Old and worn, it was far too small and the piece of crap didn’t even have a decent sleeping quarters. He would have much rather slept in the chair.

Or on the floor, whatever. He closed his eyes and drifted off to sleep.

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*“You know you shouldn’t have left. You should have faced it while you could, now look at you!”*

What? It was that voice again!

“Stop playing games with me and tell me what the hell you want. I’m tired of going to sleep and hearing your voice. I’m not a toy, don’t play with me!”

Out of the darkness came his other self, still naked as the day he was born. Tarneus gestured toward his naked body and sneered. “At the very least put some damn clothes on. I know what I look like nude.”

The thing nodded.

*“Well I would have some something covering me if I wasn’t stripped or everything I was” *

These little beat around the bush comments were grating on his nerves so Tarneus frowned and advanced toward the thing. “What the fuck is that supposed to mean. Speak like you’re telling me something I want to know. Stop fucking with me!” It smiled and put its head down. *“You don’t know what I am. As I told you before I am you, or who you used to be.”*

Tarneus’ eyes widened. What was this thing talking about? He couldn’t be him. Sure they looked the same but they were far too different. This thing had a softer voice, a bit higher in pitch.

*“I am Son Goku, you know who I am. I am you. You don’t remember me for a reason. What happened to you is---*

“Your name….is the name in my dreams!”

This time it laughed, *“This is your dreams, sort of! Of course, you’re right, you have heard of me. Now you see how much relevance I have to your past. Your memory may be a bit fuzzy” *

Tarneus believed none of the nonsense spewing out of this things mouth. A shape shifter of some sort, telling him all sorts of colorful lies about himself. But as it was, it was correct. There was a blurry spot in his memory that he couldn’t figure out. But what did this apparition know? It was just a figment of his imagination and could have been telling him fictional bullshit.

*“You forget, I am in your head. The very thread or your existence now hangs on in me, the vision in your thoughts. I know all you know, I see all you see, and I have to say, we are very different. But I have to change what I said earlier. I am not you, you are ME. I was what you were before you became…this”*

Outrageous bullshit!

Tarneus shoved the thing backward and away from him but it didn’t go far before it pushed him back.

“You bastard! You don’t know what you’re talking about. I don’t know what you are but I am myself I am Tarneus, and you don’t know shit about me. Get out of my head and leave me alone. There is nothing you can say to make me believe you!”

It grabbed his arms and twisted then until Tarneus was brought to his knees. “Auuggh what the fuck, let me go!” *“I don’t think so. You did say you were the most powerful being in the universe. Why don’t you try that power on yours truly”*

This monster was going to pay!

Tarneus began to power up until his hair bled to blonde and his eyes flashed teal. The thing holding him did the same.

“What the hell?!”

*“I told you, we are one in the same. Well, physically. You are not stronger than me. In the end you will only be hurting yourself. I don’t mean anything, I’m here to represent what you used to be. That depends on what you’ve become. Now, what say we work on that attitude?”*

This… demon or whatever it was sure was a cocky fucker and Tarneus didn’t like it. “I don’t care what you think you are. This is my dream and if I want to kill you, I will!” This only made his other self chuckle.

* “I’m sure you remember, I was dead when we first met. You could kill me again, but it wouldn’t do you any good. Now I didn’t come here to taunt you. I’m here to tell you something….” * It paused.

“Well, out with it. What the hell is so important and get your disgusting hands off of me!” The freak let him go and kneeled down to his level. “You are an earth raised Saiyan. You are not human and obviously not Lais-jin. Should I continue or have you had enough information for one day?”

Tarneus wasn’t sure he wanted to hear anymore, things were getting awfully strange and the look a like wasn’t making any sense. None of this could be true, not by a long shot but then again, he couldn’t trust those dirty Lais-jins to tell him the truth. They must have done something to him, which might have explained the unknown gap in his memory. They never did tell him what kind of accident he was in and he never thought to ask.

Amnesia, they said. He couldn’t remember a thing after coming back from Earth.

It was suspicious and what was even more confusing was that whatever this ‘it’ was talking about sounded strangely like it fit into that gap. “What do you mean? Tell me more!” This was such a sudden powerful blow to his mindset. How could any of this be true and why would he think it to be? Still he wanted to know just how much he could take in before discerning what was real and what were lies.

