Dragonball Extreme

Bulma jumped a little as the cell phone in her pocket let off a shrill series of beeps. Seika and Ninjin looked up from their drinks in surprise.
\"What\'s that sound?\" Ninjin asked.

Bulma reached down and fished the phone from her pocket. \"It\'s my cell phone,\" she said. \"Someone\'s calling on my private line.\" She answered the phone. \"Hello?\"

Bulma\'s secretary was on the other end. \"I\'m sorry to bother you Miss Bulma,\" she said, \"but an Officer Jakku from the police department is on the other line. He said it\'s important that he talk to you or Mr. Vegeta.\"

Bulma sighed. \"I swear, if one of those men has run off and started trouble again...\" she thought to herself. \"Go ahead and put him through,\" Bulma instructed.

After a moment there was a click and the officer\'s voice came on the line. \"This is Officer Jakku with the West Capitol police department,\" he said. \"Is this Bulma Briefs?\"

\"Yes, it is,\" Bulma replied. \"How can I help you officer?\"

\"Well, I\'m not sure, exactly,\" the man said. \"We have a guy down here who claims to be related to your husband. He\'s carrying around a picture that looks like it could be him, but I\'d like someone to come down here to verify his story.\"

\"Related to Vegeta?\" Bulma\'s eyebrows shot up. \"Did he say how so?\"

\"No, ma\'am,\" the officer replied. \"He said his mother just passed away and Mr. Vegeta may be a relative. Didn\'t say where he\'s from, but he\'s definitely not from around here; his clothes don\'t look like anything I\'ve seen a guy wearing before.\"

\"I\'ll come in and take a look,\" Bulma said. \"At worst it\'ll take a few minutes of my time. He\'ll be waiting at the station then?\"

\"Yes,\" Officer Jakku replied. \"He doesn\'t seem in a hurry to leave, and I\'d rather he not wander around the city without someone who\'s acquainted with it.\"

\"Ok,\" Bulma said. \"I\'ll be in shortly.\" She hung up the phone.

\"What was that all about?\" Seika asked.

Bulma shook her head. \"Someone claiming to be a relative of Vegeta\'s,\" she said. \"Probably some kid looking to grab newspaper attention. I\'m going to go take care of it so that more rumors don\'t start flying.\" She nodded to the other two women and walked out of the house.

She stepped out onto the ledge around their cave and remembered that she still had difficulty getting up and down the cliffs. She looked around, but Vegeta was nowhere in sight. \"Vegeta!\" she called.

Vegeta appeared out of nowhere behind her. \"What is it now, woman?\" he demanded.

Bulma rolled her eyes. \"I need you to lift me down to the canyon floor so I can open a hover car capsule. I\'d climb down on my own, but I\'m in a hurry.\"

Vegeta\'s eyes narrowed. \"Why?\" he asked.

\"There\'s some guy at the West Capitol police station claiming to be a relative of yours. I want to get over there and put out any rumors before they have a chance to start circulating.\"

Vegeta snorted. \"Hn. What human fool would dare? There isn\'t a human alive who could pass for saiya-jin under any kind of scrutiny.\"

\"That\'s what I intend to find out,\" Bulma said. \"I\'ll let you know what I find out when I get back.\"

\"Oh, you mean you don\'t want me to go with and claim the brat?\" Vegeta asked sarcastically. He smirked evilly at Bulma.

\"I know full well that you mean \'kill\', not \'claim\', Vegeta,\" Bulma said. \"I\'m not going to have any casualties over this.\"

Vegeta circled an arm around her waist and quickly dropped the two of them to the canyon floor. \"Whatever,\" he said. \"Just see that it\'s taken care of.\" He turned and sauntered carelessly away.

Bulma sighed and tossed out her hover car capsule. It exploded in a plume of dust and a hover car sat in it\'s place. She quickly climbed inside and took off.

She carefully navigated the wind currents around the mountains, and once she cleared into the vast expanse around them she pushed the car to its maximum speed. It didn\'t take long for her to reach the police station, and she pulled up along side the building and parked. She walked quickly up the steps and into the building.

The officer on duty recognized her right away and waved her over to where Officer Jakku and Gato were waiting. She started a bit at Gato\'s appearance but kept her cool.

