Author Notes: This was written in response to a review by Sprinting Whippet, who requested a Yamcha story. The desert bandit happens to be a favorite character of mine as well, so I figured, "Why not?"
Anyway, here it is, and I hope you all have fun with this. (I did.)
WARNING! - Incurable cat-lovers may want to forgo this fic. Trust me when I say "this won't end well." If you choose to disregard this warning, do so at your own risk and not mine (i.e. don't go flaming me, please). Yee've been warned, youngsters...
"But Bulma--"
"No buts, Yamcha!" the blue-haired girl growled. "You're going to watch after Thin Lizzie while I'm away tonight, and that's final."
"But why me? Why do I have to babysit your stupid cat?" the desert bandit whined.
"Everyone else is busy, and it wouldn't kill you to help me out for once," she retorted. "Now, I'm off. Take good care of her, okay?"
As he watched Bulma walk out the door, Yamcha got the sinking feeling that he was in for a rough night. Thin Lizzie had lived at Bulma's house ever since the former bandit's first visit there, and Bulma loved that cat like a sister. Unfortunately for Yamcha, Lizzie was a very mean, spiteful, envious sibling that didn't like anyone except her owner.
"Yamcha, is it safe to come out?" a small voice squeaked from behind a potted plant.
"Yeah, Puar. Bulma's gone," Yamcha said, amused at his friend.
The cat-like creature floated up to eye level and sighed, "Yamcha, you really should find another girlfriend. Bulma may be pretty, but she's so violent and bossy. What's more, I'm beginning to wonder if she's unfaithful to you!"
"Now, now, Puar," Yamcha cautioned him. "Just because she's been going out at night lately is no reason to suspect infidelity on her part."
With a look akin to an adult frustrated with a stupid child, Puar grumbled, "And you don't think it's the least bit strange that she's been helping Vegeta renovate his hotel room... every night... all night long?"
Yamcha began sweating profusely; he had been trying very hard not to think about that. He sputtered, "I h-have total faith in Bulma. She'd never betray me, right?"
Two weeks later...
"PREGNANT? WITH VEGETA'S KID? Bulma, you two-dollar whore! You (bleep) mother-(bleep) sleep-around slut! You probably carry more diseases than a biological weapon!"
Present day...
"Like I said, complete trust. That's what a good relationship is based off of," Yamcha beamed.
"Yeah... anyway, where's the cat?" Puar asked.
"I dunno. That's a good question," he replied, looking around.
CHOMP!
"ACK! Yamcha, get it off meeeeee!" Puar screamed.
Whirling around, Yamcha saw to his horror that Thin Lizzie was attempting to devour his best buddy whole. The title "thin" was a joke Yamcha applied to the vicious feline; the gargantuan puddy-tat actually weighed well over a hundred pounds.
"Let'm go, Garfield!" Yamcha roared at the cat.
It looked up at Yamcha with a "Yeah, and what are you going to do about it?" look.
"WOLF-FANG FIST!" the bandit snarled. Sadly, the deviously intelligent cat spit Puar out just in time for the attack to hit him instead of it.
SPLAT!
"Oh, no! I've squashed my best friend!" wailed Yamcha, scooping the pan-cat off the floor.
"Get him... for me... Yamcha!" Puar gasped before losing consciousness.
Yamcha glared at the fuzzy, white sumo-cat with fire in his eyes. "How dare you? Thin Lizzie, you monster... I'll see you destroyed!"
Adopting the famous Turtle-Hermit pose, he shouted, "KAMEHAMEHA!"
BOOM!
Thin Lizzie barely managed to dodge the blast in time. A look of panic came over Lizzie as she realized that her opponent meant business. Waddling toward Yamcha at breakneck speed, she suddenly sprang upward and attatched herself to his head.
"GAH! Get it off me!" he shrieking, screaming in agony as it clawed his face.
Finally, Yamcha managed to pry Lizzie loose and toss her aside. Clutching his face, he dropped to his knees. Not only did the humongous cat reopen every last one of his scars (almost healed, too!), but she had blanketed his eyes in so much cat hair that he couldn't see. He realized with an anxious feeling that he would be fighting blind for the duration of the battle.
"Meow, ha, ha!" the wicked kitty cackled. It began bounding back and forth, biting and scratching him as it pounced.
"If this keeps up, I'm finished!" Yamcha thought in alarm. "I must rely on the wise teachings of my masters to get me through this..."
His mind began cycling through the wisdom his various teachers had dispensed:
Master Roshi: "Yamcha, ya got a woman with big bazoos. Hold onto 'em... I mean 'her', tight."
Kami: "Remember, eat your prunes and it'll keep you regular."
King Kai: "Did you hear the one about the serpent who failed his test? He made too many mis-snakes! Waaahahahaha!"
"Holy crap, no wonder I'm always dying! My teachers were absolutely freakin' worthless!" Yamcha finally realized. "I guess I'll have to do this the Yamcha way if I want any chance of survival..."
Switching into "Daredevil" mode, he began to try to sense his surroundings. To his consternation, he couldn't sense a darn thing because of the racket Thin Lizzie made every time her flabby body connected with the floor!
"Wait a minute! That's it! The ridiculously loud and obvious sound her impact makes!" Yamcha shouted, elated. Turning toward the site of the latest "THUMP!", he adopted his trademark fighting stance.
"Wolf-fang kitty-impaling fist!" he bellowed, attacking with unspeakable fury.
KER-SPLAT!
Now that he didn't have to guard himself from the fiend's sharp claws and pointy teeth, Yamcha wiped some of the cat fur out of his eyes so he could see. It wasn't a pretty sight; Lizzie had basically exploded on impact, leaving only her head sitting atop a pile of gore.
