Hey. y'all! How r u? I'm soooooo sorry that this chapter took so long to come out... so I decided to make it really long to make up for the time. Also - for all y'all japanese illiterates, I'll be translated the japanese words for you, okay? That should make everyone happy.
Disclaimer: I don't own Dragon Ball Z/GT, but I do own all of the characters I made up, the castle, the planet, all of the inventions that will be coming up, and the big event that will take place a lot later in the story...
Chapter One: Her Mission
As she walked down the long, paved path to her vessel, she thought about her mission and what she was to do if she in fact *did* find him. Her purpose was to find him, alive or dead.... If he was alive, bring him home. If he was dead.... At least find out where and how he had died. If he had been killed, find the
person(s) that had killed him and show them what would happen to them if they took the life of the Prince of the Saiyans....
But then an odd thought occurred to her: What *had* happened to him? The last time she had seen him, he had been setting out on a journey to Anthroxia along with Nappa and Raditz. They were going to destroy the inhabitants there, she had been told. She was on another assignment when she had caught wind of a change in their plans - Earth. As far as she could gather, something had happened to Raditz on a solo mission and Vegeta had decided to go out and investigate matters. But that's as far as she could look into it, as her work sent her all the way to a far away galaxy called M2, where she was needed immediately. That was the last time they had seen or heard from each other. After that, she had lost all contact with Vejitasei, and she received word that the planet had been destroyed.
That was when she had had made the discovery of the existence of the legendary Black-Star Dragon balls, magical spheres capable of invoking a god that could summon the power to grant almost any wish. It was not long afterward that she had embarked on a diligent quest to recover them and wish the planet back, which she succeeded in doing with ease, much to her satisfaction.
Had he died on Earth...? But... how could that have possibly happened? The habitants of Earth couldn't have possibly - they weren't strong enough, nor did they have the cavalry to destroy three saiyajins. And beyond that line of reasoning, the earth had a moon! Oh, she could just picture the carnage when the moon showed her full face... They should have much more than virtually indestructible. She estimated that they should have been able to destroy the species there within the space of two months.
Then she remembered.... Another saiyajin had been sent there, as a child.... She had known his ather. His name was Bardock; he was a loyal soldier in the Saiyajin defense force... She had been told that he had been trying to stop Frieza from destroying the planet, but unfortunately had died in the struggle...
But she'd found this ubelieiveable - Frieza, destroying Vejitasei? No, it couldn't be tue... She'd known Frieza as a child and as a teen, and she'd even slightly befriended him. No, that wasn't right, he couldn't have done it.
So there were four saiyajins. And the child alone, whom should have been strong enough of its own accord, should have finished the job alone within three months. It should have been a massacre. She grimaced at the thought. She wasn't as much of a ruthless killer as saiyajins went - she could even be considered *nice*, at least by saiyajin standards. She would kill if she was ordered to (unless of course, she didn't believe that the person deserved to be killed), or if she had to, or even if she wanted to - which wasn't very often - but she wouldn't as much go off and destroy an entire planet. That was just.... Monstrous.
Of course, this "soft" way of going about things had gotten her much ridicule from her peers in her time in the lower ranks - heck, it most likely STILL got some pretty bad views... the only reason she never heard it said outright anymore was because she was now so high ranking that if anyone dared to question her, they'd get discharged or killed for insubordination. And who would want to be disgraced because of a woman? The thought was simply shameful. So, of course, people preferred to keep things to themselves... or at least, out of earshot. Not that she really cared what they thought anyhow.
She was pulled from her reverie when she saw the huge ship before her. It was very good looking - it was really big, and had a smooth, contoured shape. The top front side, which was slightly slanted, had a big, slightly arched window that looked as if it served as a windshield type device. On the top, she knew through experience would proudly display (since the side was a bit too thin to show it) the Vejitasei coat of arms. She raised an eyebrow continued walking toward the vessel. She saw a few royal officers standing below the ship, which was sitting on the ground. She walked over to one of them, who she knew as Senior Officer Dryphus.
"Is there a problem, Officer Dryphus?" she asked, looking around the area.
"No, Commander. We're just making a few last-minute verifications," said Dryphus as she observed the rest of the officers. "So... do you think that you'll complete this mission?" she asked, an eyebrow raised.
"Oh, please don't ask," sighed Clarice. "I've already been through this enough with Vegeta, and I'll just tell you the same thing that I told him - I'll do my best."
"What else did he try to *emphasize* upon you?" asked Dryphus, humor clearly in her voice.
"Don't ask," repeated Clarice. "...But... he did offer to 'reward' me if I completed the mission successfully..."
Dryphus almost laughed at the exasperated look on Clarice's face. "It seems that you're on a first-name basis with him..."
Clarice looked at Dryphus with a slightly annoyed expression. "The only reason I called him by his first name was because I don't think that he deserves the honor of being called 'Your Highness'..." she grimaced slightly, "More along the lines of 'Your Royal Ass'..."
Dryphus laughed out loud at that, but then said, still laughing slighly, "You really musn't speak of our King in such a manner... even if you don't enjoy being under his rule, like it or not, we're sworn to follow him... you musn't question his directives."
"Oh *shut up*," said Clarice, rolling her eyes playfully. "*Must* you be so submissive..."
Dryphus elbowed Clarice in the stomach good-humoredly and then turned to speak to another officer that had jogged over to her.
"Alright. I believe you can leave now," said Dryphus when she finished speaking to the other officer. "Everything seems to be in order."
She nodded and smiled and began to walk toward the ship, which was now floating above the ground. As soon as she arrived before the entrance (a circular door that spun open), a walkway protruded from it as if on command. She moved up the walkway and the automatic door slid open as she appeared before them. She strode into the main room of the vessel and took in the ambience. After looking around a bit, she strode towards the opposite side of the ship (which took a while, considering the size of the ship) and stood before the control panel. She pressed a blue button. Suddenly a hologram sign popped up, and a pleasant, mechanical voice reading the sign said, "Autopilot. Please set coordinates."
"Set coordinates to..." she cocked her head to the side and thought for a moment.
'Well, that's the last place I knew about... maybe he's still there...'
"Earth."
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
It was a bright and sunny day on earth. As usual, the whole gang was at Capsule Corporation, hanging out.
Chi-Chi had just cooked a huge meal and now everyone was just sitting around, relaxing. Pan, Marron, Bra, and Nazomi *my own made up character... Piccolo's daughter* were in Bra's room, talking and listening to one of Nazomi's CDs from her extensive music collection.
Chi-Chi, Videl, Juuhachigou, Bulma, and Mercy *Piccolo's beautiful French wife^_^* were in the kitchen, talking. Most of the guys (Goku, Gohan, Goten, Trunks, Kuririn, Uubu, and Yamucha) were in the living room watching a baseball game. Piccolo was outside meditating (which Mercy always thought he looked *so* cute doing), and Vegeta, as usual, was in the Gravity Room training.
And as for Master Roshii and Oolong - they were in one of the guest rooms, playing a video game - now this may seem unusual for them to be doing, being the perverts that they were, but that was the point - they were playing a game called 'Primal Image', which Nazomi had given Master Roshii (if he promised to stop being such a pervert around girls). And this was no regular game - the game featured a variety of different women (mostly teenage girls) that they could choose from, put them in whatever type of clothes that they wanted (if not to leave them completely naked), and the catch was that they were able to pose them however they wanted.
And now, Master Roshii, with a drooling Oolong at his side, was in the midst of posing a girl with a yellow/orange string bikini lying on her back with her legs wide open... *I'm not kidding, this is an actual game... really disgusting, if u ask me....*
A lot of noise cold be heard coming from the living room; the guys in there considered the game going on now important, it being the last game of the season, and a lot of people were showing great support for their own team, which included shouting at the top of their lungs as if the players could hear them.
"YES!! Oh Kami, somebody get Nazomi!!" cried Goten, looking as if someone just gave him a fifty-course dinner.
"Why?" asked Trunks, who was backing away from Goten, trying not to get hurt as Goten started jumping up and down and doing what looked like dancing.
"We made a bet," said Goten as he began to calm down, though not completely - he still had an ear-to-ear grin on his face and was shaking like mad. Still panting, his fists clenched, he continued -
"She bet me that by fifth - inning, the Sox would be up by at least two points!!" *I don't even know anything about baseball... I'm just making this up* "I told her that she was crazy and that the Yankees would be in the lead, so we made a bet!! Now she owes me nine hundred dollars!!" he said ecstatically.
"You guys bet *that* much money?" said Gohan incredulously.
"We're both *very* confident in our teams, " Goten spoke seriously before going back into histerics.
"Ah," said Gohan as he nodded, looking slightly amused.
"I'll go get Nazomi," said Trunks. "I was gonna get a soda in a minute anyway.."
He got up and walked through the kitchen where the women were talking to get the soda, and then he took the stairs by two to Bra's room. When he got there, he heard loud music coming from inside and the door was locked. He knocked, but the music was too loud, then knocked a little bit harder, causing the door to shake.
Suddenly the music got quieter. He heard the lock coming undone and saw Bra standing behind the door as it opened.
"Hey," she said.
"Where's Nazomi?" he asked, walking into the room.
"Over here, Boxers!!" he heard Nazomi's voice shout.
He looked over at the other side of the large room, where he saw Pan and Nazomi lying on the floor. Pan was apparently concentrating hard, though both her and Nazomi looked as if they would burst out laughing at any moment.
"What are you guys doing?" asked Trunks, seeing the board as he walked over to where they were lying on the floor.
"They're playing 'Scribble'," said a bemused Marron, who had gotten up from Bra's bed to walk over and wrap he arms around Trunks.
He looked at the board more closely, putting his arm on her shoulder. "I thought it was called 'Scrabble'," he said, looking confused.
"Well if you wanna play it *their* way it is," said Nazomi as she looked up at him with her bright orange eyes, a child-like smile on her face as she swung her legs back and forth. "But this way is more fun."
"Oh, really? Well how do you play 'Scribble'?"
"The same way as 'Scrabble'. Except in 'Scribble', we use nonsense words. Like a minute ago, I spelled out 'wazza'..." she had a broad grin on her face as she looked back own at the board, showing off her sharp white fangs.
"Aha!!!" shouted Pan suddenly (causing everyone to jump and Trunks to start choking on his soda), laughing like a maniac as she chose six out of her seven letters and put them down on the board.
"BOOOH-YA!!! Triple word score!!" she cried as if this meant that she had won a million dollars. "I win!! (Which is pretty good, I was running out of letters...)"
Nazomi looked down at the word Pan had spelled out. "Zazzow? Nice one!!" she said. "I never would have thought of that word..."
"...Oh yeah, Nazomi - Goten wanted to talk to you downstairs," said Trunks after he recovered.
"Okay." Nazomi got up and stretched, then walked back downstairs with Trunks.
Goten was still breathing heavily when Trunks and Nazomi walked into the room. The game had gone to a commercial break, and most of the guys were talking about the score and their predictions for the rest of the game.
"Ya know... that Radio Shack guy kinda looks like Duke Nukem with those shades on," said Nazomi thoughtfully as she stared at the man on the commercial.
"You know... I have *never* noticed that before," said Goten goofily as he looked at the TV. "You're right..."
"So what did you want, Ten?" Nazomi asked Goten as she sat half on the arm of the plush chair and leaning down on his shoulder so that she was half in his lap.
He gave her an evil grin, making her orange eyes go wide. "What?"
"You'll see," he said, a hint of maliciousness in his voice.
Nazomi stared at him.
"Just watch," he said, pointing to the television screen.
As if on command, the game came back and one of the men doing the commentary immediately said, "Let's check up on those scores, shall we? In the first inning..." he announced the scores for each inning and finally got to the fifth, indicating that the Yankees were about 3 points in the lead.
Nazomi stared at the television, her mouth open and her eyes wide, looking as if she wanted to blow it up right then and there. At first she was quiet, then -
"DAMN IT!!" she cried, though she didn't feel quite as angry as she let on; She didn't really need the money, her parents spoiled her rotten - She could have anything she wanted. And her mother was plenty rich, nine hundred dollars didn't really matter to her.
But she *hated* losing.
Goten just sat there, twiddling his thumbs and smirking. Nazomi sat back down, her face in a cross
state.
