Happy Holidays, if you celebrate anything. Enjoy!

Another day, another council meeting.

Vegeta had been sitting in on these for the past month, at the behest of his father. And each one was more boring than the last. The only amusement he found in them was during heated arguments. Last time, it nearly turned into a fist fight. But other than that, it was a dull, plodding, monotonous gathering. When he became king, he was going to make drastic changes to this tradition.

Most of all, it made him miss Bulma.

She had been gone for nearly three months. He hadn't even spoken to her since the night she landed back on Earth. He knew she was a busy woman, probably doing a hairbrained scheme to help the cause back here, but he still missed her. The moment the killer was caught, he was hopping on the first pod to Earth. There would be a lot of lost time to make up for, between them. For now, he took some comfort in knowing that she was out of harm's way. Sometimes, it was the only thing that could get him through a long day without her.

Nappa nudged him on the arm, bringing him back to the meeting. The Arlian envoy was still talking about trade routes. How much longer was this supposed to take?

"So as you can see, gentlemen," the giant bug said, "we should be able to do swift and fast travel between planets very soon."

The king cleared his throat. Vegeta knew his father well enough to know that he was just as enthralled. "Thank you, Greger. We appreciate your planet's cooperation. You are dismissed."

He bowed and left the room.

The king let out a breath. "Now that is out of the way, we will conclude this meeting with a report regarding the murders. Will someone please let in our guests from the lab?"

One of the council members opened the door, letting Haricot and Mizu into the room. They took a seat at the end of the table.

The king continued. "I understand that you have had a bit of a breakthrough. Is that correct?"

Now here was something that caught Vegeta's attention. He sat up and listened, as they spoke.

"We have, your majesty," Haricot said. "Through independent investigations, we have come up with a theory. We believe that the culprit is an Earth scientist called Dr. Gero. Mizu, if you please."

Mizu passed out papers to the council members. Vegeta looked at Nappa's packet. Printed on the front was an emblem: two triangles fused together with two Rs on it.

"Dr. Gero worked for a military called the Red Ribbon Army. While it is long since defunct, there is no confirmation of his death or whereabouts. Our independent investigators discovered that he was making what he called androids - humans fused with machines. And one of his 'stealth models' is a perfect match for the killer. If you turn to page three, you can see an image of it."

Nappa turned to that page, and Vegeta's eyes lit with recognition. That was him. It looked just like the bastard he had fought all those weeks ago.

"But that was not all," Haricot continued. "For Mizu discovered something we neglected at a crime scene. Mizu?"

She nodded. "I managed to recover something that most of us thought was lost - one of the murder weapons. In the alley where the Saiyan, Beets, was rescued, I found a large dagger. I couldn't find any DNA on it, but what I did find was a chip. Upon reading it, I discovered that it was, indeed, from Gero. Further connecting him to the crime."

Vegeta could hardly believe it. Months of speculation were finally being put to rest. Now, the only question left would be what to do about it. As he pondered the information in his head, a horrifying thought came over him. If this scientist were on Earth, did that mean that planet was at risk? Was Bulma at risk? In putting her out of harm's way, had he put another target on her back? For both of their sakes, he hoped not.

"This is very impressive," the king said. "I commend your research. But what would he want with us Saiyans, all the way out here?"

"I'm getting to it. You see, also on that same chip, I found a letter from Gero to some of the leaders on Earth. He sees us as a threat to their way of life, and that our interests don't align with theirs. So he proposed a way to 'mitigate' it. I think you can put together the rest from there."

The council members began to murmur to each other. This meant there was a greater conspiracy at work than they had initially thought.

"There's more."

Haricot looked over at her. "What do you mean 'there's more'? You didn't brief us on it."

"That's because I hadn't found it, yet." Mizu dropped another pile of papers onto the table. "I did some digging, and I believe there's a greater anti-Saiyan sentiment on Earth than just one man. When our alliance was first forming, many spoke out against us, using the same language that Gero used in his letter. I was led to believe that Gero was just an extremist, but maybe this is more normal there than we would have expected."

