Jeez…. I just got over being sick…. Dyslexia also seems to be making a run at me today…. rrg. -_-;
My disclaimer can bite me today. In fact, I think it just did. ((O_O;))
Go big or go home!
…
You'll see.
~*~ Hattiakourri~*~
This is War!
Chapter Four: Mole Isn't Just in Mexican Food
"Oh, Vegeta—I almost didn't see you there," an effervescent Mrs. Briefs chimed as she strapped on her gardening gloves. "Your hair's such a lovely color; it blends in with the chrysanthemums."
"Oh joy," Vegeta grumbled, a plastic grin twisting his lips as he anxiously bated back and forth. Spending an entire morning assisting the Old Woman with her gardening was definitely NOT his idea of a good time. The only reason he was out here was that Bulma would refuse to repair his training equipment unless he followed the twittering blonde around like a faithful manservant. It was nothing short of humiliating.
Unfortunately for him, Bunny never missed an opportunity to congratulate him on his new hairstyle (which apparently seemed to be quite "lovely"), consistently comparing the bright hue of his freshly-dyed hair to the dazzling colors of autumn, which seemed to be bewitching the world with its rustic charms.
It had certainly bewitched her.
She wouldn't shut up!
Heading out to the landscaping shed, Mrs. Briefs dug out a pair of narrow-bladed garden shovels and her trusty red wheelbarrow. "Honey, can you take these out to the South garden, near the pear tree? I want to plant my chrysanthemums and my crape myrtles over there, but I need to check something first…" she rambled as she dialed her cell phone, punching the numbers with her trademark glee.
…
He surmised that she must go through cell phones like he went through cupcakes.
No longer listening to the conversation she was having on the phone, Vegeta trundled out to the indicated spot, mulling over his disastrous hair …incident. While the majority of it was crammed under the brown corduroy hat he had swapped from Bulma's bedroom (It was the least feminine one he could find), his hair was long and fine enough to spill out in wisps around his ears and the nape of his neck. The hideous color was visible for blocks, and was bright enough to see on a moonless night… even worse, even the slightest peek into a mirror made him think of Son flipping-Goku. .
It was sickening.
…Nameks Suck.
At least he went against Bulma's suggestion to re-dye his hair—he figured that with his shitty luck, he'd come out of the process looking like a silly neon skunk. No thank you, he mulled with a grimace. As bad as it is, I'll take what I've got.
Bunny came flouncing to him from the other side of the garden with a grin on her face. "Hello again, precious," she twittered, giving him a quick kiss on the cheek. "Let's plant our trees and our shrubs and slap on the new sod, so we can go inside and have a nice cup of hot chocolate."
Still cringing from Bunny's display of completely unwarranted affection, he reluctantly agreed. After all, who didn't like hot chocolate?
*Two minutes later*
IT'S NOT WORTH IT.
As they got underway with their project, Bunny began chattering about a myriad of pointless things— the fantastic Autumn Social she had attended with the other ladies of the neighborhood, how positively sweet he looked in corduroy, how she needed to start baking her famous pumpkin muffins for the trick-or-treaters… most of her prattling, he had ignored. It had little relevance, and either made him hungry… or confused.
When she brought up her conversation on the phone, however, he became all ears.
"He looked up the map of the pipelines, and he cleared us to dig here. I wasn't quite sure, because I know that the sewer pipeline runs through the yard nearby—but it's far enough away that…"
Well…maybe he wasn't all ears. Listening to her gab on about anything and everything would drive even angels to drink. His tolerance was—naturally-- much lower.
But what little he did listen to gave him an idea. When he began to eye the garden cart with the carpets of fresh grass, a wicked light sprung to his eyes—and he never once thought about how odd it was that dirt could inspire such mischievous thoughts….
Piccolo was not doing so well.
When he'd executed his daring counter-attack the previous week, he had felt like the King of the World (only taller and less hairy). It was the perfect attack on his Saiyan enemy, who was known to be particularly vain. The extremely luminous hair dye that he had filched from Bunny's bathroom cabinet had been the perfect double-whammy—not only was it garish and hideous enough to offend Vegeta's very conservative sensibilities, the color would stand as a constant reminder of his hated rival.
It was perfect.
…Now what?
Piccolo was literally driving himself crazy with paranoia. He knew that the insult to Vegeta's pride was guaranteed to elicit a retaliation of his own. Very naturally, he wanted to avoid the inevitable assault, but the fact that he knew little about the unpredictable Saiyan prevented him from knowing what signs to look for. If it had been Gokou, he would have simply hung a rope trap in a tree or propped up a box with a stick. Vegeta, however, was light-years more intelligent, and his method of attack would more than likely come out of nowhere.
He sniffed every water bottle he drank, expecting the familiar tang of Green-Gro to flood his nostrils.
No dice.
He was careful to inspect all the doors he opened, cautious of possible buckets propped on the doorway above. Granted, it seemed like a Gokou-grade prank, but it was possible that Vegeta would do it to outsmart him by doing precisely the thing he thought he wouldn't do…!
….confusing. Obviously, he wasn't in his right frame of mind.
…
But he sure knew he wasn't stupid enough to miss thisblatant trap.
When Piccolo reached the gateway to the rose garden, he noticed two very important things. Firstly, the earth immediately underneath the main gate had been disturbed and covered up with fresh sod. (Immediately, he was forced to revise his summation of Vegeta's intelligence) Secondly, Vegeta himself was present in the garden, lounging in a chaise that had been strategically pointed toward the main gate.
