Gravity Chamber

"He's not here," Rhuda muttered once back at the Gravity Chamber. She sighed in relief, not knowing how she'd had explained being there without her Instructor Vegeta.

She walked over to the counter in the middle of the cylindrical room and quickly pressed the buttons as high as they could go. "300X Gravity" the counter now read.

The room grew deeply red as it changed in hue to match her session. Rhuda's hands shook with icy adrenaline. This was it. She would die here, and hopefully return home or to the after life like she should have done in the first place. Would she go to Hell, or heaven?

She sucked in a tight breath as the air began to warp, changing with increasing pressure like heat rising from a metal car.

And immediately threw up.

"Guk---!"

Rhuda was pulled fiercely to the ground and slammed into it so hard her body was hidden among debris. Her eyes teared up as she wheezed for air, feeling her lungs collapsing beneath the weight while being squeezed into oblivion.

"...Ha..."

'I'm...suffocating!'

Yet death had been her goal. It was a little too late for regrets, but she had some anyway. Perhaps staying in the game wasn't so bad after all, maybe she could have found a new life to live among the rest of the characters.

Her body remained stubbornly alive. Rhuda saw red and black spots in her vision as it speckled with lack of oxygen, her Stamina bar depleted and Health Bar fading lower and lower. How could she still be conscious?

"...Huuu..." she hissed, breathing in dust from the floor.

Her plan had failed.

Soon it became apparent why. The counter had been turned off.

The weight suppressing her to the floor was gone, and she gasped for more air, not realizing at first that someone had stopped the gravity just in time. Rhuda propped up onto shaky elbows and squinted to see that Trunks was there, blade drawn and hair bloody red, curled at the tips.

"T-Trunks...?" She gasped fearfully.

Surely he thought she was insane. But he didn't rebuke her. Only stared across the room with a quiet tension as though a thread were the only thing keeping him in line. She watched his eyebrows lower, and he sheathed his large blade. "...What are you doing?" He asked quietly.

"T-Training!"

"You do realize you had it set to 300 times earth's normal gravity, right? Even Father has difficulty at that level without transforming." He said, watching her intently.

"M-my mistake."

"You call it a mistake, but.." his eyes that were already tightened further narrowed. The genius gaze glaring into her made Rhuda gulp. A Saiyan's glare could be fierce some indeed.

*

*

What she didn't know was that Trunks had been alerted the very instant she'd stepped foot into the gravity chamber, thanks to his mother's advanced security system. The system was tied to his patrol wrist watch, and had beeped to let him know there was an intruder. As such, Trunks watched through the gaze of the connected security camera and witnessed Rhudas odd behavior, how carefully she had pressed the dial until it read 300, how her body had shook with an almost fear.

It didn't take a genius to see there was no logical reason to undergo such vigorous training unless one was crazy for pain. And last time Trunks checked, Rhuda wasn't his father. 

But because Trunks was indeed a genius, and had already noticed her strange behavior so different from who he remembered, he had many thoughts all at once, until landing on the most analytical reason behind her gravity room entrance.

Rhuda had actually tried to end her life.

Trunks grit his teeth together harshly, wondering with intensity at the reason behind that conclusion until his brain throbbed and threatened to short circuit. At last he threw his multiple theories out the mental window and sighed, "...anyway, weren't you supposed to be having a mission with Shallot?"

*

*

Rhuda edged off the floor and staggered slightly until firmly standing, noticing how bruised her insides felt at that moment. It was as though she had tried to cuddle a box of rocks while going down the most thrilling of roller coaster rides. She winced and answered, "I was...but he had to do something first. I'll go meet him now!"

She gave him a faux smile and turned towards the automated door to leave when Trunks grabbed her hand, hard.

Her mouth uttered a tiny squeak of noise before she yelped in both pain and surprise, startling Trunks so thoroughly he yanked away as if electrocuted. It would have laughable if not for the throbbing that shot up her arm. 

"Woah there!" he said, then, seeing Rhudas damaged fingers added, "your hand.."

She looked down and saw it was broken quite well. At some point it must have became trapped underneath her during the ordeal. She hid the evidence behind her backside, brown tail wrapping around it like a covering. "Oh, this? It's nothing."

He gave a look that clearly questioned her sanity and said, "It's broken. I've got a sensu bean upstairs in my room. Follow me."

"Eh? sensu? I don't need that, don't be silly!"

It wasn't in her nature to ask for hand outs, or expect anyone to actually care when she was injured. At most she'd take care of the problem herself.

Her automatic response rose Trunks' lilac eyebrows. They then lowered as concern crossed his face. "...most people wouldn't call the condition you're in 'fine'." 

"..."

"..."

Silence stretched on between them. It became awkward fast until Trunks sighed exasperatedly and relented. "...I won't ask why you were really down here, but I can't let you run off being hurt like that. Let's go."

Rhuda followed his broad backside out of the gravity chamber and down a long white hallway lined with fanciful modern decorations of plants and pottery, until he stopped outside a black door. He pressed a button and she heard a dinging sound. The black door split apart and he stepped inside to calmly wait for Rhuda to follow. It was an elevator.

At the fourth floor of Capsule Industries the door opened and Trunks briskly walked ahead of her and down the new, plain white hall. It was void of decorations aside from a few family photos, and she glanced at them in passing. Vegeta and a blue haired woman holding a baby girl swaddled in a pink blanket, Trunks and a blue haired little girl who appeared to be around the age of seven eating popsicles sloppily, and a black cat who had been captured atop Vegeta's black mane. The grumpy face on Vegeta was laughable.

"In here," Trunks raspy voice said, snapping her attention back to him. He held open a wooden door and waited for her to enter, gentleman that he was. 

She emerged into a room of modest design but elaborate technology. Rhudas green eyes landed on a bright colored scarf immediately, the orange faded and scruffy looking. It sat on a shelf with other trophies, such as a boot and an old Gi top, partially ripped away. All the stories about boys rooms being messy and stinky didn't hold true at that moment for her. She could have eaten off the floor, it's shiny wax almost blinding. 

The white blanket on his large bed appeared to be more suited for a hospital room than a Saiyan's.

Rhuda found herself standing at the frame and unsure of what to do.

Trunks edged past her into the room and walked over to a metal desk. Atop it sat wires all scattered and a diagram with could-have-been Greek lettering. Certainly she would never know what it was supposed to say.

Trunks opened the drawer of his desk and grabbed a tiny brown satchel, pulling out one green bean of mysterious properties. "Here." he said, placing it into her open palm.

She crunched into the nutty bean, amazed by the rush of endorphins that flowed into her veins. Her health and stamina filled to MAX. 

Carefully she opened her fixed hand and flexed it, marveling. "It's... all better."

"..."

*

*

Once more Trunks bit his jaw. The tiny Saiyan female he knew for a year with a horrid attitude, much like his Father, was no where to be found. It was like she'd been replaced by some new strange alien who didn't even know what a sensu bean could do. He filed his newest intel away to review later and motioned, "Good. No more secret training, alright? I...might not be around next time. You're just lucky I was still here in the lab."

The guilty expression Rhuda displayed concreted his theory. She had definitely been there to kill herself. But why on earth would she want to do such a thing? Just who was this person, really? Trunks had no idea, but his genius mind would stop at nothing until he knew the answer.