Dragon Ball/Z/GT Fan Fiction ❯ Wish For The Past ❯ Monkey-Boy ( Chapter 32 )

[ T - Teen: Not suitable for readers under 13 ]

Disclaimer: Maybe if I say it enough times, it'll come true... *closes her eyes* I own DBZ. I own DBZ. I own DBZ. I own DBZ. *continues in this vein for several minutes* *opens her eyes and looks around* Well? Did it work? Do I own DBZ yet?

Random lawyer: No! And if you keep saying you own DBZ when you don't, I'll sue you!

Brenda: *cries* Waaaaah! I don't own DBZ!!!

"Damn it to hell, onna!!!" Vegeta cried out, covering his ears in pain. "Are you trying to make me deaf?!"

Bulma ignored him, looking as though she'd just been hit by a ton of bricks. She stared at Trunk's tail, then Vegeta's then Goten's, and back to Trunk's tail. For a few moments, her mouth worked, but nothing came out. Finally gathering her wits, she stammered, "Y-you mean you're all aliens?!" Trunks nodded, not willing to go into details about how he and Goten were only half-alien. He didn't want to raise questions about who their parents were. Especially not his parents!

"Amazing! The onna has a brain!" Vegeta commented sarcastically. "Even if it's only large enough to comprehend the obvious."

"Which is more than I can say for you, monkey-boy!" she shot back, snapped out of her daze as anger sparked again. "No offense to you two," she hastily added, talking to Goten and Trunks. The two boys only grinned and shook their heads to indicate that they had taken no offense. Kami knew they were used to Bulma's insults by now!

One corner of Vegeta's eye started to twitch involuntarily as Bulma inadvertently used the insult that all Saiya-jin hated with a passion. "What did you call me?" he hissed between clenched teeth. His nostrils flared and his face darkened with rage as he took an aggressive step towards the offending ningen.

"I called you monkey-boy," Bulma taunted, unaware of the danger she was walking into. "What, is your intelligence so low that you have to have me repeat myself? It must hurt to be that stupid."

Three things happened at that moment. A curious Radditz stepped into the room in time to hear what Bulma had just said. An infuriated Vegeta roared and launched himself at Bulma. And a frantic Trunks threw himself between his parents, grappling with the Saiyan Prince to keep him from killing the blue haired girl.

"Let me go, brat!" the prince screamed in fury as he was wrestled to the ground. "No one insults the Saiya-jin no Ouji and lives!"

"And I said," Trunks grunted as he pinned his father to the floor, "no killing anyone who isn't a threat! Do I need to beat that into your thick skull, or will you calm down and behave?" His angry blue eyes met Vegeta's furious obsidian eyes as a contest of wills raged back and forth between them. In the end, Vegeta growled and turned his head to the side, breaking eye contact in a gesture of defeat. Satisfied, the lavender haired boy let go of the Saiyan and sat up, only to turn his glare on the startled looking Bulma. "And you!" Bulma jumped in surprise. "Do you have to use the most insulting term possible for a Saiyan?" he asked, forgetting momentarily that this Bulma didn't know how infuriating the word 'monkey' was. He would have forbidden them from insulting the each other outright, except he knew that with Bulma and Vegeta there wasn't a chance in hell that would happen.

Bulma blinked owlishly. "Huh?"

"Monkey," Radditz answered her shortly. "You called Prince Vegeta a monkey. If you say that to a Saiya-jin, you're practically begging to be attacked." He gave her an appraising look and folded his arms. "I'm Radditz."

"I'm Bulma Briefs." Glancing at the newcomer, Bulma was, for the second time that day, struck speechless. Before her stood a teenage boy, perhaps fifteen years old, with spiky black hair that fell in a mane down to his knees. His facial features were fine and delicate, but possessed a sense of strength that she found intriguing. He, too, had the graceful, muscled body of a fighter, though without the excessive bulk that body-builders had. The resemblance to Bardock wasn't as strong as Goku's was, but it was, nonetheless, unmistakable. Bulma knew without a doubt that this was the brother Goku had told her about. I think I'm in love... A faint blush crossed her cheeks as she stared unashamedly at the Saiyan teenager. She blinked. Speaking of brothers...

"You still haven't explained to me about Goten's relationship to Goku," she said, tearing her eyes away from the cute boy so she could impale Trunks with her gaze. She could ogle boys later. She was a woman... er.. girl... on a mission, and she would not stop until she had the answers she sought. Now was the time to find out what was going on.

Eyeing his mother's past self warily, Trunks squirmed uncomfortably beneath her stare. Even as an eleven year old girl, she could still make him feel like a bug under a microscope. "Goten is Goku's son," he muttered quickly, barely loud enough for everyone to hear.

"NANI?!?!" Bulma and Yamcha shrieked in unison. Yamcha had remained silent up until this point, figuring that Bulma could handle the situation without any help from him, but was unable to keep quiet any longer. All four Saiyans present winced and covered their sensitive ears. Trunks sighed. He could already tell it was going to be a long day, starting with a long explanation.

By the time Bardock and Goku emerged from the bathroom, still slightly damp but clean and fully clothed, Trunks and finished explaining his and Goten's presence in the past. Having gotten bored halfway through the explanation, Vegeta, Goten, and Radditz had gone outside to continue fishing for breakfast, Goten promising Trunks that he'd catch enough for his friend so that Trunks could finish the story and still be able to eat breakfast. Now that he had finally cleared everything up for Bulma and Yamcha, Trunks had rejoined his friend outside, only to find that, between the three Saiyans, they had already caught enough food to feed everyone, which Lunch was now beginning to cook. When Trunks gave Goten a surprised look, Goten had shrugged and simply said, "We were bored, so we had a contest to see who could catch the most stuff the fastest. I won." He beamed with pride. Vegeta growled and stomped off to sit under the tree.

