Chapter 8 - Men In Black

Bulma grabbed a broom from the closet and took it into the living room. How he got there or why was beyond her, but, there was Krillin, passed out face down on the living room rug and drooling. She was half pissed off, and half ready to laugh hysterically, but they canceled each other out and all she wanted was him gone before her parents woke up. She grabbed the broom just above the brushes and lightly poked him with the handle on his chin. Nothing. She jabbed it into his side.

His eyes snapped open as he snorted in a large amount of air and grumbled ,"My hair!"

Bulma tucked her lips into her head. "18 is gonna kick your ass when you git home."

Krillin the realized he wasn't alone. He turned around and looked at Bulma. Upon seeing her face, he realized he wasn't home. "Awww fuck." He knew his wife was going to kill him for not coming home. He finally picked himself up into a sitting position. He couldn't open his eyes all of the way; he had the Headache from Hell no doubt. "Wha time is it?", he mumbled as he wiped the saliva from the corner of his mouth with his wrist.

"6:30. Now hurry your ass outta here before my parents catch ya!"

Krillin tried to get up, but couldn't. "Can I get a little help please?"

"Oh no. I ain' touchin' ya when yer all wet like that."

Krillin gave her a look of disapproval, then tried to get up himself. "Awwww shit." When he finally got up, he looked at Bulma. She pointed at the front door. Just as he started to turn around, Bulma stopped him.

"By the way, do you know where Vegeta ran off to?"

"Uhhh," He looked like he was thinking real hard. "That can't be right."

"What?"

"He said something about going to outer space and teaching alien girls how to grrrughtgrrm...," she couldn't under stand what he was saying ,"yeah."

She probably wouldn't have gotten it if he didn't add "yeah" at the end. "What the fuck? That's not even funny! Get out!"

"Wha!? Tha's wha he said!" he replied indignantly.

"Get out!"

"Urgggh." He turned around and left. He didn't need the loudness, there was enough of that ahead of him.

Bulma turned around and went into the kitchen. She was a bit worried about Vegeta. He usually disappears like this, but he always told her before he went. This time there was no word or anything. This was odd. Then it hit her. She forgot to contact those resistance fighters about Freeza. She was going to have to do it today. Maybe that's what this was about...or maybe he didn't want to sleep with her after what he did. She hoped he didn't feel that way. She did all she could to let him know that everything was all right. She wished that he'd get over this depression soon, this wasn't like him at all. Maybe her contacting those fighter would help make him feel a bit better. Freeza's men regrouping sounded like serious business, so maybe that's what he's been stressing out over. It would explain the nightmares. After the hell Freeza had put Vegeta through, that nightmare was most likely a flashback. The only thing that she didn't understand was how he went about asking her. It sounded like it wasn't that much of a problem to him, more like curiosity. That's probably why she forgot about it until this moment.

When she got into the kitchen, Trunks was there, already wide awake, and going through the cabinets looking for cereal. She wasn't going to make anything this morning, and he seemed to know it. Besides, he had to leave for school in an hour. When he saw her, his first thing he said was ,"Where's Dad?"

"Probably at the beach again."

"Figures."

"Why?"

"Didn't you hear the fit he threw last night?"

"Wha? Did he get into another fight?"

"Probably. Sounded like he trashed the place."

"Aw damnit. If he wrecked that place again I'm not gonna let 'em play anymore."

Trunks pulled out a cardboard cereal box with a cartoon character on it. Bulma knew that what ever it was, it was 100% guaranteed to rot his teeth. Vegeta greatly disapproved of him eating "such filth", and to a certain extent, so did she, but she didn't feel like making a fuss over it. Grandparents always spoil their grandchildren, she thought to her self.

* * *

As soon as Trunks got off of the school bus at school, he met up with Tai, his school buddy. Tai had a look of concern on his face and looked like he was itching to tell Trunks something important.

"Trunks, you're not gonna believe this."

"Wha, wha happened?"

"Ami's in the hospital!" Ami was a friend of both of them.

"What's wrong with her?"

"Her brother told me she had food poisoning coz she kept getting bad stomach cramps. Now the board of health is all over the place coz they think she got it here."

"Figures. Is she gonna be okay?"

"They dunno. They can't even visit her because they said she shouldn't be bothered in her condition."

"Why? Is she critical or something?"

"I dunno."

"Well, what hospital is she at?"

"I dunno."

"Then what the fuck do you know?!"

"I DUNNO!"

The two fell silent as they entered the school. Almost immediately upon entering, there were two tall men standing at each side of the indoors side of the entrance. They were standing at attention with their hands below their waists with one hand in a fist and the other clenched around the opposite wrist. They looked stone chizzled, crew cut hair, black sunglasses, black dress suits with white undershirts, and black shoes. They had something in one of their ears which had a coiled cord that went down into their suit jackets.

Trunks looked over at Tai with a look of disgust and disbelief, "Are those guys the Board of Health?"

"Two of 'em. There's like fifty of them all over the place."

Trunks looked rather puzzled and looked around. Sure enough, there were at least three more down the hall, and that was a mere part of the school. Those three seemed to be stationary as well, but were more interested in the children. Trunks watched as their heads tracked each individual child that passed them, making the kids passing them feel very uncomfortable. Trunks knew something was wrong. These guys weren't the Board of Health.

