"Therefore, the board wants to change the name of Satan Security back to Chayote Security," a balding man in a stiff black suit and black rim glasses concluded his presentation with a bunch of charts showing numbers that Chayote could have kept track of if she gave it a chance but willingly chose not to halfway through the meeting.
"W-Wait up a second," Mark Hercule stood up with a sweaty forehead. "This is a little bit sudden, isn't it? Do you mean you want to remove me as the head of Satan Security? I am Mark Satan!"
"Correction, Hercule-san, you WERE Mark Satan. Before you legally changed your name, consulting no one on the board or minding the effect that this change would have on the company. Ever since its founding, Chayote Security and now Satan Security rely on name recognition. Chayote-san worked hard for years to associate her name with security, you risked your life and rescued hundreds of thousands if not millions of people, associating your face and your name with security and increasing the worth of our branding more than ever before. Don't get me wrong, Satan Security is an incredibly stupid name for a private security company, but before we had your name to associate it with. Now it's just called that for no reason other than brand recognition, I suppose…" another, taller board member with broad shoulders elaborated on.
"This move just makes more sense, and, frankly, you should have been the one to propose it. Aren't you focusing on your political career now, Hercule-san?" the balding board member added. "You know you cannot hold a political position like the King of the World as well as be the president of a major private corporation, right? That'd be the motherlode of all confusion of private and public interest."
"I… I guess I hadn't thought about it that way," Mark Hercule scratched the back of his head, working his fingers through his black curly afro while sweating and chuckling nervously. The current president of Satan Security settled back down and began fiddling with his tie to make more air for himself to breathe and cool off the nervous blush of his skin. "Obviously, I don't have any problems with the company changing names. Chayote-san is just as important to this company's legacy as I am, if not more so."
Chayote stood up, forcing her chair to drag across the overpriced tiles before shoving it back to the table, closing her eyes, and shutting herself off this meeting. She was about to walk out on this annoying and pointless affair, caring very little about something as trivial as what their company is called. Mark kept telling her she doesn't have to attend every board meeting if she doesn't want to, but he guaranteed her an important spot on the board and the dividends from this position more than paid her and her family for the cost of living. And yet Chayote made time and would continue to do so as long as she's not off-world or fighting the next obsessive dirtbag threatening the Earth's safety.
In the end, Chayote was a Saiyan, and this matter, like many others, came down to her pride. She needed that exorbitant amount of money to feel self-reliant. To feel as if she could take care of herself and her son just as well, if not better if Mark Satan one day decided that she wasn't welcome in his home anymore. She couldn't stomach the charity and as long as both of them earned that ridiculous amount of money together, she felt like his equal, which made the fact that they were living under one roof feel like less of a charity. Not to mention, if she's getting paid for being an essential legacy board member of Satan Security, she had to attend every meeting. Otherwise, the fact she's getting paid all that money for nothing would make it no less charitable than it would be if Mark Satan just had her living under his roof for no reason and no part of Chayote's to play for it.
Even if she mocked Vegeta both internally and externally, for being the insecure and prideful prick that he was, maybe she had an unhealthy amount of Saiyan pride in her too. As she slowly clacked her heels to the door with a twitching right eye, feeling stress boiling up inside her, only hoping that Navy would avoid the pitfalls of Saiyan pride could keep Chayote from swelling out of her outfit and going ballistic.
"Excuse me, Chayote-san, is something wrong? You wish to leave the meeting?" a female board member stood up, stopping Chayote by addressing her when the rest of the board members just sweat and shifted their eyes with unease. She must've figured that since she had the least threatening body build and stature, Chayote would see her as so insignificant if she flipped out that she'd avoid tearing her up and crushing her into the ground purely from how offensively easy that feat would be.
"Yeah, what does it matter what's the company called? Chayote Security, Satan Security, Hercule Security… Who cares?" Chayote waved her hand in dismissal without turning around to face the woman. "If that's the most important question you want to discuss, I don't see the point of participating in this meeting. I've just recovered from an injury that made me worry I might not see my son grow up. I've got no time to waste on dumb bullshit like what's this company called…"
"Well… That's not all that we wanted to discuss, Chayote-san," the plump board member fixed his tie, accepting that he might have been putting his head on the line by joining the conversation. "Yes, the changing of the name of the company is profoundly important. It is the face of our company, the essence, and core of our branding. It is an integral part of what makes us all our livelihoods. There is nothing lost in changing the name of this company–most of our clients remember our roots, they remember you and the role you've played in saving the world. That will not always be the case. By relying on your name, instead of a name that's already been legally changed once, we are relying on longevity, we are forging a new legacy for our company."
"Are you in charge of our marketing department?" Chayote pointed at the short and balding board member, who threw his hands up, startled.
