Gohan sat at his living room table, working on his latest lecture for the class he taught at college; he was the youngest professor in its history. Videl, who had been his girlfriend for several blissful years and his wife for several perfect months, was in the adjacent room. It was a special miniature training room that they had built with money from Videl's father Mr. Satan, world champion martial artists until five months ago when he had been defeated by Vegeta.

He looked up, puzzled. Speaking of Vegeta, it felt like there were two of him. Gohan frowned. Why was he sensing two duplicate ki signatures?

No, wait...they weren't quite duplicates. One was Vegeta's typical ki signature. If he had to describe it in visual terms, he would say it was rather a dirty shade of gray.

The other one, however, would have been pitch black.

Gohan shuddered. The last time he had felt something that purely evil had been when he had fought Buu.

He rose from the table and walked to the training room. He opened the door and entered.

"Hey," said Videl, a bit out of breath. She was bench pressing approximately three hundred pounds. Then she noticed the grim expression on his face. "Is something wrong?"

"Something weird is up with Vegeta. Try and sense his ki."

Videl wasn't as proficient at it yet as he was, so she had to do a bit of concentrating. "What is that?" she asked when she did feel it.

"I have no clue, but I think I should go check it out."

"Want me to come?"

Gohan shook his head. "No, it might be too dangerous. I'll be back soon, hopefully." He gave her a hug, then used Instantaneous Movement to teleport to Capsule Corp.

Videl immediately headed to the nearest bathroom and toweled off. Then she grabbed a capsule. She headed outside to the driveway, where she activated the capsule. It contained a car. She hopped in, activated it, and began to drive.

"Too dangerous, like hell."

***

Everyone at Goku's house was enjoying some of Chi-Chi's superb cooking. Suddenly Goku, Goten and Bardock looked up from their plates.

"What is it?" asked Chi-Chi.

"It's like there's two of his Highness," said Bardock, rubbing his chin in thought.

"But one of them's mean. Well, meaner," added Goten.

"We'd better see what's going on," said Goku as he rose from his chair. "Dad, Goten, you might need to come too. Grab hold." Bardock touched his son's shoulder, while Goten took his father's hand.

"WAIT!" yelled Chi-Chi, but she was too slow. The three of them had already disappeared. She headed to the door.

"Chi-Chi?" questioned Gyu-Mao, the Ox King. "What are you up to?"

"I'll be back soon, dad," she replied as she headed for the car. She got in and began driving to Capsule Corporation.

"Goku, you said all the dangerous things had been taken care of!"

***

"What is that, Dende? It's like there's two of him..."

"That's just what it is, Piccolo," replied Dende as he used his powers as god of the Earth to observe the situation at Capsule Corporation. "Two of him." Although he already suspected the answer to his next question, he asked anyway. "Are you going there?"

"Of course. But first I'm going to see how many senzu Karin has."

As he leapt off the edge of the tower, Dende and Mr. Popo stared after him.

"This is bad," said Dende in a dismayed tone of voice. "No good can come of this."

***

In the northern wastelands...

"Do you feel that?"

"Yes, and I don't like it," said Tenshinhan with a dour look on his face. "One of him is more than enough. I'm going to investigate."

"I'll come too."

"No, Chaozu, you stay here. I'll do this myself. I shall return soon." He patted his friend on the shoulder, then the former student of Tsurusen'nin launched himself into the sky.

***

In the southern islands...

"Is something wrong?"

"I don't know what exactly's going on, but it's like there's two of Vegeta," said Kuririn, sweating.

"Oh, great. Like the world needs another ego that size," replied Juuhachigou, rolling her eyes.

"We'd better see what's going on." He headed into the Kame House, where Kamesen'nin seemed to be concentrating.

"Master, can you--?" Kuririn began, but the old master interrupted him.

"Watch Marron? Of course I will, I won't make much of a difference in whatever's about to happen anyway."

"Thanks." He headed back outside, nodded, and the couple took off.

***

"WHAT'S GOING ON HERE?!" roared Vegeta as he grabbed the other version of himself around the throat.

"Get your hands off me," replied the other, and pried Vegeta's grip loose. Before either of them could do anything else, Gohan appeared on one side of the crater, and Goku, Goten and Bardock materialized on another.

"You're ridiculous," said the other Vegeta. "You let Kakarot live? And I will not even ask how Bardock and Nappa and Raditz and Broli and Turles are all here, or who those other fools are. But you are ridiculous."

Vegeta charged up a Big Bang attack and aimed it straight at the head of his doppelganger. "If the next thing you say does not involve who you are, I'm going to annihilate you."

"Very well. I am Vegeta, the King of the Saiyans. But you worthless fools may call me the Hasha no Ankoku--the Supreme Ruler of Darkness."

"But, um, I thought this was Vegeta..." Goku said quizzically.

"Apparently you need the concept of alternate timelines explained to you--"

"No, we understand that all too well," Mirai said in a gruff tone of voice.

"At least you are not total idiots. I come from a different reality. I do not know how things transpired in this one, but in mine, all of us save myself, Kakarot, Raditz and Nappa were killed by Freeza. Raditz and Nappa were then killed here on Earth, and I was repulsed from it. I was then forced to ally myself with Kakarot's son, a Namek, and a human against Freeza. I died, but was revived. Kakarot transformed into a Super Saiyan and defeated Freeza. Afterwards stuck on Earth, I moved into this building."

"That is how events happened here as well," said Vegeta. He was frowning. What had changed?

"A few years later, I achieved the Super Saiyan as well. Determined that Kakarot would be defeated by nothing but the highest of Saiyan royalty, I hunted down the Dragonballs and wished to be transported back to Namek. I then collected their Dragonballs. My first wish was to revive my father. After he passed on the title of King, I killed him. My second wish was for a grand spaceship. My third wish was to revive Freeza so that I could kill him myself. However, the dragon informed me that he was not dead. So instead, I used my wish to determine where he was. I learned that he was on his way to Earth. I boarded my ship and headed to Earth myself. We both landed at approximately the same time. All the weak Earthlings who had sensed him coming had gathered as well. And as if that was not enough, Kakarot returned to Earth!" He laughed in a way that unsettled everyone except Vegeta, who was wondering how this version of himself had achieved the Super Saiyan so much earlier than he.

The Hasha continued. "It was then that I discovered the power of the Saiyan kings--"

"To draw upon the power of all living beings with any Saiyan heritage at all," interrupted Vegeta. "I know."

While the others stared at him in surprise, the Hasha nodded. "Exactly. Using it, I was able to easily slay Freeza and his father, King Cold. Then, while everyone else was celebrating, I slew Kakarot as well. Once he was dead, the others posed no challenge. I proceeded to finish my original mission and wiped the planet Earth clear of humanity. Then I headed back to space and took control of Freeza's empire--and from there, the rest of the universe. But as it turned out, one universe was not enough. So I had my top scientists build a gateway to another universe I could conquer. This one. And now you will all die."