Dragon Ball/Z/GT Fan Fiction ❯ Darker Tides ❯ Chapter 1 ( Chapter 2 )

Hey guys, sorry it took so long to get this chapter posted. It's been a busy week, between work and a wedding. But here it is! I hope you enjoy it!

DISCLAIMER: Nothing's changed. I own nothing except the characters previously stated.

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Chapter 1

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Seven long years had passed since the Saiyan formerly known as Saluna arrived on the planet Galia, and the teenager found herself growing more and more restless as the days passed. The teenager lay on the grass in front of the military academy she now attended, her arms folded behind her head. Balamb Garden had been her home the last few years, and despite the training she always doing, she was beginning to feel bored. Starr sighed and glassed through the glass of her scouter, searching for a sign of the other Saiyans. She had removed the tracking device out of it shortly after she arrived, and was constantly searching for some scrap of news, but so far hadn't heard anything through the communication system. She reached her hand up and was about to remove it, when the sound of static reached her ears. She paused and listened intently as three voices began to come through.

“Seems Kakarot is still alive,” a voice came through.

“What planet is he on?” a second husky voice asked.

“A planet called Earth,” the first voice responded. “I think it's time my brother rejoined us.”

“And if he doesn't?” the second voice spoke again.

“Then he'll have to die,” the first responded.

“Very well,” a third voice spoke, and Starr's ears perked up with recognition at the sound.

`Vegeta,' she thought and quickly sat up, focusing everything on her hearing.

“Go to Earth to retrieve your brother, Radditz,” Vegeta spoke again. “We could use an extra Saiyan for this rebellion. If he refuses, kill him. We aren't that desperate. Nappa, we are going to have to keep up the pretenses for the time being until we can make our move.” Nappa and Radditz each gave a sound of acknowledgement before the comms went dead. Starr slowly removed the scouter from her eye and smirked. She now knew how to find the others. Sure, Vegeta had told her to stay hidden until he came, but she was bored, and a teenager now, and in her mind, she made her decision to travel to this Earth and head Radditz off. One way or another, she was going to find out what was taking so long.

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Starr picked up her small bag from off the bed, and slug it over her shoulder. She crossed the room and was about to open the door, when it suddenly opened from the other side. A beautiful young blonde girl stood in the doorway.

“Hey Starr,” Charm, the Saiyan's roommate, greeted her. “Where you off to?” Starr narrowed her eyes at the girl, not liking being questioned.

“I'm leaving for a little while,” she responded.

“How long?” Charm asked curiously. Starr growled in annoyance.

“Don't worry about it,” Starr's tail flickered in agitation.

“But we have exams coming up.”

“I don't really care!” Starr snapped. Charm was taken aback from the tone Starr took with her.

“Ok, ok. Relax, jeeze,” Charm shrugged. “No need to be defensive. Just have a safe journey, where ever you're headed.” Starr sighed and wrapped her tail around her waist, as Charm moved into the room and out of the doorway. Starr gave a curt nod, and quickly walked out of the room, just in case Charm decided to ask more questions. In now time at all, Starr was walking out of Balamb Garden and took to the skies. She flew for a while, until she came to a hidden mountain pass. She touched down and smirked as she looked at the space pod she had hidden here years ago. She deliberately walked up to it, and pressed an almost hidden button, and the door hissed open. She tossed her bag inside, and sat down in the seat. After pressing several buttons, the door closed with another hiss. The pod began to violently shake, and shot off in to the sky. Starr watched as the small planet disappeared, and she was soon surround by the deep, black abyss of space. The sleeping gas began to fill the pod, and as the young Saiyan's eyes began to feel heavy, she glanced at the timer.

Two weeks until she reached the planet Earth. Two weeks until she found Radditz, and was reunited with her own kind.

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Starr began to awaken as the shaking of the pod indicated that she was entering Earth's atmosphere. She stretched, and with a big yawn, rubbed the sleepiness from her eyes. She was fully awake by the time the internal computer beeped, notifying Starr that she would be landing in thirty seconds. The pod with the ground at break neck speed, and Starr quickly opened the door. She wasted no time shooting out of the crater left behind, and hovered in the sky above. The Saiyan raised her hand to her scouter and pressed the tiny button to begin scanning for power levels. She frowned as she registered none of them signified Radditz being present on the planet, but she raised an eyebrow when a decent reading showed up.

