Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

“C’mon Beerus, everything turned out okay,” Goku put his hands up in defense, facing the irate god in the immediate aftermath of his messing around. Perhaps, maybe, he should not have acted without putting more than two seconds of thought into what he was going to do, but it hadn’t really gone sour and he didn’t think there was any reason to be so upset about it all. But Beerus seemed to disagree with that sentiment and he was nearly steaming from the ears with how mad he was—almost bowing Goku over for how steeply he was hunched over him with his threatening gaze.

“You do not have the self awareness to know when do quit, do you!? I have all the reason in the universe to erase you on the spot. Even now, you cease to have any understanding of what you shouldn’t have done and your stupidity has no lack of depth.”

“It’s not like I went out of my way to do it...I just...Winged it…? I won’t do it again…” He cowered back even more, but Beerus only seemed to glower down at him with hotter fury than before. The long tail behind him smacked into the ground and Goku could actually feel it cause a tremble in the ground under them. Oh, he was seriously angry. Beerus had explosive moments of temper tantrums, but he’d sort of equated them to Vegeta’s in their severity, usually. Not true displays of anger, but rather just aspects of personality that wouldn’t go away. Beerus would always be a little explosive about something, right…?

No, but he was really, very angry. Goku actually felt like he’d gotten Beerus incensed enough that he had to watch his step and his words very carefully; and when Beerus got into his face, he quickly ducked, slipped down on his knees—bowed back in defense with his arms still up—and let Beerus tower over him with the dominance of a furious god that could destroy him with the flick of a finger.

“Winged it? You winged it? You did everything opposite of what I told you to do! You had no business picking fights with things bigger than you and I should have let you be obliterated,” the tremors shook them again, with the second clap of his tail swiping into the ground. “But you went and ran your mouth. If you don’t cease this nonsense of yours, I will make you wish you didn’t exist at all you absolute mistake—”

“Hey—We fixed it...Right? I said I won’t do it again, I promise. I mean it. I really do. I’m sorry, Beerus...I didn’t mean to make you mad,” he tried, aiming desperately to smooth down Beerus’s ruffled feathers, but it only appeared to accomplish the exact opposite, despite his attempts. The whole event was a catastrophe, but most things they got themselves into were; he just didn’t understand why that had Beerus so ruffled. Goku started to feel a little nervous by just how intensely he became unraveled.

“Mad? I am beyond mad. I’m at the point of debate on whether or not erasing you would be a greater benefit to me than leaving you in this universe. I’ve come across this problem with you before, and you’ve brought me here again,” he poised over him, holding his hand out—posed as if the option was presented for him to just fix what he considered the problem to be. “You are not nearly as intelligent as Vegeta. At least he has the sense to be afraid of the fact that I can and have always been able to remove you from reality—” His voice was becoming louder, shrill in a manner of speaking. His frustration was peaking. “He even warned you, you idiot—what not to do.”

“—I don’t listen to Vegeta that much thou—”

“Well maybe you should start!” He screamed in his face, stomping his foot down so hard right beside him that the ground actually cracked. Goku swallowed thickly and he put his hands together and tried to look as deeply apologetic as he could muster. Beerus stiffly ignored him in favor of continuing to berate him. “If you had listened, just maybe you both could have walked away without nearly inciting a war. But you have to be a battle hungry numbnut and quite honestly, I’m stuck on how to teach you a lesson on restraining yourself. Because telling you to stop clearly doesn’t do much for you, now does it!?”

“I...didn’t think they were going to take it as a threat...I thought it was mutual...How was I supposed to know...They weren’t supposed to be here in the first place—Why’m I the bad guy!”

“They were visiting, you idiot—you nearly ruined a perfectly good relationship and then you call solving the problem with violence—winging it. Because you want a good fight. Ignore every sliver of good advice to stop and are failing to see the actual problem...I...I am unable to actually comprehend the vastness of how stupid you actually are—”

“Ouch...I got it...I messed up…”

Beerus suddenly pressed his face so close to Goku’s face that he almost fell over from his presence. “Do you really got it? Because I think you probably don’t have it. I think your lessons aren’t ever going to connect in this thick skull of yours until you have a reason to remember them. Erasing you outright, while it would probably save me so much stress, wouldn’t do any good, because you wouldn’t learn a damn thing. And if I have to explain to Lord Zeno that you just vanished, because I destroyed you, then it would be my hide. And then you, once again, cause me grief. But, I think I have a solution, I will make you learn a goddamn lesson, Son Goku. If I have to force it. You will learn, at least to place a few more seconds of thought into your actions.”

Goku clamored to straighten himself up when Beerus stepped away, backing off of him and moving some paces away. The god of destruction turned away from him and nodded off to the angel who always stood some distance from him. He spoke to him, but Goku didn’t immediately hear what he said. Goku frowned and crossed his legs, sitting on the ground and waiting to see if Beerus was going to calm down any bit. Was he still as furious? He suddenly backed off and his tone shifted. He sounded like he had an epiphany in the middle of his berating, but he didn’t say what it was. That was more concerning than all the threatening nature of his words.

With a brief exchange completed, Whis stepped away and Beerus turned back to him, tail swishing and indicating that he was still very irate, indeed. Never mind. The fury wasn’t gone, he was just focusing it better. The weird knot in the pit of Goku’s stomach tightened a little bit and he frowned up at Beerus.

“You brought this on yourself, keep this in mind,” Beerus spoke and a cold twitch hit his spine that he didn’t care for at all. Beerus’s attention was split between him and the direction Whis left for and Goku wondered why, but he understood after some odd minutes—when Whis came back with Vegeta in tow. He was going to bring Vegeta in to scold him too? Goku whined a little inwardly. Vegeta was very likely to tell him just how much he told him not to do it, and just how right he had been about it.

But that wasn’t what Beerus meant, because Beerus held a hand out to pause Whis, who stopped and kept Vegeta at his side—confused but watching the event unfold, just the same.

“This is not what I wanted to have to do, and it’s a shame. Because there was potential. But I have reached my limits with you Son Goku and for that, you pay. And unfortunately, it looks like he pays for your blunder as well. And that’s a poor fate for him, seeing as he attempted to restrain your foolishness. You not listening to his wise advice, cost him.”

Beerus’s words took a moment to connect as he spoke them, but once they reached, each one started to hit harder and began to alarm Goku with more intensity with every passing second. The raised hand Beerus still had, was not just to pause Whis from continuing. Goku’s breath stuck in his chest and he found the energy within him to jump up from his place on the ground, wobbling to his feet and blurting a breathless mouth of words, with a lot more fear behind them than he realized he’d have. “B...Beerus, wait, don’t, that’s not fair—”

“Not fair is your reckless behavior. And your lack of learning your place So you need real consequences of your actions. And so you will get them.” Beerus showed him no warmth, his willingness to back down had been completely dissolved. Instead, he took several steps to face the other saiyan and Goku was almost ready to pick a fight with Beerus at that very moment, if he didn’t already know he would lose immediately. If he wasn’t stunned, knocked wordless and motionless at what felt like a betrayal, in a way.

“L...Lord Beerus?” Vegeta must have felt similar, though he always knew that Beerus would do it at any moment, under any circumstance, for any reason. He was the smarter one, Goku knew that. But Goku just didn’t think that…

“It’s not personal, you’re just a necessary sacrifice to prove my point.” Beerus didn’t give Vegeta the chance to actually respond.

