Chapter Text
Saiyan Justice System - “Just Is, Just us”
Vegeta caught the kick aimed at his midsection with his knee, retaliating a hook to the offender. Not enough to kill, just enough to incapacitate.
A little further away he could see Trunks and Goten dually taking on a couple of the last of the remainder Tuffles who were still fighting. They weren’t losing, but they weren’t gaining ground either.
Cursing, Vegeta moved to backup the boys. He should have said no to this stupid “bonding trip” idea of Bulma’s. Checked this planet’s coordinates before they landed. At least ran a search on its current inhabitants. Something. He would have caught on to the history he had with these people, and steered them to a safer course.
Complacency had its price. But Vegeta would not let anyone else pay for it.
A glow. Unsettlingly familiar slithering energy.
“Nobody move!” was all Vegeta got out before the first chain struck him. The teeth of the weapon sank into his left arm, an old injury that never healed even with countless Senzu.
The precision - that could not have been a coincidence. Vegeta’s knees gave way. The chains whipped around, tying him down. Gold hair faded to black as ki drained from his body, a horribly familiar sensation from a long ago memory.
“Vegeta!” In a flash Goku was beside him, all ferocity and protective fury. He reached for the chains, ready to break them -- but Vegeta shook his head No. It would only drain them both.
The moment he’d seen the emblem on that ship, recognised who these people were. Vegeta had understood what was coming.
Next time Bulma suggested Vegeta and Goku bond with their two sons by a day trip exploring a random planet, Vegeta was going to flat out deny her.
It was supposed to just be a fun trip exploring a nearby planet with Goku and their two sons, trying this human thing called bonding, but it had quickly descended into chaos.
Vegeta had to give the Tuffles credit - their technology was as impressive as he remembered, right down to the holding cells they were in. Right down to the ki block that prevented Goku from instant transmissioning them all out. Right down to ki chains that shackled Vegeta’s hands and ankles. Bulma would have had a field day exploring all this.
Everyone was very ostentatiously ignoring the ki-leg shackle on Vegeta’s ankle. Honestly, Vegeta thought it would be less annoying if they'd just stare at it and get it out of their systems.
"We could break you out of here,” Goku suggested. He was lounging back against the bars of the holding cells with a casualness only his twitching tail betrayed.
“Yeah, we could,” Goten nodded enthusiastically.
"Thought about it," Vegeta said, interrupting Trunks in the middle of a brisk analysis of the cell's structural integrity and the sufficient application of a bomb. That was the boy’s mother talking through him; if Vegeta had wanted, he could have just turned himself into a living bomb, anyway. "Don't want to. I'll go to trial."
"Why?" Trunks wanted to know. "I don't know why these guys are so adamant that you destroyed their planet, Dad, but you and I both know you didn't, so there's no point in playing along --"
"I did do it," Vegeta said bluntly. Behind Trunks, Goku had been giving Vegeta intense, meaningful looks. Now he let out an exasperated sigh.
It was nice, in a way, that Goku hadn't told anyone about what he’d seen of Vegeta's memories from their fusion. All the violence and destruction that had characterised Vegeta’s former life in the PTO. Goku had kept his past away from their sons, from the rest of the team. Protected Vegeta’s secrets until Vegeta was ready to divulge them himself and that was… nice.
Vegeta didn’t need the protection, but it was… nice.
But now, in a moment where Vegeta wasn’t ready to say anything, both Saiyan kids were staring at him. "You did what?" Goten asked, his voice suddenly very different.
If Vegeta was the type to wince, he would have winced.
“Dad,” Trunks said slowly, “they said you destroyed their entire homeworld without even a thought.” A shaky exhale, wide disbelieving blue eyes. "I always joke about your violent tendencies, but that doesn’t... sound ... like you..."
A beat of silence, in which Vegeta was sure everyone in their holding cell realised it very much did.
Vegeta considered what was appropriate to say. Trunks was no longer a boy, growing well into Saiyan teenhood. His mother’s intelligence shone through his eyes, the same way Vegeta’s strength ran in his veins. Trunks could take the truth. Would have to, one day.