"Fine, Ten, you win..." she growled, getting up again and taking her silvery, bubble-patterned wallet out of her pocket. Goten heard her mutter, "Pedro, how could you do this to me?" She took nine one-hundred-dollar bills out of it and shoved them into his hand.
"I *will* win next time... you'd better get ready to be my personal butler!"
"I don't think so," said Goten, looking through the money.
"Oh yeah?" said Nazomi.
"Yeah!" said Goten, taking his eyes off of the money for the first time in a few minutes to look at Nazomi.
"Oh yeah?"
"Yeah!"
"You wanna bet?" said Nazomi challengingly.
"I zink zat's enough betting for now," said Mercy, who was leaning on the door frame, her arms crossed. She looked at Nazomi and clicked her tongue disapprovingly as she shook her head.
"Okay," said Goten, who was staring at Mercy.
Nazomi gave him a look that said plainly, "You are *hopeless*!" and walked over to her mother to give her a hug.
"I'm sorry, mommy, I'll never do it again," said Nazomi in a baby-ish voice as she hugged her mother.
"Oh, eet's alright, darling," said Mercy, rubbing Nazomi's back gently. She smiled at Nazomi and gave her a kiss on her forehead.
When Mercy left to go back to the kitchen, Nazomi gave herself a satisfied smirk - she could still get her parents to do whatever she wanted them to. Not that she didn't like or respect her parents - she loved them, of course - but she just liked knowing that she could control them and get away with anything.
They suddenly heard shouts behind them as the game finished - the Yankees had won. Nazomi stomped hard on the ground, causing the room to shake slightly.
"No!" she cried. "Pedro, Manny, Nomar.. how could you guys do this to me...?"
"What's going on down here?" they turned to see Chi-Chi standing in the doorway, a frown upon her face.
"The Sox just lost the game," Goten answered for her since Nazomi was still staring at the television set in horror.
"Well that's still no reason to be making so much noise," she said. "Try to keep it quiet."
"You guys are just calling *all* of the attention to this room, huh?" said Pan as she walked into the room, holding a party-size bag of chips. "Aw man, the Sox lost?" she said, a slight grimace of disappointment on her face. She noticed Nazomi staring at the bag with a scowl on her face as if the chips were her worst enemy.
"You want some?" said Pan teasingly - she knew Nazomi wouldn't eat any of it.
"Ugh... no thank you. Too fattening..."
"So? You could work off the fat in about two seconds."
"Uh-uh. I don't know how you can stand that stuff... It destroys your body. And if I ever want that much grease, I will just crack open a jug o' Crisco and take a nice long swig, thank-you-very-much..." she stated, still eyeing the bag hatefully - Like her father, Nazomi didn't eat very often.
Pan shook her head and laughed softly. She looked at the TV and they could see her eyebrows raising behind the bag chips. "So you lost the bet, huh?" she said before putting another handful of chips into her mouth.
"Yeah... But the Sox should've won," said Nazomi sadly.
"No way! I knew that the Yankees would win," said Goten.
"*Liar*!" cried Nazomi, pointing an accusing finger at him.
Soon enough, there was huge discussion about who should've won and why. They began listing players, starters, hitters, past games, winning streaks each team had ever had, etc.
"Yeah, but - " said Goku, who was in the midst of defending the Sox, suddenly stopped talking, and the others knew exactly why. They suddenly felt a massive power. Everyone suddenly felt as if a huge weight had been put on every part of their bodies, as if the air had gained about a ton. Even Piccolo had stopped meditating. Vegeta, who had been sitting in a tree resting, suddenly stood up, eyes wide. He recognized that ki signature immediately. He closed his eyes, brows furrowed, trying to concentrate on where the enormous force was coming from.
Chi-Chi, Bulma, Juuhachigou, Videl, Bra, Marron, and Mercy went to the living room, worried
expressions on their faces - except for Juuhachigou, who looked intrigued.
"So you felt it too?" asked Goku.
"Yeah," answered Bulma. This only showed the strength of whatever the ki energy was coming from - even people that weren't trained to recognize ki signatures could feel the tension in the atmosphere.
"Hey... what if it's a new enemy?" asked Nazomi, a mixture of alarm and enthusiasm in her voice. She'd always heard stories about the old enemies such as Frieza, Cell, the Androids, etc. - and always wanted to be in some type of battle.
"I 'ope not," said Mercy.
"Whoever or whatever that is.... is really strong..." said Goten, overwhelmed by the feeling. None of them had ever felt anything like it before.
Soon, everyone was outside, trying to figure out where it was coming from - but it was so big it seemed to be coming from *everywhere*.
Suddenly Vegeta jumped out of the tree that he was sitting in.
"I don't know about you lethargic bakas," said Vegeta harshly, "but I'm going to check this out. I've been looking for a good fight..." with that, he powered up to super saiyajin level 1 and was about to fly away when Bulma grabbed his arm.
"Be careful," said, a worried expression on her face.
"Humph... Whatever, woman," he grunted, and blasted off in the direction of the power source, determined to ignore his Earthbound mate's emotional probing.
The rest of them stood there, still trying to contemplate what they where going to do.
"I'm going too," Piccolo growled suddenly. "I want to know what this is about." Without another word, he blasted off after Vegeta.
"Maybe we should all go," said Trunks. "Whatever this is... we all know that it's too strong for only a few of us to take on by ourselves. I doubt that even all of us would be able to stand up against it together..."
"Trunks is right. And besides, we can't leave Vegeta and Piccolo out there by themselves," said Goten, though he looked just as anxious as everyone else did.
"I'm going," piped up Pan.
"Me too," Juuhachigou murmured, getting ready to take off.
"Ditto," Kuririn and Yamucha boomed in unison.
"Are you coming?" Yamucha asked Nazomi before he blasted off. "You could really help us out if we got into trouble...."
"Maybe later," she said, looking slightly nervous.
He looked confused at first, then nodded and blasted off into the air after the others.
"Mom, did you see where I put my car keys?" asked Nazomi as she searched her pockets.
"Can't you fly?" asked Mercy. Not that she wanted Nazomi to go, but she was well aware of her airborne capabilities.
"Yeah, but do you see my hair?" she asked, pointing to her long, silky maroonish-purple hair, which was mostly free, except for bangs and a few half-braided ponytails at the top of her head. "If I fly, this like sooo totally gonna frizz," she said as she walked inside to search her purse.
After a few minutes, she came back, a victorious look on her face, declaring that she'd found her keys.
"You guys wanna come?" she asked as she walked over to the car (which had a license plate that said 'QUEEN NA-NA' on it).
"I've got dibs on the front seat," said Bra as she ran over to the passenger side and hopped in.
"Eef you're going, I'm comeeng weeth you," said Mercy, throwing on her brown, fur-trimmed leather jacket.
"I'm coming too," said Marron as she jumped in beside Bra (there were three seats up-front).
"You might as well all come," said Nazomi as she fixed her rear-view mirror. "Unless you wanna stay here with Master Roshii or something..." she stopped playing with the mirror and concentrated on where everyone's ki was.
By the time she found them, the rest of the women were in the two back rows of the car. She smirked and started the large, red Hummer jeep and the truck was suddenly filled with loud music. Nazomi instantly turned it down and muttered, "Sorry," purple flecks of color crossing her green face as she blushed.
She floored the pedal and they were off.
********************************************************************************************
Everyone (that could fly) was flying south, towards the power source. And to their utter surprise, it completely disappeared. Everyone stopped abruptly.
"Well, whatever it was either is gone now or is masking their power really well," said Juuhachigou, taken back.
Everyone decided mentally that the person was masking their power.
"If we go to where we last felt the ki signature, we might find a clue," said Goku. So they kept going.
And it happened that Goku was right - they did find a clue when they got there. Their 'clue' turned out to be a very big, jade gray ship. The ship was floating a few hundred meters above the ground.
"Cool," said Goten out loud, though he hadn't meant to.
Pan flew around the ship to investigate it more closely. When she was above the ship, she froze.
"What is it?" shouted Uubu.
"There's some type of weird emblem on the top of this thing," said Pan, looking down at the ship. The others flew up to see what she was talking about it. And sure enough, there was a lionized, gold "V" with two crossed, emblazoned swords in the background.
"What could that mean?" asked Trunks, his head tipped to the side in confusion.
"I know exactly what it is," said a gruff voice from behind them. Everyone turned to see Vegeta floating in midair, arms crossed, head bowed down. To their surprise, his face wasn't in its usual livid statue appearance, but in a blank state. No readable expression at all.
"Well... what is it?" asked Pan. He raised his head, his face completely solemn.
"It's the Vejitasei Coat of Arms," he said quietly.
Everyone stared at him in utter shock.
After what seemed like ten minutes, Goku said, "Are you sure?"
"Of course I'm sure, dimwit," spat Vegeta, annoyed.
"But that's impossible... I thought that Freiza had destroyed Vejitasei," said Kuririn.
"It did," mumbled Vegeta quietly.
"Well then... h-how could the Coat of Arms be on this ship?" said Pan.
Vegeta didn't answer right away. He just floated there, arms crossed, his head bowed down. He could only think of one explanation for this...
"I don't know," he said, his voice barely above a whisper.
"Maybe this is a trick," said Goten. "Maybe this ship isn't really from Vejitsei..."
"No, it's real. The ship... it looks saiyan," said Vegeta. Everyone thought that something was weird about Vegeta. He wasn't yelling, he didn't look mad... he was just floating there like he was numb.
Was he *scared*?
All of a sudden, everyone felt the huge burst of power again. They immediately had to descend to the ground. Vegeta powered up to super saiyajin level two and blasted off again, this time going east.
"....I'm guessing that whatever it is... is over there," said Kuririn, his eyebrow raised.
"We should follow him," said Piccolo.
Now everyone was flying east, following Vegeta's faint ki trail. Vegeta began to slow down, then stopped. He landed about a hundred meters from the coast of a beach. The others landed there as well. They still felt the huge power nearby, but they couldn't quite pinpoint where it was coming from. Then they felt it a bit farther west. But to their surprise, Vegeta took off flying farther east. They thought that of all people, he would want to know what was going on...
*****************************************
Vegeta continued flying east, away from where the power *seemed* to be coming from. He knew that maneuver all too well, and that the source of the power was really coming from the opposite direction. He finally saw her standing on a cliff, looking out at the ocean below.
He couldn't believe how much she'd changed since he'd last seen her. For one thing, her hair had doubled in length, and her body was much more curvacious, even though she had been pretty well developed when he'd left. She also looked older, but still very young despite her age.
She was wearing a skin-tight leather suit which had a zipper in front, and the zipper was pulled down slightly, exposing some cleavage. She had a pink Scouter over her left eye, though he doubted that she needed it, and her tail, silky brown fur and all, was wrapped around her thin waist.
He landed soundlessly behind her, and then crossed his arms. They both knew that she knew he was there.
She smiled, still looking out at the ocean that was spread before them, and then turned around slowly.
"...Why, hello," she said, still smiling warmly. She had a very deep, husky voice - her voice was low, commanding, and resilient, with abundant power - but at the same time pleasant and kind, and could be very sensual and soothing. *And also - remember that British accent that I told you about last time* "I'd almost thought you'd forgotten about that tactic."
The tactic she was referring to was an evasion technique, taught to a special few saiyajins - they could divert their ki to another direction so that whatever enemy they were against would think that they were in one place when they were really in another, confusing the adversary and giving the saiyajin the chance, if severely needed, to escape.
He merely smiled. "You almost fooled me," he said quietly.
She grinned and then turned to sit on the edge of the cliff, her legs hanging off of the edge.
"Who were they?" she asked after a moment, her voice sounding serious.
"Who?" he asked, as if he didn't know who she were speaking of.
"The people that were trying to follow me."
"...I don't know... And now I have a question for you," he said, also sounding serious.
She remained silent, knowing what the question was going to be.
"What are you doing here?"
"...I should be asking you the same thing," she said. "What happened?"
"What are you talking about?"
"Where's Nappa?"
"Dead," he answered, making her gray eyes go wide. "He was weak. I killed him."
She was still quite surprised, but nodded nonetheless and looked down. "And Raditz?"
"...He is also dead," he said. "But he died under different circumstances."