The papers were passed around the table. Sure enough, it contained many articles and discussions from Earthlings talking about Saiyans in a negative manner. Some were mildly disapproving, while others were much harsher. The evidence was fairly damning. Some of the men had a hard time believing what they were reading.

The king nodded, after looking over a particularly mean page. He cleared his throat. "Well… I appreciate being alerted to this. We will take this into consideration, moving forward. Was that all you had wanted to share?"

Haricot had already stood up, slowly dragging Mizu by the arm out of the room. "I believe so, your majesty. Have a good-"

Mizu cut him off, wriggling out of his grasp. "Not yet. I have one more thing to share."

"Alright," said the king. "You have the floor."

"I discovered all of this independently, with another scientist. She used to work here, but was removed a while ago. I wish to bring her back. Her name is Okra, and I think she'll be a great asset to our team."

Haricot's eyes widened in shock. In a rare sight, he looked to be close to snapping at her. Instead, he spoke directly to the king. "Your majesty, Okra was terminated due to uncooperative behavior. These are desperate times, I'm aware, but surely, we aren't desperate enough to ask for her help"

"What," Mizu snapped at him. "She's the reason I was able to find all of this! You're not going to let her back on just because of that?!"

"Yeah," one of the councilmen spoke. "If this Okra was as invaluable as the woman says, why shouldn't she be back on the team? And these are desperate times, Haricot. We need all the help we can get."

This started a heated argument between the councilmen, Mizu, and Haricot. The king put his hand on his forehead and dragged his hand down his face, rolling his eyes. Vegeta and Nappa just glanced at each other, watching their tempers flare. Finally, the king called everyone back to order.

"That's enough," he said, exasperatedly, silencing the chatter. "As I said, we will take your concerns into consideration, and let you know what we decide." Haricot tried to speak, but the king silenced him with his hand. "I said that was enough. Once again, I commend you for your research. You two are dismissed."

Somewhat sheepishly, Haricot bowed and left the room, followed by Mizu.

"Alright," said the king, pressing his fingers to his temple, "We will decide what to do about the scientist another day. I will need to talk with the rest of the lab to learn more. For now, let's focus on everything we've learned, today. What do we do with all of this information?"

Of course, the first to speak up was Chini. "I have a proposal," he said, raising his hand. Vegeta rolled his eyes, when he spoke.

"You have the floor, Chini."

"Well, we seem to have ample evidence that the Earthlings are hostile to Saiyans. Looking at Gero's credentials, he had a lot of prestige and influence. So did those Red Ribbon bastards. Am I not correct in that assessment?"

The councilmen all nodded along.

"Well, then perhaps for the moment, we shouldn't do any more business with the Earth."

Vegeta's head shot up and he glared at him. "What?"

"Why not? If we're to believe they're involved, then why should we continue our relationship with them? Just for the sake of safety, if nothing else. If your neighbor kept breaking into your home, you would build a fence to keep them out, would you not?"

"Isn't that a tad excessive," Nappa asked.

"Certainly not. I'm not suggesting we cut ties with them permanently, but we need to now, to mitigate any problems going forward."

The councilmen were silently nodding along. It sounded logical, to them.

"You're being ridiculous," Vegeta said. He couldn't believe that they were all agreeing with this backwards logic. "Permission to speak, father?"

"You have the floor, Vegeta," said the king. He gave him a look that meant 'please don't embarrass me'.

"How many of these anti-Saiyan sentiments do we have in front of us - a few dozen, a few hundreds? Earth has seven billion people on it. That's only a fraction of them. The Earth has been an invaluable resource to us - both on Planet Vegeta and with other planets. Would it be wise to cut ties with them because of some mean words and one extremist?"

"Ah, but we can't forget," Chini countered, "when we live under the Tuffles, it started as just 'some mean words'. It can only escalate from there. And you didn't address how much power people like Gero and the Red Ribbon Army had."

"Yeah. Had. It was decades before we even started communicating with Earth."

"Maybe so, but that influence doesn't magically go away. Either way, it's simply too risky to continue our relationship as normal. Not when Saiyans keep dying."

