With a strange feeling in his heart and a dark premonition of things to come, Vincent casually strolled to the docking bay area in hopes that he could still see prince Vegita on his way. In the pod loading area surrounded by smoke and the bustle of workers Vegita was placing his gloves on when he noticed Vincent approaching him.

    "Vincent!" The boy shrieked excitedly "Has my father changed his mind?" He asked

    "No my prince." Vincent replied in his usual dark tone. Vegita knew there was something wrong, for Vincent would never put himself in an uncomfortable position such as a farewell under normal circumstances.

    "Then why the hell are you here?" The prince sneered, but deep inside regretted that he had said such a thing. Vincent only snickered at the boys attempt to mask his feelings, they knew each other too well for such games.

    "I came to remind you of your teachings one last time before you go" Vincent knelt eye level to the boy "You have learned all that I can teach you, there is nothing more I can tell you that you cannot learn for yourself. Remember this: You are the prince of sayajin, lower than no one… One day you will be great and will be able to overcome anything or anyone that crosses your path…" He noticed Nappa was snickering in the background. "He’s probably good enough to beat you, Nappa!" Vincent rose to his feet.

    "He might have a couple of tricks taught to him by a nursemaid" Nappa replied in a cocky manner. "And he could beat me… If he were properly trained by a real warrior." Just then without warning a stream of white light whizzed past Vincent hitting Nappa in the chest flinging him backwards and smashing his body into a nearby wall. Nappa fell to hands and knees gasping for breath, He looked up to see Vincent with arms crossed and next to him surrounded in an aura of red, the prince, Vegita. Vegita’s hands were still smoking from the powerful energy blast as he stood smiling in the ready position awaiting a rebuttal. "Vegita, I… I apologize" Nappa held up his arm as if to block any further attack. The blast had hurt him harder than anything he had ever felt in battle, and so he had decided that it would not be a good idea to challenge the boy.

    Vincent crookedly smiled at Nappa as he attempted to stagger back over to his original spot.

    "You…" Nappa’s voice was much more humbled. "Consider yourself lucky…" He whispered "See, unlike these other sayajin, I don’t believe those bullshit myths… I’m not afraid you, in fact you’ll find there’s allot of people who aren’t afraid of you, nursemaid." He gestured into a crowd of dock workers who had stopped to watch the excitement "I’d be careful if I were…" Suddenly Vincent grabbed Nappa by the neck and raised him into the air effortlessly. He looked hard at the now helpless Nappa who was fighting for air.

    "Old fool, I have fought for this empire longer than any warrior still alive" Vincent’s voice had turned darker "Who are you to test me?" He asked. "You have no idea who I am…" And for less than a split second Vincent’s hair flashed white and his eyes blood red, it was so quick that only Nappa had seen it. "Bitch…" Vincent dropped the horrified sayajin, who did not fully understand what he had just seen.

    "Nappa!" Yelled the prince who had just readjusted his scouting unit to fit his over his eye "Let’s go!…"He looked to his former caretaker one last time.

    "We will meet again, my prince… Long live the thrown of Vegita.." Vincent yelled as Vegita’s pod door had closed and was sent blasting off into the dark regions of space, never to return to planet Vegita again. That would be the last time Vincent saw the boy on his home plant, and for some reason he knew that.

    Vincent started heading back to his quarters but noticed that several sayajin were staring at him, he had made a mistake by not fighting Nappa… And worse, it had seemed like the child had protected him. It is a well known fact that sayajin despise fear, and now it seemed that a number of them believed they could instill fear in Vincent.

    The warrior returned to his small room within the castle in which he lived. His room was small but adequate a washroom, a bed, and no light, somewhat cave-like. As he lay on his bed he soon started to drift-off, cloudy red and gray visions slowly crept into his mind. Vincent often did not pay attention to his dreams but this night would haunt him for quite some time. As the sayajin slept he saw the horrible fates of men that he had killed in battle, how he would wrap his war chains around his enemy’s neck and slowly decapitate them. He saw the vision of a beautiful woman and black tears falling from his own eyes. Another vision had appeared, but of the prince holding a crown in his hands, the prince then threw the crown on the ground smashing it into a million pieces. Then he awoke; it had been hours since he had first shut his eyes. Outside of his room he heard the sounds of fighting and disorder, as he sat up to investigate he felt a cold breeze run past him, he was not alone in the room.

