A bright azure flash was far less disturbing in the middle of a sunny day, like most days in Penguin Village. The hiss of the electricity and the fabric of space-time contorting itself to accommodate the unlikely couple of time travelers on a mission with far higher stakes than either of them could comprehend faded away in the busy morning routine and the cheerful song of the flowers further from the village where the pair manifested back in the past.
"Huh… We're back. The sky doesn't look like it's got a bit of Destron in it," Videl observed after the lid slid off and released them and she could step out from the time machine and gaze at the sky. Before Trunks could say anything, the time machine began plummeting down below and crashed onto the floor completely powerless. Just like the heap of scrap that Turbo built it from.
"Aww man, now we won't be able to go back again if we screw it up!" Trunks muttered after crawling out from the rubble with a few irrelevant, skin-deep grazes all over.
"All the more reason to do it right," Videl became serious and looked around. "We need to decide on a plan on how we can prevent the spread of Destron Gas."
"That planet… The Dark Planet, or whatever Turbo called it. That's the place flooding with Destron Gas. If we can destroy it–we'll stop the Destron Gas," Trunks pointed out.
"Problem is, this place is ludicrous with its laws of physics. We don't know if that planet is just up in the sky or on a whole different galaxy. We may not have the time to get to the planet. Our best hope for success is still Turbo-san and his Destron Gas vacuum machine," Videl said.
"We could have stalled the Destron monster. It was only when Arale and her Gatchans joined the battle that things got out of control," Trunks slammed his open hand with his right hammering knuckle.
"True, Arale-chan is a chaos factor we can't comprehend or plan around…" Videl deflated. Recalling how easily Arale manhandled that immensely powerful Destron gas monster with all of his magical abilities and how it was of no issue to her to just smack him all the way back to the Dark Planet and thoroughly trounce him, there almost made Videl feel hopeless.
"That's not true," Trunks crossed his arms and pouted his lips. "Arale is weird. She's incredibly powerful, but she's got all those weird weaknesses, just like a cartoon character. Like, remember how she couldn't fly, even though every Android designed by Dr. Puri could, despite being much weaker than Arale?"
"That's true…" Videl sighed. "But we don't know any of Arale-chan's weaknesses."
A scurrying car flew over the hill, making Videl and Trunks stiffen in tension and observe Aoi blitz past their wreckage site in her car and hurl toward Penguin Village. It was a familiar sight to the pair. Though something struck me as incredibly peculiar. Trunks squinted, then shook his head in complete bafflement and began frantically scratching his head, trying to put the pieces together before things got out of hand again.
"Wait… That was Aoi's car, wasn't it?" Trunks barked out. "This makes no sense! I can't believe we haven't sensed it earlier!"
"It's true, if this was Aoi-san's car, that means that we should've bumped into it. Where are the past versions of us?" Videl scratched her head in confusion too. She closed her eyes though, no matter how hard she tried, she couldn't pick up a lick of either of their Ki signatures anywhere. Almost as if Videl and Trunks didn't exist in this timeline and the two of them were the only true versions of themselves. "Wait… Remember what Turbo-san said? This Time Machine Mark-2 works differently from other time machines. What if it doesn't create a new timeline but just reverts us back in time on the same one?"
"Hmm… I guess that could explain some of his incoherent babble. What is Dragon Ball Heroes anyway?" Trunks scratched his round chin. Something snapped in him and he grabbed Videl's gi, tucking it downward. "No time! We need to figure something out before the Zero Imagination Wave happens again! We need to find Arale's friends and ask them what her weakness is!"
"No," Videl shook her head. "Remember, we don't yet know any of Arale-chan's friends. Introducing ourselves to them and getting them to trust us will take too much time. We need to talk to her enemies. Though I'm not sure where we can find any of them…"
"I've got a clue…" Trunks leaned to the side, seeing a busy reporter with luggage in his right hand running the other side of Penguin Village. Arale turned to follow the object that caught Trunks' attention. Upon seeing Kuraku Kenta scurrying about, she calmed down and turned to Trunks with a hearty nod. The pair slipped out from the messy wreckage site and took to the air to follow the undercover alien reporter around until they found the ideal time to ask him about Arale's weakness.