Goku tried to yell something. Anything. But he was struck by the reality that the god of destruction actually placed his hand in front of his friend’s face and pulled his god of destructions powers out to destroy him—his physical body seeming to come apart in a golden shimmering glow, as if returning to nothing but a natural form of ki. Beerus didn’t draw it out or let Vegeta have enough time to ask why or explain it to him, he didn’t have enough time to suffer. But the physical form of him was gone in a glowing mist and Goku stood still, breath caught. He was unwilling to take it in, for the sound he was going to make if he did.

Beerus erased Vegeta.

Erased him.

He’s…

The breath still didn’t come and his lungs burned. He stood, hands reaching for nothing, but there as if he was stuck in a position of horror. He was. All he could really see was the empty space where a body just was and the distorted haze of ki that left an impression behind. He felt like he was being blasted harder than he’d ever really been blasted. He felt winded and yet wasn’t even breathing. He was frozen in a moment where his mistake caught him and broadsided him with so much intensity that his vision was blurry and he wanted to scream.

“You did this. He did his very best to avoid being erased by me. And as it would be, you were the one who caused it. How will Bulma respond? His children? How will they react to know you are the cause?” Beerus spoke, as if he hadn’t just destroyed someone so uncomfortably important to him—more important than he’d realized until that very moment, where seeing him destroyed was burning him alive.

He was simply gone. The shocking reminder of Beerus’s ability to do that so easily, flexed for him to witness, and he nearly lost feeling in his limbs in direct response to it. Goku had hardly begun to think about anything beyond the immediate event. Bulma and the rest of them, hadn’t even begun to sink in. He hadn’t even considered what that would mean. The burning in his chest overtook every other feeling, until he it left him finally gasping for air as moments passed.

“This is what your trouble making causes, and you will do well to keep this reminder in the back of your head for the next time you decide you want to try and cause a stir,” Beerus tilted so close to him that he could feel his presence radiating his seriousness in the moment, before he moved away with all the confidence of a god who didn’t care that he’d destroyed something important to someone—someone Goku thought Beerus was at least a little fond of… But Beerus whipped around and raised his voice, “Whis, turn it back now.”

Goku sucked a breath in, acutely aware of time distorting around him, but not being part of it. Whis was omitting him from the rewinding of time. The events of the last few minutes rewound in front of him and he watched the golden haze reform into the physical form of Vegeta and solidify in an instant. Purposefully, they wanted him to see it happen again, to remind him and Goku nearly barked Vegeta’s name just seeing him in front of him again. But he was struck silent for a moment, again, eyes trained on Beerus.

“Remember what I said, Goku.” Beerus delivered a hard look, and he turned away from him, stalking away without a word. He was done with his lesson. His very effective, very horrifying lesson that left him more shaken than he wanted to admit.

“Kakarot, what the hell is going on, why am I here?”

Goku turned his attention from the departing form of Beerus, to the irritated and completely unaware fellow saiyan. He said nothing, immediately. Anything he said would come out in a failure. He left the silent moment to hang in the appreciation that Vegeta was there at all.

Chapter Text

“Kakarot, you’ve been acting strange and I can’t pinpoint when it started, but if you don’t stop it, It’s going to actually start pissing me off.”

Vegeta shocked Goku out of a brief moment, where he’d forgotten himself—leaned on the table, with his face propped lazily in a hand. How long had he had his eyes wandered over in Vegeta’s direction he wondered? Well, long enough to make Vegeta jump at him, at least. Though, a quick glance could have done that, too. Vegeta was willing to pick a fight with him for any number of reasons, but he had seemed to be in a pretty good spirit, otherwise. He’d actually shown up to a group gathering. He’d actually dressed down from his battle armor. He actually spoke to someone other than Bulma.

But it certainly didn’t stop him from barking in his direction when he caught him casting long sideways glances at him. Goku couldn’t blame him, really. He was being weird. He knew he was being weird. He couldn’t quite shake the image of the gold shimmering mist that Beerus had turned him into, out of his mind. Vegeta had no idea that it ever happened—Beerus intended for only Goku to be aware of it. On purpose. He wanted it to stick with him and it was most definitely stuck with him.

“Sorry, I...just thinkin’ about stuff...that all.”

“What could possibly go through that brick up there that has you spacing out for a solid five minutes in my direction?” Vegeta tapped his fingers against the table, arms just barely out of their folded, accusing stance. “God knows not much does any other time.”

He deserved that. More than Vegeta knew, but he just forced a weak smile. “I dunno, just stuff. Nothing particular. Really…” He tipped his head down and swiped his drink off the table to divert his attention to something, in hopes of taking away the conversation or playing it off, but Vegeta was acutely aware of him and his quirks. He was being a lot dodgier than usual and Vegeta had no patience for it.

“Evidently, you think I’m stupid,” Vegeta snapped, leaning back and finally slipping the loose arm right back where its home would be, tucked firmly under the other. The tone of his voice was sharp, enough that Goku didn’t actually want to glance back over at him—because he knew he would be met with a fight. Vegeta was always prepared for that, and Goku was unexpectedly not ready to battle with him about anything that didn’t involve fists. A battle of wits was a pure forfeit at that particular moment, but Vegeta never cared about obvious tells of opponents ducking out. “Because you seem to think I’d believe bullshit being handed to me.”

“That’s...not it. It’s not really...I got nothin’...you never come to these things...Really….I’m surprised you’re even out here, Vegeta,” he deflected, but it bounced flatly, because the attempt was too apparent. Too clearly made to be a deterrent from calling out whatever was turning Goku from his usual behavior.

“I’m acting more normal than you are,” he managed to shut it down, swiftly, and Goku winced. When Vegeta was moody or off centered, really, no one noticed. But when Goku was...behaving out of rhythm, it was apparent enough that it had Vegeta snarling at him for his indiscretions. And those were the indiscretions that he didn’t even know about. If Vegeta knew about what happened with Beerus...Goku wondered what he would do. How he would respond to that. How furious he would be to know he was responsible for that.

That had become a large part of his strange behavior. The very idea of Vegeta even knowing about it at all, on top of the memories of seeing it with his own two eyes. One aspect of it actually filled him with anxiety he didn’t recall having a feeling for before, and the other made his chest hurt from experiencing loss he’d rather die himself than see again. The brief thought of running away actually crossed his mind, but then Vegeta would be in a special kind of pursuit and he wouldn’t be able to escape that. For all Vegeta’s apparent dismissal of him, he didn’t let things go once he was made aware of them.

If Goku ran away, Vegeta would be the very sort of man to obsess about why, and if not apparently, he would do so silently and get angry about it. Goku thought he and Vegeta were doing relatively well...he didn’t want to ruin it, but he’d also almost gotten Vegeta erased. Having him angry at him...seemed small now, after that...but he still didn’t want that.

So it became a trial of making it through, until he could finagle his way out without earning his ire. Usually it would be at the sweet mercy of one of his friends, but they were occupied. Krillin could stand to be a little less occupied, Goku lamented, watching his friend from the corner of his eye—hearing his friend’s attempt to hold a musical tune, with a bit of a steep cringe.

“...I dunno what you’re talking about, Vegeta… I’m just thinking I should take a shot up there next, yeah? Whatchu want me to sing you? I can do better than Krillin at least?” He managed a half baked grin and cast a glance off to a small space where a few people were drinking and singing. Badly.

Vegeta’s deep breath told Goku that his patience was being tested, but surprisingly, he played along. “I have my doubts. Why don’t you go duet with him, and make an appropriately sized idiot of yourself.”