It was a good thing it kneeled in front of him because being on his knees in front of his naked form was not the most pleasant thing in the world.

“You left one day for reasons known to only me, and took off for a random planet, you ended up on Lais and they, seeing your potential, took you in. But you didn’t arrive with your memory intact and so they played with you, used you. They thought you to be a most valuable asset to the planet. The bloodlust that courses through your veins was only a minor detection in battle against every adversary you’ve ever faced. This lust for the fight, the kill is what led you to become what you are once you lost your memory. The crash landing, Lais was so cold…your body simply couldn’t handle it. You were on the verge of death but I was not dead, I was stuck in the limbo between myself and Kakarot.”

The name struck a chord in Tarneus.

It was the name the voice, whom he still knew nothing about, had been repeating.

“Who is Kakarot, you know something. I’ve been hearing of that name, what pertinence does it have to this?”

“This is going to sound strange, but Kakarot is you and me. Or the likeness in you that is what you really are, what you were meant to be had you not lost your memory on earth.”

“You said I lost my memory on Lais.”

“I did say that, but what I meant was when you were born. You were not born on earth, but you were raised there. As a babe, you had taken a life threatening fall down a steep ravine and bumped your head. Then, you were on the verge of death, like you were when you landed on Lais, and you lost your memory. You had originally come to earth with the intention to destroy it. But your mission was forgotten and you lived the rest of your life on earth in for the past 87 years up until now.”

It took so long for Tarneus to let the information sink in, the other one didn’t think he had heard. “Do you want me to repeat it?”

“No. I have another question, who was the voice calling out that name, ‘Kakarot’?”

This thing had better not be telling him lies. Because as of now, Tarneus believed and hung on to every word. It sounded all very true, it answered every mysterious instance in his dreams and certainly explained how he lost his memory. But he had also believed the Lais-jin too. This thing couldn’t be lying, it was HIM.

This was not a game, Tarneus was starting to see that. Something here was being exposed that he would have otherwise never known if he hadn’t succumbed to this dream like state every time he went to sleep.

“So in essence, this is not a dream, it’s…how to say… a reality. That doesn’t sound right but it’s the only way I can explain. You are sleeping but you are very aware of what is going on. What’s happening to you is a reversal of the effects of what happened on earth. You are being your Saiyan counterpart, Kakarot. The person calling you Kakarot, is someone you’ll have to find for yourself. I won’t tell you. He is very relevant to all of this. Now it’s up to you whether you want to take my advice and do something with it or whatever. But just know, I won’t go away if you choose to stay the way you are. I can’t change you though, you were born this way.”

How was he supposed to do anything with this information?

What was he supposed to do, bang his head into a comet and then all would be right with the world? Stupid thing thought it could comeback and change him. All it did was peak his curiosity about the voices in his head.

“Oh, and don’t call me a thing. My name is Goku.”

What the hell was this? He had three different names, one of which he just had finished explained to him and now there was another. How many different people was he? Yet another name he heard called out in his dreams, by different voices, none of them the voice that called him Kakarot.

This was more than he wanted to understand and he wanted to leave it alone and just go on with his life.

He had some killing to do and it wasn’t going to wait on a dream.

“This isn’t a dream, I’ve already told you that. Goku is the name you were given on earth and the reason that voice knows you as Kakarot is because Kakarot is your Saiyan name. I don’t particularly like to call myself that but I accept when he calls me.”

“Who is he?”

“I told you I wouldn’t tell you. Now, you can go back to your life of purging planets. It’s what the Saiyan people did. Well at least now you know what you are. Goodbye and farewell. I will always be here deep in your mind and I will slowly drive you insane until we are reunited as one. In the meantime, you have more problems on your hands than what I’ve told you. You will soon see.

“Now…wake up.”

Tarneus shot up in his seat, breathing heavily and sweating rivulets of perspiration. That disturbing dream had assaulted him again, but this time it left him feeling mindless. He knew nothing of himself other than he had a life before this.

On the one hand, it was helpful because now he knew his origin and that there was something before Lais. But it didn’t fill the memory gap, it just skimmed it.