The pair followed Kuraku Kenta all the way to the woods just outside the anthropomorphic hills surrounding Penguin Village. As Kuraku Kenta stopped and pressed his back to the tree in waiting, Videl and Trunks hovered above, taking a glance at the sky once in a while to observe minor black puffs forming around the bubbly white clouds. Whatever shady business Sourman had planned for that day, Videl and Trunks may not have had the time to scope the situation out. Yet, before aggravated Trunks could swoop down and bully the information out from the weirdo, Arale herself appeared from the bushes.
"A-Arale!?" Trunks and Videl cried out in shock. Judging from Kuraku Kenta's reaction, he too was not expecting this wicked turn of events as he tossed his cloak to the side and began scouring himself for his jar of sour prunes to suck on in order to trigger his transformation into Sourman. Sadly, Kenta's arms were too shaky from the sudden fright, so he dropped the jar and had the prunes rolling all over the hill.
With a poof, Arale disappeared in a colorful smoke cloud. What appeared from within the dispersing cloud was a little bipedal fox laughing it up, with crystals of tears forming in the corners of its eye. From the looks of it, it was as if the pooch would die of laughter as he grabbed his chunky belly and began rolling on the ground, howling.
"Got you! Got you so good! You should've seen the look on your face!" the shapeshifting fox couldn't shut up about its successful scare that he put not only Kuraku Kenta but, unknowingly to him, Videl and Trunks too.
"You imbecile! I could've died of a heart attack. Didn't you know that high blood pressure is called the silent killer?" Kenta shook his fist over his head. "Now look at what you've done, scoundrel, you've made me scatter all my sour prunes! What if the Earth is in danger and needs Sourman to rescue it?"
"If the Earth is ever in danger, you're the last guy they'll call…" the shapeshifting fox finally scrambled back on two feet, though still shaking and coughing up in booming hilarity, still wiping tears. "Man, Buzzman was right, you are a real crybaby scaredy cat!"
"Foul villain, I'd make you eat these words if I wouldn't need your help!" Kenta shook his fist out in front of him, swearing that his day of comeuppance on the trickster fox would come yet. Calming down, he fixed his glasses and pressed his knuckles to his hips. "I thought I asked you for your help. Can you help me with my sensitive matter or not?"
"Depends…" the fox began rubbing his index and middle finger to his thumb like a mobster, stretching his lips out and raising his snout. "Do you have the merchandise I asked for?"
"There… The real deal, Dr. Senbei Norimaki's See-Thru Glasses. Even though it hurts me to imagine you using them for nefarious deeds, the matter I need your cooperation with is of utmost importance…" Kuraka Kenta ground his teeth, pulling out a pair of hi-tech binoculars attached to one another by a simplistic spectacles' rim.
"Dumbass, Senbei himself used them for pervy stuff when he invented them. Thing is, the doc no longer needs them since he's married to that hot babe teech. I usually just use my transformation skill to speak to babes, but it's too much work. At that point, I may as well just ask them out. Where's the fun and pranking in that?" the shapeshifting fox took the See-Thru Glasses off of Kenta's hands and put them on, rubbing his hands as he looked around but then he blanked out and cried out, tripping and falling on his back, passed out.
"H-Huh?" Kuraka Kenta blinked a few times, confused by what might have made the shapeshifting fox keel over.
"Imbecile, he must've seen you naked…" Videl announced as she and Trunks swooped down. The female martial artist flipped the glasses off of the fox's snout and crushed them in her hand.
"A-Aliens! I knew it! Damn you, Donbe! What a terrible time to lose my sour prunes!" Kenta grabbed his head and began pulling his hair out after having just seen the pair of martial artist fly.
"You've caused trouble for Arale before. We want to stop her from messing with something dangerous. Tell us her weaknesses!" Trunks demanded with an aggressive approach. At first, Kenta was taken aback and looked intimidated by the boy's approach, though, once he heard that Trunks and Videl were trying to stop Arale, a malicious spark flashed in Kenta's glasses and his mouth turned into a long, round smile.
