Tyranny and Mutation
Chapter 5
--Planet Earth...
They looked at a section on the page that read, 'In loving memory of Bulma Brief'. Bra raised an eyebrow and scrolled on down to the picture of the woman the page was dedicated to.
"Th-that's Mom," Bra said.
Trunks could only stare at the name and the picture.
"That's Mom," Bra repeated.
Trunks shook his head. "No. There's no way. There's no way that's possible."
Bra closed her eyes and put her hand on her forehead. "Of course, it's possible. Mandolin told us that our mother wasn't from Planet Vegeta. She doesn't look like any of the other Saiyan females either."
"But to find out she's from here? You don't find that the least bit odd? That out of all the planets in the universe, our mother is from the same planet we just happened to decide to investigate? It's like some unknown force is pulling the strings behind the scenes," Trunks said thoughtfully.
"Trunks, you're paranoid," Bra told him. "Maybe Mandolin just knew what we would be looking for when we set out. Don't put too much thought into stuff like that. We should concentrate on more important things..."
Trunks nodded. "Alright, fine." He got quiet and started thinking about their current situation and how they would convince the Earthlings that they should fight beside them against the universally powerful force known as the Saiyan Elite army.
After a short silence, Bra smiled. "Of course!"
Trunks flinched, and then sighed. "Don't startle me like that! What is it?"
"Sorry, but I just realized something," Bra said. "The reason Goten's parents insist that they know us is because they must have known our mom."
"Come on. That's a bit far fetched, don't you think?" Trunks asked. "I mean, it's crazy enough that we're on the same planet that our mother's from, but that we've run into people who knew her personally. That's ludicrous."
"Why is that so hard to believe? Goten's brother is the president of the company that our mother obviously used to have dealings with," Bra pointed out. "Why wouldn't they have known our mother? The picture of her is from at least within the last 20 years."
Trunks frowned. "This is making my head hurt."
"It's a lot to grasp," Bra said. She rubbed her eyes. "I'll tell you what. We'll continue on that end of things another day." She started typing on the computer again.
"Didn't you just say we were stopping on that for today? What are you doing now?" Trunks asked.
"I'm doing a little school research," Bra replied. "The more we know, the more we can blend in."
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--Planet Vegeta...
Bulma stomped into the war council room, where she was told she could find her husband. "Vegeta, this is the last straw!"
All eyes were on the queen.
"Woman, what are you doing here? I told you never to interrupt a war council meeting," Vegeta said angrily.
"Well, I think I've got more than enough reason to!" Bulma shouted. She held up the data strip that his Tactician and his Head of Intelligence had brought to her.
King Vegeta II stood. "Everyone out. I must speak to the queen privately."
Bulma put her hands on her hips and glared at Vegeta as the entire council retired to the hallway. Once they were gone, Bulma held the data strip up again. "I was in the middle of putting the finishing touches on the prototype battle pod you wanted with all the specifications you asked for. Then two of your cronies come up to me with this--"
"Don't talk to me like that. I'm your king," Vegeta said. "I demand respect."
"Oh, cut the charade, Vegeta. Your band of followers isn't here. And I wouldn't care if they were, I'd still say what needs to be said," Bulma told him. She walked closer to him. "After all these years I thought you would have caught onto that by now."
Vegeta gritted his teeth. "I don't have all day for your incessant nagging. I have important matters to attend to. So say what it is you came all the way here to say." He smirked. "Or maybe you just missed me."
"Hardly," Bulma spat out. "Making last minute changes like this will set me back a couple of days--"
Vegeta's smirk disappeared. "A couple of days? We don't have a couple of days. We need those battle pods with improved com systems in production by the end of the day. You should have been spending your time working on the prototype instead of coming here, you insolent female."
"I can't, bonehead," Bulma retorted. "I'd like to work on something I don't have the part for, but it would take even longer to develop the part than it would be to have it delivered. I ordered it from Tondurae 8. It seems the Unnur sector has an extremely sophisticated communication system, so we'll just have to fight fire with fire."
