Dragon Ball/Z/GT Fan Fiction ❯ Wish For The Past ❯ Mall Misery ( Chapter 43 )

King Kai: Oooo!!! Good one! Good one! Oh, I'm so jealous! Why didn't I think of that?! Just wait till I tell Kaioshin! Nyahahahaha!!! *chortles with glee*

Brenda: *grins broadly* I own DBZ, not DBZ. Hee hee, get it? I own the Dung Beetle Zzzz joke, not Dragonball Z. *snickers and promptly begins to laugh again*

King Kai: Hahahahaha!!! That was great! You have such a great sense of humor! I'm so jealous!

A/N: I'm not gay-bashing in this chapter. The views expressed in this chapter that might sound like gay-bashing are completely the thoughts of their respective characters. Meant for humor, not offense, so no flames, please.

After thirty minutes of watching Bulma enter and exit the changing room, each time carrying a different article of clothing, Bardock and Radditz began to grow bored. While Radditz was seated near the waiting room, trying desperately not to look anywhere except the floor, Bardock had begun to let his curiosity get the better of him. A smile of amusement slipped across his face as he picked up a nylon stocking from a pile and started to play around with it.

"Hey, Radditz, what do you suppose they use these for?" he asked, holding up a fist that he had shoved inside one leg of the nylons. His son glanced up long enough to see what Bardock was talking about and frowned in puzzlement.

"I really have no clue. Gloves of some kind, maybe?" Standing up, the fifteen year old boy lifted the other half of the thing and peered at it closely. He gave an experimental stretch, then shrugged and let it drop. "I'd hate to wear gloves like that. They look like they constrict movement and press too closely to the skin."

A mother and her daughter passed them by and the little girl looked up at her mother in confusion. "Mommy, why are those two men playing with pantyhose?"

"Never mind, honey," the woman said firmly, pulling her child by the arm to the other side of the store. "Some people are just plain sick."

Not noticing the exchange, Bardock nodded his agreement with Radditz's assessment and pulled the nylon stocking off his hand, dropping it casually back into the pile of its mates. Spotting a pair of particularly frilly panties, he grinned and plucked it off its rack. "Call me crazy, but who in their right mind would actually wear these? The amount of lace on this thing would surely get in the way of wearing anything else! It can't be very comfortable, either." He handed the underwear to Radditz, who snorted his amusement as he turned the garment over in his hands.

While they were examining the panties, a woman passed by and saw what they were holding. "Perverts!" she hissed venomously at them, glaring heatedly as she stalked past them. Both Saiyans jumped a little and flushed slightly with embarrassment. They stared at the woman's receding back for a moment, then Radditz hung the panties back on their rack. Feeling a little bolder, he looked around curiously until his eyes came across the nightwear section. He pointed at one of the negligees, smirking.

"Wouldn't it almost be better to wear nothing at all? It's not like that thing hides anything!" he chortled, shaking his head with mirth.

"Can I help you two... um... gentlemen?" a sales lady asked as politely as she could, schooling her face to a neutral blankness that showed nothing of her true feelings. Still, it was hard, since she was relatively new to this job and hadn't ever had to deal with male customers before.

"Huh?" Bardock blinked in confusion. "Gentle... men?" That's a new one. I've never been called gentle before. He looked around to make sure there wasn't someone else that the woman might be talking to, but found that he and his son were still the only males in the store. Scratching the back of his head in confusion, he met the eyes of the clerk and asked, "Are you talking to us?"

Thinking that he was emphasizing the 'men' part of the phrase, the clerk inwardly groaned, completely disgusted. Just my luck. I get stuck with a couple of girly men who want to play dress up. She smiled an oily smile at the two men in front of her. Money was money, and she wasn't going to turn down the opportunity of a sale, no matter what she felt. Best to avoid gender terms if at all possible. "...err... I said, is there anything I can help you with?" Her voice was honey sweet. The epitome of polite correctness.

"Umm... what do you mean?" Bardock replied in confusion, scratching the back of his head as he tried to puzzle how just why this person thought he and his son might need help.