"I'm sure we can help each other out. I know of a weakness that can definitely stop Arale. It won't defeat her, but it will keep her busy long enough to do whatever it is you want to do…" Kenta struck a confident pose with both of his knuckles pressed to his sides as the short and plump reporter blew his chest out with a series of faked cocky laughs.
"That's exactly what we need. Tell us what it is!" Videl demanded with a strict look on her face.
"Well… It's not so simple. You see, Donbe and I had a deal that your interference messed with. Now I'm leaving the deal disappointed and I don't feel like sharing anymore…" Kenta crossed his arms and turned away while playfully inspecting his fingernails.
"You rotten…" Trunks ground his teeth, stepping up to pound the irritating alien coward.
"Don't waste your time," Videl scolded the young boy. "Remember that this dimension operates on cartoon physics. You won't be able to torture him and you'll just end up knocking him out with a comedic effect, like the fox. All this will bring us is more wasted time and we'll be back to square one," Videl listed all the reasons beating up on Kuraku Kenta was a bad idea right now.
"Fine. What did you two agree on?" Trunks crossed his arms and pouted his lips. The boy turned his eyes away from the loathsome scaredy cat who flung grenades at people, imitating superpowers and pretending to be some grand hero.
"Well, I used to have a lovely home here in Penguin Village, before that, Obotchaman carried it off and took over my patch of land to live in Penguin Village himself. I want to get back at him. I want someone to carry his house off and put it somewhere insulting, like maybe on top of a public toilet. Then, you can put my home back in its place!" Kenta shook his fist out.
"Obotchaman?" Trunks scratched his head.
"This must be where Obotchaman was during the crisis. He must have been dealing with these two and their scheme to move his house," Videl reasoned with Trunks.
"Hmph… Fine, we'll dump Obotchaman's house somewhere and put your house back in its place. Then will you tell us about Arale's weakness?" Trunks turned to Kenta with a strict look for a four-year-old.
"I swear by stars and garters!" Kuraku Kenta pressed his hand to his chest as if he was wholeheartedly listening to the national anthem of Gengoro Island.
Trunks and Videl floated off toward Penguin Village, following Kuraku Kenta as the reporter jogged the entire way through the hills. Trunks was sneering and rolling his eyes the entire trip, at some point snapping and putting his hands around his mouth to focus his voice.
"Hey, dummy, how about you ride that skateboard? You're dragging behind!" Trunks called out to Kuraku Kenta, something that vexed Videl a little since he was raising far too much noise.
"No can do!" Kenta stopped and began panting excessively. "I cannot use the powers of Sourman while I am in my civilian disguise! Because of Donbe's silly prank, I've lost all of my sour prunes!"
"You can still ride a…" Trunks yelled back, but Videl tapped his shoulder with her index finger to attract his attention and shook her head once the boy turned to her.
"Just… Don't argue with him. Let's just go. We're raising too much noise and we're getting close to the village," Videl said. Seemingly agreeing with her, Trunks just stopped trying to tell Kenta to ride his skateboard and flew alongside his companion while Kenta jogged at less than impressive speed, even to an ordinary Earthling who didn't observe his weight, and showed them the way.
"There… It is!" Kenta nearly fell flat on his face, panting heavily as he rammed against a white house for support. "Take it… Somewhere else… The toilet…"
Trunks stretched out and did some warm-up exercises before slipping his fingers down under the home's foundation. "Heave ho!" he chanted and tilted the entire house over his head.
"N-No!" Kenta bawled out, scrambling and tripping over himself as he ran up to Videl and began shaking her, then ran up to Trunks, who still held the house raised over his head in confusion. "This is… The wrong house. My house… Is that way…!"
"Seriously?" Videl's right eyebrow twitched while her knuckles started feeling itchy. "Then why the heck did you put your hand on this house?"
"B-Because I was tired!" Kenta hissed in spite. "Do you have any idea how difficult it is for an ordinary human and not an alien at all, mild-mannered reported Kuraku Kenta to run all the way from the hills to the Penguin Village on foot? I just rammed it for support, not because this was the right house!"