She looked back down at the water. "...You?"
"What?"
"Why are you still here? Why haven't you completed the mission yet?"
Now there was something he was going to have trouble answering.
"...I got stuck here," he lied. "My ship was destroyed and I was stranded."
Her eyebrow was raised, she knew he was lying, but she didn't enquire him any farther on the subject.
"Wasn't there another saiyan here? Bardock's son?"
"...yes..."
"Well do you know where he is? Is he alive?"
"He's alive," said Vegeta dully. "But when we got here, he'd lost his programming, and had lost his tail... so he'd been living among these humans as if he were one of them."
"And the same situation befalls you, I presume?" she asked quietly.
"Ahre?" *Huh?*
She pointed to him. "You're tail seems to be missing, you are dressed like a human, and the fact that you've been here for about four decades is a supporting factor."
He'd forgotten about the ensemble he was wearing - the black sleeveless jacket, the black tank-top, black jeans, boots and the fingerless gloves. *Well.. just picture the basic GT outfit, really*
His hair was also a lot shorter than it was when he'd first come to earth. *GT hair, too*
He looked back at her to find that she'd been staring at him.
"Well you've changed, too," he said as if it were an excuse.
She laughed softly and shook her head. "At least *my* changes were good..."
"Yes, they were..." said Vegeta as he looked over her body. When he realized what he'd said and done, he slapped himself mentally.
"But do you know what... what happened to Vejitasei? I've heard rumors, but... I just don't believe them..."
"What rumors?"
"...Well... I... I heard that Frieza did it... destroyed Vejitasei..." she shook her head slowly. "But of course, I just don't think that it could be true... I mean, why would he? He wouldn't..."
"Well... I knew that the planet had been destroyed a few months after I got here," he began. He sighed suddenly, "He would and he did."
Now she just looked shocked. She didn't even ask. She didn't want to know. She turned away, her look of shock melting into a look of sick disgust, disgust in finding out that someone you trusted did something like that....
"So where *is* Bardock's child, anyway?" she said, changing the subject.
"...around..."
"Vegeta, don't do that."
He shrugged in response.
She scowled, though she wasn't very angry. She turned around and looked at him again. He looked so much older, yet still so young... he had continued his training, obviously. For one thing, his ki was quite a bit higher, though he didn't have his tail, and that should have reduced his energy level ten times... and his muscles were much more developed and defined...
And his hair, she liked it. It looked better short.
She smiled and blushed slightly when she realized that she'd been staring at him. It had been a long time since she'd seen him, the only image of him being a portrait in the Hall of Kings in the castle... and of course, his father, a perfect picture of him, except King Vegeta had a goatee, and his face wasn't as defined and strong...
She looked down at the ocean below them, and watched the sun as it began to set, a beatiful sunset accompanied by flourishes of color, going from yellow to orange to pink, to red, to purple, to a deep, dark blue...
'It doesn't even compare to the sunsets on Vegita-sei,' she thought, grinning.
"What are you smiling at?" asked Vegeta, who had realized that she was suddenly grinning at nothing,
"...Hmm...? Oh, the sunset... I like them more back home... I find watching *both* suns setting at once is more beautiful..." she sighed and rested her chin in her hand, still staring at the sunset.
He looked at her, and found himself staring in awe at her beauty. She'd always been beautiful, her entire life... and now, sitting with that content look on her face, the light from the sunset illuminating and shadowing her features, accenting her high cheekbones...
He shook his head slightly, clearing his mind of such thoughts. No, he was married to Bulma now, and he was bonded with her... he loved her very, very, much, though he'd never admitted it in his life, and wasn't exactly planning on doing so anytime soon. What he'd had with Clarice was in the past.
Now all he'd have to do was tell her.
This was going to be hard, considering the fact that the woman could kill him with little or no effort in *much* less than a nano-second without a second thought to it.
The look of wonder suddenly left her face. She frowned, looking slightly sad.
Just *ever* so slightly.
"...You..." she exhaled deeply, and contined, "You have another mate, don't you..." she said, turning to look at him with her chin still in her palm.
He looked taken back. How did she know?
"Human, I presume?" she said, looking back at the still setting sun. "I don't remember there ever being any other dominant speicies here that were... 'related' to saiyans..."
He knew what she meant by 'related' - it meant that humans had the same qualities as saiyans, except of course the attribute of power; these qualities being the same body anatomy, ability to think, work, reproduce, and of course, to love.
"...*And* I can say quite confidently that you have at least one child."
How did she know all this? He felt kind of sorry, owing to the fact that she looked quite expressionless. Clarice's face always expressed some type of emotion, whether it be anger, exasperation, amusement, boredom, happiness... and the only time her face didn't display some type of emotion was when she was depressed or upset and didn't want to show it.
"...Y-yes," he said. "How did you know?"
"I can tell... and remember when I asked you who those people were?"
"Hai." *Yes.*
"Well... I was hoping you'd tell me the truth about that," she said quietly. "I could feel an excess of your ki in one of them. That automatically told me-"
"That he was my son," finished Vegeta, feeling quite stupid. He knew that the person she'd felt had to be Trunks.
She nodded slowly, her eyes cast downward.
"Gomen nasai... daijoubu?" he asked. *I'm sorry... Are you alright?*
"Shinpai shinai," she said, shrugging her shoulders. *It's Alright.* Then she looked at him and said softly, "Sugei..." before turning away. *Wow...*
"Nani?" he asked. *What?*
"...human..." she said, laughing softly and looking up at the sky.
"So? Do you have a problem with it?" he asked fiercely.
"Iie... Wakatta... tonde monai," she said quietly, though she still looked a little amused. *No... I understand... Not a problem* "But I know someone that *will* have a problem with it," she said, suddenly looking serious.
"Nani? Who?" *What? Who?*
"Your father." She looked at him, not knowing what to expect.
"*What*?" he said, his voice a dangerous whisper, his face split between disbelief and rage.
She understood how he felt, and she knew that he hated his father more then anything in the world. And even more, he was intimidated by him, which actually wasn't his shortcoming - King Vegeta was a very intimidating person, even almost scary if he wanted to be. He was also cunning, ruthless, dangerous, and could turn even the best of allies against each other.
"He's *alive*?" asked Vegeta.
"Ano... hai," she answered. *Um... yeah*
"Since when?" exclaimed Vegeta.
"Well... after I found out that the planet had been destroyed.... Have you ever heard of the Black-Star Dragon Balls?"
"..hai.." *...yes...*
"Well, I got the Dragon Balls together and wished it back..."
Vegeta buried his face in his hands, and then he began to massage his temples slowly.
"Well, I suppose that you know why I'm here now," she said quietly after a moment.
"T-to take me *back*?" he stuttered in anger, his voice still excercising the same dangerous whisper.
"...H-hai," she said quietly. *...Y-yes* She wasn't afraid of him, but she was afraid of what his reaction could be.
"USO!!" he yelled. *NO WAY!!*
"Vegeta, Onegai!!" she cried. *Vegeta. Please!!* "At least-"
"Iie!" he spat. *No!*
She looked down at the waves that were crashing at the bottom of th cliff. She could understand if and why he didn't want to go back... after being on this planet for so long, he proabably liked it here... and he had probably become accustomed to everyone and everything throughout the planet. He most likely even considered it a second home.
And then there was the fact that he was bonded with a human... She stared at him for a moment, then turned to look at the sunset.
This was harder for her than she thought it would be.
King Vegeta was what some people would call 'racist', but not in the manner that most people thought of it - he thought that saiyans were meant to rule the galaxy, that they were the strongest, the best, the most intelligent, and that all other populaces of the universe were nothing but lowly, dirty, vermin made to be game for the saiyans to hunt and kill for sport, and if ever left to live, to be their slaves and do whatever they wished without any type of resistence; to live in the shadow of the saiyans, to be ridiculed and belittled...
"Maybe-" she bagan before Vegeta interrupted.
"I ALREADY SAID -"
Before he could finish, Clarice grabbed him by the shoulders and slapped him across the face. Luckily, she could control her immense power, or she may have killed him right then, but she only slapped him hard enough to stun him a bit.
"Vegeta! Urusai!" *Vegeta! Shut up!* "Please let me speak for a moment..."
When he didn't say anything, she continued. "I have a proposition to make," she said quietly, looking him in the eye. She let go of him when she was sure he wouldn't interfere anymore. She sighed and continued.
"I will give you... some time to think about it. Let's say... a week? I'm not supposed to, I'm supposed to find you and drag you back kicking and screaming if I have to," she said, her crimson lips curling slightly into a tiny smile. "But I think that you have a right to decide."
He looked down at the ground. She was doing this for him?
"And if it happens that you choose to stay here," she continued, "I'll... I'll just call this mission failed and mark you as 'lost'," she said, shrugging her shoulders, though she seemed almost fearful of the possibility that he would make that decision; if she failed the mission, she would most likely be discharged, though the King might let it go - one, for being the best right-hand any King had ever had, and two, because he - well, she didn't want to think about it.
"A...::sigh::...Arigatou," he said quietly. *Th...::Sigh::...Thank you*
She looked up at him, surprised, then smiled. "Doitashimashite," she said, still smiling. *Your welcome*
"And about your family," she said suddenly, "And whatever friends you have here... You are welcome to tell them about your predicament if you trust them... and you are absolutely sure that they will not pressure you either way. But I'd advise you..." she took his hand in hers and squeezed it gently, "to do whatever makes you happy."
He looked at her, disbelieving.
"Clarice..."
She smiled and put her finger to his lips, shushing him, and then she found herself looking at his mouth. She leaned over and kissed him softly, her soft lips just brushing his own for a few seconds.
She pulled back from the kiss, much to both of their distress. She whispered softly, her face still only inches from his, "Just for old time's sake..."
She got up and turned back to smile at him one last time, then blasted off into the dark twighlight of the sky.
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"No, I swear, that ki was RIGHT HERE!" cried Pan, becoming more and more agrivated.
They'd been standing in that same area by the beach all afternoon, feeling the ki move around them as if it were only a ghost. By sunset, they'd heard the roar of an engine, and could see the redness of Nazomi's Hummer through the mass of dust and sand that it's rugged tires had been kicking up.
But to their surprise, the ki disappeared again, and this time it was taking longer to come back, if it were coming back.
Now it was dusk, the sun setting behind the clear blue water of the ocean, and everyone was waiting, waiting for something to show up and reveal where this mysterious force was coming from.
Bra and Marron were singing along with one of Nazomi's Destiny's Child CDs in the front seat of the Hummer; Mercy was sitting on the hood of the car, her chin sitting in her palms, talking to Piccolo; Videl and Chi-Chi were all the way in the back (the third row), just talking; Nazomi was playing with one of her laptops, this one of which she'd found in the trunk of the car before she'd gone over to ask Pan what had happened; and Bulma was trying to get as much info as she could on Vegeta's whereabouts.
"What if this is the spirit of a dead saiyajin?!" said Nazomi.
"What?" said Pan, looking confused.
"Y'know, it could be," continued Nazomi. "I mean... since there's a ki and there's no one to be seen anywhere near it... it doesn't seem to have any 'owner'..."
Pan and Nazomi looked at eachother for a moment, then said "Nah," in unison, shaking their heads.
"But I know what it could be," said Pan suddenly. "Once I was talking to Vegeta... and I asked him if he were in hiding and really weak, what he would do, because he's always taking pride in how strong he is... and he told me he'd 'Never be in such a predicament'... but he said that if he ever were in that situation, he'd keep fighting the enemy, AND he would win." She shook her slowly. "But then he muttered something about how someone exremely weak would divert their ki to get away. He called it pathetic..."
"So... so you think that that's what's going on?" asked Nazomi, looking intrigued.
"Uh-huh..."
"C'mon! Let's go tell everyone else!"
"But Nazo-"
But Pan's pleas went un-noticed by the excited Nazomi, who had grabbed her hand and was practically dragging her towards the group.
"Pan thinks that she knows where the 'thing' is!" cried Nazomi, running over to everyone else and hauling Pan along with her.
"Really? Where?" asked Gohan.
"Uh..." Pan began to feel nervous, now everyone was staring at her. "Thanks a lot, Nazomi," she hissed at her before she began talking. "Ano... V-Vegeta told me once that w-weaker saiyajins c-could divert their ki in order to escape from an enemy," she explained.