He could take that invitation and roll with it, but it was a trap, he realized. “Oh, no, I see, you wanna duet with me instead, I got you. You don’t gotta say it.” he forced a curl to the corner of his mouth, trying to keep his pace, but it was hard to compete when Vegeta had such a cool look in his eyes with each response.

“I’d be more interested to see how long you can keep this up.”

Goku tilted his head down, taking a sip from his drink. There was no breaking of eye contact from the moment he squared off with him, because he knew that if he did from that point, it was a loss and Vegeta was not an opponent he liked to just hand it to...not usually. But damn, he was making it hard. Krillin’s shrill shrieking was not making it any easier… either. The battle for concentration was tipping precariously, but he managed to keep some face, for at least a little while, just not long enough to outdo Vegeta.

The first point went to him, when Goku glanced away, back to the awfully distracting wailing, and he held the glass close to his mouth, “I think you’re just imaginin’ things.”

“I think you forget how long I’ve been around you, Kakarot,” he shot back, with fluidity that didn’t even break stream over Goku’s words. Vegeta had a conviction to his accusation that made it apparent that maybe it hadn’t only just occurred to him that something was amiss. Well, he even said it. He’d been acting weird for a while, just didn’t know when it began. So clearly it wasn’t a new realization. Vegeta just waited and observed. Of course he did.

Goku set his glass down and glanced into it, feeling like he was being preyed on—being cornered until he’d have to spill something, because Goku was pretty bad at lying or keeping secrets entirely. But he could twist out the part where he’d gotten Vegeta erased by Beerus. He could omit the days he spent afterwards, feeling a huge void in his chest from the image of seeing him just vaporized in front of him. He could kindly forget to mention that the concept of Vegeta gone did a lot more to instill fear in him than Beerus threatening to do anything to him personally. Being destroyed himself didn’t have nearly the effect that Beerus harming Vegeta did.

Why was that exactly? Goku spent some time figuring that out and Vegeta wouldn’t appreciate that one, he didn’t think. What part would make him mad more? The part where Goku got him erased or the part where the aftermath of it placed a whole new perspective on Goku that he hadn’t really considered the angle for prior to that incident? Thanks, Beerus. Now he had to dodge more layers of Vegeta’s suspicion than any form had the power for handling.

“Krillin’s….realling nailin’ it, huh,” he cringed, finding nothing else to say, derailed by the noise behind him. He could not recall, in all the years being around Vegeta, feeling so lost for functional chatter. Even silence was easier any other time. He could always find some way to annoy Vegeta into leaving prematurely, but he wasn’t budging. He was being the obstinate one this time and Goku lamented every second of this exchange in a wild reversal of roles.

Vegeta, please just get bored and go so I can skip out without making this into an ordeal—

But Vegeta actually tilted his drink back, watching him and challenging him directly over the rim of his glass—setting it back down without looking away. “What’s the matter, Kakarot? You don’t like this fantastic performance? Could kill street cats with this, even I’m impressed. Are you not?” The sarcasm was maddening, the tension was worse and Vegeta knew it. Way to purposefully push the buttons Vegeta—

“You’re not usually this mean, y’know,” he pouted, debating on how quickly he could empty his drink and go for another.

“You’re not usually this obtuse, and that says a lot,” he countered, leaning his elbows on the table and glaring him down, right across the table. “So are you going to tell me what the fuck your problem is, or are we going to pretend this is about how badly you want to run off and hit the high notes with the girl part of the song over there?” He shot the glance off at Krillin and Goku couldn’t...deny the terrible truth that Krillin was great at many things...but his smooth tones was not exactly one of them. Maybe if he lowered his volume, he could actually pull off the lady parts of the songs, pretty okay… Little manly, but there’s nothin’ wrong with that…

He just rubbed the back of his neck and forced himself to face Vegeta and not the distraction he was trying to use. Once he did, he lost his fight and dropped his hand back on the table. The way Vegeta looked at him, had the intensity of someone who just wouldn’t relent, and being presented with a fight, did have a tendency to make him feel a need to fight right back. He just...had nothing to fight back with. Nothing that wouldn’t grossly incriminate him.

Not that it would ever stop him from doing just that, when he leaned forward on the table, bracing himself on a hand and bending to meet him face to face. Catching the slight widening of Vegeta’s eyes in the brief moment before Goku reached the event horizon, made it worth that action—but then he realized what he was doing and the alarm bells started to go off in his own head even as he recognized how he’d damned himself.

Seeing Vegeta freeze gave him a mixed feeling of satisfaction and abject horror. He might have been better off just telling him he got him erased than picking this option, but once Goku acted on his impulses, he stuck them through and he tipped Vegeta’s face back with his thumb and fingers gripping his chin—in the boldest move of his life, honestly. Not even Krillin’s background squalling could shake him out of his momentary insanity of kissing Vegeta on the mouth, right there. Out in the open.

Without an explanation. Without prompting. Without a second thought to consider where he was and just how many witnesses he had. The music kept going, but he could distinctly hear a hiccup in the voice going over it.

Damn it Vegeta—

The one time you had to pick where you weren’t willing to back down—

“—Kakar—” He sputtered as soon as Goku released him, and the whole thing would be satisfying in any other scenario. He could belt it as a win, except for that small fact that he did so in retaliation to being backed into the corner. Suddenly, he found himself less than a breath away from him, with not nearly enough missing from his drink to excuse why he’d done that.

If anything, the reason he was acting strange to begin with was explained within that whole action and Vegeta was smart enough to connect it. But he said nothing, blinking at him in silence—stunned silence, but unnerving silence nonetheless. It made Goku feel sick to his stomach.

Damn it, say something, Vegeta.

“...Well...You wanted an answer, right?” He tried, attempting to pry something out of him. Ignoring anything outside of what happened between them in that brief instance. He’d contend with that after.

Vegeta’s brows furrowed and he could actually see the dilation change in his pupils with how close he was. He could see him calculating his thoughts and he agonized the moments it took for Vegeta to come to his senses, because they felt like forever to him. “...What is missing, Kakarot.”

“—W...what.” He squawked at him, his turn to be stunned to silence.

“You pull that shit on me, but you’re not fucking clever. What else is there?” The anger he expected to see, was most certainly present in Vegeta’s features, etched as lines that his expressions pressed permanently into his face; but the feeling he got was not what he expected and it left Goku at a loss for words. Vegeta expected more from him and Goku could not pretend he didn’t understand what he meant, but he didn’t want to give him anything else. He meant what he did, but the reason for prompting it, held a whole different possible consequence. He’d rather back down and walk away.

Though he did not have to, it appeared; because Vegeta turned his nose up at him in the most chest tightening display of distaste he’d seen out of him since he’d found out he’d hid Super Saiyan 3 from him. “Now I’m certain something isn’t goddamn right, so, when you decide you’d like to man the fuck up and stop playing these games with me, then you let me know, Kakarot. Until then, you can stay and explain to your friends why you just did that. I’m going to see myself out, after all, I don’t usually hang out for these things, you’re absolutely right. It is surprising. Let me fix that.” He stood up, eyes trained on Goku, but he leaned to grab for Goku’s glass this time, making a pointed effort to finish drinking the remainder of what was left in it with him watching, and setting it down cooly.

Goku watched him leave, walking with no apparent hurry. Vegeta managed to be the one to leave and somehow still make Goku feel like the one who ran away.

The power trip Vegeta must be having.