    "Did you come here to die?" Vincent blindly asked in the darkness of the room…No answer, suddenly an attacker appeared from a corner of the room leaping towards Vincent with arms extended, another man had run to the door, possibly to let more attackers inside. Vincent reached forward and grabbed the leaping attacker by the head, quickly turning he placed the man under his massive arm, his new prisoner gasped for breath. Vincent looked up briefly to see more attackers enter the room, and behind them seemed to be royal guards running up and down the passageway in a state of anarchy. Vincent wasted no time amongst the confusion, he placed one hand on his captive’s chin and the other on the back of his head, in one swift movement snapped the intruders neck and then completely removed his head from his body. Another attacker was approaching from the back, Vincent quickly turned around and grabbed the sayajin by his hair and proceeded to walk forward dragging the attacker behind him. Vincent could feel the mentality of his past returning, his veins pulsing with hatred and evil, he looked forward to see a group of nearly twenty sayajin blocking his doorway. Vincent smiled wickedly, then suddenly released a blast of energy into the head of the sayajin he had grabbed earlier. The blast lit the entire room causing a standown between Vincent and his intruders, there was nothing left of the sayajin that was blasted. The mob stood in awe of Vincent’s power; some of them were starting to reconsider attacking him when an older sayajin spoke.

    "You’re not as impressive as I thought you would be, nursemaid." The voice was coarse and raspy.

    "What is the meaning of this and who are you to enter my masters castle" Vincent asked, the sounds of looting could heard outside of the room.

    "Your master?" Another sayajin questioned. "The king is dead!" He yelled.

    "You lie!" Vincent screamed blasting another sayajin at random instantly killing him.

    "We speak the truth…" The voice answered back.

    Vincent noticed all of these common sayajin were wearing royal armor, possibly stolen from the dead. The noises outside grew louder, he knew they were not lying. The planet was in anarchy, the kingdom demolished in one night. Vincent put his arms down in a state of confusion and was quickly grabbed from behind; his attackers showed no sign of mercy relentlessly beating Vincent. The warrior did not struggle, he had lost the will to fight, and he slowly fell to his knees and faded to blackness. The crazed mob continued to beat Vincent to a bloody pulp.

    Hours later Vincent’s tore body lay flat on the same bloodstained spot upon a broken marble floor, his attackers had left him there to die. Suddenly his eyes had opened.

    "The prince!!!" Vincent staggered to his feet. The broken warrior started to limp through the maze of now deserted hallways to the docking area. Just as he had entered the bay he heard the sounds of battle miles above him. "That must be… Bardock?" He moved on. Vincent was not concerned with the battle that waged in the skies above, he thought only of the prince and the salvation of the crown. He sat himself down in the nearest empty pod; he could feel his energy fading away as he struggled to close the pod door. Vincent’s hands dragged over the control consul out of pure exhaustion, he had accidentally set the Hyper-sleep State in the cabin and slowly drifted into a deep sleep. Suddenly a violent force pushed the pod into the air, Vincent had not even set a course, and the pod was taking off aimlessly into space. Vincent flew up into the sky but had not traveled far when suddenly the ground below exploded upward in a ball of flame, it seemed that Bardock had failed. The force of the explosion reached up into sky chasing Vincent at a blinding speed, it destroyed the pod’s engines and flung the pod deep into space. The warrior would be sleeping inside frozen in time; he would be one of only a hand-full of sayajin to survive. Vincent’s pod was now heading in a direction that would take him decades until he landed, but because of his state of hyper-sleep he would not age during this time, and so Vincent sailed slowly out into the regions of the next galaxy.

PREVIOUS                    NEXT CHAPTER