"But I wouldn't exactly call whatever that thing was *weak*," said Uubu.
"...He didn't say that they could divert it to a special direction, all he said was that it would the other person off..."
"So... you mean that whatever that thing was could be *anywhere*?" said Goten.
"I guess so..."
"Hey! Maybe they could throw their ki in the opposite direction," said Bra, who'd been sitting in the doorway of the car, listening. "I mean, the opposite direction is the farthest you can possibly get them from you, right...?"
"Oh my GOD Bra, you're smarter than you look," said Nazomi teasingly.
Bra glowered at her, though there was a smile of amusement tugging at the corners of her lips.
"Oh! So THAT'S why Vegeta went east when the force seemed to be going farther west," said Goku. "Same to you, Koo-koo clock," said Nazomi.
"Then... then Vegeta's with what-whatever that *thing* is! Oh Kami, what if he's hurt?" cried Bulma, apparently going into histerics. "Oh, Kami, what if.. what if he's...de..." she couldn't even say the word.
"Bulma, you don't even know if he's in any danger at all," said Juuhachigou, slightly annoyed by Bulma's sudden panic. "If whatever this is is saiyajin, than you don't have to worry, they wouldn't hurt their 'prince'..." she said, making the flying quote marks with her fingers.
Bulma was beginning to calm down, but then Juuhachigou added, "But it's the possibility that they're *not* saiyajin that you have to worry about... whatever this thing is knew that they could make contact with him by doing that diversion thing, so they obviously had some type of 'buisness' to take care of with him."
"Yeah, Juu-Juu Bee!" said Nazomi. "Great job on the... detective... work..."
But she stopped when she saw the look on Bulma's face; she was staring at Juuhachigou, wide-eyed.
"What? I was only saying that it was a possibility..." said Juuhachigou.
"Uh... why don't we try going back east and see if we can find out where Vegeta and the other.. thing are?" said Pan, trying to ease the unbearable tension.
"...Yeah! Great idea, alright." People began babbling okays and prepared to find Vegeta, wherever he may have been.
"You guys'll probably have to stay here," said Goku.
"Oh no, I'm going with you guys," said Bulma fiercely. "I want to find Vegeta as much as you do."
"But it could be dangerous," said Gohan. "It wouldn't help if you got hurt, too-"
"I DON'T CARE!" she cried.
"Fine... Bulma, I'll take you," said Yamucha.
"THANK YOU! *Finally* someone agrees with me," said Bulma, walking over to Yamucha to stand beside him.
"He doesn't agree with you, he's just afraid of you," everyone heard a voice say.
They turned to see Nazomi, leaning on the car with her arms crossed, looking up at the stars.
She felt them watching her and turned to them, feeling nervous.
"What?" she asked, before realization dawned on her. "Oh, did I say that out loud?" she asked, her hands over her mouth.
Some of them laughed, but soon the matter at hand forced them to start thinking about finding Vegeta.
"Okay... we can split up going east, and probe around for Vegeta's ki or the ki of that... person," began Goku. "But remember to keep your own ki really low. We don't want to give the person a warning..."
The others nodded, and Goku turned to the others.
"Bra and Nazomi, if anything shows up here, drop us a line, okay?" he said, looking at both of them.
They both nodded.
"You guys ready?" asked Goku, looking around anxiously.
The rest of them nodded. Yamcha picked up Bulma, and they were off.
"So... what do we do now?" asked Bra after a moment, already bored.
"Oooh! Oooh! We can tell scary stories," said Nazomi. "Hey, a bunch of girls in the middle of no where in the middle of the night? Eh? Eh?" she said, elbowing Bra playfully with each 'eh'.
Bra laughed and said, "Alright. Marron, you coming with us?" she asked as she and Nazomi got out of the car.
"Sure."
"Wait a minute... I'm just gonna leave the headlights on," said Nazomi before she got out of the car. "Just so we don't get lost when we come out of the woods..."
"But why don't you just find your Chi-Chi or Videl or your mother's ki?" said Marron. "That would be easier..."
"But if I raise my ki the guys'll think that I'm trying to signal them... Mommy? We'll be back in a little while," shouted Nazomi to her mother after she'd set the headlights to high-beams. She'd even left some music on, just slightly loud - with her and Bra's sensitive hearing, that would be another way of finding the car. "But..." she suddenly glanced over at where her mother, Chi-Chi, and Videl were sitting.
"What's wrong?" asked Marron.
"Well... we were supposed to stay here incase anyone or anything showed up," she said, looking worried. "But... what if something showed up and my mom was still here? I mean... I'd feel so guilty if she got hurt..."
"Yeah, I know what you mean," said Bra. "...So... what, are we bailing?"
"...No, I have an idea," said Nazomi. She suddenly leaped into the air and landed a few hundred feet from where she'd been standing.
She took a few deep breaths, her arms at her sides, and began to power up immensely.
Mercy, Chi-Ch, and Videl, thinking something was wrong, stood up on a flat boulder that was nearby and watched Nazomi intently.
Suddenly, there was a bright flash of light, and then they were plunged into darkness again.
No one could see what was goin on, that is until Nazomi jogged back over to the car. They noticed that she looked a bit different...
That was the thing with Nazomi's split-forms - since she was half-human, half of her came out looking more human and the other part of her came out looking more Nemekian.
The Nazomi that was jogging over to them was the more Nemekian one - her skin was a slightly darker shade of green, her hair was a lot shorter and had turned and had gotten darker, her eyes were also now black instead of orange, her fangs were sharper, her white, long, claw-like nails were longer, Her lips had turned black, despite the purple lipstick she had been wearing, and since she had been wearing a tight, gray tank-top, they could see that she'd become a bit more muscular.
A few seconds later, the more human Nazomi came over - this one had the same maroon-purple hair color, here eyes were still that insanely bright orange color, her lips had seemed to keep the purple lipstick shade, she didn't seem to have fangs, her "claws" had turned simply into long nails, and she didn't appear to be as muscular as the other Nazomi. And instead of green, her skin was a dark, tan color, giving her a latin look.
They were even dressed in an opposite manner - the Nemek had a tight, black tank-top on, and the human one had a white tank-top; when Nazomi had been 'whole', so to speak, she'd been wearing a gray tank-top. But both of them were wearing black flare jeans, along with the bright blue sneakers and the bright blue fleece sweaters tied around their waists.
They both arrived at the car, panting slightly; the split form had taken a bit of energy out of them... er, *her*.
"Oh fuck-" swore the Nemekian Nazomi. "The others are gonna think that we were trying to get a hold of them..." she immediately closed her eyes and seemed to go into a trance as the human one walked over to the group and leaned against the hood of the large car with her elbows.
"What eez she doeeng?" asked Mercy.
"She's telling everyone else that it was a false alarm," said the Human Nazomi as she tucked a few strands of purple hair behind her ear.
"Alright. They were kinda bitchy about it, but at least now they all know that it was bogus," said the Nemekian Nazomi when she finished 'speaking' to everyone.
Some more attributes of the N. Nazomi - for one, she looked more scary, more dangerous, and tough. Her voice was also a lot deeper, and she seemed to have all of Nazomi's worst qualities, such as slight impatience and a dirty mouth.
"Okay. You stay here and protect mom and the others, and I'll go with them," said the Nemek.
The human nodded and hopped up on the side of the hood, her feet resting on the rugged tire and her elbows resting on her knees.
This one was the submissive one.
"Where are you goeeng?" asked Mercy as the Nemekian Nazomi, Bra, and Marron began to walk away.
"Uh... just a little bit into the forest there," said Nazomi, pointing to the mass of trees that was a few kilometers from where they were; she'd decided to go over there because it looked eerie and extremely dark, as if the trees where just a structure of pitch blackness, imprinted against the navy-blue mountains about a mile behind them.
"Alright, sweet-'eart," shouted Mercy. "Please do not get 'urt..."
"I won't!" shouted Nazomi, waving to her mother.
"You girls better not go too far, okay?" yelled Videl.
"Be careful!" shouted Chi-Chi.
They all nodded, shouted that they'd be bcak soon, and continued walking towards the forest.
"Hey, don't get yourself messed up or I'll pay for it too!" cried the human Nazomi.
"Shut up," yelled the Nemek jokingly. "Same to you!"
The girls walked in silence for a while, headed toward the terrifying forest.
"Don't you think it's weird," asked Marron, her head tipped to the side, "that this thing was so strong, yet it was almost... hiding from us?"
"Yeah," agreed Bra and Nazomi.
"That's true," said Nazomi. "...But you know what I find weirder? Goku tends to be such an idiot sometimes, I mean no disrespect or anything, but when it comes to saving someone or fighting something evil, he pulls an Einstein of battle and strategy on us..."
Marron and Bra nodded in agreement.
They walked in silence for a while before they began to speak again.
"This is like one of those horror movies," said Marron, shivering slightly.
"How so?" asked Nazomi, still looking ahead.
"Well... it's like you said earlier. A bunch of teenage girls, in the middle of no where, in the middle of the night..."
"Actually it's only about nine-thirty," said Nazomi, looking at her watch, which was now glowing due to the darkness.
"Wow... it's so dark out here.. it seems more like midnight..." said Bra, looking around anxiously.
"And that's the beauty of it all, folks," said Nazomi, and they could tell that she was grinning even though they couldn't see her very clearly; the occasional moonlight caused her barred fangs (which were now longer and sharper) to glint.
"Oooh.... don't do that, Nazomi," begged Bra.
"Do what?"
"Anything that involves your teeth showing... your fangs are freaking me out. They kinda remind of that old movie... what was it...? 'American Werewolf in Paris'..." Bra shuddered suddenly.
"I will take that as the compliment that I *know* it was meant to be," said Nazomi haughtily.
Marron laughed, along with Bra. "So... what type of stories are we going to tell?" she asked. "Stupid scary, kinda scary, scary-scary or *really* scary?"
They all looked at eachother and said in unison, "*Really*-scary!"
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* ^_^ ... 0_0 ... _ ... O_o ... !_! ... ~_~ ... ';'... =0) ... =0( ... :) ... :( ... =P ... ;) ... ^_^ ... 0_0 ... _ ... ^_^ ... 0_0 ... _ ... O_o ... !_! ... ~_~ ... ';'... =0) ... =0( ... :) ... :( ... =P ... ;)..._...=P
Sorry this took so long! So how do u like this chapter so far? I know I kept everyone waiting too long... I apologize. I also wanna warn people that this fic is going to begin following the Sonic Adventure storyline after a little while. I wanted to put that in the summary, but there wasn't enough room... BUT WAIT, WAIT, WAIT, WAIT!! I know that some of you are saying "Aw, man, this sux!" or something and you're getting ready to leave - but lemme just say this - that's only one part of the story. There is A LOOOOOT more going on besides that, so even if you know how some of the things are going to turn out, it'll still be good to read... so if you have the game, I hope u'll find this kinda fun to read. Why do u think that i called it "The Legends of Chaos"? You know what Chaos is, right, I mean in the sense of the game? If you don't know what Chaos means here, I won't ruin it for u. I just thought it would be kewl to do a partial parody, so bear with me... please...
Oh - and some people are concerned about Clarice interfering in Bulma and Vegeta's relationship - I just want to ensure you that she won't.
I mean not really, anyway.
And also, Komadori called to my attention that Vegeta knew about the planet being destroyed since he was six years old - I just wanna say that this is one of the A/U factors.... in this story, he was in his early twenties when he left Vegita-sei. You'll see why later.
And one more thing - I know that some people may have found the T/M thing in this chapter weird, but the story starts out T/M and goes to T/P a loooong time from now... I really like T/P, but the T/M part is just so that everyone is happy.
I'll try to get the next chappy out soon. I already have part of it done... and I hope u'll keep reading! What's going to happen in chappy 2? Will they find Vegeta? Will Vegeta agree to go back with Clarice? What will Bulma and the others have to say about it? What's going to happen if Vegeta decides that he wants to go back? Will the girls get around to telling their stories? Will they get attacked by American guys that decided to take a trip to Paris and accidently got bitten and turned into werewolves the size of bears? Find out on the next episode of -
Dragon Ball Z: The Legends of Chaos
PWWWWEEEEEEEEAAAAAAASE Review? *Makes puppy dog face*
Disclaimer: I don't own Dragon Ball Z/GT, but I do own all of the characters I made up, the castle, the planet, all of the inventions that will be coming up, and the big event that will take place a lot later in the story...