Goku met Vegeta’s gaze. Can I tell them for you? What can I tell them?
“Are you… covering for someone, maybe?” Goten asked, and Vegeta blinked at the boy’s hopeful tone. Goten did inherit his father’s heart after all- Vegeta shouldn’t have been surprised.
This was why Vegeta envied both children, and Earthlings in general. They always thought everything had a good side, and that they could fix everything -- even things that couldn't be fixed. "Kakarot was there," Vegeta said. Both boys look even more confused. "Sort of. He saw it all."
Their fusion had made each other’s memories blend, like watercolours mixing. While the memories the other harbored didn’t stay, feelings lingered on. It was part of the reason Goku and Vegeta had become so close. Hard to still defy someone who had seen each and every side of you, still chose to look past that and stay.
Goku gave Vegeta a brief, searing look, and then turned a calm face to both boys’ incredulity. "Well, kinda. Your dad’s telling the truth - he did destroy that planet.”
And many others, and done a lot worse, Vegeta wanted to add, but they probably didn’t want to hear it, even Goku.
Trunks’ body language slammed shut like a door closing. Goten looked like he wanted to be anywhere else, but he scooted up to Trunks’ side instead.
“...Why, Dad?” Trunks asked. Despite his growing shoulders, sharpening jaw, and deepening voice, right then Trunks was reminiscent of the kid he used to be. The kid who’d looked up to Vegeta with nothing but adoration and idealism in his eyes.
That kid was about to learn some painful things.
Vegeta hated to do this, but then, it was probably long past time for some truths. “Trunks...you’re smart like your mother.” Vegeta’s gaze swerved to Goten; the boy deserved an address too, he supposed. “And Goten, you aren’t as oblivious as your father likes to pretend to be either.” Goku’s soft “Hey!” across the room was duly ignored. “Surely both of you realise I wasn’t always…” The phrase ‘ a good person ’ sounded pretentious, even now, so Vegeta finished with, “...I wasn’t always on the side of the protectors.”
“Well yeeahhhh,” Goten agreed, scratching the back of his neck - a nervous tell he’d picked up from Goku. “We’ve figured out pretty much everyone on the Dragon Team used to be enemies at some point. Most of them out to get Dad.”
If only you knew , Vegeta thought wryly. His eyes met Goku’s. Both Saiyans had to stifle a laugh.
Trunks was probably the only one acting appropriately in this context. “Wanting to kill Goku is still a very long step to genocide of a planet.” Trunks’ voice was cold. “I’m… not really making the connection here, Dad.”
Veegta forced himself to meet those blue eyes. A prince didn’t run from his regrets. “You already knew I was under Frieza’s control in the PTO for a long time, Trunks.” Trunks opened his mouth, but Vegeta needed him to hear this. “But I wasn’t… whatever picture you’d painted of me, I wasn’t that. I was very much a mirror of him.”
A truth Vegeta hadn’t wanted to admit until then.
Heavy silence. Both boys seemed to be holding their breaths; Vegeta didn’t talk of his past often, or ever, so when he did, it merited the gravity.
“So… that means they’re right then, in wanting you dead,” Trunks surmised, his voice flat. That uncaringly dead tone was definitely something he’d picked up from Vegeta. Should he be proud?
Goku abruptly sighed, a reaction so unlike him Vegeta couldn’t help but raise an eyebrow. When he spoke his tone was light-hearted enough that Vegeta knew it to be anything but. "At some point, do you think you could sit down and make a list of all the worlds you're wanted on, Vegeta? It would be really nice to know the places to avoid."
“That would be a very long list, Kakarot," Vegeta said. “Easier and faster to make a list of places I’m not wanted on.” Despite himself, his lips twitched.
Goku coughed down a chuckle, but Goten was already grinning. Finally, reluctantly, Trunks relaxed, one corner of his mouth twitching up even though his expression remained serious. At that moment, his similarity to future Trunks was staggering .
To Vegeta’s slight surprise, Goten was the first to break the silence. “But Uncle Vegeta, you’ve changed. Right?” The boy looked like he was trying to wrap his brain around this. “You’re not the same anymore. That’s why you.. want to face this, right?”
