Prologue

"How? How did this happen?"

They were in a small house – a man and a woman, facing each other, tense and fearful. The woman was crying. Sniffling, she wiped tears from her wide, dark eyes. "We were visiting your mother, and he was bored. He wanted to go outside and play, so I said okay. I don't know, he must have climbed up the mountain a-and…and…"

Her voice broke. The man shook his head, then reached out to put his arm around her, bring her close. "Stop crying Gine, for gods' sakes."

"He must have tripped over something and then…oh gods," she sobbed.

"It's going to be alright."

"It's not!" she yelled, distraught. "It's not going to be alright, Bardock! He's in a c-co-coma. The doctor said he has no idea when he'll wake up, or even if he'll ever wake up."

The man looked over to the small bed occupying a corner of the room. On it lay a small boy, his eyes closed in what appeared to be a deep sleep. His head was wrapped in thick bandages, out of which poked dark, messy hair, its spikes mimicking the pattern of the older man's style.

"Let's just take him home, and…"

"We can't," Gine interrupted. "The doctor said it could be dangerous to move him."

"Well we can't leave him here."

"Master Gohan said I could stay here as long as Kakarot is in this condition."

Bardock paused. The man in question was sitting at the foot of the bed, eyes shut in a deep meditation. He bent his head towards his wife, lowering his voice, "I don't want to leave you alone with him."

"I think I can handle an old human," Gine snapped, then began to whimper again. A new stream of tears rolled down her cheeks.

Bardock rubbed his face wearily. "This is a nightmare."

"When are you leaving?"

"Two weeks."

There was silence. Both knew that nothing could be done about that. Bardock had very little choice in when he left the planet and when he returned.

"He'll wake up. I know it."

"Bardock, don't…"

"No, I promise you Gine. He'll wake up."

Chapter 1

Nine years later…

Bardock stepped off the spaceship at the main landing zone of Planet Vegeta, the red, sun-burned home of the Saiyans, and smiled broadly. It was good to be home. After a stint of nearly eight months on missions with his crew for the Planet Trade Organization, he would finally get to see his family again.

"Hey!" Bardock turned at the feeling of a hand on his broad shoulder. Toma, his crew mate and best friend, was smiling at him. "Say hi to Gine for me."

"Sure thing. I'll call you when I get sick of the kid."

"Let me have him," Toma chuckled. "Better than my little brat."

Bardock laughed at that, and the two friends took to the sky, each heading to their homes and families.

It was a long flight out to Arkisbe from the landing zone – a good four hours, though Bardock wasn't going at top speed.

Arkisbe was an average-sized town out in the North plains, nestled at the fork of the Maanqe river, four miles from where it split into its eastern and western branches. Because of its position, Arkisbe was was one of the few places on Planet Vegeta that was conducive to the growth of produce and was therefore mostly farmland.

It was also one of the few places outside the larger cities where humans were integrated into the Saiyan population. Saiyans and humans had shared Planet Vegeta since time immemorial. The two species, while distinct, shared a common ancestor and had a similar anatomy. Humans outnumbered Saiyans almost 2-to-1, but Saiyans ruled the planet due to their superior strength. In most villages in the plains, deserts and mountains of the planet, humans and Saiyans lived in adjacent settlements and in most cases, shared food and water resources, but interaction was limited. Arkisbe's acres of farmland, however, demanded manpower that the Saiyans of the area could not provide on their own, and so humans and Saiyans worked side-by-side, planting and providing for themselves and their neighbors.

Arkisbe was Bardock's wife Gine's hometown, and he had settled there after their marriage in accordance with Saiyan tradition. His own hometown, Ter-kader, was located the foot of a long mountain range, halfway between the lush plains and the sweltering desert. It was in Ter-kader where his youngest son, Kakarot, had taken a fall down a mountainside and cracked his skull open when he was just two years old.

Bardock sighed deeply as his thoughts turned to his son. Ever since the accident, Kakarot had not been quite right. It wasn't just that the boy had woken with no memory of himself or his family, or that he was a little slow. Bardock's brother liked to say that no son of his was ever going to be a scientist, and he wasn't wrong. Bardock didn't mind. He didn't need his sons to be scientists and didn't expect them to be. As far as he was concerned, as long as the boys could read, write and count, they would be fine.

No, it wasn't that the boy was slow. He was strange. He was always smiling and laughing; no matter what the situation was, nothing seemed to anger or upset him. For a Saiyan, that was practically unheard of. Even Gine was easily riled up, and she was the softest Saiyan woman Bardock had ever known.

That wasn't even the worst of it. The boy had no concept of what was and wasn't socially acceptable. He consistently disobeyed Bardock's orders openly: no matter how many times the man had explained to his son that he was obliged to listen to his father, Kakarot simply did what was in that funny little head of his. He befriended humans, talked to animals like as though they could understand him, and was always asking people if they were boys or girls. And that was only after Bardock had threatened to hang him up by his tail if he grabbed someone's crotch again.

As the green plains of Arkisbe came into view, Bardock began to descend, landing right in front of his house. He opened the door with the key he always kept tucked in a small pocket he'd sown into the bodysuit that was part of his soldier's uniform.

Kakarot was sitting at the large, low table in the center of the room, bent over some papers, a small pencil held tightly in his chubby fist. Next to him sat the bane of Bardock's existence.

"Boys."

"Master Bardock!" A little boy with a shiny bald head and no nose got up and came round, giving the Saiyan man a deep, respectful bow. "It's nice to see you again. Welcome home."

Bardock sighed heavily. "Krillin," he replied tersely.

"Hello father," Kakarot waved at him, not bothering to get up.

What was worse, Bardock wondered, the fact that a human boy was a near-permanent part of his home life, or that that same boy had given him a more respectful welcome than his own son?

Krillin cleared his throat nervously. "Well, I should probably be going home," he said, going back to the table and collecting his papers.

"But Krillin!" Kakarot protested. "You said you'd help me with this math homework."

"It's hardly homework Goku," – Bardock bristled at the hated nickname – "You're just copying times tables. You're not even solving anything!"

"Okay, I guess you're right," Kakarot conceded as his friend made for the door. "Bye Krillin!"

"Bye Goku!" the human boy said as he stood at the door's threshold. "Goodbye Master Bardock," he added, bowing again.

Bardock nodded silently, shutting the door firmly as the boy scurried away. Then he turned to his son.

"Hi!" Kakarot smiled broadly. "Are you hungry? We have some fish, but I was going to have it as a snack later."

Bardock was home.

A/N: I got this idea a while back and just had to get it written down. Please let me know what you think of my premise! I'm very excited about this story and already have a lot of ideas for it, but fair warning, updates on this will probably be a bit slow since I am already working on my first story, Consequences.