On the other hand, he didn’t care who Goku or Kakarot was, he was neither anymore. Tarneus was a good enough name to keep. Kakarot being the same person, was a part of his past. A past he wanted nothing to do with. So there was some meaning in his daydreams of the planet Earth.

He had lived there all of his life until a few months ago. That was a HUGE chunk if his life he didn’t know about. 87 years! That was forever! These Saiyans seemed to have very long life spans.

He would finish the rest his new life as Tarneus, and no amount of strange ghosts of himself were going to change that.

So much for finding the owner of that voice… Well, a little mystery never hurt anyone.

The dream was still vivid in his mind, it was disturbingly nagging at him. What for? Just because he believed the Goku in his dream it didn’t mean he wanted to revert back to being him. He would stay the way he was, haunted by an old image of his former self or not.

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Goddamnit it all to hell?! Where the fuck was Kakarot?

Vegeta was not going to go back into the ship until he felt his rivals Ki again.

Still on whatever planet he Instant Transmissioned to, Vegeta stood where he had been standing for the past hour and struggled to concentrate, but he felt nothing but the air blowing around him. So many different life forces, and none of them was Kakarot’s. Now that he had the power to Instant Transmission, it was damn near useless if he couldn’t find what he was looking for.

If Kakarot had even tried to IT anywhere, he would feel it. But he must have still been in his ship. Did he even know that Vegeta was out here looking for him? The idea of raising his Ki was getting more and more tempting by the minute.

“Perhaps going to a planet on Konack may help if I am closer” That idea would have to suffice for now, because it was all the choice he had left.

The urge to put his fingers to his forehead was too great to ignore and so Vegeta lifted his hand and pressed his to index fingers to the middle of his forehead and picked a planet on the outer limits of the Konack galaxy. Kakarot said this helps him locate better. It would help him too.

Feeling some Ki activity, Vegeta IT’ed over to the planet. When he arrived the people on it were startled to see him pop out of nowhere. More surprising, he had landed in the middle of someone’s table while they were having supper.

Vegeta hopped off the table and walked out the door as if it were the most natural thing in the world.

He didn’t care for the people there and proceeded to walk around surveying the planet for a good spot to search. This planet had a large population and so it was not easy to find a quiet, deserted place, but after a while, he found one. Small, but it would do. The people looked at him with bewilderment in their faces. Where had this man come from? Why had he come to their planet? He did look different, even though they themselves were humanoid in appearance. But he definitely stood out in the crowd.

They watched him walk off into the distance, not even so much as sending a greeting of peace. “You there, what is it that you’re looking for here. You can’t just come here and stay on our planet. We have a policy against that.” Vegeta didn’t stop walking but replied,

“I won’t be here long.”

The man that spoke had skin with an orangish tint to it, not very much unlike a humans, and small pointy ears. He didn’t resemble Tapion in many ways, still Vegeta could tell that this race was of close relation to his. But he didn’t come expecting to meet the man who was acclaimed to be the legend of the brave.

IT’ng over to the spot with the least amount of people, he calmly sat on top of a rock and stared off. Feeling out for the familiar Ki he was looking for, Vegeta tried not to get his hopes up. Being closer did not necessarily mean getting lucky. He was one step closer, it wasn’t something to celebrate about but, he was feeling a little more confident then he had been a while ago.

A few minutes had gone by and still he could feel nothing. How was it possible? Surely Kakarot had a Ki whether he was suppressing it or not, Vegeta should have been able to feel it.

“He is still in the Konack galaxy I know that” The voice didn’t startle him out of his concentration. “It would take longer than that to leave this area. Konack is very big and so I don’t know where he is now, but he hasn’t left the galaxy”

Vegeta grunted in response and King Kai closed he link.

If Kakarot was still here, how close was he without Vegeta knowing? Any kind of sign would have helped, but he wasn’t getting a thing. He could be anywhere, passing him by. Vegeta decided to use his ship to track Kakarot. If he could track his ship then he would be able to pick him up on his radar. That sounded like a decent plan. For now he would use the ship.

Pulling the capsule out of his pocket he dropped it and a puff of smoke later, his spaceship stood before him. He boarded it and put the coordinates on auto pilot and programmed it to track any ship within his radar, which had a large scale.

