A/N: So this is my first DBZ story. I'll try to update as frequently as I can. Enjoy!
Disclaimer: I don't own anything to do with DBZ nor do I make any money from writing fanfiction.
Age 720
The Saiyan female known as Peppra crouched in a crevice of red rock—ready. Thirty yards ahead a mother badersh was keeping watch while her cubs drank and cooled off in a rare oasis, the mother looked skittish, clawing the rough red ground and throwing her great head around, her sharp black eyes searching as she kept both eyelids wide open. The twin suns of Planet Plant beat down on those who lived in the Wastes. Peppra and the mother were waiting for the same creature—the father of those cubs.
As the cubs played the mother sniffed the air anxiously and Peppra was momentarily worried that the beast would pick up her scent but that was a baseless fear. Peppra had been crawling around in the semi-wet plains since early that morning-back when just one sun had crested the horizon-as she stalked her prey. Peppra's body was caked from head to toe with red clay. Her clothing was made from the tanned hide of a bandersh she had killed last spring and the strip of hide she used to tie her hair back was taken from her breakfast kill (a small snopes rodent whose meat had been stringy) whose blood matted in her hair. There was no way the mother could smell what danger lurked just out of her range of vision.
As Peppra watched the male badersh came into view, pulling the corpse of a two hundred pound hoofed hardenn for the cubs' breakfast. This badersh was a beast, at least six hundred pounds and seven feet high (when all four paws were firmly planted on the hard ground). He would be quite the kill and he would be hers.
As the cubs began to devour their food and the mother began to relax since her male was back, Peppra began to prowl.
She kept her tail curled tightly around her waist, since it would be her number one give-away. Its hair follicles held more scent than skin did. The silent Saiyan predator stalked twenty-five yards and the herd of badersh was still unsuspecting. Without the male to get the cubs' food the mother would join a larger herd—they would be fine without him.
Twenty yards. Peppra could pounce from this distance, as long as she minded the four ivory, three foot long tusks that protruded from the males snout and head, it wouldn't be a problem.
Peppra bent her knees lower and channeled her ki to her feet to gain extra distance. She prepared to spring.
Three…Two….On-
"Peppra!"
The call, though miles away, is loud enough to scare the pride of badersh. They scatter; the cubs leaving what remained of their meal for the lower life forms.
"Damn it, Nappa!" Peppra cursed under her breath. The Saiyan female looked up and could see him flying toward her, still calling her name to the skies like an idiot. Since she still had so much energy concentrated in her feet Peppra changed her course from where the badersh's had been to where Nappa was now flying above.
Her feet left the ground in a whirl-wind of red dust as she rocketing through the air straight at the large idiot. The wind resistance pulled the tie loose from her hair and coaxed water from her eyes but she was determined to teach Nappa a lesson.
"Peppr-OHF!"
Peppra flew straight into the mans midsection, her arms wrapping around his middle and her body pushing him off of his course so that the two of them were free falling toward the unyielding red ground of Planet Plant.
"Pep!" Nappa yelled, his voice, though rough, was high with excitement as he grasped the young woman's shoulders and pulled her off his midsection. Half a second later their free fall was stopped and they were floating together about twelve feet from the ground.
"You ruined my hunt, Nappa!" Peppra yelled at him, curling her tanned hands into fists and furrowing her dark brows. She let her tail lash back and forth behind her so that he would know how displeased she was with him. "That badersh you scared away by hollering for me all over the planet was at least six hundred pounds!"
Nappa's eyes widened at this and she immediately regretted her quick anger. "Jeez, Pep," Nappa's tail went from excitedly swaying to hanging dejectedly behind him. "I'm sorry; I should have just waited until we met back up."
Peppra sighed; her quick temper was already dissipated. Nappa had that effect on her. "It doesn't matter; we will find something else to eat today. What's your news?"
Immediately Nappa was excited again. "I just spoke to a group of Saiyan's who settle forty miles west of our camp and they told me about a man who has called all battle ready Saiyans to converge in the south on the night before the full moon."