A compact bespectacled man with short charcoal-grey hair, small beady eyes, and no nose rolled out through the front door of the house Trunks had lifted like a little cannonball. He was dressed in plain civilian clothing, though he had belts of ammo wrapped around him and multiple gun holsters stuck to his body. The stunned man stroked his head to ease the pain of having smacked straight down and planted on his face from his entire house, hovering up in the air over Trunks' head before scrambling back on his feet. He pulled a gun out and aimed it at Trunks, Kuraku Kenta, and Videl interchangeably.
"Halt! I am Charmy Yamada, even though I am on holiday leave, I can still make a civilian arrest! The job of the No. 1 Policeman is never done!" the man that rolled out from the house said.
"Can I put the house down though?" Trunks turned to the policeman along with his entire house, changing the direction his door was pointing to in the process and causing great distress to the off-duty policeman.
"Stop turning around! Just… Put the house down on the same side you found it. Also… Be gentle! I can't afford to buy another house even from the salary of a No. 1 Policeman!" Charmy Yamada spilled words like peas.
"How much does the job of a No. 1 Policeman pay?" Videl wondered with a squinted expression.
"The same as every other policeman's…" Charmy Yamada's arms weighed down. "It took me a dozen years until I could afford a house of my own here after being transferred."
"Sheesh… Cry me a river…" Trunks grumbled while heaving the house off of his hands and slamming it down only to break down into broken boards and tiles. Charmy grabbed his head in terror and dashed off to check on his house and what of his Big City Island memorabilia he could still salvage from the wreckage.
"Now, which house did you say it was?" Videl turned to Kenta who was half-frozen in a turned-around position in mid-air, ready to bolt after the emergence of the police officer until Videl and Trunks spotted him in the process of running away.
"What do you know? You can fly after all…" Trunks squinted in reaction to Kenta's terrified and sweaty static freeze in place, hovering in mid-air as he froze up mid-vault. Chuckling, Kenta turned around and pointed to another house. The three strut up to it and Trunks spat into his hands, preparing to lift another house.
"H-Halt, house thieves!" a rather high-pitched yet still somewhat boyish voice made the trio freeze up and turn toward the source of the noise. Trunks and Videl seemed rather oblivious to the severity of the appearance of a short yet stout boy with large and lively eyes, short black hair with two conical points resembling the devil's horns, and a tad oversized blue suit with a red necktie, orange gloves, and black loafers. "You would dare steal the house of the mayor of Penguin Village? Does your deviance know no bounds?"
"Obotchaman!" Kenta shrieked out in absolute terror.
"Huh? That's Obotchaman?" Videl raised an inquisitive eyebrow as the geek attempting to stop them didn't look that much more impressive than Trunks. He had no Ki signature either, not even the speck that ordinary people would've had.
"Kuraku Kenta-san, I should've known you'd be involved in this!" Obotchaman clenched his fists and put 'em up, preparing to go for a few rounds of fisticuffs.
"M-Me!?" Kuraku Kenta freaked out. "B-But I'm just a mild-mannered reported, Kuraku Kenta, here to report about these two alien monsters stealing the houses of unsuspecting people of Penguin Village!"
"I can't believe he's using the same excuse he used for the police…" Trunks smacked his forehead, stiffening up his neck and pulling his hand off of his forehead after realizing that he had just facepalmed with the same hand he spat on.
"I can't believe it's going to work…" Videl deflated in disappointment at the quality of writing of the work she found herself in.
"I see, I'm glad to hear you're turning a new leaf, Kuraku Kenta-san. Though you should be more careful. You should try reporting crimes after they happen to avoid getting in danger," Obotchaman advised after making a concerned face.
"I see… That is sage advice!" Kuraku Kenta bowed respectfully before setting a devious grin. "I think I'll abscond until you deal with these foul villains and report on the story afterward. Maybe I can even get your statement and one of those funny pictures of you stomping on their butts as they lay defeated?"
"That would be a good idea, Kenta-san. With Arale-chan occupied with being the mayor, it's up to me to take care of our child and assist her in her work!" Obotchaman stretched his hands to the side and took a wide-open fighting stance while tucking his chin and lowering his forehead, like a rhinoceros about to gore his enemy.
This try may end up being way messier than Trunks' and Videl's first one which already ended in disaster!