* * *

One by one, children were called to the office. Two kids that Trunks knew hadn't come back, even though others ahead of them had. Trunks hadn't gone yet. They were probably doing it in some sort of random order, otherwise he would have been one of the first to go if it were alphabetical. Their teacher pretended that nothing was happening. She was trying to teach them about insects. Trunks wasn't paying a bit of attention. Neither were any of the other kids. They were too caught up in what was going on around them. This seemed too be too much for a single case of food poisoning. Something else was at hand here. The children chattered amongst themselves as the teacher lectured. They talked about who they thought those men really were, where the two children were that didn't come back, and what this was really all about. Ami couldn't just have had food poisoning, could she?

Rumors were spreading like wildfire. One kid said that the men were looking all through the cafeteria very thoroughly, looking through the stoves, dish washers, storage rooms, and empty boxes. Another said that they had taken apart some of the ceiling tiles in the hallways and were looking up there for something. Another said that there were even a few men in the bathrooms with flash lights, looking in all of the corners and vents for something. One child who helps out as an office aid even said she over heard a conversation with one of the men and the principal, asking him if any of the children had weird marks on their faces.

"Class, this wasp, found in the deserts of North America, plants its eggs inside other insects. When the egg hatches, the host is killed and...", she was cut off when one of the men appeared in the door way to the classroom. He looked down at a card in his had.

"Trunks Briefs."

* * *

Trunks found himself in front of a small room that was hardly ever used by anyone. He always thought it was a storage closet, but he soon fond out he was wrong. His usher opened the door for him and let him go in first. Upon entering the room, the man followed him in and closed the door behind him. Inside, there were two men sitting on foldable steel chairs at a square brown table across from him. Just as he thought, the room was small. It made him feel claustrophobic. The were no windows, paint on the walls, or anything to lighten the mood. The walls were plain concrete and only one overhead lamp lit the room. The four of them could barely fit in there.

"Please, have a seat," the man on his left said.

Trunks took a seat in the empty seat to his left. His heart was racing and he was a bit scared that they were going to ask him about him and Goten making all of those prank phone calls. As he sat down, the man on the right side of the table got up with a pen in his hand and made his way around the table.

The man knelt down beside Trunks. "What I need to do is check under you hair for a type of rash that is associated with the form of food poisoning we're looking for. Is it okay if I check?"

Trunks didn't know if he could refuse. It sounded simple enough. Besides, if he tried anything, he could easily stop him. "Yeah, sure."

The man began to lift Trunks' hair up with his pen. "What we are looking for are marks on the side of you head that look somewhat like long bruises." He continued checking. When he was done on that side, he asked Trunks to turn around and he repeated the process on the other side. When he was done, he looked over at the man behind the table and slowly shook his head. The man responded by writing something in an open folder. The man next to Trunks turned back to him. "You don't seem to have any rashes, but to make sure, I'm going to ask you a few questions."

"Sure", Trunks answered. He was surprised that they were this friendly to him. He thought for sure they would be monotone and demanding and that they would keep referring to him as "Mr. Briefs." He felt a little bit better this way, allot less antsy.

"Have you had a sore throat within the past few days?"

"No."

"Any long periods of nausea?"

"No."

"Dizziness?"

"No."

"Any abnormally long periods of sleep?"

Again, no.

"Memory loss?"

"None."

The man behind the table began writing again. The man next to him spoke again. "Do you know anybody who might exhibit these symptoms?"

"Naw."

"If you know anybody who does, or if you fall under these symptoms, please come back and let us know."

"Why? Am I done?"

"Yes, you can go back to class now."

Trunks hopped of his chair and walked toward the door as the man that lead him in opened it for him. There was something he was itching to ask them. He better do it now while he had the chance.

"Hey, uh, my friend is the one that got poisoned. Do you know if she's gonna be ok?"

The room fell silent for a moment. It seemed like none of them knew what to say. The man that had been speaking to Trunks the whole time finally said something, "I wish I could tell you, but I really don't know. Do you know what hospital she's at?"

"No. Ah well. Thanx anyway," he said disappointingly. He turned around and left. When he was out, the man was still holding the door open, looking at the man behind the table.

"Who's next?" he asked.

"Uh," the man went through a few papers in his folder. "Mike Brown, room "N" right now."

The man nodded his head and left the room, closing the door behind him. He saw that Trunks was still there. "You're done. You can go back to class now."

"Alright," Trunks said and turned toward the direction of class. The man went the opposite way. When the man disappeared around the corner, Trunks looked around to see if anyone was near. No one. He was going to see what he could find out from a little ease dropping. Something wasn't right here, and he wanted to know what it was. He went back to the door and put his ear up against it. He could barely hear the muffled voice on the other side of the door, but he could understand them.

"I don't like screening kids."

"We have to if there's an infestation."

"But still, couldn't we start somewhere else? It doesn't feel right to be here."

"If this island is infested, wouldn't you feel a little bit better to make sure the children are safe before you move on to adults? Three of them are already dead, and we found twenty more infected because the higher-ups didn't pick up on this soon enough. And we're not even done have of the student roster yet. They probably already have a nest somewhere at this rate. As soon as the task force finds it and isolates it, we should be done here."

"Yeah. You're right. But my point is, ya know the shit's really hit the fan when we're finding infections in a school. It shouldn't have gotten this far."

Trunks heard foot steps. He looked around, then he looked up.

The man from before returned with another kid. He opened the door. The kid didn't look too healthy. He seem out of it, disorient, and looked like he was about to vomit. This child did have weird marks on his face, though. They looked like several long, parallel bruises up and down the side of his head. When they entered the room and closed the door behind them, Trunks jumped down from a vent in the ceiling. This was getting to him now. He started walking back to his class with a weird feeling. The he stopped dead. "Three kids dead? Twenty infected. Fuck this." He made plans to leave, but remembered that the doors were guarded. He'd have to jump out a window.