Who would have ever needed Super Saiyan 3, with that, honestly. He groaned and sat back down, waiting for the others to come over and wonder what the hell just happened. He wasn’t going to tell them Vegeta got his first real effortless kill on him, but that was exactly it. But at least he had time to work out how to approach it.

But how was he ever going to clear anything with Vegeta without telling him what happened?

He had some time to think on it, at least.

Chapter Text

More than once, Goku had woken from a dead sleep, in a cold sweat. Sitting up, he’d needed to shake himself awake and remind himself that dreams weren’t real. He hadn’t really ever been so plagued by them in the past before, but one kept trickling back in and it left him with an ever present hesitation to spent any long period of time sleeping—not that he slept for large stretches of time anyway, but he didn’t particularly want to hit a deep enough sleep to reach that phase where he’d come back around to seeing visions of Vegeta turned into a gold mist again.

Only when he’d gotten Vegeta pissed enough at him, did he start to really be haunted by the bad dreams. He’d made a complete fool of himself by admitting one thing, and lacked the willpower to fess up and admit that he’d placed Vegeta in almost catastrophic danger—which Vegeta seemed to be intrinsically aware of, just not actually aware of. Admitting one meant that he placed that admittance under duress immediately.

Vegeta was not particularly the forgiving kind, he suspected. He also didn’t have anything to go on; to gauge how he even reacted toward what Goku did do, which made it all the worse. He kissed him, blatantly, and Vegeta offered him nothing but to ask what else he was hiding. He didn’t even have the capacity to be angry at him for it?

Was Goku’s action not even worth being offended over?

Give me something, Vegeta. Anything. Be angry at me. Call me an idiot. Yell at me or something. This ignoring me thing is the absolute worst…

Vegeta was completely serious when he said he expected him to man up and stop playing games with him...but he wasn’t playing any games and Vegeta was blocking him out almost completely in response to it all. Goku wasn’t prepared to talk about any of it, because the manner of experiencing loss hit him at different angles, and Vegeta wasn’t predictable enough for him to determine his reactions.

He had been so certain he would have gotten some kind of...anything else out of him from actually, openly, kissing him. On the mouth. Without any cheekiness, without playing...he meant it. Vegeta knew he meant it. It wasn’t a slip and he hadn’t gone beyond a glass of drink to be altered enough for it to actually make him do anything he didn’t intend to do. He meant exactly what he did—even if the intensity of Vegeta’s unwavering personality had bullied him into doing it.

He received an unexpected, “was that all?” and Goku had no idea how he could retract and recover from that without having to actually place his reason for doing it into context. Vegeta was cleverly forcing Goku to have to think of a reason to tell him why he’d decided, after all these years, to suddenly kiss him. Without lying boldly to his face. To explain it without lying, meant he had to stretch and bend things he wanted, to keep Vegeta in his favor...and he was very bad at words. He knew that. If he attempted to game Vegeta, he was going to get volley’d hard. Especially when he was still so affected by what happened.

He could barely look at Vegeta sometimes, without catching the glint of gold that might have been pretty, had it not been a reminder of the glittering remnants of someone he decidedly cherished a whole lot more than he realized. Obviously, Vegeta wasn’t dissipating anymore, Beerus turned that all back—or rather Whis did—but sometimes, he couldn’t help but feel like the image was locked in his head and nothing was letting it go. Beerus really wanted it to stick. Any other damn thing went away, but not this.

For some reason, not this.

Maybe because it was unresolved. Or the threat of it would never go away. He knew he could always put Vegeta in that danger. He could be the thing that ended Vegeta. He’d rather Beerus just erase him than do that again.

He was starting to dislike gold as a color, especially when it blanketed Vegeta. He’d rather see him battered and bloody, because then at least blood can be put back in. Red was alarming, but gold was the new color of trauma. That was, when he managed to get close enough to Vegeta to see him and not have Vegeta immediately snuff him.

But Vegeta knew exactly how to snuff him and if Goku wasn’t prepared to tell him what he did, then Vegeta was almost pointed about turning his nose at him. The only bright side was that it made it easier to explain away his sudden turn to kiss him in the middle of a party as Goku’s excessive teasing and extreme lack of boundaries—acting incredibly stupid, when he knew damn well, he wasn’t supposed to just kiss someone for jokes. They didn’t need to be aware of that.

Haha, I was just messing around, guys.

Messing around was one way to put it, if he stretched it hard enough...Messing up was actually more like it. Vegeta acting like he didn’t exist anymore, certainly did fall in line with the whole event...Definitely made it look like Goku did a great job taking things too far in earning his ire again and he did deserve it....But being in the same room, sitting at the same table, and being unable to even make eye contact for the severity of his cold shoulder...made Goku cringe. Especially when he constantly itched to reach out and confirm he wasn’t transparent. To make sure the stupid dreams he had weren’t bleeding through and becoming reality.

Beerus’s lesson was a little too sobering and he suddenly wished he’d just chosen to knock his head off instead.

“Goku, you haven’t eaten hardly anything, are you alright?” Bulma asked him and he took a full moment to turn his eyes to her and register the question. He was doing the thing that made Vegeta so irritated with him in the first place—staring at Vegeta for longer periods of time than normal.

“Huh? Yeah, I’m just...thinkin’.” He managed to withhold the urge to slap himself for repeating the same thing he’d mechanically given to Vegeta, but Bulma didn’t have the same insight to Goku’s finer quirks.

“Oh? About what? What could possibly make you not want to eat?”

“Not wanna? Oh nah, I’m just making more room is all!” He would have easily diverted it, but was met with the scathing sound of Vegeta’s sneer and he grimaced.

“Listen to that, Bulma, the sound of a man attempting to abscond a subject,” Vegeta didn’t even look in his direction, but he could feel the cold gaze just the same.

Bulma looked between them and put a hand on her hip, shaking her head and turning her attention all on him. “Goku, what in the world did you do to him? You cannot have possibly made him this bitchy over what happened last week. He Has been moody ever since. I can’t even talk about you without getting scorn out of him. If you did something else, boy, you better kiss some ass and make up with him, he’s unbearable. Slip him a little more tongue and maybe he’ll lighten the hell up.”

Goku nearly choked taking a sudden breath following the sound of Vegeta slamming a glass into the table. The growl he gave her was loud enough to cause her to shoot him a severe look and prompt Vegeta to openly start barking at her—though he wouldn’t address Goku directly for anything. “Woman, how dare you say such vulgar goddamn things—”

“What? I’m just trying to fix the shitty mood you’ve got going on here—because apparently you can’t do it your damn self.”

“ME? I’m not responsible for this one. Ask Kakarot what the problem is. If you want to know what the fucking ordeal is. Hell, maybe he’ll fucking tell you. Because apparently he’s too much of a big chicken shit to tell me, isn’t that right, chicken shit?” He finally did give him attention and Goku decided he didn’t like this attention at all. He just looked right down at his plate and stuffed something in his mouth and Vegeta pointedly held an arm out, he could see it from the corner of his eye. “He’ll kiss me on the mouth in front of all your fuck off friends, but then this is what happens when I tell him him to stop acting weird and come out with what’s making him act stupider than usual.”

And Goku swallowed abruptly. Too abruptly.