"This won't do. I want those new battle pods tomorrow, and I won't settle for anything less," Vegeta told her. "Any more time wasted and we could lose our hold on the Unnur sector."
"Well, you can't always get what you want, Your Highness," Bulma said sarcastically. "I'm doing the best I can. If I develop the part from scratch, it'll take about 2 more weeks. Since I ordered it, it'll only take about 2 more days. So just sit tight. It's not gonna get ready any faster than that."
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--Planet Earth...
The next day dawned and the siblings still had more work to do. They would have to remember to go out and buy new clothes after school. They just put together some outfits from what they had in the closet of their capsule house. But the latest school fashions here on Earth were sure to be much different. They had no backpacks, but that didn't matter to them today.
Signing up to attend school was the hard part, but eventually they got it done. They didn't, however, sign up for classes. If they were going to take classes there, they may as well take them with people they knew. Goten and Pan.
The young half-Saiyans were sitting at one of the picnic tables outside the school when they heard a voice call out to them.
"Hey, Bra! Hey, Trunks!" Pan shouted as they arrived early for school. Pan was apparently full of energy.
Goten, on the other hand, looked like he'd just woken up. He even yawned as he waved to them.
The siblings turned to the two black-haired students and waved to them. They took seats at the table with them. Since Bra and Trunks were sitting across from each other, Pan decided to sit beside Trunks and Goten ended up sitting beside Bra.
"Hi," Bra said to Goten. She turned to face him and presented a smile.
Goten's eyes seemed to open then. "Uh, hi." He looked away a little.
"You know, my brother and I haven't signed up for classes, yet," Bra began, still smiling. "I was hoping I could have all my classes with you."
Goten looked at her, a little befuddled.
Trunks put his hand over his eyes. :I don't think she could possibly be more obvious about the fact that she likes this guy.:
Pan watched them and grinned. "That would be great. Even though we're at different grade levels, Uncle Goten and I have a lot of the same classes. So maybe all 4 of us could have pretty much the same schedule." She looked at Trunks. "That way, you two will always have someone to help you find your way around."
"Hey, thanks. This is a pretty big school. I can imagine a lot of newcomers get lost trying to make it to class on time," Trunks said. He looked over at Goten and saw that he was still amazed by Bra's comment. He looked back at Pan. "Hey, could you take me on a little tour before classes start?" He stood.
Pan raised her eyebrows and stood as well. "Alright." She looked at Goten and Bra. "We'll see you two in our first class."
Bra smiled at her brother and Pan.
Goten looked like he didn't want them to leave.
Unfortunately, they left anyway.
Bra turned back to Goten. "Would that be alright with you? If we have the same schedule?"
Goten tried to recover from his speechless state. "I... That is... Well, I wouldn't mind. I mean, it would be alright." His face was slowly beginning to turn a little red.
"Good," Bra said, her smile widening. She pushed her hair behind her ears. "Good. I think I'll do that." She sighed. "I'm not gonna lie to you, Goten. I'm not the kind of girl who likes to beat around the bush in most situations." She blushed and looked away. "I know we don't really know each other, but I have to ask this question... Will your girlfriend be angry if you and I have every class together?" She frowned to herself. :That didn't come out right: she thought.
Goten looked confused. "Girlfriend? What girlfriend?"
Bra smiled. :But that was the kind of answer I was looking for: she thought. "Never mind. Why don't we talk a little? Get to know each other."
--school perimeter...
"So, what's Greenland like?" Pan asked, putting her hands in her pockets and slowly walking beside Trunks.
"Huh? Greenland?" Trunks questioned, looking a little confused.
Pan looked at him strangely. "Yeah. Greenland. You know, the place you're from." She cocked her head to the side.