Feeding six hungry Saiya-jin and five ningen is no simple matter, so breakfast was taking a long time. Bardock figured it was a perfect opportunity to begin teaching his son how to fly and fight, so he picked the boy up and headed to a slightly more secluded part of the island. Goten and Trunks had watched from a distance for a few minutes as the older Saiyan began explaining the basics of flight, then quickly grew bored and had started sparring against each other. By silent agreement, they had taken to the air and kept the fight well away from the island to avoid doing any damage to the place or its inhabitants. That left Vegeta and Radditz sitting on the beach with the stupefied Bulma and Yamcha. The two humans had gaped openly when the two demi-saiyans had taken to the air, and they still wore their expressions of bewildered amazement.

Vegeta snorted in amusement, then glanced at Radditz. Using his newly learned ability to sense ki, he appraised the older boy carefully, and found that he was pitifully weak in comparison to the Saiya-jin no Ouji. Unfortunately, all of the worthy potential sparring partners were occupied, leaving the prince with the only options of either waiting around uselessly for the human female to finish cooking breakfast, or sparring with the low-class teenager. It wasn't a difficult decision to make.

"You," he said, looking directly at the other Saiyan. "Spar with me." At least there was someone he could still order around! With Bardock and the two chibis all being stronger than him, Radditz was the only one he could count on to take him seriously due to his superior strength.

"S-spar with you?" Radditz gulped, his eyes widening in surprise and fear. He knew perfectly well that Vegeta more than outstripped him in strength and skill. The blood drained from his face as he thought of the inevitable outcome that a fight with Vegeta would have for him. Vegeta would pound him into the dirt in no time.

"Yes, spar with me, you baka low-class!" the Prince snarled in annoyance. "Do you see anyone else around here who even knows how to fight?"

"Hey, I can fight," Yamcha protested, wondering why Vegeta had dismissed him out of hand to casually. Vegeta just snorted in amusement and ignored him.

"Radditz doesn't have to fight if he doesn't want to," Bulma said firmly, stepping between Radditz and Vegeta when she realized that Radditz wasn't going to defend his rights against the younger boy. With her back to the teen, she couldn't see Radditz frantically shaking his head, but she did feel his hand on her shoulder, pulling her gently away from Vegeta. Her stomach fluttered wildly as she realized it was his hand that was touching her. "Huh?"

"Vegeta is my prince," Radditz stated calmly, managing to keep his voice steady despite the sick feeling in his gut. "If he wants me to fight with him, I can only obey." Despite the paleness of his face, he managed to step past the human girl without any noticeable trembling.

"Just make sure you don't injure him too badly," Bardock called sternly from above, where he was floating in the air holding one of Goku's hands. The child appeared to be having difficulty staying afloat, constantly dipping in altitude, sometimes depending completely on Bardock's grip to keep from plummeting to the ground. "We don't have any senzu beans or regen tanks available, after all, and I'd rather not have my son spending the next several days recovering from sparring with you, Prince Vegeta."

Scowling in irritation, the ten year old Saiyan nodded sharply. "Fine. I'll try not to damage him too much." He pulled off his shirt and crouched in a fighting stance, waiting for Radditz to do the same. As the teenager removed his shirt and shifted into a defensive position, Bulma promptly bit back any more protests about Radditz fighting Vegeta as she got a good look at his body. A dreamy expression clouded her eyes and drool started trickling from the corner of her mouth. Yamcha noticed this and frowned, but said nothing. He was used to Bulma behaving oddly from time to time, though he'd never seen her act like this before.

Up in the air, Bardock turned his attention back to his struggling son. Goku was an incredibly fast learner, he had to give him that, but he learned techniques incompletely. He had picked up on the concept of manipulating his ki to push himself off the ground, and had even succeeded in doing so within a few minutes, but maintaining his flight was another story entirely. He pulled his son up once again as the boy suddenly dropped towards the ground for the umpteenth time.

"Come on, Goku, concentrate!" he urged the boy, trying to keep his impatience out of the tone. His progress was, after all, quite remarkable considering he had only been working on it for the past half hour. Still, it became somewhat frustrating to watch his son constantly meet with partial success because of something as simple as a lack of concentration. "It's easy once you get the hang of it, but in order to do that, you need to focus on what you're doing." If there was one thing Goku had problems with, it was his ability to focus on one thing for an extended period of time.

"I'm sorry, tousan, but it's just that I'm so hungry!" Goku whimpered. He really wanted to learn this technique, he really did! But hunger had always had a way of making him unable to concentrate on anything, no matter how important it was. As if to prove his point, his stomach growled loudly and he dipped in the air again, only to be pulled up by his father before he could actually fall into the ocean.

Bardock sweatdropped at his son's excuse, then laughed sheepishly as he recalled what it was like to be seven years old with an empty belly. No wonder he had poor attention right now! "Breakfast should be about ready, and you've done well for your first try, so why don't we take a break, okay?" Flipping Goku up onto his shoulders, he shot through the sky back towards the Turtle House, both of them whooping with delight as the wind played through their hair and thoughts of good food cooked by Lunch danced through their heads.

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