Smacking his chest a few times, he felt tears pooling in his eyes from the lack of air following the abrupt choking spell. Vegeta’s outburst caught him by complete surprise and he didn’t have the capacity to calm himself down and focus on not breathing what he’d foolishly shoved into his mouth, right down the wrong passage. The coughing fit lasted longer than he intended and Bulma had a glass of water for him that he was immensely grateful for, even if he couldn’t say anything to her...or hardly look up at her. Vegeta said it too bluntly—

Why—

“Goku, are you okay…? Vegeta, honestly, can you take a chill pill,” Bulma snapped over at her husband, once Goku calmed down and could breathe again. The tears in his eyes made his vision blurry and he had to pant a bit to get himself back to his resting form, but he no longer felt like he was dying from the punch of Vegeta’s words. He held nothing back. Not when he was being particularly vicious.

“He’s fine.”

“You’re being extra shitty today. You’d think you’d be a little more pleased with yourself, but you’re more mad, what the fuck, can you make up your mind on what you actually want? I let you run amok and do what you want, and you can’t even decide what you want, Vegeta. We even talked about this—”

“This isn’t about that. This is about something else. We’re not talking about that here, shut your damn trap, woman—”

Wait, talk about what…? Goku blinked and looked between them, trying to read body language and figure out what was going on in the brief exchange, but he was suddenly hit through his blurry vision with the reminder of why he was at odds with Vegeta in the first place. The distorted view his watery eyes gave him, left him with an illusion of Vegeta that he knew wasn’t real, but his brain didn’t immediately catch up to it. Something about the way Vegeta’s form appeared hazy in his eyes, made his stomach bottom out and his heart thrum harder in his chest, until it began to hurt.

Quickly, he blinked his vision clear. Or tried to, but every time he attempted, the picture stayed the same. He still saw Vegeta the same way and he felt the same discomfort—the overwhelming need to reach out and confirm he was alive.

“...Kakarot..? Are you…?”

He blinked again and wiped the back of his hand across his eyes, dragging a wet mess across his face and unsure of what to do with it or how to play it off. Vegeta said he was acting weird, but he was being beyond weird and even he recognized it. Vegeta was mad at him and he would have every reason to be mad at him, but he was desperate to validate the sudden tingling in his fingertips that reached out to feel Vegeta’s physical body at the other end of them.

At a point, he left Vegeta far too stunned by his sudden movement to grab him and yank him against his body. Just to feel him present hadn’t been enough, his brain had decided in a split second motion and he wrapped his arms around the smaller body—trapping him in the moments where he was trying to make sense of what he was even doing.

That was not the sort of behavior that made Vegeta less mad, at all, but Goku had gotten hung up in the illusion of Beerus’s punishment. Vegeta felt like the other shoe. Without him, he wouldn’t be able to function right. Be unbalanced. Out of sync. He’d be looking for the missing piece and the thought of losing it never had come until Beerus gave him his warning. Now he had no explanation to offer Vegeta, while he had him held tightly in his grip, with his face turned into his shoulder. Just to make sure for a few minutes he didn’t disappear.

Vegeta was struck silent.

He wanted Goku to tell him what he was keeping from him, but Goku still didn’t give him anything. Clearly something was wrong, and he was no longer making it possible to ignore.

But how could he explain it? Without the possibility of earning Vegeta’s cold shoulder forever?

He had no solution yet, but Vegeta was taken back sufficiently enough by his desperate embrace to not make him answer him at that moment. That was good enough.

Chapter Text

Goku came out of the shower, feeling fresher. The workout was physically a good one, but he noted the strict business-only impression he got from Vegeta. Vegeta was still turning his nose at him in some fashion, but was not willing to sacrifice his training for the sake of putting off Goku. Which actually had a stronger effect than turning him out, really. Goku preferred Vegeta just ignoring him outright to sparring him with a complete voided sense of camaraderie. At least when he ignored him, he could feel the intensity of Vegeta’s disdain toward him. Vegeta’s silence in the midst of tolerance was unnerving in a totally different way.

Once, playing around on her phone, Bulma showed him a picture from some website. It was supposed to be one of those joke pictures, of some guy’s stuff thrown all over the front yard by an angry girlfriend, but the next picture had some other guy’s stuff neatly placed and stacked outside like the girlfriend took her time to methodically let him know just how mad she was and how unquestionably done she was with him. Goku thought about those pictures, and Vegeta seemed to be like some uncomfortable personification of the second image.

Even though Vegeta wasn’t an angry girlfriend, the sensation was reminiscent. But then, Goku still wasn’t coming forward with him either, and he couldn’t actually blame him for being mad—if mad was what you could call it. Maybe just done with him was a better comparison. The problem was that fixing it felt like a coin toss of making it worse, but Goku took so long to try and amend it that Vegeta went from being the clothes tossed wildly all over the lawn, to neatly folded and Goku found himself much more intimidated by the neatly contained absence of outward disregard.

Be angry with me in large outbursts, Vegeta...C’mon. Call me out on this…

He wanted to be backed into a corner. Maybe if he was pushed so hard that he had to come clean, he could finally get over it and face the consequences. For all he knew, the only thing that would happen was Vegeta would just...keep being just like was already was. Dismissive and uncaring. Not exactly the favorable outcome, but it would be better than him losing his cool at him entirely for almost being the reason Vegeta would have been forcibly removed from reality, taken from his family, and for a reason he didn’t have a thing to do with. Because of someone who was supposed to be his friend.

With that friend spending some months trying to work out why the whole event left him more shaken than if the God of Destruction had just killed him instead.

How many times had Vegeta barked at him about his absent staring off in his direction? Enough times.

“Kakarot,” and he was doing it again, with the staring—even still— if Vegeta was snapping at him, “if you’re going to just stand there posing like that, at least put a shirt on. After the way you’ve been acting, I don’t need someone to come in and casting their judgment on me as well for putting up with your bedroom eyes.”

Goku nearly took a full step back and squawked, “I’m not—what do you mean—it’s not—”

“Since you’ve given me no reason to believe it’s anything else, and I have plenty of evidence to prove otherwise, I’m just going to assume your problem is me, Kakarot. Or rather, your feelings toward me. And since you have no intention of correcting me, I’m just going to commit to believing it completely.”

“S...seriously—that’s….not the….c’mon, don’t be like this—”

“Be like what, Kakarot? Reaching obvious conclusions from several months of observations is only natural,” Vegeta shrugged, but his nonchalance held a sinister intention that only Vegeta could manage. He was switching tactics on Goku to try and force his hand and it almost worked by a knee jerk reaction on Goku’s behalf. Maybe he did feel strong things for him, but that wasn’t the actual issue. They both knew it. Vegeta knew it. If he didn’t know it, then he wouldn’t have been looking at him with such a challenging, unfaltering gaze.

The problem with them had always been, that challenges were always met with with hard countering and Goku decided that fighting him was easier than facing the issue. “S’not like it matters to you, right? Just ignore it, Vegeta,” he tried.

Instantly shut down. “I would love to, however, Kakarot, you can’t see to keep your focus anymore. I know you’re just dying to find the most public place to kiss me in front of all your friends again, but please, let’s keep this on the downlow, shall we?”

Goku felt sucker punched by his inability to snap back from his brutality. Vegeta was either just naturally, horrifyingly cutthroat in this battle of emotional wits, or he had the time to think about it and actually planned his method of attack. He, more than likely, thought through every way Goku could try to edge the conversation and plotted how to shut it down. He was the folded laundry neatly placed outside and Goku understood why Bulma laughed about how screwed the boyfriend was. He was starting to sweat it a little bit.