`It's lower than what I would expect for Radditz,' she thought to herself. `but I wonder if this could be that Kakarot they were talking about.' Decided to check it out for herself, she flew in the direction the energy was coming from. She noticed that Earth looked a lot like Galia. She passed bodies of water, and forests, and was soon flying over mountains. The scouter beeped as she was passing over a tree filled clearing, telling her she was close, and she began her descent. A small house came in to view, and in the front yard was a man dress in an orange gi playing with a small child. Her sensitive ears picked up the sound of laughter as her feet lightly hit the ground. She crept slowly to get a closer look.

“Ah, you got me, Gohan,” the man laughed, as the child jumped on him and he flung himself to the ground. Gohan laughed, and Starr's eyes widened as she saw something brown flickering from behind the child.

“A tail!?” Starr gasped, louder than she meant to. The man looked over suddenly in Starr's direction, searching for the sound of the noise, but Starr was well hidden among the trees.

“Gohan, go see if your mom is done with lunch,” the man said, standing up and putting his son upright. The boy flashed a big smile and ran in to the house. He waited a moment, making sure Gohan was inside, before taking a few steps towards the tree line where Starr hid.

“I know some one's there,” he called. “Come on out.” Starr hesitated for a moment before pulling her resolve together, and stepped out in to view. The man said nothing, as he observed the teenager in front of him. He looked her up and down, and took note of the sword strapped to her back and the strange device covering her eye, but he didn't sense a threating energy coming from her. He smiled at the girl, and raised a hand in greeting.

“Hi, I'm Goku. What's your name?” Starr stared him down for a moment, trying to decide if she should answer or not.

“Starr,” she said simply, decision made, and figuring it would be safer not to give him her Saiyan name. She looked at Goku, and felt a sense of familiarity. She could easily see a resemblance to Radditz, although she noted that he wasn't quite as tall. The sound of his voice brought her out of her thoughts.

“So, Starr, why are you hiding in the trees? Are you hungry? Why don't you come have some lunch with us?” Goku asked with a smile. Starr scoffed, and took a step back. She took a last look at Goku before flying off.

“Oh well, I guess she wasn't hungry,” Goku shrugged, before turning towards his house.

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Starr spent the next few days observing Goku from a distance. He had all the qualities of a Saiyan, minus the tail. She knew that if she had patience, sooner or later Radditz would should up, but her patience was wearing thin.

“I don't know how much longer I can wait,” she muttered to herself as she watched Goku do some training exercises. She sighed in agitation and leaned up against a tree, pressing a button on her button to scan for communications. She listened intently for some word of Radditz, and her patience paid off.

“I'll be landing on this mudball planet within the next ten minutes,” Radditz's voice came through.

“Don't take forever,” Vegeta's bored voice responded.

“Copy that,” Radditz replied, and the comms went dead again. A smirk crept on to Starr's young face.

“Finally,” she breathed. She took a last look at Goku, who was now joined by his son and a strange golden cloud, and ran in to the forest. She wanted to put some distance between her and the house before flying away. Unknowingly to the young Saiyan, Goku was already aware of her presence, but sensing power levels without a scouter was not an ability she possessed.

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Starr flew for a distance at a high rate of speed before suddenly stopping over an ocean. She pressed a button on her scouter again to scan for power levels. She could see Goku, and another power level around a thousand roughly in the same distance, but it was a higher one that suddenly appeared that caught her attention. She looked in the direction, and made her decision that it had to be Radditz. She took off in the direction, following the reading on her scouter. She soon found herself flying over a desolate plane, and a crater caught her attention for a moment, before a figure with long black, spikey hair drew her attention. He turned towards her, a scowl on his face as she approached, but it was evident that he hadn't noticed her. He took off before she landed, making Starr scowl.

“I guess I'll just wait around her for him to come back,” She muttered to herself. As she sat down on top of his pod.

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The young Saiyan sat cross-legged, arms folded across her chest, on top of Radditz's space pod. She growled in annoyance at having to wait longer than she wanted to. She figured she'd been waiting almost an hour, and began to bounce her foot impatiently. Her scouter suddenly beeped and she glanced into the eye piece. Radditz was finally coming back, but he wasn't alone. She saw a much smaller power level accompanying the Saiyan, but she knew that it wasn't Goku. Starr frowned as she tried to figure out what was going on. Her scouter beeped again, this time showing two more substantial readings trailing at a distance behind Radditz. Her frown deepened as she jumped off the pod.

“What the hell?” she said aloud. Starr decided that she should wait and see what this was all about and flew away to a distance far enough where she wouldn't be seen, but still close enough that she would still be able to see. In no time at all, Radditz returned carrying a small child, the same child she saw with Goku. Starr watched as he threw the crying half-breed into his pod and seal the door, and cringed as she heard the boy's harsh wails. She watched as Radditz paced around before suddenly looking in the direction he had flown in from. He turned his body completely as his brother and a strange green man touched down. They were exchanging words, and Starr mentally slapped herself for not being closer to hear what was being said. All three dropped into fighting stances, and Starr anxiously watched the battle unfold.