Chapter One: Her Mission
As she walked down the long, paved path to her vessel, she thought about her mission and what she was to do if she in fact *did* find him. Her purpose was to find him, alive or dead.... If he was alive, bring him home. If he was dead.... At least find out where and how he had died. If he had been killed, find the
person(s) that had killed him and show them what would happen to them if they took the life of the Prince of the Saiyans....
But then an odd thought occurred to her: What *had* happened to him? The last time she had seen him, he had been setting out on a journey to Anthroxia along with Nappa and Raditz. They were going to destroy the inhabitants there, she had been told. She was on another assignment when she had caught wind of a change in their plans - Earth. As far as she could gather, something had happened to Raditz on a solo mission and Vegeta had decided to go out and investigate matters. But that's as far as she could look into it, as her work sent her all the way to a far away galaxy called M2, where she was needed immediately. That was the last time they had seen or heard from each other. After that, she had lost all contact with Vejitasei, and she received word that the planet had been destroyed.
That was when she had had made the discovery of the existence of the legendary Black-Star Dragon balls, magical spheres capable of invoking a god that could summon the power to grant almost any wish. It was not long afterward that she had embarked on a diligent quest to recover them and wish the planet back, which she succeeded in doing with ease, much to her satisfaction.
Had he died on Earth...? But... how could that have possibly happened? The habitants of Earth couldn't have possibly - they weren't strong enough, nor did they have the cavalry to destroy three saiyajins. And beyond that line of reasoning, the earth had a moon! Oh, she could just picture the carnage when the moon showed her full face... They should have much more than virtually indestructible. She estimated that they should have been able to destroy the species there within the space of two months.
Then she remembered.... Another saiyajin had been sent there, as a child.... She had known his ather. His name was Bardock; he was a loyal soldier in the Saiyajin defense force... She had been told that he had been trying to stop Frieza from destroying the planet, but unfortunately had died in the struggle...
But she'd found this ubelieiveable - Frieza, destroying Vejitasei? No, it couldn't be tue... She'd known Frieza as a child and as a teen, and she'd even slightly befriended him. No, that wasn't right, he couldn't have done it.
So there were four saiyajins. And the child alone, whom should have been strong enough of its own accord, should have finished the job alone within three months. It should have been a massacre. She grimaced at the thought. She wasn't as much of a ruthless killer as saiyajins went - she could even be considered *nice*, at least by saiyajin standards. She would kill if she was ordered to (unless of course, she didn't believe that the person deserved to be killed), or if she had to, or even if she wanted to - which wasn't very often - but she wouldn't as much go off and destroy an entire planet. That was just.... Monstrous.
Of course, this "soft" way of going about things had gotten her much ridicule from her peers in her time in the lower ranks - heck, it most likely STILL got some pretty bad views... the only reason she never heard it said outright anymore was because she was now so high ranking that if anyone dared to question her, they'd get discharged or killed for insubordination. And who would want to be disgraced because of a woman? The thought was simply shameful. So, of course, people preferred to keep things to themselves... or at least, out of earshot. Not that she really cared what they thought anyhow.
She was pulled from her reverie when she saw the huge ship before her. It was very good looking - it was really big, and had a smooth, contoured shape. The top front side, which was slightly slanted, had a big, slightly arched window that looked as if it served as a windshield type device. On the top, she knew through experience would proudly display (since the side was a bit too thin to show it) the Vejitasei coat of arms. She raised an eyebrow continued walking toward the vessel. She saw a few royal officers standing below the ship, which was sitting on the ground. She walked over to one of them, who she knew as Senior Officer Dryphus.
"Is there a problem, Officer Dryphus?" she asked, looking around the area.
"No, Commander. We're just making a few last-minute verifications," said Dryphus as she observed the rest of the officers. "So... do you think that you'll complete this mission?" she asked, an eyebrow raised.
"Oh, please don't ask," sighed Clarice. "I've already been through this enough with Vegeta, and I'll just tell you the same thing that I told him - I'll do my best."
"What else did he try to *emphasize* upon you?" asked Dryphus, humor clearly in her voice.
"Don't ask," repeated Clarice. "...But... he did offer to 'reward' me if I completed the mission successfully..."
Dryphus almost laughed at the exasperated look on Clarice's face. "It seems that you're on a first-name basis with him..."
Clarice looked at Dryphus with a slightly annoyed expression. "The only reason I called him by his first name was because I don't think that he deserves the honor of being called 'Your Highness'..." she grimaced slightly, "More along the lines of 'Your Royal Ass'..."
Dryphus laughed out loud at that, but then said, still laughing slighly, "You really musn't speak of our King in such a manner... even if you don't enjoy being under his rule, like it or not, we're sworn to follow him... you musn't question his directives."
"Oh *shut up*," said Clarice, rolling her eyes playfully. "*Must* you be so submissive..."
Dryphus elbowed Clarice in the stomach good-humoredly and then turned to speak to another officer that had jogged over to her.
"Alright. I believe you can leave now," said Dryphus when she finished speaking to the other officer. "Everything seems to be in order."
She nodded and smiled and began to walk toward the ship, which was now floating above the ground. As soon as she arrived before the entrance (a circular door that spun open), a walkway protruded from it as if on command. She moved up the walkway and the automatic door slid open as she appeared before them. She strode into the main room of the vessel and took in the ambience. After looking around a bit, she strode towards the opposite side of the ship (which took a while, considering the size of the ship) and stood before the control panel. She pressed a blue button. Suddenly a hologram sign popped up, and a pleasant, mechanical voice reading the sign said, "Autopilot. Please set coordinates."
"Set coordinates to..." she cocked her head to the side and thought for a moment.
'Well, that's the last place I knew about... maybe he's still there...'
"Earth."
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
It was a bright and sunny day on earth. As usual, the whole gang was at Capsule Corporation, hanging out.
Chi-Chi had just cooked a huge meal and now everyone was just sitting around, relaxing. Pan, Marron, Bra, and Nazomi *my own made up character... Piccolo's daughter* were in Bra's room, talking and listening to one of Nazomi's CDs from her extensive music collection.
Chi-Chi, Videl, Juuhachigou, Bulma, and Mercy *Piccolo's beautiful French wife^_^* were in the kitchen, talking. Most of the guys (Goku, Gohan, Goten, Trunks, Kuririn, Uubu, and Yamucha) were in the living room watching a baseball game. Piccolo was outside meditating (which Mercy always thought he looked *so* cute doing), and Vegeta, as usual, was in the Gravity Room training.
And as for Master Roshii and Oolong - they were in one of the guest rooms, playing a video game - now this may seem unusual for them to be doing, being the perverts that they were, but that was the point - they were playing a game called 'Primal Image', which Nazomi had given Master Roshii (if he promised to stop being such a pervert around girls). And this was no regular game - the game featured a variety of different women (mostly teenage girls) that they could choose from, put them in whatever type of clothes that they wanted (if not to leave them completely naked), and the catch was that they were able to pose them however they wanted.
And now, Master Roshii, with a drooling Oolong at his side, was in the midst of posing a girl with a yellow/orange string bikini lying on her back with her legs wide open... *I'm not kidding, this is an actual game... really disgusting, if u ask me....*
A lot of noise cold be heard coming from the living room; the guys in there considered the game going on now important, it being the last game of the season, and a lot of people were showing great support for their own team, which included shouting at the top of their lungs as if the players could hear them.
"YES!! Oh Kami, somebody get Nazomi!!" cried Goten, looking as if someone just gave him a fifty-course dinner.
"Why?" asked Trunks, who was backing away from Goten, trying not to get hurt as Goten started jumping up and down and doing what looked like dancing.
"We made a bet," said Goten as he began to calm down, though not completely - he still had an ear-to-ear grin on his face and was shaking like mad. Still panting, his fists clenched, he continued -
"She bet me that by fifth - inning, the Sox would be up by at least two points!!" *I don't even know anything about baseball... I'm just making this up* "I told her that she was crazy and that the Yankees would be in the lead, so we made a bet!! Now she owes me nine hundred dollars!!" he said ecstatically.
"You guys bet *that* much money?" said Gohan incredulously.
"We're both *very* confident in our teams, " Goten spoke seriously before going back into histerics.
"Ah," said Gohan as he nodded, looking slightly amused.
"I'll go get Nazomi," said Trunks. "I was gonna get a soda in a minute anyway.."
He got up and walked through the kitchen where the women were talking to get the soda, and then he took the stairs by two to Bra's room. When he got there, he heard loud music coming from inside and the door was locked. He knocked, but the music was too loud, then knocked a little bit harder, causing the door to shake.
Suddenly the music got quieter. He heard the lock coming undone and saw Bra standing behind the door as it opened.
"Hey," she said.
"Where's Nazomi?" he asked, walking into the room.
"Over here, Boxers!!" he heard Nazomi's voice shout.
He looked over at the other side of the large room, where he saw Pan and Nazomi lying on the floor. Pan was apparently concentrating hard, though both her and Nazomi looked as if they would burst out laughing at any moment.
"What are you guys doing?" asked Trunks, seeing the board as he walked over to where they were lying on the floor.
"They're playing 'Scribble'," said a bemused Marron, who had gotten up from Bra's bed to walk over and wrap he arms around Trunks.
He looked at the board more closely, putting his arm on her shoulder. "I thought it was called 'Scrabble'," he said, looking confused.
"Well if you wanna play it *their* way it is," said Nazomi as she looked up at him with her bright orange eyes, a child-like smile on her face as she swung her legs back and forth. "But this way is more fun."
"Oh, really? Well how do you play 'Scribble'?"
"The same way as 'Scrabble'. Except in 'Scribble', we use nonsense words. Like a minute ago, I spelled out 'wazza'..." she had a broad grin on her face as she looked back own at the board, showing off her sharp white fangs.
"Aha!!!" shouted Pan suddenly (causing everyone to jump and Trunks to start choking on his soda), laughing like a maniac as she chose six out of her seven letters and put them down on the board.
"BOOOH-YA!!! Triple word score!!" she cried as if this meant that she had won a million dollars. "I win!! (Which is pretty good, I was running out of letters...)"
Nazomi looked down at the word Pan had spelled out. "Zazzow? Nice one!!" she said. "I never would have thought of that word..."
"...Oh yeah, Nazomi - Goten wanted to talk to you downstairs," said Trunks after he recovered.
"Okay." Nazomi got up and stretched, then walked back downstairs with Trunks.
Goten was still breathing heavily when Trunks and Nazomi walked into the room. The game had gone to a commercial break, and most of the guys were talking about the score and their predictions for the rest of the game.
"Ya know... that Radio Shack guy kinda looks like Duke Nukem with those shades on," said Nazomi thoughtfully as she stared at the man on the commercial.
"You know... I have *never* noticed that before," said Goten goofily as he looked at the TV. "You're right..."
"So what did you want, Ten?" Nazomi asked Goten as she sat half on the arm of the plush chair and leaning down on his shoulder so that she was half in his lap.
He gave her an evil grin, making her orange eyes go wide. "What?"
"You'll see," he said, a hint of maliciousness in his voice.
Nazomi stared at him.
"Just watch," he said, pointing to the television screen.
As if on command, the game came back and one of the men doing the commentary immediately said, "Let's check up on those scores, shall we? In the first inning..." he announced the scores for each inning and finally got to the fifth, indicating that the Yankees were about 3 points in the lead.
Nazomi stared at the television, her mouth open and her eyes wide, looking as if she wanted to blow it up right then and there. At first she was quiet, then -
"DAMN IT!!" she cried, though she didn't feel quite as angry as she let on; She didn't really need the money, her parents spoiled her rotten - She could have anything she wanted. And her mother was plenty rich, nine hundred dollars didn't really matter to her.
But she *hated* losing.
Goten just sat there, twiddling his thumbs and smirking. Nazomi sat back down, her face in a cross
state.