"W-Why yes, I am," the board member pulled on his collar, shifting in his chair like a chicken on the tray that was being heated in the oven.
"Good. You're pretty good at this. Almost made me think this nonsense is more important than seeing my son start talking," Chayote crossed her arms and squinted, shifting her weight on her left leg with a grim stare.
"W-Well… Thank you, ma'am… But… As I've said, there is another matter. In the case of Hercule-san's election to the office of the King of the World, we'll need a substitute president. The board would like to propose Chayote-san to return to her position as president of the newly re-named Chayote Security, but… In that case, our image would still be compromised because you still live under the same roof as Hercule-san. We'd like to hear your thoughts on this, would you be willing to return to an active leadership position in the company, and would you be willing to invest into your own home for it, maybe move to Central City?" the board member said.
"Take over Chayote Security again?" Chayote pondered, tapping her shoe.
"They're discussing my outing with me still in the room…" Hercule's head dipped as low as his neck would allow it as he sulked behind the desk. "That's so cruel."
"This is way too much right now. I need to think about it," Chayote dismissed it with a wave of her hand, turning to the door before the plump board member stood up and put his boot down.
"Chayote-san, this matter is the most important question we need to settle on in this meeting," he insisted. "It can't just be shrugged away how a child shrugs away a family trip they don't want to go to."
"There are plenty of capable enough candidates for the position, but none have your rich legacy with the company. Not to mention the fact that, as a Saiyan, you make our diversity rating go through the roof since very few companies have extraterrestrials in management positions. In terms of worthiness, nothing beats actually founding Chayote Security and building it from the ground up," the tiny female board member from earlier added.
"Besides, you have secured the essential Capsule Corps financial support that was needed to get this company off the ground. You have close ties to Capsule Corps and its management and Capsule Corps has risen to being the leader and the monopoly owner in far too many industries to just brush those sorts of connections away. I mean… The current King practically lost his career and credibility as a political leader by challenging Capsule Corps. There are things to discuss regarding the absolute dominance of Capsule Corps in the market, but as long as that dominance is pumping assets and support into us, we can discuss those things at a further date. A date yet to be determined," the broad-shouldered board member shrugged.
"None of this stuff will matter until Mark gets elected anyway," Chayote grit her teeth and clenched her fists against her best attempts to restrain herself. She turned away to hide how much wrath the mentioning of Capsule Corps' influence on her business made bubble up deep down. Chayote could have sworn that she heard a tear somewhere and her shirt began feeling increasingly tight around her body which was gaining bulk completely out of Chayote's control. It's been a while since she'd lost it like this. Managing her anger was one of the very few things she's been consistently working on since ending up on Earth.
"Well, I suppose that is true. As long as Chayote-san thinks this offer through and lets us know in one of the following meetings, I suppose there is no harm in forcing ourselves into a decision right now when the kingly race is still not over," a board member suggested with the rest of the board just nodding to each other in hesitant agreement. By the time a combined decision could be reached, Chayote was no longer in the room, just papers wildly flying about while the door to the office flapped front and back until shutting for good.
"Damn it…" Chayote groaned. Her blazer and shirt lay on the bed as she examined them in front of the mirror. Just to be safe, she blitzed home faster than the human eye, just in case someone could see whatever had ripped. She knew that whispering and pointing fingers could make her stress level even higher and make her just rip her outfit up for good. From the looks of it, it was just her shirt. It was as good as done in the state it was currently in, with a hole spanning most of Chayote's back.
"Dam!" a childish exclamation made Chayote stiffen with a dead stare at a blank point in the mirror as her heart sank to her heels and her blood froze over. Slowly, the Saiyan turned around to see her son floating behind her like a little guardian angel, the happiest she's ever seen him and shooting fists in the sky while kicking about in joy at his latest, potty-mouthed achievement.
"No… Please, no… Can you send that one back, just this one time, and give me a do-over? Please… Just say "Mom", or something… Heck, I'll settle for "Satan"… "Mark" is a very easy one, why not that?" Chayote slapped her forehead and ran her hand down, putting her best attempt at tearing her whole face off and bleeding out in front of her little rascal while bargaining with the forces that be to help her prove herself as less of a screwup of a mother than she felt she was.
"Dam!" Navy exclaimed with an almost devilish childlike cheer.
"Calm down… Breathe…" Chayote put her swollen arms up and slowly waved them down to her sides while breathing in and out. She could feel rock-hard biceps vanishing without a trace and the pulsing tension that made her face go red, alleviate and flush it with nice cool. "I'll just tell everyone your first words came out on an educational family trip down at the Mountain Pass Dam. The guide couldn't keep their mouth shut, so you naturally picked up the one word that was rehashed the most. It's perfectly logical. It's still salvageable, you're not an awful mother…"
"Dam!" Navy kept shooting fists into the sky and kicking around while Chayote gently scooped him out of the air and pressed him to her chest, walking up to the window to see Gohan and Videl sparring outside.