It wasn’t the judgment Vegeta had been expecting.That instant absolution was as much a Goten trait as it was a Goku trait. Waving away the past, focusing on the future. Characteristic of a boy who easily embraced and forgave his father for 7 years of absence.
Vegeta shrugged, hoping he would just drop the question. This kind of thing was so far out of his comfort zone it may as well have been on another planet.
“Dad?” Trunks prompted when the silence stretched on too long. Damn.
“If you must know…” Vegeta looked at Goku, who gave him an encouraging smile. The sensation of a light brush against his mind, not demanding entry, just a reassuring touch. It was enough to prompt him to speak, even if haltingly. “I spent twenty years looking over my shoulder, firing at shadows. Suspicious of everything, even as I settled on Earth. I don't want to live that way anymore. I will not run away from the people who come calling for justice.”
Especially if, in lieu of getting him, they came for his family instead. Vegeta had gone through enough of a mental fight to be able to allow himself to admit to these attachments in the first place. There was no fucking way he’d let them come to harm now, least of all because of himself. The only person Vegeta couldn’t hide from was himself, after all.
“Twenty years,” Goku mused. “You adjusted pretty well, Vegeta.”
Vegeta, Goten, and Trunks all stared at him. Their collective effort thankfully wasn’t lost on Goku, who shrugged. “Well, you adapted as well as I ever did, at least. I’ve been on Earth almost all my life and I’m still kind of clueless about it sometimes.”
“ Kind of ?” Vegeta repeated in askance. Goku stuck out his tongue, then grinned. “Comparison to you is a new low I’d rather not stoop to, Kakarot.”
Goku’s grin widened at his double meaning. “You get funnier the worse the situation is,” he told Vegeta warmly.
Vegeta smirked, appreciating the other Saiyan’s relaxed demeanor. Truth be told, their mental links were solidified enough that if Goku was to be agitated right then, Vegeta’s emotions would follow suit. At the moment though, Goku’s apparent calmness helped soothe Vegeta’s frayed nerves.
Just having him here, and their sons here - that was enough, for now.
***
The Tuffle justice system demanded that the accused be tried on the Tuffle planet or on the accused’s homeworld, whichever both parties found agreeable.
“Isn’t that like a huge loophole?” Trunks asked, ever the critical thinker. “I mean, what if the Tuffles consider it a crime but the accused’s race doesn’t? Like… I don’t know, murder."
Vegeta humored the boy, because he recognized that same avoidance tactic in himself. Hyperfixate and fuss over the small things, in lieu of addressing the actual important big thing.
"Murder isn't a crime on Planet Vegeta," Vegeta said. He paused to correct himself. “Well, wasn't."
"It's an example, Dad."
Vegeta shrugged. “I don’t particularly care either way.” He had more important things to worry about than the philosophy of justice systems. “But it makes sense to me. Different planets have different taboos, systems of right and wrong. This way the Tuffles aren’t at risk of condemning a foreigner to their own peculiar laws. Justice isn’t just theirs.” His lips quirked. “Not that I’m in any position to be talking about justice.”
“Vegeta, let’s... not go there.” Goku’s tail lightly brushed against Vegeta’s arm, soothing him the way Goku must have known it would.
Trunks had that ‘I’m-figuring-out how-to-blow-shit-up’ look he’d inherited from both his parents. “Do you know anything about the Tuffle’s justice system, Dad?”
“No.” I blew up the planet, I didn’t have time to make friends and learn their culture. Vegeta hastily bit back the response.
“Okay… so with Earth’s justice system, when someone goes to trial, they have a defender… a lawyer,” Trunks clarified, sensing the two mildly confused gazes directed his way.
“A lawyer.” Goku brightened. “Someone smart and good with words. Maybe we can get… Bulma, or even King Kai?”
Vegeta shook his head. "No." It wasn't worth explaining that whatever Vegeta did at this point, anyone acquainted with him would be universally regarded with suspicion.