"Fine, Ten, you win..." she growled, getting up again and taking her silvery, bubble-patterned wallet out of her pocket. Goten heard her mutter, "Pedro, how could you do this to me?" She took nine one-hundred-dollar bills out of it and shoved them into his hand.
"I *will* win next time... you'd better get ready to be my personal butler!"
"I don't think so," said Goten, looking through the money.
"Oh yeah?" said Nazomi.
"Yeah!" said Goten, taking his eyes off of the money for the first time in a few minutes to look at Nazomi.
"Oh yeah?"
"Yeah!"
"You wanna bet?" said Nazomi challengingly.
"I zink zat's enough betting for now," said Mercy, who was leaning on the door frame, her arms crossed. She looked at Nazomi and clicked her tongue disapprovingly as she shook her head.
"Okay," said Goten, who was staring at Mercy.
Nazomi gave him a look that said plainly, "You are *hopeless*!" and walked over to her mother to give her a hug.
"I'm sorry, mommy, I'll never do it again," said Nazomi in a baby-ish voice as she hugged her mother.
"Oh, eet's alright, darling," said Mercy, rubbing Nazomi's back gently. She smiled at Nazomi and gave her a kiss on her forehead.
When Mercy left to go back to the kitchen, Nazomi gave herself a satisfied smirk - she could still get her parents to do whatever she wanted them to. Not that she didn't like or respect her parents - she loved them, of course - but she just liked knowing that she could control them and get away with anything.
They suddenly heard shouts behind them as the game finished - the Yankees had won. Nazomi stomped hard on the ground, causing the room to shake slightly.
"No!" she cried. "Pedro, Manny, Nomar.. how could you guys do this to me...?"
"What's going on down here?" they turned to see Chi-Chi standing in the doorway, a frown upon her face.
"The Sox just lost the game," Goten answered for her since Nazomi was still staring at the television set in horror.
"Well that's still no reason to be making so much noise," she said. "Try to keep it quiet."
"You guys are just calling *all* of the attention to this room, huh?" said Pan as she walked into the room, holding a party-size bag of chips. "Aw man, the Sox lost?" she said, a slight grimace of disappointment on her face. She noticed Nazomi staring at the bag with a scowl on her face as if the chips were her worst enemy.
"You want some?" said Pan teasingly - she knew Nazomi wouldn't eat any of it.
"Ugh... no thank you. Too fattening..."
"So? You could work off the fat in about two seconds."
"Uh-uh. I don't know how you can stand that stuff... It destroys your body. And if I ever want that much grease, I will just crack open a jug o' Crisco and take a nice long swig, thank-you-very-much..." she stated, still eyeing the bag hatefully - Like her father, Nazomi didn't eat very often.
Pan shook her head and laughed softly. She looked at the TV and they could see her eyebrows raising behind the bag chips. "So you lost the bet, huh?" she said before putting another handful of chips into her mouth.
"Yeah... But the Sox should've won," said Nazomi sadly.
"No way! I knew that the Yankees would win," said Goten.
"*Liar*!" cried Nazomi, pointing an accusing finger at him.
Soon enough, there was huge discussion about who should've won and why. They began listing players, starters, hitters, past games, winning streaks each team had ever had, etc.
"Yeah, but - " said Goku, who was in the midst of defending the Sox, suddenly stopped talking, and the others knew exactly why. They suddenly felt a massive power. Everyone suddenly felt as if a huge weight had been put on every part of their bodies, as if the air had gained about a ton. Even Piccolo had stopped meditating. Vegeta, who had been sitting in a tree resting, suddenly stood up, eyes wide. He recognized that ki signature immediately. He closed his eyes, brows furrowed, trying to concentrate on where the enormous force was coming from.
Chi-Chi, Bulma, Juuhachigou, Videl, Bra, Marron, and Mercy went to the living room, worried
expressions on their faces - except for Juuhachigou, who looked intrigued.
"So you felt it too?" asked Goku.
"Yeah," answered Bulma. This only showed the strength of whatever the ki energy was coming from - even people that weren't trained to recognize ki signatures could feel the tension in the atmosphere.
"Hey... what if it's a new enemy?" asked Nazomi, a mixture of alarm and enthusiasm in her voice. She'd always heard stories about the old enemies such as Frieza, Cell, the Androids, etc. - and always wanted to be in some type of battle.
"I 'ope not," said Mercy.
"Whoever or whatever that is.... is really strong..." said Goten, overwhelmed by the feeling. None of them had ever felt anything like it before.
Soon, everyone was outside, trying to figure out where it was coming from - but it was so big it seemed to be coming from *everywhere*.
Suddenly Vegeta jumped out of the tree that he was sitting in.
"I don't know about you lethargic bakas," said Vegeta harshly, "but I'm going to check this out. I've been looking for a good fight..." with that, he powered up to super saiyajin level 1 and was about to fly away when Bulma grabbed his arm.
"Be careful," said, a worried expression on her face.
"Humph... Whatever, woman," he grunted, and blasted off in the direction of the power source, determined to ignore his Earthbound mate's emotional probing.
The rest of them stood there, still trying to contemplate what they where going to do.
"I'm going too," Piccolo growled suddenly. "I want to know what this is about." Without another word, he blasted off after Vegeta.
"Maybe we should all go," said Trunks. "Whatever this is... we all know that it's too strong for only a few of us to take on by ourselves. I doubt that even all of us would be able to stand up against it together..."
"Trunks is right. And besides, we can't leave Vegeta and Piccolo out there by themselves," said Goten, though he looked just as anxious as everyone else did.
"I'm going," piped up Pan.
"Me too," Juuhachigou murmured, getting ready to take off.
"Ditto," Kuririn and Yamucha boomed in unison.
"Are you coming?" Yamucha asked Nazomi before he blasted off. "You could really help us out if we got into trouble...."
"Maybe later," she said, looking slightly nervous.
He looked confused at first, then nodded and blasted off into the air after the others.
"Mom, did you see where I put my car keys?" asked Nazomi as she searched her pockets.
"Can't you fly?" asked Mercy. Not that she wanted Nazomi to go, but she was well aware of her airborne capabilities.
"Yeah, but do you see my hair?" she asked, pointing to her long, silky maroonish-purple hair, which was mostly free, except for bangs and a few half-braided ponytails at the top of her head. "If I fly, this like sooo totally gonna frizz," she said as she walked inside to search her purse.
After a few minutes, she came back, a victorious look on her face, declaring that she'd found her keys.
"You guys wanna come?" she asked as she walked over to the car (which had a license plate that said 'QUEEN NA-NA' on it).
"I've got dibs on the front seat," said Bra as she ran over to the passenger side and hopped in.
"Eef you're going, I'm comeeng weeth you," said Mercy, throwing on her brown, fur-trimmed leather jacket.
"I'm coming too," said Marron as she jumped in beside Bra (there were three seats up-front).
"You might as well all come," said Nazomi as she fixed her rear-view mirror. "Unless you wanna stay here with Master Roshii or something..." she stopped playing with the mirror and concentrated on where everyone's ki was.
By the time she found them, the rest of the women were in the two back rows of the car. She smirked and started the large, red Hummer jeep and the truck was suddenly filled with loud music. Nazomi instantly turned it down and muttered, "Sorry," purple flecks of color crossing her green face as she blushed.
She floored the pedal and they were off.
********************************************************************************************
Everyone (that could fly) was flying south, towards the power source. And to their utter surprise, it completely disappeared. Everyone stopped abruptly.
"Well, whatever it was either is gone now or is masking their power really well," said Juuhachigou, taken back.
Everyone decided mentally that the person was masking their power.
"If we go to where we last felt the ki signature, we might find a clue," said Goku. So they kept going.
And it happened that Goku was right - they did find a clue when they got there. Their 'clue' turned out to be a very big, jade gray ship. The ship was floating a few hundred meters above the ground.
"Cool," said Goten out loud, though he hadn't meant to.
Pan flew around the ship to investigate it more closely. When she was above the ship, she froze.
"What is it?" shouted Uubu.
"There's some type of weird emblem on the top of this thing," said Pan, looking down at the ship. The others flew up to see what she was talking about it. And sure enough, there was a lionized, gold "V" with two crossed, emblazoned swords in the background.
"What could that mean?" asked Trunks, his head tipped to the side in confusion.
"I know exactly what it is," said a gruff voice from behind them. Everyone turned to see Vegeta floating in midair, arms crossed, head bowed down. To their surprise, his face wasn't in its usual livid statue appearance, but in a blank state. No readable expression at all.
"Well... what is it?" asked Pan. He raised his head, his face completely solemn.
"It's the Vejitasei Coat of Arms," he said quietly.
Everyone stared at him in utter shock.
After what seemed like ten minutes, Goku said, "Are you sure?"
"Of course I'm sure, dimwit," spat Vegeta, annoyed.
"But that's impossible... I thought that Freiza had destroyed Vejitasei," said Kuririn.
"It did," mumbled Vegeta quietly.
"Well then... h-how could the Coat of Arms be on this ship?" said Pan.
Vegeta didn't answer right away. He just floated there, arms crossed, his head bowed down. He could only think of one explanation for this...
"I don't know," he said, his voice barely above a whisper.
"Maybe this is a trick," said Goten. "Maybe this ship isn't really from Vejitsei..."
"No, it's real. The ship... it looks saiyan," said Vegeta. Everyone thought that something was weird about Vegeta. He wasn't yelling, he didn't look mad... he was just floating there like he was numb.
Was he *scared*?
All of a sudden, everyone felt the huge burst of power again. They immediately had to descend to the ground. Vegeta powered up to super saiyajin level two and blasted off again, this time going east.
"....I'm guessing that whatever it is... is over there," said Kuririn, his eyebrow raised.
"We should follow him," said Piccolo.
Now everyone was flying east, following Vegeta's faint ki trail. Vegeta began to slow down, then stopped. He landed about a hundred meters from the coast of a beach. The others landed there as well. They still felt the huge power nearby, but they couldn't quite pinpoint where it was coming from. Then they felt it a bit farther west. But to their surprise, Vegeta took off flying farther east. They thought that of all people, he would want to know what was going on...
*****************************************
Vegeta continued flying east, away from where the power *seemed* to be coming from. He knew that maneuver all too well, and that the source of the power was really coming from the opposite direction. He finally saw her standing on a cliff, looking out at the ocean below.
He couldn't believe how much she'd changed since he'd last seen her. For one thing, her hair had doubled in length, and her body was much more curvacious, even though she had been pretty well developed when he'd left. She also looked older, but still very young despite her age.
She was wearing a skin-tight leather suit which had a zipper in front, and the zipper was pulled down slightly, exposing some cleavage. She had a pink Scouter over her left eye, though he doubted that she needed it, and her tail, silky brown fur and all, was wrapped around her thin waist.
He landed soundlessly behind her, and then crossed his arms. They both knew that she knew he was there.
She smiled, still looking out at the ocean that was spread before them, and then turned around slowly.
"...Why, hello," she said, still smiling warmly. She had a very deep, husky voice - her voice was low, commanding, and resilient, with abundant power - but at the same time pleasant and kind, and could be very sensual and soothing. *And also - remember that British accent that I told you about last time* "I'd almost thought you'd forgotten about that tactic."
The tactic she was referring to was an evasion technique, taught to a special few saiyajins - they could divert their ki to another direction so that whatever enemy they were against would think that they were in one place when they were really in another, confusing the adversary and giving the saiyajin the chance, if severely needed, to escape.
He merely smiled. "You almost fooled me," he said quietly.
She grinned and then turned to sit on the edge of the cliff, her legs hanging off of the edge.
"Who were they?" she asked after a moment, her voice sounding serious.
"Who?" he asked, as if he didn't know who she were speaking of.
"The people that were trying to follow me."
"...I don't know... And now I have a question for you," he said, also sounding serious.
She remained silent, knowing what the question was going to be.
"What are you doing here?"
"...I should be asking you the same thing," she said. "What happened?"
"What are you talking about?"
"Where's Nappa?"
"Dead," he answered, making her gray eyes go wide. "He was weak. I killed him."
She was still quite surprised, but nodded nonetheless and looked down. "And Raditz?"
"...He is also dead," he said. "But he died under different circumstances."
She looked back down at the water. "...You?"
"What?"
"Why are you still here? Why haven't you completed the mission yet?"
