Time Warriors Chapter 21

"Gokuu, put him down over there – and Kuririn, go get him a senzu bean, and hurry up about it!"

Bulma immediately took charge, directing Gokuu toward the sofa in the main living room and Kuririn to the kitchen, the former to put down his burden on the long, wide couch in the apartment and the latter to get their small bag of senzu beans. Her mind barely registered that even more strange people were spilling into her apartment, as her attention was completely focused on her unconscious husband.

Gokuu carefully placed Vejiita on the couch, arranging him so that the smaller Saiyan could easily see everything when he awoke, supporting the prince’s head with several small throw pillows, and stood back. The rest of the crowd from Theo’s TARDIS straggled after Gokuu, pressing around the sofa, hovering near the prince. Gohan and Trunks pushed toward the head of the couch, standing just behind Bulma as she kneeled on the floor, very close to Vejiita's head. Piccolo dragged Theo by one arm and forced her to stand at the opposite end of the sofa with him, right in the prince's line of sight.

And that was absolutely the last place on the planet Theo wanted to be. The moment Piccolo pulled her out of the TARDIS, Theo felt as though long, burning spikes had been pushed into the deepest part of her brain, trying to cleave it in two. There was something clearly wrong in that apartment, so much so that the Guardian clenched her teeth together and dug her nails into her palms so that she wouldn’t scream. Whatever was there affected her on such a basic level that her first instinct was to leap back into the TARDIS and take everyone else with her.

Everyone except the prince, of course. Theo had no compunction about leaving him to fend for himself.

"Let go of me!" she hissed at the Namekian, struggling to free her arm from his grip, her eyes slightly wild as she pulled against him, panting. I have to get out of here-

"What – and have you run back to that ship of yours before Vejiita wakes up? I don't think so," Piccolo rumbled, giving her arm a rough shake that made the rest of her body tremble. "You'll stay until we decide otherwise."

"No, no, you don't understand," she protested strenuously, twisting to see the Namekian's face. "I can't stay – there's something terribly wrong here, I can feel it. It's -" and she shivered, her head shaking helplessly, "- it's horrible - it feels as though something is stabbing me from inside my brain - and it's not stopping – please, you've got to believe me, there's something wrong here -"

"Listen to me, woman," Piccolo snarled. He pulled Theo close to his chest and leaned his head down to hers, his lips so close to her cheek that she felt his breath brushing across her lips, causing her to shrink back slightly. "There's nothing wrong here – everything is just as we left it. It's your own fault that you don't want to face Vejiita - you're the one who decided to betray him. Don't blame anyone else for your own mistakes."

Bulma's voice cut through the general hubbub, slicing cleanly across conversations. " –but what happened to him?" she asked, upset, staring at Vejiita's face as she smoothed away invisible strands of hair from his forehead.

Theo panted, gaping helplessly at Bulma. Pain lancing through her skull did nothing to stop a crawly, tingly sensation from shimmering up her spine; the longer she stared at the couple, the more she felt the vibrant psychic connection thrumming between them.

What ... why am I feeling this? she wondered, very close to being overwhelmed with sensation. This type of connection with another person was something that was usually very personal and private, something that was almost impossible for other creatures, even sensitives, to pick up. Gods, I don't want or need to know anything else about ouji-sama -

But apparently her body didn't care what her mind wanted to do - it simply continued doing what it did best, which currently was responding to psychic signals from other beings linked to it. Desperately, Theo took the information and shoved it into another part of her brain, determined to examine it later, knowing that she would NOT be able to properly analyze what she saw immediately.

"He was fighting this alien, Bulma, and then—" Gokuu's voice faded into the background as Theo's became more strident.

"Look, I don't care what you're saying, I'm telling you there's something wrong!" Theo's voice rose as her protests became louder, vying with Bulma's decibel level. The Guardian twisted in Piccolo's grasp, still trying to pull her arm away as hard as she could, completely ignoring the scene at the other end of the room.

"You don't understand, I can feel it, it's in my head—"

Gohan turned to glare at Theo before returning his attention to Bulma and Vejiita. Had the younger Saiyan been able to reach Theo, he would have cheerfully choked her for being so disruptive at a time where the Saiyan prince obviously needed and deserved everyone's attention. Now his sensei, of all people, was forced to deal with that traitorous woman and they all were obliged to listen to her whine while Vejiita lay unconscious on the couch.

"But that doesn't make any sense, Gokuu! He's fought plenty of aliens – I don't understand why—"

Piccolo also glowered down angrily at Theo, then settled himself on his heels, tightened his grasp on her upper arms and pressed his seven foot frame against her smaller body and forced her to face the head of the couch, motionless. "I don't care what you say – you are going to STAY here and watch this, whether you want to or not," he hissed in her ear, his long fingers digging painfully into the soft skin of her arms. "And you will answer him when he speaks to you and asks you questions, whether you want to or not. Is that understood?"