\"Officer Jakku?\" she asked. She extended her hand to shake his.

\"Hai,\" Jakku replied. \"This is the young man I was speaking of, Mrs. Briefs.\" He gestured toward Gato.

Gato looked nervous, but bowed deeply to Bulma. \"K-Konnichiwa,\" he said respectfully. \"M-my n-name\'s Gato.\"

Bulma raised an eyebrow but said nothing. She noticed the long, saiya-jin tail twitching nervously behind the young man and the pronounced sweep of ebony hair that rose off of his head and around his ears. \"You said that he has a picture of Vegeta?\" Bulma asked.

\"Hai,\" Jakku said. He handed the picture on his desk to Bulma. \"He said this and a name was all he had to go by.\"

Bulma looked at the picture and did a quick double-take. Her cheeks pinked ever so slightly as she noticed that Vegeta was for the most part nude in the picture, and reclining in a slightly suggestive pose. She quickly found her voice. \"It\'s definitely Vegeta,\" she said, \"but much younger than he was even when I met him.\" She turned to Gato. \"Do you have any papers to go with this photo?\" she asked.

\"H-h-hai, Madam,\" he said. He shakily reached into his case and withdrew a sheet of paper.T-thT-this is w-where I got h-his n-name,\" he said.

Bulma wondered briefly about the young man\'s unusual stutter and glanced over the paper. Some of the lines in it caught her attention and she read it over more carefully. Her breath caught for a moment, but she quickly composed herself. \"His story seems to check out,\" she said. \"Mind if I take him back with me so that Vegeta can confirm it?\"

\"Not at all,\" Jakku replied. \"I know he\'s in safe hands with you. I\'ll be glad to see this little issue resolved and get him on his way.\"

Bulma nodded. She said her thanks to the officer and motioned for Gato to follow her. \"Follow me, Gato,\" she said. \"I think Vegeta needs to meet you.\"

\"H-h-hai, M-madam,\" Gato said. He shook as he nervously followed her out to her hover car.

Bulma indicated for him to get in the passenger\'s side, and she walked around to the driver\'s side. She stuffed the paper into her purse and took off. She was silent as she buzzed out of town.

It was well over the vast expanse of an arid plain where Bulma abruptly pulled the car to a halt. She took the paper Gato had given her out of her purse and tossed it to him. \"All right, now that no one\'s around to overhear you, I want you to start talking.\"

Gato looked startled. \"M-m-madam?\"

\"That paper,\" she said. She nodded to it and looked at him. \"It reads like some kind of pedigree. Vegeta\'s name is clearly marked on it as being the \'sire\'. What\'s it all about?\"

\"I-it\'s m-my p-pedigree, m-madam,\" Gato replied. \"I...I th-thought all m-men h-had th-them.\"

Bulma shook her head negative. \"Not around here,\" she said. \"This means that Vegeta\'s your father, then?\"

\"H-hai,\" Gato said. \"M-my mistress k-kept i-impeccable r-records.\"

\"I suppose you don\'t know how it came about?\" Bulma asked.

\"N-n-no, M-madam,\" Gato replied. \"I-I n-never m-met h-him. I-it wasn\'t u-unusual f-for m-men taken f-from offworld t-to be s-sent b-back after b-breeding.\"

\"I see,\" Bulma replied. She pursed her lips. \"We\'ll see what Vegeta has to say on the matter when we get back.\" She started the hover car again and took off.

Gato quickly put the pedigree paper back in his case and fastened it shut. As they approached the windy border to the saiya-jin valley, he clutched the case tightly to his chest and huddled down in the seat. Bulma noticed his nervous behavior out of the corner of her eye but didn\'t remark on it.

Bulma landed the hover car back in the same spot she had left. She gestured for Gato to get out of the vehicle and quickly popped it back into it\'s capsule.

Gato watched her, wide-eyed and trembling, and waited for her to speak. Bulma, however, was scanning the cliffs to find Vegeta.

Trunks and Goten suddenly appeared from the ledges by the hot spring. They looked over Gato with interest.

Trunks turned to speak to Bulma. \"Who\'s the new guy, \'Kassan?\" Trunks asked.