Now there was something he was going to have trouble answering.
"...I got stuck here," he lied. "My ship was destroyed and I was stranded."
Her eyebrow was raised, she knew he was lying, but she didn't enquire him any farther on the subject.
"Wasn't there another saiyan here? Bardock's son?"
"...yes..."
"Well do you know where he is? Is he alive?"
"He's alive," said Vegeta dully. "But when we got here, he'd lost his programming, and had lost his tail... so he'd been living among these humans as if he were one of them."
"And the same situation befalls you, I presume?" she asked quietly.
"Ahre?" *Huh?*
She pointed to him. "You're tail seems to be missing, you are dressed like a human, and the fact that you've been here for about four decades is a supporting factor."
He'd forgotten about the ensemble he was wearing - the black sleeveless jacket, the black tank-top, black jeans, boots and the fingerless gloves. *Well.. just picture the basic GT outfit, really*
His hair was also a lot shorter than it was when he'd first come to earth. *GT hair, too*
He looked back at her to find that she'd been staring at him.
"Well you've changed, too," he said as if it were an excuse.
She laughed softly and shook her head. "At least *my* changes were good..."
"Yes, they were..." said Vegeta as he looked over her body. When he realized what he'd said and done, he slapped himself mentally.
"But do you know what... what happened to Vejitasei? I've heard rumors, but... I just don't believe them..."
"What rumors?"
"...Well... I... I heard that Frieza did it... destroyed Vejitasei..." she shook her head slowly. "But of course, I just don't think that it could be true... I mean, why would he? He wouldn't..."
"Well... I knew that the planet had been destroyed a few months after I got here," he began. He sighed suddenly, "He would and he did."
Now she just looked shocked. She didn't even ask. She didn't want to know. She turned away, her look of shock melting into a look of sick disgust, disgust in finding out that someone you trusted did something like that....
"So where *is* Bardock's child, anyway?" she said, changing the subject.
"...around..."
"Vegeta, don't do that."
He shrugged in response.
She scowled, though she wasn't very angry. She turned around and looked at him again. He looked so much older, yet still so young... he had continued his training, obviously. For one thing, his ki was quite a bit higher, though he didn't have his tail, and that should have reduced his energy level ten times... and his muscles were much more developed and defined...
And his hair, she liked it. It looked better short.
She smiled and blushed slightly when she realized that she'd been staring at him. It had been a long time since she'd seen him, the only image of him being a portrait in the Hall of Kings in the castle... and of course, his father, a perfect picture of him, except King Vegeta had a goatee, and his face wasn't as defined and strong...
She looked down at the ocean below them, and watched the sun as it began to set, a beatiful sunset accompanied by flourishes of color, going from yellow to orange to pink, to red, to purple, to a deep, dark blue...
'It doesn't even compare to the sunsets on Vegita-sei,' she thought, grinning.
"What are you smiling at?" asked Vegeta, who had realized that she was suddenly grinning at nothing,
"...Hmm...? Oh, the sunset... I like them more back home... I find watching *both* suns setting at once is more beautiful..." she sighed and rested her chin in her hand, still staring at the sunset.
He looked at her, and found himself staring in awe at her beauty. She'd always been beautiful, her entire life... and now, sitting with that content look on her face, the light from the sunset illuminating and shadowing her features, accenting her high cheekbones...
He shook his head slightly, clearing his mind of such thoughts. No, he was married to Bulma now, and he was bonded with her... he loved her very, very, much, though he'd never admitted it in his life, and wasn't exactly planning on doing so anytime soon. What he'd had with Clarice was in the past.
Now all he'd have to do was tell her.
This was going to be hard, considering the fact that the woman could kill him with little or no effort in *much* less than a nano-second without a second thought to it.
The look of wonder suddenly left her face. She frowned, looking slightly sad.
Just *ever* so slightly.
"...You..." she exhaled deeply, and contined, "You have another mate, don't you..." she said, turning to look at him with her chin still in her palm.
He looked taken back. How did she know?
"Human, I presume?" she said, looking back at the still setting sun. "I don't remember there ever being any other dominant speicies here that were... 'related' to saiyans..."
He knew what she meant by 'related' - it meant that humans had the same qualities as saiyans, except of course the attribute of power; these qualities being the same body anatomy, ability to think, work, reproduce, and of course, to love.
"...*And* I can say quite confidently that you have at least one child."
How did she know all this? He felt kind of sorry, owing to the fact that she looked quite expressionless. Clarice's face always expressed some type of emotion, whether it be anger, exasperation, amusement, boredom, happiness... and the only time her face didn't display some type of emotion was when she was depressed or upset and didn't want to show it.
"...Y-yes," he said. "How did you know?"
"I can tell... and remember when I asked you who those people were?"
"Hai." *Yes.*
"Well... I was hoping you'd tell me the truth about that," she said quietly. "I could feel an excess of your ki in one of them. That automatically told me-"
"That he was my son," finished Vegeta, feeling quite stupid. He knew that the person she'd felt had to be Trunks.
She nodded slowly, her eyes cast downward.
"Gomen nasai... daijoubu?" he asked. *I'm sorry... Are you alright?*
"Shinpai shinai," she said, shrugging her shoulders. *It's Alright.* Then she looked at him and said softly, "Sugei..." before turning away. *Wow...*
"Nani?" he asked. *What?*
"...human..." she said, laughing softly and looking up at the sky.
"So? Do you have a problem with it?" he asked fiercely.
"Iie... Wakatta... tonde monai," she said quietly, though she still looked a little amused. *No... I understand... Not a problem* "But I know someone that *will* have a problem with it," she said, suddenly looking serious.
"Nani? Who?" *What? Who?*
"Your father." She looked at him, not knowing what to expect.
"*What*?" he said, his voice a dangerous whisper, his face split between disbelief and rage.
She understood how he felt, and she knew that he hated his father more then anything in the world. And even more, he was intimidated by him, which actually wasn't his shortcoming - King Vegeta was a very intimidating person, even almost scary if he wanted to be. He was also cunning, ruthless, dangerous, and could turn even the best of allies against each other.
"He's *alive*?" asked Vegeta.
"Ano... hai," she answered. *Um... yeah*
"Since when?" exclaimed Vegeta.
"Well... after I found out that the planet had been destroyed.... Have you ever heard of the Black-Star Dragon Balls?"
"..hai.." *...yes...*
"Well, I got the Dragon Balls together and wished it back..."
Vegeta buried his face in his hands, and then he began to massage his temples slowly.
"Well, I suppose that you know why I'm here now," she said quietly after a moment.
"T-to take me *back*?" he stuttered in anger, his voice still excercising the same dangerous whisper.
"...H-hai," she said quietly. *...Y-yes* She wasn't afraid of him, but she was afraid of what his reaction could be.
"USO!!" he yelled. *NO WAY!!*
"Vegeta, Onegai!!" she cried. *Vegeta. Please!!* "At least-"
"Iie!" he spat. *No!*
She looked down at the waves that were crashing at the bottom of th cliff. She could understand if and why he didn't want to go back... after being on this planet for so long, he proabably liked it here... and he had probably become accustomed to everyone and everything throughout the planet. He most likely even considered it a second home.
And then there was the fact that he was bonded with a human... She stared at him for a moment, then turned to look at the sunset.
This was harder for her than she thought it would be.
King Vegeta was what some people would call 'racist', but not in the manner that most people thought of it - he thought that saiyans were meant to rule the galaxy, that they were the strongest, the best, the most intelligent, and that all other populaces of the universe were nothing but lowly, dirty, vermin made to be game for the saiyans to hunt and kill for sport, and if ever left to live, to be their slaves and do whatever they wished without any type of resistence; to live in the shadow of the saiyans, to be ridiculed and belittled...
"Maybe-" she bagan before Vegeta interrupted.
"I ALREADY SAID -"
Before he could finish, Clarice grabbed him by the shoulders and slapped him across the face. Luckily, she could control her immense power, or she may have killed him right then, but she only slapped him hard enough to stun him a bit.
"Vegeta! Urusai!" *Vegeta! Shut up!* "Please let me speak for a moment..."
When he didn't say anything, she continued. "I have a proposition to make," she said quietly, looking him in the eye. She let go of him when she was sure he wouldn't interfere anymore. She sighed and continued.
"I will give you... some time to think about it. Let's say... a week? I'm not supposed to, I'm supposed to find you and drag you back kicking and screaming if I have to," she said, her crimson lips curling slightly into a tiny smile. "But I think that you have a right to decide."
He looked down at the ground. She was doing this for him?
"And if it happens that you choose to stay here," she continued, "I'll... I'll just call this mission failed and mark you as 'lost'," she said, shrugging her shoulders, though she seemed almost fearful of the possibility that he would make that decision; if she failed the mission, she would most likely be discharged, though the King might let it go - one, for being the best right-hand any King had ever had, and two, because he - well, she didn't want to think about it.
"A...::sigh::...Arigatou," he said quietly. *Th...::Sigh::...Thank you*
She looked up at him, surprised, then smiled. "Doitashimashite," she said, still smiling. *Your welcome*
"And about your family," she said suddenly, "And whatever friends you have here... You are welcome to tell them about your predicament if you trust them... and you are absolutely sure that they will not pressure you either way. But I'd advise you..." she took his hand in hers and squeezed it gently, "to do whatever makes you happy."
He looked at her, disbelieving.
"Clarice..."
She smiled and put her finger to his lips, shushing him, and then she found herself looking at his mouth. She leaned over and kissed him softly, her soft lips just brushing his own for a few seconds.
She pulled back from the kiss, much to both of their distress. She whispered softly, her face still only inches from his, "Just for old time's sake..."
She got up and turned back to smile at him one last time, then blasted off into the dark twighlight of the sky.
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"No, I swear, that ki was RIGHT HERE!" cried Pan, becoming more and more agrivated.
They'd been standing in that same area by the beach all afternoon, feeling the ki move around them as if it were only a ghost. By sunset, they'd heard the roar of an engine, and could see the redness of Nazomi's Hummer through the mass of dust and sand that it's rugged tires had been kicking up.
But to their surprise, the ki disappeared again, and this time it was taking longer to come back, if it were coming back.
Now it was dusk, the sun setting behind the clear blue water of the ocean, and everyone was waiting, waiting for something to show up and reveal where this mysterious force was coming from.
Bra and Marron were singing along with one of Nazomi's Destiny's Child CDs in the front seat of the Hummer; Mercy was sitting on the hood of the car, her chin sitting in her palms, talking to Piccolo; Videl and Chi-Chi were all the way in the back (the third row), just talking; Nazomi was playing with one of her laptops, this one of which she'd found in the trunk of the car before she'd gone over to ask Pan what had happened; and Bulma was trying to get as much info as she could on Vegeta's whereabouts.
"What if this is the spirit of a dead saiyajin?!" said Nazomi.
"What?" said Pan, looking confused.
"Y'know, it could be," continued Nazomi. "I mean... since there's a ki and there's no one to be seen anywhere near it... it doesn't seem to have any 'owner'..."
Pan and Nazomi looked at eachother for a moment, then said "Nah," in unison, shaking their heads.
"But I know what it could be," said Pan suddenly. "Once I was talking to Vegeta... and I asked him if he were in hiding and really weak, what he would do, because he's always taking pride in how strong he is... and he told me he'd 'Never be in such a predicament'... but he said that if he ever were in that situation, he'd keep fighting the enemy, AND he would win." She shook her slowly. "But then he muttered something about how someone exremely weak would divert their ki to get away. He called it pathetic..."
"So... so you think that that's what's going on?" asked Nazomi, looking intrigued.
"Uh-huh..."
"C'mon! Let's go tell everyone else!"
"But Nazo-"
But Pan's pleas went un-noticed by the excited Nazomi, who had grabbed her hand and was practically dragging her towards the group.
"Pan thinks that she knows where the 'thing' is!" cried Nazomi, running over to everyone else and hauling Pan along with her.
"Really? Where?" asked Gohan.
"Uh..." Pan began to feel nervous, now everyone was staring at her. "Thanks a lot, Nazomi," she hissed at her before she began talking. "Ano... V-Vegeta told me once that w-weaker saiyajins c-could divert their ki in order to escape from an enemy," she explained.