"Chini's right," another councilman said. "It's a precaution. Who knows how many other people like him are on that planet? They could engineer something even worse. Especially if they have that power and infastructure behind them."

Vegeta felt like he was going crazy. "Do you not hear yourselves, right now? These are all conspiracies. Did we see any of those world powers reply to his letter? For all that we know, he was talking to thin air."

"And for all that we know, he wasn't," said Chini. "Either way, it's too big of a risk to continue on as normal."

He rolled his eyes. "Oh please. The only reason you're suggesting it is because you've hated Earth since the beginning."

Chini laughed. "I could say the same for you. You're the one letting your school boy lust cloud your judgement."

"What was that," he snapped, standing up out of his chair. Everyone in the room went silent, watching the two of them go at it.

"You and I both know if this were any other planet, you'd be on board with me. But because it's your precious little mate's home planet, you're telling us to be cautious. Even when the fate of our entire race is on the line."

Vegeta was seething. He slammed his hands down on the table, sending all of the papers flying around the room. "You continue to talk like that, and it'll be your own life on the line, next!"

He raised a hand to his chest. "Temper, temper, your highness. I was only wondering why the fate of a backwater planet matters more than your own. No need to get so defensive."

"Vegeta," the king said in an aside, "remember what we talked about."

The words were suddenly caught in his throat, and his jaw dropped. His father wasn't even going to stand by him? He looked back at Chini, who had a smug look on his face. Vegeta groaned, and sat back down in his seat. He crossed his arms and tapped his fingers into his biceps.

"Alright," said the king, "I think we are getting needlessly worked up over hypotheticals. We will meet again tomorrow and discuss the terms then. We'll need to talk to the Earthlings about it, too. All in favor?"

Everyone said 'aye'.

"Then this meeting is adjourned."

Soon, the room began to clear out. Vegeta shot up out of his chair and started stomping towards the door. He was practically seeing red, hearing how the others talked to him. The lack of respect they showed floored him. Had they forgotten that he was their prince? He needed to blow off some steam, before he ripped someone's head off.

"Vegeta, stop. I want to speak with you in private."

He stopped and his hands clenched into fists at his sides. Slowly, he exhaled and turned around. His father stood up out of his chair and walked over to him.

"So," the king began, "is there anything you have to say about your behavior today?"

"If you're asking if I'm sorry, I'm not."

"That's a shame, because you'll have to tell him so, when we meet again tomorrow."

Vegeta glared at his father. "Why would you make me do that?! You heard how he was speaking!"

"And I could have dealt with it, had you not snapped at him. Aggravating our allies will only make things worse." He sighed. "My son, I know that these meetings can seem tedious. Especially when they don't see things the way you do. But that is no reason to start flying off the handle. This is precisely why I wanted you to begin sitting in on these meetings with me. You'll have to deal with things like this a lot more, when you become king. So you have to learn to control your temper."

"Is that all you wanted to speak with me about? You just wanted to lecture me about staying quiet, while hearing someone go on an unhinged conspiracy rant?"

"That is not what I meant and you know it," he said firmly. "I never once asked you to be quiet or to not voice your grievances. But you have to do it in the right way. Or else you'll provoke people that we need the most. I can see all of this is getting to you. So perhaps, you should sit out tomorrow's meeting."

His jaw dropped. "You don't think I can be a part of an important conversation because I spoke up against someone too harshly?!"

"And this is exactly why I'm doing this. You are clearly stressed out and not in a good mood, with everything going on. So I don't think you have a clear head right now. You will have plenty of chances in the future to participate. But for tomorrow, I need you to take a break. A real break. No training, no royal duties: just a day to relax. When you're in a better headspace, then you can rejoin us."

Vegeta tried to find the right words, but they died in his mouth. He did bring up a good point. There was a lot going on. The new royal duties, the murders, being away from Bulma: it was all piling on top of him at once. Maybe he was right. A break would do him some good. Even just one day. He finally sighed. "Very well."

The king nodded. "Good. I'll be making sure you hold up your end of the bargain. You are dismissed." He patted him on the shoulder, as he left the room.