Pain sensations as keen as hot needles lanced through Theo's psyche again and again, dulling the impact of Piccolo's words. The only thing Theo knew for certain was that there was something drastically amiss, something so wrong that it affected the very core of her being. Something was trying to sift through and rip her very essence into a new design – and it was painful in the extreme. She threw her head back against Piccolo's chest, eyes wide, and writhed in the kami's grip, obviously in some kind of distress.

"Please – please," she gasped, craning her neck to see his face, "you don't understand – whatever is here is tearing me apart – it feels as though it’s killing me. Please – let me get back to my TARDIS – it’s the only way I’ll be able to figure out what’s happening here – I can hardly think as it is – “

"You're not dead, Guardian," he snapped, shaking her roughly. "At least, not yet."

Bulma’s impatient voice snarled from the other end of the couch. "Kuririn, hurry up – he needs that senzu NOW, not two weeks from now!"

"Coming," the warrior called from the back of the apartment. "You father just wanted to see what—"

A disturbing idea started to form in Piccolo's mind as he looked at Theo, frowning. If there was anything at all to what this woman claimed, then the problem would not simply be confined to her only - her daughter should be involved as well.

Nodding, the kami threw a suspicious glare in Elyse’s direction - which quickly faded to an incredulous stare the longer he looked at the teen. More than a little disturbed, Piccolo watched Elyse; a light sheen of perspiration covered her face, she was breathing rapidly through her mouth, her hands were clenching and unclenching reflexively, and her eyes kept darting back and forth. She was obviously in a great deal of discomfort, and just as obviously trying not to give her distress away, instead standing just behind the tall woman and her gray haired companion.

But Piccolo knew. And if he knew, then there was a pretty good chance that the others would catch on soon, too – especially Trunks. That young man seemed to be fairly well attuned to her.

What's wrong with the girl? he wondered, staring and scowling. She's acting as if she's in pain. Could they both be suffering from the same thing? He scowled, not knowing whether to trust his instincts – which told him that Theo and Elyse were indeed in great physical distress – or –

"Get OVER here now, Kuririn – can't you move any faster?"

"Okaasan, he's moving as quickly as he can," Trunks interjected, putting his hand on his mother's shoulder. She looked up at him for a moment, then turned her attention again to Vejiita. Kuririn slid to a stop next to Gohan, pushed Trunks aside and gave the senzu bean to Bulma.

"About time," Bulma muttered, snatching it from the hapless Earthman and shoving it into Vejiita's mouth.

"That should do it. He should be just fine now," Kuririn said, watching the Saiyan carefully.

Whatever this thing is, it’s getting worse, Theo groaned silently, staring at the knot of people at the opposite end of the couch. It feels as though something is warping space arou—

Theo went limp in Piccolo’s grip as the stark realization of why she was in pain hit her. Eyes wide with dismay and shock, Theo stared blindly at the odd tableu near the end of the divan, her mind racing through all the possible reasons for the ache in her mind. Her hands trembled involuntarily while her mind kept coming back again and again to that terrifying, inevitable conclusion:

Warping space ... ye gods, no, tell me they aren't doing that ...because there’s only one way that people at this level of technology could warp anything in the space/time continuum, and that’s by building something that warps the time continuum itself –

Fear and pain now mixed together in quantities much too vast for Theo to control; she was going to burst if she couldn’t get free of the horrid, twisted perversion this timestream had become. She tried to pull away again from Piccolo, but his hands were steady and hard on her forearms, making escape impossible.

”Forget it, woman,” Piccolo rasped, sliding his hands down her arms and forcing them tightly behind her, holding her wrists easily with one massive hand. “It looks like Vejitta is coming around – and I’m sure he’ll have plenty of questions to ask you about those rock aliens. You're not going anywhere.”

”You just don’t GET it –“ Theo started, heated, when her quick indrawn breath and sudden silence caused Piccolo to glance at her, then in the direction of her stare.

Vejiita's eyes suddenly snapped open; black and unfocused, they roved around until they centered on the closest thing in his line of sight. An uncharacteristic expression flickered in his eyes, one that was immediately answered by the blue-haired woman kneeling next to him.

”Woman,” he said hoarsely, “where are we?”

”Inside the apartment – where else would we be?” Bulma responded immediately, looking at him as she gently touched his forehead, a slight smile on her face.

Vejiita grunted and rolled, swinging his legs off the couch and pushing himself up to a sitting position, forcing her hand to drop away from his face. “How should I know?” he muttered, glaring at her. “There’s nothing that—“

”All right,” a shaky feminine voice voice demanded, interrupting Vejiita. “Someone better tell me where the damn shattered time machine is before we ALL get consumed by this timeline.”