Ningenkakushi: Lord of the Desert

Crow of the Mountain

"I don't see why you have to go," Bulma grumbles as Yamcha packs. His cast is off (the doctor said he'd never seen a bone heal so swiftly or cleanly), and now he's itching to be out training.

"I told you Bulma, it's not over." Yamcha considers his gi and his yellow capsule case, the one that holds his most important possessions (it's about the only yellow thing he owns (he's not very fond of yellow, to be honest)), then tucks both into his travel pack.

"Oh yes, please, do bring up the mythical hunch again," Bulma snarks, folding her arms and huffing, "Because that's such a good reason!"

Yamcha sighs and buckles the straps of his pack. "Come on, B, you're smarter than that, and me. And if I was able to reach that conclusion so easily..."

"I know," Bulma sighs as well, relenting, "I swear, trouble follows Goku around like a lost puppy. It's just..." she looks away, biting her lip, a rare show of vulnerability from Bulma Briefs, beautiful genius, "I don't see why you have to go." She looks back at him, eyes wet. "I only just got you back after two years of seeing each other maybe once a week, and now you're going to be gone for almost three, and you don't think we'll see each other at all during it? Why does it have to be you? Why can't we just leave it to the rest of them?"

He goes to sit beside her on the bed, then gives her a long, slow kiss. When they break apart, he keeps his face close to hers, black eyes locked on blue. "Because I never want to see you that scared again and not be able to do anything about it," he says with a quiet intensity, "Because I want a world where I can walk into your lab wanting to know why you're an hour late for our date and find you dressed like a movie star and waist-deep in some machine, with grease and oil up to your elbows, because you had an epiphany while you were putting on your make-up.

"And we'll go out anyway, grease and all, because you're Bulma Briefs and you don't follow the rules, you make them, and you'll spend half the meal telling me what horrible thing you were doing to physics this time and how they'll have to reprint the textbooks again. And I'll probably only understand about half of it at best, but that'll be fine, because you'll be smiling as bright as the sun and I will know, know, that nothing is going to make you stop smiling. That's why I'm going."

Bulma leans into him and sighs again, but this sound is less miserable and more a little 'oh' of breath, as though, for a moment, she can see his beautiful vision, and she wants it, too. "Where did you get so good with words?"

He laughs a little. "I used to love listening to people telling stories – professionals in the marketplaces, travelers around the campfire in the dunes. Listen enough and you pick up a few things."

"Mmm." She looks up at him again, cheeks light pink and gaze a little smoky. "Before you go, are you sure you don't want to...?" and she moves so their legs are touching and her hand is resting far up on his thigh.

Yamcha swallows. He wants to, of course he wants to, they're both twenty (at least, they're pretty sure Yamcha's twenty (he's turning out to be prone to extremely youthful features)), Bulma is sexy as hell, he loves her, and he is, in fact, a man, of the sort who is interested in this sort of thing.

He really, really, really wants to.

He's not going to.

Because he knows that, while she also really, really, really wants to, Bulma also thinks this will be a way to ensure he comes back to her, that it will forge some connection that will hold them together. And it won't. He's not sure how he knows it, but he does, and this isn't how he wants his first time to be.