Inwardly sighing, the sales clerk resigned herself to her fate. It was, after all, her job to make the customer feel welcome and wanted, and to try to get them to buy things, no matter how she personally felt. "Well, I can point out where various things are kept, and I could give good advice about what colors, cuts, materials, and so forth go with your complexion. That nightie right there, for instance, would look just lovely on you." She pointed at the negliee the two men had been discussing earlier, unaware of exactly what they'd been saying about it. She thought it might be the kind of thing a gay man might like, but she couldn't really be certain. The mental image of either one of these guys wearing it made her mentally cringe.

Radditz, too, began to visualize his father wearing the skimpy outfit, and the mental image he formed made him promptly burst out laughing. The confusion Bardock felt wore off as he realized that the woman thought he wanted help shopping. And she actually thinks I'd wear any of this stuff? he thought incredulously. I thought this was only for girls! Apparently, Earth styles are far more different than I imagined!

"Errr... actually, we're just waiting for someone," Bardock replied warily, not wanting to continue on the topic of what things he'd look 'good' in. On cue, Bulma stepped out of the changing room, a nightgown and a few other articles of clothing draped over her arm. "Are you done yet, Bulma?" he asked hopefully.

Bulma flashed him a sparkling smile, giving him a thumbs up as she walked off in the direction of the cashier. "Yup! Sure am! Wow, I don't think I've ever found such great stuff in so short a time!" A chill crept up the two warriors' spines at these words as Bulma laid her purchases on the counter and waited for the sales attendant to total the prices. Short? That was a short amount of time? Bardock was just beginning to get an inkling as to why Trunks had been laughing earlier when Bulma had first offered to take them shopping. It had to have been nearly an hour that they'd spent in this place, and they had only been to one store!

Thinking that she now understood the situation, the sales woman gave the three another oily smile. "Your daughter is really pretty, sir," she commented, though she secretly thought it strange that the girl's father and brother were taking her nightie shopping. She blinked in surprise as the teen started choking and the older man looked startled.

"She's not my daughter," he explained, an amused smile gracing his lips. "She's just a friend who's taking me and my son shopping."

She's... taking them shopping?! Mentally, she shrugged it off. Oh well. She didn't really care what was going on as long as she got her money, and her 10% commission. Given those two essentials in life, she could deal with any and all oddities displayed by her customers.

"All right, I'm done!" the blue haired girl said cheerfully as she promptly handed her newly acquired bag of clothing over to Radditz. "Here, Radditz, will you carry this for me?" The teenager opened his mouth to protest, but Bulma didn't give him any choice as she turned around and exited the store so quickly that he and Bardock had to speed up their pace just to catch up with her. Her eyes darted around the mall in search of their next destination, lighting up when she saw the sign above another store. Both Saiyans followed her gaze to the brightly painted sign, confusion reflected on their faces as they tried to make out the unfamiliar letters.

Surf's Up, Dude!

The adrenaline of excitement flooded through the veins of the two demi-Saiyans as they finally caught sight of the thin tower that reached up into the heavens farther than even their eyes could see. Both boys angled upwards toward the top of the tower and gave an extra burst of speed, almost flashing into Super Saiyan in their haste to arrive at the tower where the one who grew the magical senzu beans lived. Within moments of when they first spotted their goal, Goten and Trunks landed lightly on the balcony, directly in front of the short, fluffy white cat who held a staff almost twice as tall as he was.

"Hiya, Karin-sama!" Goten greeted the cat enthusiastically, a big, goofy grin on his face. "I'm Son Goten, and this is my friend Trunks Briefs, and we-"

"Yes, I know," Karin interrupted him. "You're here for a senzu bean for your father, Goku, who just happens to be younger than you."

"Hey, wow, that's right!" Goten exclaimed, his eyes wide with surprise. "How'd you know?"

"I read your mind," the cat replied simply. "You and your friend there are from the future, and you're gathering the dragonballs so you can wish yourselves back home. It's all there in your mind."

"Cool!" The spiky haired chibi grinned delightedly, rubbing the back of his neck in a familiar gesture.