Needless to say, Peppra didn't get as excited as Nappa. "Why would anyone answer that call?" she asked skeptically. Saiyans were nomadic beings; the only ones that settled were Saiyans with a large amount of very small children and Saiyans never met in large groups—not anymore. Companions consisted of their mates and perhaps one or two close comrades. There was really no need for them to herd together; it would only cause discord and fights.
"Wait?" Peppra stopped her train of thought as something Nappa said sunk in. "Battle ready?"
Nappa was back to nodding excitedly, the tuft of black hair on his head bobbing with the motion. "He is promising to makeit worth the while for every Saiyan who makes the trip."
She couldn't help rolling her eyes at Nappa's eagerness. "I take it from your attitude that we have a trip ahead of us." Peppra didn't mind really, the two of them had been in the eastern part of the planet for nearly two years now.
"Well, I am," Nappa laughed and Peppra couldn't help the alarm that she felt at his words. Her tail began turning at the end, curving as she wondered why he would be offering her the choice to separate. Nappa and Peppra had been traveling together for over four years and had known each other for longer than that; their mothers were half sisters, Nappa and his four full brothers had stayed close to Peppra and her ten full brothers during their younger years after his father had died. He was older than she was by four years; there were several of her brothers, and his own, that were closer to him in age, but it was Peppra he had asked to come with him when he left. And despite the fact that she was more than capable of taking care of herself without his assistance she wasn't ready to give up his companionship.
"I'll come too," she informed him while crossing her arms over her chest. She hoped he didn't notice how his offer had confused her. "I'm intrigued and it's past time for a change in scenery anyway. Though, the full moon is the night after tomorrow."
"That's more than enough time to travel to the south," Nappa chuckled. "If we leave now we can get there by mid-morning tomorrow."
Peppra nodded in consent and let her eyes roam his body lazily. He was coated in dried dirt, his hair knotted from flying, and the furs he wore around his waist were dingy; there was some dried blood on his shoulder from when she had thrown a rock at him the previous night. Peppra looked just as awful, it had been weeks since they'd bathed properly and months since they had gotten a change of clothes.
"Let's make it early evening and stop somewhere to bathe and get fresh clothes," Peppra suggested. "You reek."
Nappa snorted. "You don't exactly smell like an apir blossom yourself, Pep."
Peppra fought the urge to smell herself by scowling at him. "Let's get going then."
With a wide grin Nappa set off at a break neck speed that Peppra easily matched and was only just able to outpace. "What's the Saiyan's name?" she called over to her companion.
"Who?"
Peppra rolled her black eyes. "The man who sent out the call!"
"They call him Vegeta!"
The name sounded foreign. "Vegeta," Peppra tried it out. It was strong on her tongue; perhaps it wasn't so bad.
Early the next morning the two Saiyan companions stopped at a lake about three hundred miles from where they needed to be by nightfall. They had crossed paths with a group of Saiyans the night before who had told them this gathering was expected to be big and hard to over-look since it was being held in an abandoned Truffle palace.
Deciding it was a good idea to hunt for new clothes before bathing Nappa and Peppra separated with promises to meet back at the water.
It didn't take Peppra longer than half an hour to find an acceptable animal whose pelt would cover what she needed it to cover. Soon it was skinned smoothly and she began the process of tanning it; continuously stretching the skin tight and concentrating small amounts of ki to her hands to speed the process since she didn't have the necessary time do it the correct way. It was a common pelt, course thick fur that was black and spotted brown. Peppra didn't wait for Nappa before she roasted the gutted meat of her kill with a ki blast and devoured it. Nor did she wait for Nappa before striping out of her old garments and entering the water; leaving the tanned pelt to bake in the sun.
This planet really shouldn't be named Plant Peppra thought vaguely while clawing at her skin; trying to dislodge the filth. The planet housed very little foliage, with two suns the land was mostly flat, unfertile, red ground with the occasional plateau and small body of water.
Of course the Truffles-the Saiyan's planetary hosts for centuries-built cities and used their science to pump water into their cities and to irrigate their land so it would yield edible foliage. She had even heard that the Truffles had running water pumped directly into their individual living quarters so that they could bathe and make waste directly in their homes and the filth would just be taken away down another pipe; or something like that.