"That's right, it's a wall that stops or restricts the flow of surface water or underground streams. We had them on Planet Vegeta too, it's where your mom is from," Chayote whispered before softly pecking Navy's forehead. The little devil closed his eyes as if worried that his mother was going to gobble him up, but when Chayote pulled her lips away from her son's warm and silky-smooth forehead, she saw his eyes close and open again with increasingly delayed intervals.
The energetic little bundle of joy was getting sleepy. With enough luck, he'll find some new word soon enough and Chayote won't have to spend the rest of her life tangled in a lie that her child's first word was related to structures used to impound water.
Dressed in a suit of body armor that looked like something assembled from scraps of several destroyed Machine Mutant soldiers, Baby Vegeta sat atop of a swerved communications tower, overseeing the ruined M-2 Star. A teal-colored Machine Mutant scout flew up to the seated new owner of the cybernetic star riding on a rocket attached to a mechanical arm springing out from the scout's opened body. The cold black beads crossed with red lines in Baby Vegeta's eyes met the blinking red light in the scout's headpiece.
"You're the one that… Sacked M-2… But I feel compelled to fulfill your orders…" the scout spoke with a choppy, mechanical voice. Vegeta's rampage left very few survivors and those few that were left intact wouldn't be the same ever again. "M-2 seems lost… What are your orders…?"
"Hmm…" Baby Vegeta opened his mouth. His face began shifting as if something gooey was moving underneath his skin. From under his eyelids, his nose, and his mouth, the lavender-colored goop forced its way out and engulfed the petrified Machine Mutant scout whole. "Instead of me explaining it to you, why don't you see it through my own eyes? That is by far the most amazing power that Dr. Myuu and Dr. Lychee have given me."
The goop forced its way through the cracks and spark-spewing spots where the Machine Mutant scout had suffered extensive damage. As if controlled from within by some sprouting parasite that wore its skin like a suit, the Machine Mutant began jerking and twitching, spewing more and more sparks from its busted parts. Before too long, it relaxed and settled down. Its lone glowing eye went through an entire specter of colors before settling back on red again.
"The production lines, yes, Baby-sama!" the Machine Mutant bowed by pressing its little, broken backward mechanical arm to its round body frame before turning around and hovering off to seek other Machine Mutant survivors to share Baby's will with.
These Machine Mutants were never a part of Baby's plan for restoring his people. While he was still growing inside of that tube, they felt expendable. Just a handful of little work machines. It must have been when Vegeta's incursion forced Baby to merge with Dr. Myuu's body and mind and see the world through both of their combined perspectives that Baby realized just how sentient these Machine Mutants truly were. They could feel joy, pain, and sorrow, they could feel pride or humiliation, and they were certainly capable of despair. Letting them go extinct right now was the same as what the Saiyans did to Tsufurians and Baby couldn't quite do that, despite sharing his body and mind with Vegeta.
Unlike many races Baby had knowledge of, these Machine Mutants were single-minded in achieving their programmed goal, and, courtesy of Dr. Myuu's and Dr. Lychee's legacy, they cooperated with Baby. Just like Dr. Lychee intended, they were subservient to the new future leader of his ridiculous cyber-verse. Unlike Vegeta, Baby wouldn't waste his time deluding himself. He needed the M-2 Star and its capabilities if he were to restore the Tsufurian race. He couldn't even get to Planet Vegeta without the M-2 Star and it had unparalleled cloaking technology and the ability to warp the fabric of space-time in order to traverse the universe in the most innovative way imaginable. Not to mention the ability to terraform a planet that Dr. Myuu mentioned before his demise.
It took that runaway Machine Mutant survivor at least four hours to jumpstart the production line. He found a few more survivors and now that the single, most important lifeline of M-2 was back in order and new Machine Mutant drones were being produced, the old and broken models felt expendable. Not to Baby, but to themselves. Baby felt a loss of the part of his own body that he sent to that Machine Mutant drone. It must have withered away and died when the scout burnt up, blew up, or otherwise met his end. Nevertheless, the Machine Mutant production was back on track.
Soon, the Machine Mutant race would have an assortment of lower-ranking workers to help fix the cybernetic planet and then they could join Baby Vegeta in the new life he would start on Planet Vegeta, alongside the rest of the Tsufurians. Right now, there was no way to make any more like Baby except by Baby maturing enough to split parts of his own body and have them occupy other bodies. This would be the beginning of the new Tsufurian race on the New Planet Vegeta.
This time his race will thrive, because Baby will be there to protect them.
P. S. Sorry 'bout the sudden absence. I got sick last Sunday and I really didn't feel like writing anything. I've mostly recovered now so I shouldn't miss any more updates