To her eyes, it seemed obvious that Radditz had the upper hand against the two fighters. He easily dodged their attacks, and forcefully beat them back. She was confused momentarily as Goku and the green man began stripping out of some layers of their clothes, but her scouter beeped, showing her that their power levels jumped up substantially. It dawned on her, as their speed increased, that they were wearing weighted training gear. A smirked crossed her lips.

“Sneaky bastards,” she muttered as the fight resumed. Although they were much faster than before, the two Earth warriors were still experiencing difficulties with the Saiyan. The fight raged on, and something suddenly happened that the young girl did not expect to see. Her eyes widened as she saw Goku run behind Radditz and grab his tail, paralyzing him. She saw his mouth moving and his eyes widen. The green man was yelling something to Goku, and he slightly released his grip on Radditz's tail. The green man yelled angrily, the sound reaching the young Saiyan's ears, as Radditz brought his elbow down, hard, on Goku's head.

“How stupid can you be?” Starr muttered, shaking her head. “You had him, you idiots.” The battle continued to rage on, Radditz on the verge of winning, when her scouter suddenly beeped again. It was apparent that Radditz's scouter went off as well when he snapped his head in the same direction the drew Starr's attention, towards his space pod. Starr's eyes widened as she watched the young half-Saiyan's power grow exponentially. Suddenly, the little broke free of the pod, creating his own exit through the roof. He charged directly at Radditz, head first, striking him in the chest and causing damage to the hard Saiyan armor.

“Well damn,” Starr muttered in surprise, as Radditz was thrown backwards. Radditz struggled, dazed by the blow, back to his feet. Even from a distance, Starr recognized the look of sheer rage on Radditz's face. He phased and reappeared in front of the child, and delivered a hard kick that sent the boy flying into a rock. Radditz raised his hand to his nephew, and gather an ki blast as Starr clearly heard Goku yell. Suddenly, something in Starr snapped, and the image of her youngest sister, Saria, came to the forefront of her mind. Saria was roughly the same age as Gohan when she was sent away, and before Starr knew what she was doing, the Saiyan launched herself from her hiding spot and was hurtling towards Radditz. She was close enough now that she could hear Radditz's scouter beep, and saw him start to turn his head towards the young girl, but before his face was completely towards her, both her feet connected with his head and he was sent flying again. She gracefully touched down, and put herself in a defensive position between the boy and his uncle. Radditz got back to his feet, snarling, but the look on his face quickly turned to shock as he saw the young Saiyan girl in front of him. He was unable to speak for a moment, but the green man wasted no time.

“Who the hell are you?” Starr shifted her eyes, but did not respond. Goku got back to his feet and looked at the girl.

“Starr? I knew I felt a strong power coming from you.” Before Starr could answer, Radditz finally found his voice.

“Saluna? How the fuck are you still alive? We were told you were dead!”

“Obviously, I'm not,” Starr answered simply, her eyes back on Radditz. The older Saiyan growled as anger once again took over.

“How dare you attack me, girl!” he roared, giving way to rage once again. “You are a traitor to your own kind!” Starr said nothing as her eyes narrowed at him.

“You're one to talk, Radditz. Here you are, fighting your own brother and about to kill his son. You know how few of us are left, yet you have no problem spilling Saiyan blood,” Starr hissed, her anger equaling Radditz's. Radditz snarled again.

“Don't question things you don't understand!” Radditz raged at the girl. He suddenly switched to the Saiyan language and added, “as she as I finish with Kakarot, I'll be dragging your ass back to Vegeta and you can answer to him.” Starr's eyes narrowed, but she remained unaffected by the threat. Before Starr could respond, the green man yelled in agitation.

“Enough!” He began to power up as she charged at Radditz, clearly wanting to continue the fight. Starr stayed in her spot as she watched Goku join the fray. It all happened very quickly, but Starr watched as Goku got behind his brother again, this time locking him in a full nelson, as the green man began to gather energy for an attack. Radditz struggled against his little brother but was unable to break his grip.

“Piccolo, do it!” Goku shouted, maintaining his iron grip.

“Don't be a fool Kakarot!” Radditz shouted. “He'll kill us both!” Before Goku could respond, Piccolo spoke.

“This is a win-win for me. Special Beam Cannon!” he shouted, as his purple spiral attacked hurtled towards both Saiyans. It pierced Radditz through the chest, and exited through Goku's back. Starr watched, wide-eyed as both men were thrown backwards by the force. The brothers laid on the ground, coughing up blood, as Starr walked up to Radditz. She looked down at Radditz, who's eyes were closed, his face contorted with pain.