From these two pieces of information, he felt that it was painfully obvious that this spot was a trap. It seemed harmless, really—but it seemed a little too simple. He'd probably put something down there-- like those pestilent aphids—to enhance the …experience.
Normally, he would simply opt to fly over it—but the Saiyan had already locked onto his presence, and his cavalier gaze dared him to chicken out and hover over the spot.
Normally, he would have. He was far above such silly childish stunts like this and had far more serious concerns to attend to than playing prankster with Short-stack. But more than anything else, he knew that if he did, he would give the Saiyan the satisfaction of knowing that he was afraid to stand up to him.
That he could best him with his deviousness.
Hell no.
That just wouldn't do.
Compelled to save face as he was, that didn't mean that he had to walk right into the trap like a witless imbecile—there was a rarely used side entrance to the garden that he could use to get in. Score one for me.
So he headed down that path, encouraged when he saw Vegeta's sneer fade somewhat, looking for all the world like he had lost his prey. "Well, go ahead, Saiyan. Damn me to hell because I—"
FOOOOMP!
A perfectly normal patch of grass seemed to collapse beneath Piccolo's feet, giving way to a dark tunnel. Gravity had grabbed a hold of Piccolo and hauled him into the hole before he could react, sending him plunging down into a rapidly darkening abyss.
"VEGEEEEEEEETAAAAAAA!!!!!!"
He lashed out with his hands, trying to grip the side of the abyss, but couldn't get a grip on the sleek, oddly slippery walls. Too panicked to conjure up the power of flight, he continued to careen into the darkness…
Mysteriously, he could hear the sound of churning waters, which grew louder with every passing second.
What is that?
Before he could conjure up another coherent thought, he passed a message, scrawled onto a piece of cardboard.
HAVE A NICE DAY!
He then plunged into the swirling waters below, and was swept away with the tide.
"Umm… did you just hear that? It sounded like somebody shouting," Bunny gabbed in her trademark, ever-bubbly trill. "Oh, well. I'm sure I'm just imagining it. Tea, Vegeta-kun?"
As she filled his cup, she completely missed the Cheshire grin that spread across his face.
Piccolo's subterranean experience was less than enjoyable. While he was moderately thankful that he had, in fact, been dropped into a storm water drain as opposed to the city sewer, he wasn't particularly thrilled to be bobbing along underneath the city streets with leaves and garbage for the better part of three hours….
Ordinarily, he would have just blasted his way out of there. He decided not to take the risk, because other utility lines may have been in close proximity, and he didn't relish the idea of igniting the gas lines and taking out a city block just to get out of this hell-hole.
It would be more trouble than it was worth.
Thankfully however, he seemed to be nearing the exit…
To his credit, Piccolo didn't even snarl as he sauntered in to the house after sunset. Everything, from his turban down to his shoes, was soaked with the brackish, filthy water he had been bobbing in all afternoon. Now the clothes were beginning to sour, and mottled blotches of diluted oil and biological scum had begun to become visible on his cape.
On his way back to CC, at least four people mistook him for a severely ill vagrant.
He didn't even bother to say anything to them, even when they threw quarters at him.
He was too busy thinking about what he was going to do to that nasty little shit when he got back.
He would have words with the little dwarf, for sure—but that didn't mean that he was just going to forget this little transgression… hell no.
What had occurred today was most certainly a game changer. No longer could he pull petty little tricks and expect to win this pointless little contest of infantile audacity— no, he would have to sit down and use his cunning to draw up a plan, to fabricate a snare capable of catching the pygmy monkey and putting him in his place. He would have to—
"Do you mind? Get a towel; you're dripping all over the carpet."
Ah, speak of the devil and he shall appear.
"Hello, Saiyan. I suppose you think you're pretty clever now?"
"I've always been pretty clever," The Saiyan smarmed, flipping the channel distractedly. "You, obviously, are not."
The air was so thick with the Saiyan's arrogance, that the Namek could practically taste it.
"I was under the impression that we weren't aiming to cause bodily harm to each other—"
"Oh, come off it and stop being so…melodramatic," The Saiyan jeered, flipping the channel aimlessly. "It was only six feet deep."
How dare that little chimp make light of ME!
"Well, listen here, you little baboon--I have news for you."
"Wha-"
*THWACK!*
All of a sudden, Piccolo split a sackful of quarters (and a few bricks) over Vegeta's oversized head, showering the stupid git in silly silver coins and dust.
"Wipe that smug grin off of your face, Capuchin, because I haven't quit yet," Piccolo chuckled as he watched Vegeta try to figure out what the hell just happened. "Prepare to be humbled, little man."
With that warning, he strutted off, leaving a disoriented (but still victorious) Saiyan behind…
*End Chapter Four*
See what I mean about "Go big or go home?"
One phrase in here is a sort of homage to the legendary B/V author whose work introduced me to the wonderful world of fanfics. Can you figure out who this is?
; P
Mmg… I have a headache, and my typing skills are seriously off-kilter today… I swear, I just wrote "insteard." What kind of word is that?!! It isn't a word…
I'm going to bury my head in a pillow now and cry about Prince of Persia.
An update should be up within the next two weeks—can't give a specific date, because I have a busy college schedule. But it will come, don't worry.
Hats