You’re a savage—Vegeta, who hurt you—

Oh. Right… I did, but you don’t know that yet…

“What if I don’t care about any of that stuff anymore?” Goku finally recovered enough to shoot back at him, coming closer and standing over where Vegeta lounged with all the casualty of a man who already, most likely, won the war. It sure didn’t stop Goku from trying anyway. He was delaying the inevitable for just a little longer.

He still hadn’t ever addressed why he’d suddenly grabbed him and embraced him like he was going to vanish into thin air. He hadn’t ever explained why he’d apparently not cared if his friends and family witnessed him kiss him in a very public place. He hadn’t made the first attempt to stop focusing all of his attention on him; as Goku had barely been home, despite getting Vegeta’s cold shoulder and refusing to explain anything to him. If he left, he couldn’t easily confirm Vegeta was still a permanent structure in the world.

Damn it, Beerus… Of all people to...

“Then I’d say you’re doing a piss poor job of...whatever it is that you’re actually trying to do, Kakarot, because you are literally just pissing me off.”

“When aren’t I doing that, Vegeta?”

“Hm, well, that is a fair point, but you’re being dodgy and stupid beyond your usual measure. To the point that I feel like maybe you’re just hoping I’m going to let it go at some point. But I think you’ve sorely misunderstood the intensity to which I can hold a fucking grudge. I can make this a lifelong commitment. So just knock it off and tell me what the damn issue is. What can be so bad that you aren’t willing to tell me? How can it be any worse than your new found attraction toward me?”

“Once upon a time, you’d have told me that was the worst thing that could have happened, y’know. What happened to the time when holding my hand was gross?”

“If you think you can just divert the topic, then you better remember that you’re not nearly on the same level of intelligence to attempt the switch, and I think we both know this.”

Goku soured a bit. Vegeta didn’t give even a fraction of a window for him. “Maybe not...but, honestly, since when did you care so much? S’not like this problem you think I have is urgent. Or even that big of a deal. You could let it go, y’know.”

“I could, sure. But I’ve decided I don’t want to. I’ll play this out until you can’t take it and stop being a coward.”

“That’s...bullying.”

“I am a big bully.”

“I mean, I dunno about big but—”

“Oh, now who’s bullying, Kakarot—” Vegeta snarled and kicked his foot out at him, harmlessly, leaving his heel dug into his chest in exaggerated offense, propping his leg up while maintaining his confident posture, somehow. For the first time in days, Vegeta met eyes with him without having some steeled irritation behind it. Maybe he was softening even just a little? Unlikely, but Goku really wanted to think he wasn’t staying mad for the sake of it… Well, with Vegeta, that was possible but… He was participating in their usual banter and Goku missed that.

“It’s okay if you’re pocket sized, Vegeta,” he continued, leaning a little into the foot pressed against his ribs.

“I will bite your fucking ankles.”

At the mention of ankle, Goku draped his arm over and nearly hugged Vegeta’s calf when he had him bending his knee and forcing his leg back. It made the smaller saiyan slide back in his seat and lift the other leg, hissing at him when he found Goku hovering much closer down in his personal space. He could easily fight back and they both knew it, but Goku was pressing his boundaries and Vegeta was apparently interested in seeing just how far Goku was aiming to go to distract from the actual problem at hand. The temporary jabs back and forth didn’t alleviate the tension.

“How ya gonna bite my ankles like this, Vegeta?” He put his free hand down to brace himself against the arm of his chair and didn’t care just how offended Vegeta might get.

He craned his neck back, getting right in Goku’s face—unwilling to back down, regardless of his compromised position. “I’ll just have to bite you directly instead, I guess.”

The tone of his words hit Goku in a way that made his heart beat strangely. They were close enough that the vibration of Vegeta’s words left a tingling sensation on his lips and he twitched—unable to process quickly enough for anything that could classify as a clever retort. Battling with wits with Vegeta usually meant playing dumb until Vegeta’s frustration finally gave in, but Vegeta had all new tactics and he didn’t have the first clue of how to handle these. He made jabs at him about bedroom eyes, but Vegeta was damn near paralyzing him.

“So, Kakarot, are you going to tell me what’s going on, or am I just going to have to keep playing these games with you?” He whispered right against his mouth and Goku found himself getting flustered and weak. This was Bulma level tactics and he was sure this was a horrible sign that he’d been around her way too much, if he was pulling his sort of stuff on him.

“I don’t want to,” he admitted, plainly. “You’ll hate me.”

“I hate you anyway, so why don’t you give it a try and actually see if you can’t make it any worse, you big buffoon? Or are you going to continue to suggestively bend me in the chair and just wait for my wife to come in and start thinking things. She’d watch. Wouldn’t even stop you. Don’t make me have to live with that.”

“Vegeta—”

Without warning, Vegeta took his fingers and his thumb and captured Goku’s jaw in his grip, tightly. There was no turning his eyes away from him with his vice grip on him and Goku watched him, carefully, trying to gauge him. Vegeta said he was being weird, but only then did he note that Vegeta was being weird too. Maybe as a result of his weirdness. Maybe it was something else. But what he could identify, at least, was that Vegeta was not being himself anymore than Goku.

“You are complicating this far beyond what it needs to be.”

“...I know.”

“Then fucking answer me. I don’t give a shit what you did, but I don’t like that you’re hiding it. I won’t move beyond this, until you tell me what your damage is. Something has you fucking spooked and I want to know. It’s not just your flippant willingness to suddenly start accosting me,” his eyes flicked to the leg Goku still had a hold on in their standoff, “or you wouldn’t act like I’m going to disappear if you turn away for too long.”

With that, Goku cringed and he knew—the moment he did it—that he gave himself away. The guilt at that particular statement was overwhelming, but he did his best to try and smooth it out of his reaction, only keeping it to the brief initial recoil. Having to deal with these feelings was out of his comfort zone to begin with. “I...will tell you..Just...give me time to figure out the words?”

“You have had months to figure out the words, you asshole.”

“I’ll...I’ll figure it out soon and promise I’ll tell you and—” He sputtered under the pressure of Vegeta’s dead stare. “...I promise…?”

Vegeta exhaled and turned his face away after a moment, growling audibly with displeasure at just how stubborn Goku was remaining. His patience had long since worn off, but he was still battling with him over it. Goku could almost feel the muscles twitch in Vegeta’s body, from where he thought the man might just give in and punch him in the face for being so...probably pitiful, was how Vegeta saw it. He knew he must have looked pitiful clinging to him, with no explanation for it.

When Vegeta turned himself back toward Goku, he took him by the face again and dug his fingers into his cheeks, forcing his head down a little. It struck Goku with mild confusion for a moment, as he couldn’t see what Vegeta was doing for a solid moment after is vision was blocked by being shoved down. He heard a soft click and then the soft point of something dragging across his forehead for a brief moment, before Vegeta released his face and pushed him out of his own face. Goku witnessed, then, the tail end of Vegeta capping a marker.

“You have until you get that shit off your forehead to come up with something to say to me, or I am done with you entirely. And I mean it, Kakarot. If it’s really that bad, then I think I deserve to know. It’s probably not nearly as bad as you’re making it out to fucking be and all this time you’re wasting is going to make you feel even more stupid than you already are.”

Goku rubbed his a hand over his forehead and whimpered a little bit, letting go of his hold on Vegeta and retreating from his hovering position. Vegeta pulled a fast one and he hadn’t even seen where he grabbed the marker from—though the table next to him did have several notebooks and pens strewn about, so the obvious conclusion could be made...But he hadn’t had the time to even react.