“This isn't over, you fools,” he coughed. “my two comrades are on their way here, and they are even stronger than I am. They will avenge me!”

“How long?” Goku asked, as he coughed up more blood.

“One year. Enjoy it while you fools can. You're dead when they arrive,” Radditz opened his eyes, and looked up at the young girl standing above him. “Saluna…”

“Radditz.” Radditz switched to Saiya-go as he continued, making certain that Starr was the only one who could understand him.

“I hope you have a good explanation as to why you disappeared. He's going to want to kill you for this.” Starr crouched down and put her face near the older Saiyan.

“Who the hell do you think sent me away,” she hissed in Saiya-go. “Perhaps it is you who shouldn't speak about things you don't understand.” Radditz eyes widened as Starr watched the life drain from his eyes.

“Starr…” Goku coughed, catching Starr's attention. She stood up and walked over the dying man. Goku shifted his eyes to look at her, Piccolo moving in closer.

“You knew him?”

“Hn,” Starr responded. “indeed, but I never liked him. He was annoying.”

“Then you're one of them,” Piccolo growled. Starr gave him a dangerous look as Goku continued.

“Do you know who's coming?” Starr nodded and Goku spoke again. “How strong are they?”

“If it's who I think it is, then you're screwed,” the young girl said bluntly. She looked up as some kind of hover vehicle approached and landed nearby. Starr said nothing else as a short bald man, a blue-haired woman, and a couple others ran out of the back of the vehicle. They eyed Piccolo and the girl suspiciously as they came closer.

“They're that strong huh?” Goku winced from the pain as he spoke. Starr only offered a nod as a response. The bald man looked from Goku to Starr before speaking.

“Who's coming?”

“Hey Krillin,” Goku shifted his attention towards his friend. “Meet Starr, who says were screwed when two even stronger guys show up here.” Krillin turned his head towards Starr, his eyes instantly going towards her tail. Krillin opened his mouth a few times, trying to figure out what to say. Starr growled in annoyance.

“I did not come here to help you pathetic weaklings!” she snarled, causing the group to jump slightly. “I came only to find Radditz, and we know how that turned out. So, I'm outta here! Good luck with the others, because you're going to need it, but you'll probably still die anyway!” Starr snarled again and took off into the sky, leaving the Z Warriors below her, watching her exit in shock.

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Starr flew a short distance, before she landed roughly in a plush green clearing, a low growl erupting from her throat. She looked up to the clear, blue sky, and allowed herself to fall backwards on the soft, green grass, a sigh escaping from her lips as she hit the ground. She closed her eyes, and tried to clear her mind.

`What the hell was that about?' she thought bitterly to herself. `Why the hell did I interfere in Radditz's fight? That had nothing to do with me. What the hell is wrong with me?' Starr shook her head in disgust. `I've been around humans for far too long. It's starting to make me soft.' Starr mentally slapped herself, but she knew what she had to do. The Saiyan didn't want to risk missing Vegeta, that was, after all, the whole reason she came to this miserable planet. She sighed again, and sat herself back up. She slowly stood to her feet, and decided to go explore the planet, since she was going to be here for a while. She checked her scouter, and took off in the direction of a large gathering of energy, small as each one was.

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In no time at all, Starr was hovering over the outskirts of a city. The sign below her told her it was called West City. She touched down, and entered the streets, taking detailed notes of her surroundings. She was silently thanking herself for being smart enough to not wear her Saiyan armor, with the exception of her scouter. She noticed right away that the Earthlings had very similar fashions to Galians, and Starr was glad to not stand out. She walked along the crowed roads, and soon saw a rather large building that caught her attention.

“Capsule Corp?” she read out loud. A voice from behind her caught her attention.

“Hey, you're the girl from earlier, aren't you?” Starr spun around and came face to face with the blue-haired woman from the battle field.

“So what?” Starr growled at the woman, but the growl seemed to have no effect on her.

“Growling is rude,” the woman smiled at the teenager. “My name's Bulma. You're Starr, right?” The Saiyan girl nodded, and Bulma continued. “Well, it's obvious that you're not from here, so I'm going to assume you don't have a place to stay.” Starr raised an eyebrow as Bulma walked passed her and straight towards Capsule Corp. She stopped at the gate and turned her head back towards Starr.

“Well? Are you coming?” Bulma asked impatiently. Starr scowled and found herself following the bluenette, wondering what she was getting herself in to.

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Alrighty, another one done. What do you guys think? Let me know!