He didn't care much about the Kai, but Bulma had his loyalty despite their separation - she was still the mother of his child, after all. The Tuffles were already sizing the three with him with calculating gazes that made Vegeta’s hackles rise. He would not throw anyone else under the bus with him.
“Okay then,” Goku accepted this easily enough, but his eyes remained searching. Hesitation. “How about Saiyans then, what did we do for justice?”
The term ‘we’ did not go unappreciated. It put Vegeta into a good enough mood to return with a non-difficult response. "On Planet Vegeta, I'd be defended by an advocate befitting my status.”
Goku looked blank. “Advo…?”
“Advocate. Since I'm the Prince, that would have been my tutor or the King.”
"Okay," Goku said slowly, processing that the King was obviously too dead to be of any help. "I'm… guessing we wouldn't be lucky enough that your tutor is still alive on some random planet…?”
"Nappa.” The name tasted like ash on Vegeta’s tongue. “Was my tutor.”
Trunks and Goten had no clue who Nappa was, but Goku’s shoulders tensed. It was the first sign of tension Vegeta had seen from the other Saiyan since this whole ordeal began, which made it both unnerving and gratifying somehow.
He waited, but Goku moved on smoothly. "All right, that's out. What happens if those people aren’t available?”
“It goes up the chain of command. But that--" was meaningless , not only because Vegeta was the prince and penultimate on the chain of command, but also because every other Saiyan who would have held any power was dead. Ashes to stardust.
Vegeta drew a breath. It shocked him how, even after all these years, sometimes the reality of what had happened to Planet Vegeta still had the power to haunt him, despite his younger self’s consistent attempts to repress it.
"All of them are gone,” Vegeta managed to say finally, in something like a normal voice. "There's no one left."
Two of the last ones, Vegeta’s fault, too.
“Yes there is.” Trunks was looking at Goku with a thoughtful expression. It took Vegeta a moment to catch his drift, and when he did, his breath stopped for a completely different reason.
Anger.
Goten was looking between the two of them, a look of realisation on his young face. “Oh. Couldn’t we have Dad pretend to be -”
Vegeta’s tail lashed once. “No.”
Both Trunks and Goten jumped. They were well used to Vegeta’s abrasiveness, but that tone still had the power to make them shake in fear. Goku, used to seeing Vegeta’s various moods enough that he’d called Vegeta cute once, was unperturbed.
Another light touch, this time physical, against Vegeta’s arm. A light brush of Goku’s tail between his shoulder blades. It was wordless, but soothing. Once Vegeta wouldn’t have allowed anyone this close, but Goku was okay. Goku was safe, in as much as a rival can be.
“Vegeta?” Questioning tone.
Vegeta exhaled, ran a hand over his forehead. The anger seeped away -- it did that quicker these days than it had in past years -- leaving an empty ache and a certain amount of embarrassment. "You... can't put a name on something and make it the same as a thing that's gone.”
Goku nodded, easily understanding. The boys looked confused still. It made the little bud of embarrassment in Vegeta’s chest blossom.
Sensing Vegeta’s dark turn of thoughts, Goku took over the explanation. “Goten -- if, something happened to Trunks, would you have another person replace him, call him your best friend?”
Goten gave his father a round-eyed look of horror. "No way!”
"It’s similar here,” Goku tried, but the boys immediately jumped to a different conclusion.
“What, so was Nappa close to Dad like Goten and I are close?” Trunks asked.
Despite the utter lack of intention on Trunks’ part, the fucking heart Vegeta had developed over his years on Earth began to burn. It seemed all Vegeta’s skeletons were being dragged out into the open today.
“Not… really.” Goku paused, biting his lip. “It’s complicated, Trunks.”
Goku had tried, at least. Vegeta took over and took responsibility to answer, as he should.
“All our traditions have very specific roles, with certain obligations and duties. There is no exact equivalent for Earth, or on Namek for that matter. The same way you can’t merely replace Trunks with someone else because of his role in your life. To just have Kakarot pretend to assume the same role... it says that our traditions had no meaning."
