April 4th, 2004
The last thing Android 18 had expected a week before she was due to walk the aisle with Krillin was to materialise in the middle of an unfamiliar city. She blinked, blonde hair lashing around her face as the wind blew past skyscrapers. She was floating in the sky, hovering some distance above a tall tower.
Alarmingly, she could sense none of the other z-fighters on the planet, which either meant that they were all dead or that she was no longer on Earth. The latter, probably.
Whatever. She'd been through worse. Being swallowed through Cell's vacuum asshole and feeling every moment of it had been traumatic enough for her to easily accept her new circumstances.
Although she was quite sure that she was still in one piece, she glanced down at her front, finding the faintest mark on her black blouse.
Right.
The first order of business was to find a boutique.
Inter-dimensionally Displaced Bride and Hungry Ghoul
It turned out that they didn't accept zeni as currency here. 18 sighed as the currency exchange clerk examined her money, folding her arms. "Can't you exchange zeni for yen around here?" The question was ultimately futile to ask, but she asked it anyway. It helped her stay sane.
"Madam," the lady at he counter stressed. "I've never encountered such currency before. Maybe you should try a different booth."
"Never mind. Give it here."
Tentatively, the woman held out the cash, and 18 snatched it from her and shoved it back into her wallet.
Only one option left for her, then.
Virtually broke on an Earth that wasn't hers, 18 put on the cutest dress at the first boutique she came across. The retail assistant gushed and giggled when she came out of the dressing room, under the impression that she was a paying customer. 18 wondered what the girl would think if she knew that she wouldn't be forking anything out.
"I'll take these," 18 decided after trying on seven dresses, thirteen miniskirts, eleven tops, and three pairs of lingerie. Krillin's jaw would drop when he saw her in those. Bulma would surely be working on a way to get her back by now—If any of those fighting-obsessed pain in the ass freaks have even noticed I'm missing—and it would only be a matter of time before she was showering her bald fiancé with invigorating sex and cuddles.
"Do you have a boyfriend?" the retail assistant chattered as she scanned 18's clothes. Another assistant was packing the scanned clothes into a fancy bag.
"Fiancé," amended 18, a small smile on her lips. "We're getting married next Friday."
"Oh em gee! That's sooo cute! Your future husband is a lucky man! You're gonna knock him dead when he sees you wearing these." She finished scanning the last blouse. "That will be sixty-nine thousand yen in total!" The assistant punched the numbers into the cash register. "That'll be card, right, ma'am?"
"You also get this free poster for making a purchase over eight-thousand yen," the other girl behind the counter added, unfurling a poster of a blonde model pouting into the camera. It was signed Misa Amane.
18 scrutinised the model. She was certainly beautiful, but her kind of cutesy beauty was the kind that faded quickly with age. Frowning, 18 put a finger to her chin. I could probably make it as a model in this world. Then she would have some kind of income. That'd be too much work, though. I'll be gone in a week, anyway. 18 took the bags, snatched a pair of stylish sunglasses from off the rack, and spun on her heel.
"Sorry, ladies," she called back without much vigour. "But I have places to be."
"Huh?! Hey, w-wait, that's stealing! Come back!"
No shit it's stealing, 18 thought caustically. She strutted down the streets of Tokyo, bags swinging by her side.
18 hit six more designer boutiques, exiting the last one decked head to toe in designer. Behind her, the employees scrambled to call the police, who had already received several similar alerts.
Blissfully uncaring of her accumulating thefts, 18 stopped before an intersection, flipping a makeup mirror open before applying a fresh coat of lipstick. It wasn't like the police would be able to touch her, anyway—the very idea was laughable, considering she could decimate the entire planet and more. If she worked hard enough, the galaxy would be nothing but dust, but there was no fun in that. It would be a very lonely existence, even for one week.
"There she is!" a male voice called, followed by several footsteps stomping her way.
The light turned green.
18 crossed the intersection, surrounded by everyday citizens.
"Hey, get back here!"
But by the time the crowd had dissipated, 18 was already gone. On top of a skyscraper, she stared down at the confused officers, unable to figure out where she had gone.
18 shook her head.
Humans were so annoying.
As annoying as they were, humans were also resourceful. The moment news of a disappearing thief broke out within the NPA, the information reached L's ears. At a rather inconvenient time, too, because L was busy reviewing his university opening speech.
Well, not really.
The speech had been generic and copy-and-paste as it could get.
"A disappearing thief?" L echoed, brow creasing slightly at the gothic W on the screen. He was tucked in his room and surrounded by trays and trays of sweets while the rest of the Task Force were working downstairs.
Watari responded by forwarding to him clips from street cameras.
Curiosity piqued, L ran through them, keeping his eyes peeled for the movements of the elusive thief. Could she be related to Kira...? His Light Yagami theory was still as strong as ever, but an accomplice or an acquaintance or even just someone with a similar power was not out of the picture yet.
A blonde woman, it seemed, and certainly not one L would have first pegged for a thief based on her flashy, attention-seeking wardrobe. Then again, he still had Wedy on his contact list, so maybe he shouldn't have been so prejudiced.
The thief halted at an intersection, reapplying her lipstick. Then the light went green, and she found herself surrounded all sides by unwitting citizens. She disappeared out of the frame after reaching the middle of the pedestrian crossing—the view switched to another camera's scope.
L blinked.
She disappeared. Just—poof.
Hastily, he rewound the footage.
The people walking around her were still there—their faces were the same. The transition between the two cameras had been practically seamless. His first thought was that the vanishing thief had been masterfully edited into the first rendition of the footage—but that was highly, highly unlikely. Not even someone of Matt's caliber would've been able to produce such astonishingly realistic work in such short time. Besides—why would they? Unless this was some strange fear-mongering tactic orchestrated by Kira...
But assuming Kira is Light Yagami, that is also unlikely. L thumbed his lip, staring at the screen. Light Yagami is too careful and too concerned with maintaining his facade at this point.
This woman—this thief—was another case entirely. Kira thought himself a god—he would not concern himself with hedonistic pursuits such as stealing for glamour and vanity.
Then... L watched the woman disappear over and over again, the people around her too busy with their phones or their next destination to even pay her any attention. Who are you?
A/N: If any one of you so much as takes this story seriously, especially you power-scaling cAn hE bEaT gOkU DBZ fanboys, I will come into your house and shoot you nine times in the chest.