Thank you Bulma!

This feeling of being close was making his skin tingle. He could practically feel himself getting closer. But he didn’t want to get too excited. He would not build himself up to get broken down. King Kai could have been wrong. Kakarot could have very well been anywhere under the sun. But if he was really as close as he thought, then Kakarot did not know he was coming.

He had no idea.

Good.

If he could stay in one particular place for a minute Vegeta would be able to find him fast with his new technique. For the time being he would rest. He might need it and he was sure things were not going down without a fight.

Curling in the chair, which wasn’t the most comfortable thing, Vegeta’s eyes slid closed as sleep claimed him for the first time in days.

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His new clothes looked good on him as he thought. They were just his size. He tried not to let the remnants of his dream get to him. Stupid of him to even consider letting himself get too absorbed in what Goku had said to him. Things were strange enough and he began to regret asking him any questions at all. What worried him most was that every time he closed his eyes he would see Goku.

As annoying as it was, Tarneus believed that the naked man would haunt him. He said was stripped of all he was. It was a shame Tarneus couldn’t bring clothes in his dreams or he would have wrapped that body of his in something decent. Even if it was some agitating dream figure, Tarneus did not want to have to close his eyes and see Goku naked if he didn’t have to. He reminded himself to see if he could clothe the other version of himself.

Sleeping was out of the question now and he was already wide awake. He still had about two and a half weeks left until he got to Dusk. Dusk was in another galaxy and it took forever to get there. Tarneus was tempted to stop by and blow up a few planets to ease his boredom but he didn’t want to stop again for anything. He had been in space for to long and he was getting lonely. He wished he had a companion of some sort to accompany him on this journey.

What Goku said about earth was making him itch to destroy it all the more and he couldn’t wait until he was finished with Dusk. Dusk was a planet that had the best technology in its galaxy and some of the most beautiful possessions. Tarneus was not brainwashed into making Dusk his first option, he could have very well turned and gone back to earth but he didn’t want to end his fun just yet.

He had the time so why not? He would only end up destroying it anyway.

And for all the technology they had on that planet, maybe he could get a faster ship. Lais was not the most technologically advanced planet in its own galaxy as were most of the planets. Being on a journey was the only thing that kept him busy, despite that he was bored to no end inside his ship. But once he built an army, loneliness would not be a factor.

He would hand pick the strongest, most intelligent races to do his bidding and build an empire to rival all others. Tarneus had high priorities in mind that he would fulfill with an iron will. The universe was not prepared for him and that just how he liked it. They would receive a cruel surprise when he came knocking for dominance.

And Goku could just shove all that blabber about himself in one of the dark recesses of his mind, because none of that mattered to Tarneus, he was not going to change. And maybe…maybe he would make it his business to find out who the voice belonged to and kill them.

^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^**^*^*^*^*^*^*^
Vegeta got up so fast he felt like he got Super Saiyan whiplash.

The radar had gone off loudly signaling that a ship was in its sights. Vegeta’s hands flew over the keyboard to zoom in on the ship. It looked unfamiliar and kind of old, but if it had any modern features at all, it had a screen monitor.

Vegeta took a deep breathe and calmed himself. This might not even be him. It could be some ugly alien or some parasite roaming the universe… Vegeta pressed the button and the screen turned on.

He could see the inside of the other ship. Small and cramped, smaller than his own. Nobody was on deck as far as he could see.

“Is anyone there?” Vegeta spoke. He didn’t get an answer and stared at the screen for several minutes. As he was about to give up and try later, something walked in front of the screen.

Vegeta looked closely at all black before whatever it was sat down in front of him.

He gasped. Kakarot! King Kai was right, he did look different, not in the way was dressed, but his countenance was not the same. Kakarot gave him a bored glare and said something for the first time.

“Who the hell are you?”


To Be Continued…

Yay it’s done! Not as long as the last one but close! I didn’t have too much trouble writing this, I picked the idea out before I went to bed and started on it right away. I hope you guys like it and tell me what you think as usual. I figure the title may be changed to ‘To love a Saiyan’ or ‘To the ends of the universe’ whichever one works best. What do YOU think? Tell me in a review. I’d like to think that this fic is almost finished maybe two or three more chapters, nothing epic.