... Hrrrm. Could probably be tinkered with a little more, but I'm braindead. ;_;
---
All the lamps in the lab save one were off. She'd dismissed all the researchers hours ago.
"Are you still beating your skull against the same thing?" Vegeta asked, with an edge of insulting disbelief. She didn't turn around.
"I put it back together yesterday," she replied. "Bit of a puzzle, but easy enough. Figured out the cause of failure this morning at eleven fifteen."
"So why the hell are you still here?"
She didn't answer. Vegeta stalked his way through the cluttered workshop. On her desk were blueprints for a dozen different inventions, quite a few inspired adaptations of the Ice-jin healing tanks.
"I can't find a way to fix him," she eventually admitted, voice hitching just barely. She kept staring ahead into the desk lamp's harsh light until she had to be blinded by it.
"Even if you found a way to fix the body, he's not in it anymore," Vegeta said abruptly. Bulma's fingers curled slowly into fists. She didn't stop staring straight at the lamp.
"I supposed it must all seem very silly to you anyway."
"Yes."
Unsurprised, she closed her eyes.
"Not as silly as wasting your time here when you could be fixing your mother. The woman's been howling since yesterday."
She flinched, even though she'd known that would happen.
"...He died the way he'd lived. That's the only proper way, even for an egg-headed paper-pusher like him and you. Now stop being pitiful already."
"Saiyajin," she said like it was an epithet, but after a few seconds she let out a shuddery breath, clicked off the lamp and pushed herself up on her feet.
76. Broken Pieces
---
All the lamps in the lab save one were off. She'd dismissed all the researchers hours ago.
"Are you still beating your skull against the same thing?" Vegeta asked, with an edge of insulting disbelief. She didn't turn around.
"I put it back together yesterday," she replied. "Bit of a puzzle, but easy enough. Figured out the cause of failure this morning at eleven fifteen."
"So why the hell are you still here?"
She didn't answer. Vegeta stalked his way through the cluttered workshop. On her desk were blueprints for a dozen different inventions, quite a few inspired adaptations of the Ice-jin healing tanks.
"I can't find a way to fix him," she eventually admitted, voice hitching just barely. She kept staring ahead into the desk lamp's harsh light until she had to be blinded by it.
"Even if you found a way to fix the body, he's not in it anymore," Vegeta said abruptly. Bulma's fingers curled slowly into fists. She didn't stop staring straight at the lamp.
"I supposed it must all seem very silly to you anyway."
"Yes."
Unsurprised, she closed her eyes.
"Not as silly as wasting your time here when you could be fixing your mother. The woman's been howling since yesterday."
She flinched, even though she'd known that would happen.
"...He died the way he'd lived. That's the only proper way, even for an egg-headed paper-pusher like him and you. Now stop being pitiful already."
"Saiyajin," she said like it was an epithet, but after a few seconds she let out a shuddery breath, clicked off the lamp and pushed herself up on her feet.