"Then we don't have to explain anything, since you already know everything we know, right?" Trunks asked.

"No, not everything," the mysterious cat chuckled. "I stopped reading your minds as soon as I found out what I needed to know, which is more than I think I wanted to know. Knowing too much about the future, even a future that may never happen, can be dangerous. Still," he chortled, pointing his staff at Trunks, "I find it rather amusing the you're the son of those two hellcats down there. Oh, yes, I've been watching those two, and let me tell you, I never would have thought it possible for them to fall in love!"

"I know what you mean," Trunks agreed, grinning a little himself. Even he wondered exactly how it had happened that his mother and his father got gotten together. They were such an unlikely couple!

"So can we have a senzu bean?" Goten pleaded, giving Karin his best Son Puppy Eyes (TM). "Please? Goku really needs it! I don't want him to die!"

"Yeah, sure," Karin said as he walked over to a pot filled with the small brown beans. Reaching a paw in, he grabbed a handful and poured them into a little brown pouch, which he handed over to Goten. "Six beans, one for each of you and your friends. Good luck with your dragonball hunt." The two boys thanked him fervently as they blasted off into the air, nearly knocking the poor cat over in their wake. "Why do I get the feeling that this isn't the last I'm going to see of that family?" Karin wondered out loud as he steadied himself. No one answered him, which was only logical, seeing as how he was the only one there.

"Itai! My eyes!" Bardock cried out, shielding his eyes from the barrage of color that assaulted him from every direction. Suffering the same affliction, Radditz rubbed his eyes and opened them again, promptly wincing as he got another eyeful of the rainbow of every natural and unnatural color, some of which he hadn't even known existed. "Now I know what Goten was talking about when he told me about shopping on Earth!" In comparison with the brightly colored clothing around him, that shirt his grandson had described, neon orange with yellow and green flowers, seemed almost tame!

"Oh, quit being such a baby," Bulma snapped as she snatched a blue and red Hawaiian print shirt off a rack and held it up to Bardock's chest. "Hmm.. not quite your colors... maybe something with orange, or green." Rather than putting the shirt back, she turned on Radditz, a gleeful glint in her eyes. "But it would be perfect on you, Radditz!" she crowed as she pressed the shirt up against the teenage Saiyan, eyeing him critically. The poor boy gulped nervously as he warily glanced down at the shirt. It wasn't as bad as most of the shirts on display, but it was still much more colorful than he was used to. "Great, that's one shirt! Here, you can hold it until I'm ready to buy it." Shoving the shirt into his surprised arms, she happily dashed over to another rack. "This one will look great on you, Bardock!" she cried, holding up a tie-dye shirt with rainbow hues in a spiral pattern. The intensity of the colors was enough to make Bardock cringe, but Bulma didn't care. She snatched his arm and pulled him over to a fitting room. "Go inside and put it on. Then come back and show me, so I can see how it looks on you. Go on, go on!" Despite her inferior strength, the little human female somehow managed to push the older Saiyan into one of the rooms, shutting the door firmly as she glanced back at Radditz. "You too! Get into one of those rooms and put on that shirt, Radditz," she demanded, planting her fists on her hips. Anxious not to be forced into a changing room in such a humiliating manner, the black-maned teen hastily entered a separate room and shut the door, leaving the bag of Bulma's clothing with her.

The two emerged, wearing their respective shirts and looking very uncomfortable in them, to find Bulma staring speculatively at a pair of grass skirts. Father and son paled simultaneously as they both came up with the same idea. No. She wouldn't! Would she? Oh Kami, no! At this point, neither one of them was willing to put anything past Bulma.

"There you are! Hey, those shirts do look good on you! Ha! You can always trust me to have the greatest fashion sense," she congratulated herself. "While you guys were in there, I found some more shirts for you to try on." Smiling broadly, she shoved each of the Saiyans a dozen more shirts and shorts each and pushed them back into the changing rooms. Despite having to try on even more clothing than they thought they would ever need or wear in years, both males heaved a sigh of relief. At least she didn't make us put on those skirts!