He looked for the first shiny surface he could find to see what Vegeta did and was met with a dark, thick script across his forehead that simply read, “Stupid.” And written so that he could read it clearly in the mirror. Vegeta wrote it on his forehead in reverse, neatly. In a disgustingly neatly written script, like he took time to practice doing this just in case he’d ever have to use it in this way. It was the methodical girlfriend picture all over again—

“...You’re scary.”

“Go wash it off. And while you’re doing that, reflect in that mirror until you think of what you’re going to come back and say to me.”

“...It’s gonna….take a minute.”

“I know. It’s permanent marker. I wanted you to have some time to experience it too. Now get out and when you come back, have a shirt on. We’re trying to maintain a respectable household,” he sneered, knowing that his claim was only made to dig it in that he played Goku—tied a knot in the man’s stomach and left him with two whole new options that he really didn’t have a real choice on.

Now he had to just get over it and talk to him, or face the bad ending option of not telling him and just running away.

This time he chose the smart answer and went to start washing the stupid off his forehead.

Chapter Text

When Goku finally got himself together, and scrubbed the marker off his face, he sought out Vegeta. While he could have teleported to him instantly, he found himself more than a little intimidated by having to be face to face with him immediately. At least if he approached at a distance, he had a chance to steel himself or prepare for what he was supposed to be communicating to him after avoiding the topic for as long as he had. If it were his wish, he would have just brushed the whole thing away entirely, but maybe talking to him would finally make the anxiety go away. This sort of thing wasn’t his familiar territory at all.

Vegeta had stopped giving him a choice in the matter, it appeared. Their back and forth game had finally gotten annoying enough and Goku couldn’t fault him. He made it weird. The whole damn experience was uncomfortable to him too. He was sure Beerus was pleased with his work, though, since Goku hadn’t been misbehaving since. He just hadn’t been doing much other than hovering near Vegeta either. Hovering, while not exactly telling him why, and that was precisely what was bothering Vegeta, he suspected. Though, Vegeta was always bothered about something anyway, but he didn’t need to amplify it.

Not if he wanted Vegeta to continue to talk to him.

He shut the door behind him when he stepped out, following the familiar ki signal. He traced it outside where he knew Vegeta sometimes sat to read. The kids left him alone when he was out there and Goku knew that was why he was there, particularly. He was waiting for him and probably had been since he sent him off to figure out what his problem was—and pep talk himself to facing him like a big boy.

Vegeta felt him approaching no differently than Goku felt him out to find him. There was mutual awareness between them no matter what the approach, but Vegeta made it clear that he was expecting it. If he had been engrossed in whatever he was reading, it wasn’t enough for him to need to finish the page when Goku came into his sight. He just closed the book and placed it on the table beside him and turned his full attention up to him. No hesitation from the moment Goku stepped into his orbit. Arms folded and he crossed a leg over the other, giving such an impression of impatience; he appeared like he was about to ask Goku to step into his office for an interrogation. Not intimidating at all.

“Took you long enough, Kakarot. I didn’t think it took that long to scrub marker off,” he spoke, some hint of mocking in his tone, “but then, I did write it all the way across. And I know you really like to take your sweet time dealing with big stupid problems. Don’t you?”

Goku inhaled through his nose, deeply. “...I deserved that,” he then slowly exhaled, rubbing the back of his neck, while under the pressure of Vegeta’s weighted gaze. Somehow, keeping eye contact with him was more difficult than taking a direct punch in the face from him, but he managed. Even if barely. “Give me some credit...I did show up.”

“Only two hours later,” he snorted at him, but closed his eyes and managed the faintest of a smirk, “with the slightest hint of stupid still across your forehead, if you look at it at just the right angle. Scrubbed really hard, didn’t you?” He then tipped his head to catch the lower, softer light from the sun sitting on the horizon.

“You made sure to find the heaviest marker you could, didn’t you...Also, wrote it with as many loops as you could…like you practiced or something...” He furrowed his brows and rubbed his forehead, knowing that the redness was still very apparent. He’d stood in front of the mirror for half of the time, staring at it before he’d actually attempted any scrubbing.

“Sit down, Kakarot,” Vegeta commanded, glancing at the chair next to him, ignoring his trailing a little bit. Goku didn’t know how or where to start, but Vegeta did. Goku didn’t put up much of a fight either, at his demand, taking a seat next to him. “Now tell me what the problem is, or we’re going to have a bigger problem and if you don’t start talking, then I’m going to lose my fucking mind, because you’re borderline going crazy and you’re taking me with you.”

Goku blinked up at him, a little alarmed. Going crazy? Was he coming off that out of it? He...he must have appeared to look a little bonkers, but he didn’t think… “It’s not that bad…”

“Kakarot…” A warning.

“Alright...I...Listen…” He fidgeted, gripping the seat of the chair and looking down at how white his knuckles were turning. “I...got in trouble with Beerus...Like, really in trouble. And he...Kinda punished me for it.”

“And that’s what’s got you acting like a fool?”

“Sort of…” He really didn’t want to explain it, but Vegeta’s powers of observation wouldn’t allow him to ever miss that he wasn’t telling him everything. Between the two, it was always Vegeta who noticed the finer details of things and was scrutinizing everything, so he knew better than to even attempt to pull anything fast on him. “Well, he...Punished me, by erasing someone close to me to remind me that if I didn’t...stop messing around...he could do that at any time...I...I mean...it worked...I’ll try to be good really...I don’t...wanna see that again...It made me...realize some stuff…”

Vegeta tilted his head, clearly interested now in Goku’s words. “Beerus actually found a method to make you listen to what someone has to say? Wow, incredible. It just took the possible permanency of death to remind you that consequences are real?”

“I’m trying to tell you here—don’t be a dick about this—you were the one who cornered me to come clean about it!” Goku found himself actually bristling in defense of himself.

“It’s not like anyone else ever got through to you, Kakarot. You certainly don’t listen to me.”

“Oh, like you don’t make bad decisions, too, Vegeta. You’re right there with me, half the time...yeah, sure I start it, but you go right along with me afterward…”

“Someone has to babysit you, dumbass.”

“Yeah…well...Beerus didn’t like what happened last time...And he made me feel it. It messed me up a little...that’s all...That’s what the problem’s been...You wanted to know, didn’t you? I told you. You happy now?”

“Partially. It doesn’t explain what it’s got to do with me,” Vegeta unfolded his arms and leaned his head against one of his hands. The way he watched him, told Goku that he might have already pieced it together; but he needed to hear the words out of his mouth. Vegeta was just that kind of sadist, apparently.

“...Because he...he erased you. Whis rewound it after he was done, but I didn’t know he was gonna undo it...so I...I’ve been just seeing you disappearing...sometimes and I…” He stopped talking and turned his head down, unsure of where to go afterward. Words were difficult and even more so when saying them to Vegeta. What more did he want him to say? There was already enough fear of Vegeta turning away from him for what he’d already said...anything else, and he was afraid it would just dig him a deeper hole. “So yeah, that’s….that’s the deal. That’s it. I got ya killed, basically. Not really a ‘ha ha, I’m sorry’, kinda thing with you…I know…” He looked down at his hands, wringing his fingers out nervously.

Vegeta shifted, but Goku didn’t look up. For a moment, he wanted to remain ignorant of Vegeta’s initial reaction to being told that his stupid behavior got him erased. The lack of immediate outburst wasn’t shocking, as Vegeta’s worst displays of anger were often internalized seething; but he found himself a little bit alarmed that he got nothing out of him at all. No words returned from his explanation and he almost did look up, but considered in that brief second, that Vegeta might be back to playing his games—waiting for him to look up—so he trained his eyes down, up until Vegeta forced him to look up.