"Oh, I thought you said...Cream Land," Trunks said. :I probably should have told Bra to do some research on this place she said we were from: he thought. "Well, there's not much to look at where I'm from. Not much vegetation and things like that. We mostly rely on our technology in order to trade for goods from other plan--" He looked surprised. "Other places," he corrected. :That was a close one.:
"That's something I didn't know about Greenland. Of course, I don't know much about Greenland at all to tell the truth. I don't even know what part of the world it's in. I never paid much attention in geography class," Pan told him. "But now I've found a reason to be interested." She looked at him and smiled.
Trunks smiled back at her.
--picnic tables...
"Wow. That's unbelievable," Goten said to Bra. "Sounds like your teacher was really something else."
"He was," Bra told him. "He pretty much raised Trunks and me. We rarely saw our parents at all. He taught us everything we know. From fighting to gardening. Everything. Fighting was something I found very interesting, but I have to say that the majority of my interests lie in technology." She pulled out a scouter and showed it to Goten. "We have these devices where I'm from called scouters. They show how much fighting spirit someone has and where that person is located."
Goten looked at the scouter strangely. "I've never seen anything like that before. I didn't know they made things like that. What in the world would people in Greenland need with something that does that?"
Bra's eyes got big. "Uhhhh..." She looked away. "Well, it's like a life energy indicator... It helps locate people who get lost out in blizzards?" She frowned a little. :Bringing this up was a huge mistake: she thought. "Anyway, I made an advancement on mine so that it not only tells what a person's life energy is, but it also closes in more to assess terrain three-dimensionally. Just a little something I've been working on." She held it up to Goten's eye and zoomed in on the location of the school. "See?"
"This is really cool. It reminds me of some of the video games I've played," Goten said.
"Video...games?" Bra asked.
"You don't know what video games are? Don't you have those in Greenland?" Goten questioned.
Bra shook her head.
"Oh, man. You're really missing out. I'll have to show you sometime. If you like dealing with things like this, you'll love video games," Goten informed. He looked around and spotted Trunks and Pan on the radar. "What are those figures? And why are some brighter than others?"
"Well, older scouters used a numbering system for identifying life energies. Now we have a system of identifying them by how bright the images are in comparison to others," Bra said. "The brighter the image, the higher that person's life energy. The brightest images are most likely Trunks and Pan."
Goten laughed a little. "This is funny. You know, I have a different method of locating people by their life energy."
Bra looked a little confused. "You do? Do you have a machine like that here too?"
"No. I sense energies. It's a lot easier than using something like this," Goten said, giving the scouter back to Bra.
Bra looked amazed. :Sensing energies:
"I mean, if someone masks his energy, you'd never be able to find him with something like that," Goten said. "Of course, you wouldn't have to worry about people masking their energies where you're from because if they're lost in a blizzard, they probably want to be found."
--around school...
Pan tiptoed into an open classroom, followed by Trunks, who was walking regularly. The lights were off and no one else was there.
"What are we doing?" Trunks asked.
"Shhh!" Pan whispered. "We're just having a little fun. That's all. This is our math teacher's class. She giggled. "She likes to write on the board." She stalked over to the chalk tray, pulling Trunks along, and looked at the chalk inside. She smiled devilishly. "But I'll tell you what she hates. Short chalk." She grabbed some chalk from the tray and handed it to Trunks. Then she grabbed some for herself and started breaking them into small pieces.
Trunks raised his eyebrows. :What a mischievous girl. I think I'm gonna like hanging around her:
"Come on. What are you waiting for?" Pan asked him. She continued to break every piece of chalk she could find. "You said that you like to have fun." She giggled.
Trunks laughed a little and started breaking the chalk as well. "This isn't just fun. It's fiendish." He broke all the chalk Pan had given him. When he reached for some more, Pan was reaching for some at the same time. Their hands touched and they looked at each other, both blushing a little.
Suddenly the classroom light came on.
--End Chapter 5--
--Thanks for reading this chapter of Tyranny and Mutation. I see that I'm not getting many reviews for this story, but for those of you who are reading and reviewing, thank you. I don't care if there's only one person out there who likes this story, I'm gonna keep writing. And I like it, so that's enough to keep me writing.