Pulling the Dragon Radar out, Trunks clicked the button while the two boys sped through the air in the direction of the capsule house. To his mild surprise, a blip immediately showed up fairly close to their location. "Hey, Goten, there's a dragonball nearby. Wanna go take a look? It shouldn't be too hard to get, and we could probably still beat the others home."

The thought of bringing home a dragonball along with the life-saving senzu beans brought a grin to Goten's face and he nodded eagerly. "Yeah! That'd be great, Trunks!"

"Okay, then, it's off in that direction." The lilac haired Saiyan pointed off to the east even as he reoriented himself in mid air. "It should take us... maybe fifteen minutes to get there. Race ya, Goten!" Even as he said these words, he was already speeding off in the direction of the dragonball.

"Hey, no fair, Trunks! You got a head start!" Goten pushed himself faster as he tried to catch up to his best friend. "I'm gonna get you, Trunks!" Together, the two boys raced off in search of the dragonball.

Radditz sighed in resignation as he put on yet another of the jarringly colored shirts Bulma had picked out for him. It was a button up shirt that started with crimson red at the bottom and faded up to a shocking golden yellow at the top with the words BURN BABY scrawled across the back in flame-like letters, colored various shades of red and orange. He wore it unbuttoned with a plain white T-shirt underneath, accompanied by normal blue jeans. If it weren't for the eye sore of a shirt, he might have been able to stand the clothes, but Bulma just had to add in that last part of the ensemble.

As he stepped out of the changing room for what must have been the twentieth time that day, he looked around for Bulma, determined to get this over with as soon as possible so they could end this humiliation and get back to the capsule house. Weaving his way through the rows of clothing in search of the familiar blue haired girl, he failed to notice as a little boy came running down the aisle, shrieking with glee as his mother dashed frantically after him.

"Get back here this instant, Turuck!" she cried out angrily. The boy only laughed and ran harder, waving an ice cream cone in the air as he glanced back to see how close behind his mother was. Radditz, who had just barely spotted Bulma, had his back to the child when the boy smacked into him. Caught by surprise and knocked off balance, the hapless Saiyan fell over and only barely managed to put his hands out to break his fall and prevent his face from slamming into the floor.

"Oh, I'm so sorry!" the distressed mother apologized pathetically as she pulled her giggling son out of Radditz's knee length mane of hair. Unfortunately, Turuck's ice cream cone was another story entirely. The half-melted blob of vanilla had landed directly in the middle of Radditz's wild hair and was now dripping deeper into it all the way through to his shirt. Ignoring the woman's pleas for forgiveness for her son, Radditz picked himself up off the floor and groaned as he felt something on his back. It was cold. It was gooey. It was sticky. And it was in his hair. His hair! Not only did he have to wear this horribly bright shirt that could disable an enemy by sight alone, but now he had some kind of icy, viscous liquid dripping down his back! After that first brief and shining moment of humor in the underwear store, everything had gone to ashes. Now he seemed to be stuck in temporal distortion where time dragged by on leaden feet, he was being forced to wear clothing bright enough to scare off Frieza, and he was in desperate need of another shower. This day couldn't possibly get any worse.

End chapter, so now I'll just get on my knees and shamelessly beg the readers to review (as I always do. ^_^). *promptly falls to her knees and bows before the almighty readers* Oh, great, wise, and wonderful readers! How can I ever measure up to you fantastic people?! *bows some more* I humbly beseech you to press that little review link. *attempts to kiss the feet of anyone she can get close enough to* I am not worthy! I am not worthy for your reviews, but I beg of you to give them to me anyway! Please! I must... have... reviews.... I'll die if I don't get them! AAAHHH!!! *gives a blood curdling scream, keels over, and passes away on the spot*

Okay, okay! *laughs her head off* I wasn't serious with that! I was just feeling like mocking myself for always asking readers to review my chapters. ^_^ I'm not begging... really... okay, maybe I do beg a little, but not like that! You really don't have to review, but I hope you do anyway. ^_^