Some say that Saiyans had lived in similar affluence on the Saiyan home world but that was unjustifiable information since no Saiyan alive was old enough to have lived on the Saiyan home world; let alone remember it.
It was as Peppra began digging her claws through her hair and over her scalp to relieve the baked on grime there that she realized it had been well over an hour since she had seen Nappa. Sure he was much larger than she was (a whole 6'7'' to Peppra's 5'7'') but it shouldn't take him so long to find an animal that was suitable; he only used enough pelt to cover his bottom half after all. With new annoyance Peppra scrubbed her head harder.
It was another half an hour before Nappa finally returned and he made short work of skinning and gutting his kill before hurriedly devouring its meat and stripping to join Peppra in the water.
By the time he splashed in next to his companion she was done washing and was simply floating in the crisp water and enjoying being clean.
"Took you long enough," Peppra commented dryly, ignoring his antics as he gargled water to clean his mouth. Realizing that she had forgot to do this she quickly did the same but less obnoxiously.
"I got you something, Pep," he grinned after spitting the water out of his mouth and began rubbing water over his body. Peppra watched the water descend through the crevices in his muscled stomach with disinterest. Nappa's nakedness didn't bother her and hers didn't bother him. Many Saiyans went around unclothed, "Two something's, actually," he amended.
"Hn," she grunted, closing her eyes and switched her face from Nappa to one of the suns. "I'll look at them when you finish bathing."
"Perfect," Nappa wasn't fazed by her disinterest. "I know you'll like 'em."
Peppra didn't like them. Peppra loved them! Nappa knew just how to stroke her vanity and had outdone himself this time.
Firstly he had killed an albino animal for her. Peppra don't even know how he found a white animal on this red planet but she was too smitten with the color to care. She gratefully gave him the pelt of the animal she had killed in exchange.
Using strips of leather from the spare parts to hold their garments together they fashioned them into primitive clothes. Nappa's was his usual fitted cloth that went around his hips and was tied together between his legs. The bottom half of Peppra's was mostly the same except she left the bottom untied so it fell to her mid-thigh; it was too much of a hassle to untie when she had to piss.
Peppra spent more time on the top half of her garment since the pelt was so fine. Instead of just tying a large strip around her breasts as she usually did, she cut out sleeves that were about as wide as her palm. The makeshift top left off at the bottom of her ribcage so her muscled stomach was bared. She also placed the ties on the sides instead of just the front. With one tie on each side Peppra could leave the whole front clean and beautiful and the way it tied showed off the curve of her breasts.
Peppra loved this gift and couldn't stop grinning like an idiot every time she touched the insanely soft fur which she did frequently.
But that wasn't all Nappa got for her. Secondly, he had flown into one of the Truffles smaller cities and stole an item he knew Peppra had always coveted. A comb.
It was simple in design, red in color, and flat with fifty small teeth; still she loved it and spent a fair amount of time working it through her knotted hair as Nappa watched.
Peppra loved her hair and knew Nappa did too, which was why he risked getting such an item. Her hair was long; stopping just below her buttocks, and as black as a Ravers wing. Though unlike most Saiyan hair it was straight and when she finished combing she discovered that its texture was softer than her new white pelt.
"It gives your hair shine," Nappa said in awe as he ran his large fingers through Peppra's tresses. They went through smoothly, not snagging at a single tangle.
"Have I told you you're the best person in the world?" Peppra asked as she carefully stored the comb between her ribcage and her pelt on her left side. She and Nappa, like most Saiyans, didn't have possessions other than the clothes they wore but this was a possession Peppra was determined to take with her always.
"Only about fifty times," Nappa flushed at her praise.
Peppra couldn't help the laughter that escaped her lips at his blush. She didn't care that her gratitude made Nappa uncomfortable. For the first time in her life she felt beautiful. Peppra couldn't thank Nappa enough for that feeling.
A/N: Reviews are always nice and if you have any questions feel free to ask.