He was about to open his mouth to say something in response to the hand that took him by the chin, but Vegeta cut him off entirely. His heart almost stopped to realize Vegeta’s mouth against his. Eyes widened through the smirk he could feel against his lips and he managed a weak whimper into the sudden kiss that came out of nowhere, from Vegeta of all people—

At least when he did it, he had the easily available excuse of some drinking behind it! Vegeta had nothing but his own damn boldness to fall back on—

“Vege—” He sputtered, but lost any shot at finishing a full thought. A finger tapped over his mouth to silence him as soon as he pulled away, even a little bit.

“Shut up. I cannot believe I had to hold out for that fucking long. Dumbshit, I knew.”

Goku blinked, slowly, needing a long moment to process his words before he could come back at him with any form of coherent sentence. “You...knew...knew what? Knew that...but...You didn’t...What—”

“Whis told me, Kakarot. I asked what happened after you started acting like a bigger clown than usual and he answered, did you think I wouldn’t ask someone else? You’re a bigger idiot than I thought. I apparently couldn’t trust you to be up front with me, and putting it off for much longer than I honestly expected. Because you apparently got it into your damn head that I was going to breathe fire on you for getting me killed.”

“...You’re not...mad…?”

“Oh no. I was. I was very mad. Furious. I was fucking furious. I told you not to go off and do the stupid shit you were doing, didn’t I? Some of us have a concept of self preservation, Kakarot. And the last person I want getting me killed is you,” he snapped at him, flicking him in the forehead. Goku recoiled a little and found a pout forming, with a little bit of fear and nervousness building. But Vegeta’s snarling dissolved. “But you’re a big chicken and watching you cluck for a few months was soothing enough. Having to act like I didn’t know was trying my goddamn patience. I was basically begging you to come clean so I could stop.”

“...You’re mean...I was upset because I watched Beerus erase you…”

“Beerus erased me because of your own poor behavior, you big numbnut. I’m not even remotely sorry that you’re distressed for having to own up to it. I don’t have to remember it, but you do. Maybe that will encourage some better fucking thought process in that that empty skull of yours,” he batted his knuckles against his temple and Goku reactively puffed his cheeks at him. “Unless you don’t care and are looking to get me killed, in which case, be a man about it and do it with your own two hands and don’t do it as a byproduct of your foolishness.

His jerk reaction was involuntary. That Vegeta would say that, after the near months of apparently knowing and watching him struggle with secrets—already a feat Goku was barely functional at—made him reach out without a second to draw himself back. Before he had a chance to contain his outburst, he shoved Vegeta right back in to his chair. The back of it popped loose with how hard he shoved him down and dropped the back of the lounging chair flat. Vegeta’s expression held alarm that he didn’t have moments before, and Goku could visibly see him trying to forcibly reel it back in.

“Out, open, in my own yard, K...Kakarot—aren’t you getting fucking bold—” He stammered a bit, attempting to come back from it, but Goku pinned him and shut that recovery down quickly.

“If gettin’ you killed didn’t make you mad enough, I gotta find something that’ll do it,” he framed his face with his hands and shut down his chance to verbalize any retort by giving him back the kiss he gave earlier. Only the fight had come back into it and he met with Vegeta’s low snarl.

“Watching you,” Vegeta growled through breaks of Goku’s mouth, “act like a pathetic puppy, was horrendous enough, ” he squirmed under his bigger body, but Goku wasn’t letting him up. He was...actually a bit sour that Vegeta knew all that time. Probably knew why he was acting the way he was...Even acted the whole time like he didn’t… Could have earned a damn award for his convincing job. He didn’t have to do any of that...Beerus already did the worst part...Vegeta just amplified it with his own brand of suffering.

He stared down at him, straddling him on lounger far too small for two people, keeping him stuck there so he couldn’t escape. Goku was suddenly really glad he didn’t know how to teach anyone else instant transmission. Vegeta would probably run away at every opportunity. He could easily see this being one of him, when he braced both of his hands on each side of his head, leaving only a little bit of the faint orange light from the disappearing sunset to wash between them. The warm light seemed to drown everything else out for a moment and he got caught in a moment of silence before he opened his mouth and let himself talk without trying to think about his words carefully.

The big “I got you erased” hurdle had been jumped. What could he possibly say worse than that?

“I love you.”

Maybe that?

All of the subtle changes in Vegeta’s face were worth watching play out. Eyes widened and his mouth twitched, lips pursed into a straight line before parting as if in confusion. The stunned expression quickly smoothed over, like it processed and made sense to him once the words really connected. Goku had a feeling Vegeta already knew it, just hearing the words may have been like getting jolted. That was fair, because he was sure his own face reflected some similar surprise at how easily the words just slipped right out.

Vegeta finally managed to clear his throat and find some response to do away with the silence after his words. “You have a funny way of showing it...Kakarot…”

“I’m...working on it...I…”

“Quit clucking and lay down, you’re crushing me with your knees.” He barked at him, also aware that the lounger wasn’t meant for this, but it was preferable to Goku’s current position. Instead of crushing him between his knees, Goku would just lay right over him and crush him entirely. Seemed logical….? But Goku wasn’t going to argue, he just did as he was told, wedging a little between Vegeta and the chair, but unavoidably overlapping on him and laying his face against his shoulder—feeling some immense relief. He could feel Vegeta take a deep breath to continue speaking. “Don’t fucking hold back stupid shit like this ever again. If I have to spend that long methodically being that girlfriend in the second picture, I’m going to just haul off and kill you instead.”

Goku opened his mouth to speak but found nothing came out immediately—balking for a moment, before he pulled it back together. “Bulma showed you that picture too—?”

“...No, I showed that to her, Kakarot.”

“...I just...wanna say I think you did a really good job giving me that feeling the whole time, Vegeta….”

“Good. Then I’ve accomplished my goal. Being angry with you is one of my finer tuned skills in life. And I can flex it at any moment. But don’t try to encourage me to, Kakarot. It ruins perfectly good training sessions when I have to pretend to ignore you,” he scoffed, but the way he wrapped his arm around him, hand pressed into Goku’s back, gave him the impression that he wasn’t nearly as sour about it as he acted. Vegeta was just stubborn.

Goku closed his eyes, tucking his arms around and up under Vegeta. He wasn’t met with protest. Having him close, set to rest the uneasy sensation of him disappearing. The relief of him not being angry with him, left him feeling lighter and when he opened his eyes again, the only color he saw was the remnants of the orange glow of sunset light—the glittery gold haze he’d been haunted with was gone...at least for the time being. He would contend with the reminders of it for the foreseeable future, he was sure, but for the moment, he basked in the freedom from it.

“Take a nap, Kakarot.”

He muttered, only then aware of why Vegeta would say that. He was physically tired. It all caught up to him, leaving him feeling better, but drained. “Thought you didn’t wanna be caught in the backyard.”

“It’s not the most incriminating thing they’ve ever seen you do with me, now is it? Besides, as long as you don’t sleep on me until the sun comes up, then it’ll be fine.”

With that as a satisfactory answer, Goku turned his face back down and closed his eyes, letting himself settle into a brief, comfortably dreamless sleep for the first time in a long time—content to know he wouldn’t wake up with a big hole in his life as long as his arms weren’t empty.