In this at least, Vegeta knew himself to be truly alone. In a galaxy where people often lost their worlds; where whoever survived had to start again elsewhere. It was the continuity of shared tradition and belief that cemented a people together. Without that, a culture could not last.
All three of the Saiyans here shared Vegeta’s blood, but none of them knew his culture. He’d never cared before, but now the cosmic loneliness of being the last true memory keeper dawned upon him.
“So you’re just going to let this happen?” Trunks demanded. “Just going to let them do whatever they want with you afte-”
“I didn't say that,” Vegeta cut in impatiently. Goku looked up quickly, and there it was, that desperate flash, something hopeful in his eyes. Perhaps Goku wasn’t taking this as lightly as Vegeta had thought. “Just that I didn’t want to run. By all accounts and purposes, I am guilty, Trunks.”
"Is that why you're letting this happen?" Goku asked, his voice soft. "Because you don’t believe you were right?”
Vegeta looked coldly up at Goku. This Saiyan who would never understand Vegeta’s darkness, the part of him that craved and lusted after blood and needed to step over someone to feel powerful. Sure, Goku had his selfish sides sometimes. He wasn’t as pure or innocent as Vegeta had first believed. But he was quintessentially a good person, the epitome of everything that was good and true.
Ki dampeners were one thing, but Vegeta knew Goku would go the long mile to get them both out and impossibly find a way to succeed. He was holding back out of respect for Vegeta’s wishes, so the least Vegeta owed him was an answer.
“If I had it to do over, I would," Vegeta said at last. Goku’s face fell. Trunks’ expression pinched. “It was necessary in order to survive. Given the choice between death or disgrace, there is no choice.”
Goku tried to speak, but Vegeta beat him to it. “But.” He hesitated, and uncoiled his clenched fingers, spread them against the wall. "When I was younger, I saw everything in black and white. Honor and dishonor. Death or disgrace. It’s not that simple anymore.”
Rather than accept the quarters the Tuffles had stiffly offered them, Goku insisted on sending the boys away and staying with Vegeta overnight in the cell. Vegeta tried his best to shoo him away, because he was the Saiyan Prince and could more than handle himself, but Goku was a Goku and would not be budged.
"Kakarot ..." Vegeta said, both slightly annoyed and silently more touched than he could say.
“Vegeta,” Goku mimicked back in the same tone. Vegeta reprimanded him by prodding him in the shoulder blades with his tail, but left it at that. He was a trier, but this wasn’t worth the bother.
Dawn heralded bad news, but not unexpected ones. The Tuffles were widely calling for Vegeta’s blood and execution.
“Just another day, then,” Vegeta said dryly.
Goku gave him a look, and it wasn't playful. Vegeta ignored it.
"On the reverse side… Apparently, there's a Saiyan tradition where this kind of thing can be settled through a sort of arena grudge match?" Vegeta nodded in confirmation. "They're willing to settle it that way. You, versus their choice of champion."
Hm. The family duel was a very old way of settling disputes, one that had been largely superseded by the New Code in King Vegeta the 3rd’s time.
"Okay," Vegeta said, meeting Goku's eyes. "I'll do it."
“Dad,” Trunks said. The teen sounded desperate. “Dad, why? We could just break out of here, we’re strong enough.”
Vegeta kept silent, not because he didn’t want to answer Trunks, but because he didn’t know what to say.
There had been a time when strength was all that mattered in the world. That time… was not now.
Most of the surviving Tuffles had turned out, along with the odd foreign alien or two, probablys settlers. Vegeta saw a lot of people carrying weapons, as if it would do much good against a Saiyan.
The people on the council were young compared to the councilors he remembered before Planet Vegeta's fall; the oldest of them was not much older than Trunks. These were ones who'd had the energy and drive, in those terrible years right after the war, to mobilize enough support to win an impromptu election among a deeply wounded and dispirited people.
Vegeta wasn't sure if this would help or hinder his cause.
Vegeta walked bound by the ki chains, neither defiant nor deferring. He wasn’t superior or righteous here in the slightest, but neither did he feel cowed.
No one cheered and no one booed. Everyone merely watched as he bowed his head to the council. The last full-blooded survivor of the Saiyan Royal line still had to show some manners, after all.