"But I wouldn't exactly call whatever that thing was *weak*," said Uubu.
"...He didn't say that they could divert it to a special direction, all he said was that it would the other person off..."
"So... you mean that whatever that thing was could be *anywhere*?" said Goten.
"I guess so..."
"Hey! Maybe they could throw their ki in the opposite direction," said Bra, who'd been sitting in the doorway of the car, listening. "I mean, the opposite direction is the farthest you can possibly get them from you, right...?"
"Oh my GOD Bra, you're smarter than you look," said Nazomi teasingly.
Bra glowered at her, though there was a smile of amusement tugging at the corners of her lips.
"Oh! So THAT'S why Vegeta went east when the force seemed to be going farther west," said Goku. "Same to you, Koo-koo clock," said Nazomi.
"Then... then Vegeta's with what-whatever that *thing* is! Oh Kami, what if he's hurt?" cried Bulma, apparently going into histerics. "Oh, Kami, what if.. what if he's...de..." she couldn't even say the word.
"Bulma, you don't even know if he's in any danger at all," said Juuhachigou, slightly annoyed by Bulma's sudden panic. "If whatever this is is saiyajin, than you don't have to worry, they wouldn't hurt their 'prince'..." she said, making the flying quote marks with her fingers.
Bulma was beginning to calm down, but then Juuhachigou added, "But it's the possibility that they're *not* saiyajin that you have to worry about... whatever this thing is knew that they could make contact with him by doing that diversion thing, so they obviously had some type of 'buisness' to take care of with him."
"Yeah, Juu-Juu Bee!" said Nazomi. "Great job on the... detective... work..."
But she stopped when she saw the look on Bulma's face; she was staring at Juuhachigou, wide-eyed.
"What? I was only saying that it was a possibility..." said Juuhachigou.
"Uh... why don't we try going back east and see if we can find out where Vegeta and the other.. thing are?" said Pan, trying to ease the unbearable tension.
"...Yeah! Great idea, alright." People began babbling okays and prepared to find Vegeta, wherever he may have been.
"You guys'll probably have to stay here," said Goku.
"Oh no, I'm going with you guys," said Bulma fiercely. "I want to find Vegeta as much as you do."
"But it could be dangerous," said Gohan. "It wouldn't help if you got hurt, too-"
"I DON'T CARE!" she cried.
"Fine... Bulma, I'll take you," said Yamucha.
"THANK YOU! *Finally* someone agrees with me," said Bulma, walking over to Yamucha to stand beside him.
"He doesn't agree with you, he's just afraid of you," everyone heard a voice say.
They turned to see Nazomi, leaning on the car with her arms crossed, looking up at the stars.
She felt them watching her and turned to them, feeling nervous.
"What?" she asked, before realization dawned on her. "Oh, did I say that out loud?" she asked, her hands over her mouth.
Some of them laughed, but soon the matter at hand forced them to start thinking about finding Vegeta.
"Okay... we can split up going east, and probe around for Vegeta's ki or the ki of that... person," began Goku. "But remember to keep your own ki really low. We don't want to give the person a warning..."
The others nodded, and Goku turned to the others.
"Bra and Nazomi, if anything shows up here, drop us a line, okay?" he said, looking at both of them.
They both nodded.
"You guys ready?" asked Goku, looking around anxiously.
The rest of them nodded. Yamcha picked up Bulma, and they were off.
"So... what do we do now?" asked Bra after a moment, already bored.
"Oooh! Oooh! We can tell scary stories," said Nazomi. "Hey, a bunch of girls in the middle of no where in the middle of the night? Eh? Eh?" she said, elbowing Bra playfully with each 'eh'.
Bra laughed and said, "Alright. Marron, you coming with us?" she asked as she and Nazomi got out of the car.
"Sure."
"Wait a minute... I'm just gonna leave the headlights on," said Nazomi before she got out of the car. "Just so we don't get lost when we come out of the woods..."
"But why don't you just find your Chi-Chi or Videl or your mother's ki?" said Marron. "That would be easier..."
"But if I raise my ki the guys'll think that I'm trying to signal them... Mommy? We'll be back in a little while," shouted Nazomi to her mother after she'd set the headlights to high-beams. She'd even left some music on, just slightly loud - with her and Bra's sensitive hearing, that would be another way of finding the car. "But..." she suddenly glanced over at where her mother, Chi-Chi, and Videl were sitting.
"What's wrong?" asked Marron.
"Well... we were supposed to stay here incase anyone or anything showed up," she said, looking worried. "But... what if something showed up and my mom was still here? I mean... I'd feel so guilty if she got hurt..."
"Yeah, I know what you mean," said Bra. "...So... what, are we bailing?"
"...No, I have an idea," said Nazomi. She suddenly leaped into the air and landed a few hundred feet from where she'd been standing.
She took a few deep breaths, her arms at her sides, and began to power up immensely.
Mercy, Chi-Ch, and Videl, thinking something was wrong, stood up on a flat boulder that was nearby and watched Nazomi intently.
Suddenly, there was a bright flash of light, and then they were plunged into darkness again.
No one could see what was goin on, that is until Nazomi jogged back over to the car. They noticed that she looked a bit different...
That was the thing with Nazomi's split-forms - since she was half-human, half of her came out looking more human and the other part of her came out looking more Nemekian.
The Nazomi that was jogging over to them was the more Nemekian one - her skin was a slightly darker shade of green, her hair was a lot shorter and had turned and had gotten darker, her eyes were also now black instead of orange, her fangs were sharper, her white, long, claw-like nails were longer, Her lips had turned black, despite the purple lipstick she had been wearing, and since she had been wearing a tight, gray tank-top, they could see that she'd become a bit more muscular.
A few seconds later, the more human Nazomi came over - this one had the same maroon-purple hair color, here eyes were still that insanely bright orange color, her lips had seemed to keep the purple lipstick shade, she didn't seem to have fangs, her "claws" had turned simply into long nails, and she didn't appear to be as muscular as the other Nazomi. And instead of green, her skin was a dark, tan color, giving her a latin look.
They were even dressed in an opposite manner - the Nemek had a tight, black tank-top on, and the human one had a white tank-top; when Nazomi had been 'whole', so to speak, she'd been wearing a gray tank-top. But both of them were wearing black flare jeans, along with the bright blue sneakers and the bright blue fleece sweaters tied around their waists.
They both arrived at the car, panting slightly; the split form had taken a bit of energy out of them... er, *her*.
"Oh fuck-" swore the Nemekian Nazomi. "The others are gonna think that we were trying to get a hold of them..." she immediately closed her eyes and seemed to go into a trance as the human one walked over to the group and leaned against the hood of the large car with her elbows.
"What eez she doeeng?" asked Mercy.
"She's telling everyone else that it was a false alarm," said the Human Nazomi as she tucked a few strands of purple hair behind her ear.
"Alright. They were kinda bitchy about it, but at least now they all know that it was bogus," said the Nemekian Nazomi when she finished 'speaking' to everyone.
Some more attributes of the N. Nazomi - for one, she looked more scary, more dangerous, and tough. Her voice was also a lot deeper, and she seemed to have all of Nazomi's worst qualities, such as slight impatience and a dirty mouth.
"Okay. You stay here and protect mom and the others, and I'll go with them," said the Nemek.
The human nodded and hopped up on the side of the hood, her feet resting on the rugged tire and her elbows resting on her knees.
This one was the submissive one.
"Where are you goeeng?" asked Mercy as the Nemekian Nazomi, Bra, and Marron began to walk away.
"Uh... just a little bit into the forest there," said Nazomi, pointing to the mass of trees that was a few kilometers from where they were; she'd decided to go over there because it looked eerie and extremely dark, as if the trees where just a structure of pitch blackness, imprinted against the navy-blue mountains about a mile behind them.
"Alright, sweet-'eart," shouted Mercy. "Please do not get 'urt..."
"I won't!" shouted Nazomi, waving to her mother.
"You girls better not go too far, okay?" yelled Videl.
"Be careful!" shouted Chi-Chi.
They all nodded, shouted that they'd be bcak soon, and continued walking towards the forest.
"Hey, don't get yourself messed up or I'll pay for it too!" cried the human Nazomi.
"Shut up," yelled the Nemek jokingly. "Same to you!"
The girls walked in silence for a while, headed toward the terrifying forest.
"Don't you think it's weird," asked Marron, her head tipped to the side, "that this thing was so strong, yet it was almost... hiding from us?"
"Yeah," agreed Bra and Nazomi.
"That's true," said Nazomi. "...But you know what I find weirder? Goku tends to be such an idiot sometimes, I mean no disrespect or anything, but when it comes to saving someone or fighting something evil, he pulls an Einstein of battle and strategy on us..."
Marron and Bra nodded in agreement.
They walked in silence for a while before they began to speak again.
"This is like one of those horror movies," said Marron, shivering slightly.
"How so?" asked Nazomi, still looking ahead.
"Well... it's like you said earlier. A bunch of teenage girls, in the middle of no where, in the middle of the night..."
"Actually it's only about nine-thirty," said Nazomi, looking at her watch, which was now glowing due to the darkness.
"Wow... it's so dark out here.. it seems more like midnight..." said Bra, looking around anxiously.
"And that's the beauty of it all, folks," said Nazomi, and they could tell that she was grinning even though they couldn't see her very clearly; the occasional moonlight caused her barred fangs (which were now longer and sharper) to glint.
"Oooh.... don't do that, Nazomi," begged Bra.
"Do what?"
"Anything that involves your teeth showing... your fangs are freaking me out. They kinda remind of that old movie... what was it...? 'American Werewolf in Paris'..." Bra shuddered suddenly.
"I will take that as the compliment that I *know* it was meant to be," said Nazomi haughtily.
Marron laughed, along with Bra. "So... what type of stories are we going to tell?" she asked. "Stupid scary, kinda scary, scary-scary or *really* scary?"
They all looked at eachother and said in unison, "*Really*-scary!"
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* ^_^ ... 0_0 ... _ ... O_o ... !_! ... ~_~ ... ';'... =0) ... =0( ... :) ... :( ... =P ... ;) ... ^_^ ... 0_0 ... _ ... ^_^ ... 0_0 ... _ ... O_o ... !_! ... ~_~ ... ';'... =0) ... =0( ... :) ... :( ... =P ... ;)..._...=P
Sorry this took so long! So how do u like this chapter so far? I know I kept everyone waiting too long... I apologize. I also wanna warn people that this fic is going to begin following the Sonic Adventure storyline after a little while. I wanted to put that in the summary, but there wasn't enough room... BUT WAIT, WAIT, WAIT, WAIT!! I know that some of you are saying "Aw, man, this sux!" or something and you're getting ready to leave - but lemme just say this - that's only one part of the story. There is A LOOOOOT more going on besides that, so even if you know how some of the things are going to turn out, it'll still be good to read... so if you have the game, I hope u'll find this kinda fun to read. Why do u think that i called it "The Legends of Chaos"? You know what Chaos is, right, I mean in the sense of the game? If you don't know what Chaos means here, I won't ruin it for u. I just thought it would be kewl to do a partial parody, so bear with me... please...
Oh - and some people are concerned about Clarice interfering in Bulma and Vegeta's relationship - I just want to ensure you that she won't.
I mean not really, anyway.
And also, Komadori called to my attention that Vegeta knew about the planet being destroyed since he was six years old - I just wanna say that this is one of the A/U factors.... in this story, he was in his early twenties when he left Vegita-sei. You'll see why later.
And one more thing - I know that some people may have found the T/M thing in this chapter weird, but the story starts out T/M and goes to T/P a loooong time from now... I really like T/P, but the T/M part is just so that everyone is happy.
I'll try to get the next chappy out soon. I already have part of it done... and I hope u'll keep reading! What's going to happen in chappy 2? Will they find Vegeta? Will Vegeta agree to go back with Clarice? What will Bulma and the others have to say about it? What's going to happen if Vegeta decides that he wants to go back? Will the girls get around to telling their stories? Will they get attacked by American guys that decided to take a trip to Paris and accidently got bitten and turned into werewolves the size of bears? Find out on the next episode of -
Dragon Ball Z: The Legends of Chaos
PWWWWEEEEEEEEAAAAAAASE Review? *Makes puppy dog face*