"Hooray! Mission accomplished!" Yamcha crowed, dancing a jig in celebration. Just then, he heard the doorbell ring, and his heart fell to his big toe. Bulma was home! How was he going to explain this?
As he ran to answer the door, one thought kept racing through Yamcha's head: "I'm dead. I'm dead. I'm dead. I'm dead."
The moment he opened the door, he heard Bulma gasp in alarm. Her hands flying to her mouth, Bulma gasped, "Oh my gosh! Yamcha, what happened to you? You're bleeding like crazy!"
"I... uh..." he choked, trying desperately to come up with a cover story.
"Ooooh, it was awful!" a tiny voice from behind him cried. Turning around, Yamcha was surprised to find Puar awake and on his feet (despite his two black eyes and bloody nose).
Bulma gasped again when she saw Puar's sorry state. Pouting at Yamcha, she shouted, "Hey! Did you two get in a fight or something?"
This, of course, cued two king-sized faceplants. As they picked themselves off the floor, Puar squeaked, "Of course not! But, sadly, we were unable to stop Thin Lizzie from suffering a tragic fate. See?"
Puar pointed at the spot in the hall where the cat's remains still lay. If it weren't for the fact that he felt they were both doomed anyway, Yamcha would have killed Puar! What was he thinking?
"EEEEEEEEEEK!" Bulma screeched. "Wh-what on earth happened to poor Lizzie?"
Before Yamcha could say anything, Puar sobbed, "It was awful, Bulma! She ate all seven dragon balls, someone on TV said 'I wish', and it was all over. We tried to stop her, we really did!"
"Oh, poor Lizzie!" Bulma howled. "She didn't deserve this! Why couldn't it have been Yamcha?"
"HEY!"
"And that's not all! She was about to eat your jewelry, too!" Puar added.
At this, Bulma's emotions underwent a 180-degree turnaround. "She WHAT? Then she deserved worse! Yamcha, clean up the remains of that traitor, will you? After that, you can go home."
"S-sure!" Yamcha shouted, nearly unable to hide his joy at cheating death. "Right away!"
---------------------
"Yech... that's the last of her," Yamcha muttered, shoveling something red into the trash. Turning toward Puar, he dropped to his knees, hugged him, and sobbed, "Puar, what you pulled back there was pure genius! I love you, man; you're a true friend!"
"Hey, don't mention it. That's what friends are for, right?" he said, grinning at Yamcha. "And it wasn't genius. You just have to know which buttons to push."
Puar floated up and landed on Yamcha's shoulder, and the two were about to leave when Yamcha got a funny look on his face. Opening the trash can, he pulled out the head and pocketed it.
"Gotta have a momento... this is the first opponent I've beaten since season four of 'Dragon Ball'!"
Meanwhile, inside the house...
Looking frustrated, Bulma pulled item after item out of her medicine cabinet. From the looks of things, her search was proving fruitless.
"Darn it! I know I put those birth-control pills in here somewhere..." she said through gritted teeth.
After looking for a few more moments, she finally shrugged and began putting the removed items back inside the cabinet. Shutting it, she muttered, "Oh, well. It's only one night. What's the worst that could happen?"
---------------------
Three weeks after the "Lizzie" incident...
Yamcha, the legendary desert bandit, sat atop a cliff overlooking the barren, sandy wasteland. Yamcha himself looked nearly as bleak as the landscape; his scars were more pronounced than ever, his clothes were torn and unkempt, he looked miserable, and he obviously hadn't shaved in over a week. Puar sat beside him, staring at his longtime buddy in concern.
"Yamcha... are you going to be all right?" he whispered.
"I don't know, Puar," he answered. "I got mutilated by an obese cat, I found out my girlfriend was carrying another man's kid, my stocks all failed, pirates burned down my house, and then I got violently ill."
Looking pensive, Puar asked, "That was the day Zarbon called to express his undying love for you, right?"
"Let's not talk about it..." Yamcha blurted angrily. Calming down, he remarked, "Yeah, my life has basically fallen down around my ears over the past month. But, I'm not going to let it get to me."
"Attaboy, Yamcha!" Puar exclaimed. "Keep your head held high!"
Standing up to face the sunset, Yamcha said, "Yeah... this is just an opportunity to make a new start. I won't make the same mistakes this time, either. That baseball career was fun, but it made me get soft. It's time to prove what Yamcha the Bandit can really do. Starting today, I'm going to train until I'm the strongest man alive, even stronger than Goku! And I'm going to do it with my new technique..."
At these words, Puar's face went white. "Y-you don't mean THAT technique, do you?"
"Heh, heh, heh... yes, that's the one," Yamcha chuckled, slipping something furry and white onto his hand. Suddenly, he struck a strange, new pose that looked downright eerie in front of the setting sun.
Bathed in crimson light, he held his cat-head-clad hand aloft.
"Better get ready, world... for the Cat-fang Fist!"
THE END
----------------------------------------
Man, I'm such a jerk for writing this. PETA's vetenarian-ninjas are probably going to hunt me down and assassinate me. Still, I hope it was awfully funny, as opposed to just being awful.
Interestingly enough, "Thin Lizzie" was based off a real cat of the same name. One of my best friends in high school described his home as "a seething, writhing den of cats" (his mom wouldn't get rid of any of them and wouldn't pay for neutering). His personal favorite was a large, fuzzy monster named "Thin Lizzie" who was reportedly just as I described her here. She was one mean kitty. Luckily, the real Lizzie is alive and well to the best of my knowledge.
Warped though this chapter was, I hope you all enjoyed it! Leave a review, purty please!