"Prince Vegeta," the head councilor, said in a clear, carrying voice. Vegeta identified it as distinctly feminine, but then some species were gender-fluid so it didn’t matter much. The-probably-a-she turned to look at the Tuffle family. "Lady Raichi.”
Shit.
Tuffles were humanoid in form. However, unlike humans and Saiyans who had distinct biological markers, they were closer to Namekians in that barely anything made them stand out from each other, so Vegeta hadn’t been able to recognize this one until now.
Lady Raichi strode forward. She was almost as tall as Goku. She wore armor -- standing out among the villagers, most of whom wore ragged homespun material -- and her dark hair was piled in an elaborate coiffure, gleaming like polished stone against light blue skin. Her eyes skimmed past Vegeta, but her face betrayed nothing, not hate, contempt nor sympathy.
Vegeta remembered her face staring up at him all the way back then, in fear, in a plea for mercy. She looked to be of old money, old blood, old nobility. It couldn't have been worse, Vegeta thought, because such people never forgave a slight or an insult.
"Do you both agree that you accept this duel of your free will, that this will erase all debts and disputes between your two peoples?” the councilor asked them, her words in the rhythm of a memorized quote. She was young enough that she had probably seen very few real duels herself, perhaps in the playhouses before the fall of Planet Vegeta and Tuffle.
"Yes," Vegeta said.
"Yes," Raichi echoed in her husky alto.
"Do you also agree that this duel will only end at the death of one side's champion, and neither has the option of yielding without forfeiting his or her life?"
Vegeta felt a thrill run through him, more of anticipation than fear. The councilor was truly calling upon the old rules, then: that the duel could only end in the death of one or both of the participants.
To yield would be to die, and he was pretty sure there were plenty of the audience here ready to make certain of that.
"Yes," Vegeta agreed, and the all-too-familiar heat of battle-lust rose in him, throbbing in his ears in time with his pulse. He barely heard Raichi's firm "Yes."
“Accuser, name your terms.”
"The defender shall be barred from using ki," Raichi stated, her face like stone.
Goku started behind Vegeta, but Vegeta grinned fiercely at her. "Fine with me."
This was a good way to decide, an old way. Vegeta regretted nothing; he only hoped that none of them would be too upset if he lost. But he truly didn’t think that he would. He'd run a quick, assessing eye over Raichi and the possible champions she would choose.
Some of them looked fairly tough, granted. But no matter which one she'd chosen to represent her -- or even if it was Raichi herself, though Vegeta doubted it -- he knew that even without ki, he would be able to make them work for it. It wouldn’t be a fair fight. They'd been living comfortable lives here while Vegeta had fought for survival in the PTO; then trained day and night against Goku for many years.
Even with Vegeta being barred of ki, this should not be a fun fight for Raichi, whoever her chosen champion would be.
"Accuser chooses weapons; defender may challenge."
“No weapons,” both Vegeta and Raichi said simultaneously. Oh, yes. Old laws.
The councilor looked between both of them, no change in ehr expression. "Please choose your champions."
The defender -- the accused -- went first at this point. Vegeta raised his head like the prince he was, and is. "I will fight for myself," he declared, and felt the last doubts leave him. There was no turning back now.
"And the accuser's champion?" the councilor asked Lady Raichi.
“I may choose any champion of my choice, correct?” Lady Raichi’s voice carried clear.
“Yes, you may,” came the verification.
“And my champion and the defender are bound to fight to death, before the blood debt is settled?”
Vegeta frowned. Something was off here.
“Yes.” The councilor’s face betrayed a hint of confusion.
Lady Raichi turned. Her face betrayed, for a moment, the first hint of expression Vegeta had seen from her a twitch of a small, cold smile. A triumphant smile. "I want him to represent our battle as my champion.”
Vegeta’s blood turned to ice.
She was pointing over Vegeta’s shoulder.
Goku, Goten, and Trunks were the only ones standing behind him.
Goku -
Goten -
or Trunks -
The lady was pointing to Trunks.