Bulma turned to Trunks. \"His name\'s Gato; I\'m not sure who he is or how he got to be here, but your father it seems would know him. I was looking for Vegeta right now.\"

Trunks pursed his lips in thought and looked around. \"He was with Gokou for a while...he may be with Ojiisan. Something about Ojiisan and Bardock straightening out the problems with Radditz and Tales.\"

\"Hai,\" Goten agreed. \"I\'m almost sure they\'re in your house; Vegeta-sama seems to prefer meeting with people there.\"

\"Would you mind going to get him?\" Bulma asked. \"Gato and I need to speak with him.\"

Trunks and Goten looked at them curiously. \"No problem, \'Kassan,\" Trunks said. He and Goten flew up to the entrance to Vegeta and Bulma\'s cave and entered.

They appeared a few minutes later with an unhappy looking Vegeta in tow. The three of them flew down to where Bulma and Gato were standing.

Vegeta paled slightly as he looked Gato over, but he quickly composed himself. \"Well, what do you want?\" he snapped.

Bulma took Gato\'s case from the young man\'s hands and slapped it against Vegeta\'s chest. \"You have some talking to do, both for this young man\'s benefit and mine.\"

Vegeta gripped the leather case and stared at the two of them. \"I take it he was the one at the police station,\" he said.

\"Yes, he was,\" Bulma said matter-of-factly. \"And it seems you\'re the only who who knows why he\'s here.\"

Vegeta didn\'t answer her remark. \"Where\'s your mother, boy?\" he demanded. \"I hardly think you could have gotten offworld without her.\"

Gato looked at the ground. \"She is dead, sir,\" he said. \"I didn\'t mean to cause any trouble. I...I just didn\'t want to be sold, so I...I ran away. I didn\'t know where else to go.\"

Vegeta tossed the case back at Gato and folded his arms across his chest. \"And just how did you know to come here?\" he demanded. \"I\'m certain your pedigree has my location listed as Freeza\'s ship.\"

\"Hai,\" Gato said quietly. \"I stowed away on a trading ship. When their crew found me, they told me that Freeza had been slain. One of their crew members knew who you were, though, and had heard that you\'d settled on a planet called Earth. They let me borrow one of their landing pods and dropped me off on their way by.\"

\"Hn,\" Vegeta said. \"I suppose that\'s bound to happen with the reputation I carry.\" He frowned.

\"Well, at least you\'re feeling more comfortable here,\" Bulma said. \"Your stutter seems to have disappeared.\"

Gato looked up in surprise and a brief look of panic crossed his face. \"G-g-gomen,\" he said. \"I-I d-didn\'t mean -\"

Vegeta cut him off. \"Just be quiet boy,\" he snapped, \"before you make a complete idiot of yourself.\" He turned to Bulma. \"I imagine he only stutters when speaking to women; it\'s an affliction a number of males of his race seem to have.\"

\"He\'s half saiya-jin though, isn\'t he?\" Bulma demanded.

Vegeta sighed heavily. \"Yes, he is,\" he said. \"What would you have me say? I\'m not proud of the fact; as it happens I hoped and prayed every day that his mother would miscarry or he\'d be stillborn.\"

Bulma looked shocked. \"Vegeta!\" she said. \"What a terrible thing to say!\"

However, even as she spoke, Gato was moving forward to grasp Vegeta\'s hand. He quickly took Vegeta\'s hand in his own and shook it vigorously. \"Oh, thank you,\" he said. \"It means a lot to hear it from you, even if it didn\'t happen.\"

Vegeta moved away from him in disgust. \"Don\'t even start to think I care about your welfare, brat,\" he snapped. \"Your mother wanted a daughter out of the deal; I would have done anything in my power to see that it didn\'t happen. However, your mother only paid to have me for three days, hardly enough time for her to conceive let alone for me to do any damage to the developing child.\" He looked bitter as he spoke. \"Freeza earned a nice sum of money and a large chunk of land on your planet from the deal, as I understand it. It must have been quite a bit for him to allow me to be the sire with as much as he hated saiya-jin.\"

\"The purchase price is on my pedigree and birth records,\" Gato said helpfully. \"They\'re in my case.\" He withdrew the said papers from his case and handed them to Vegeta.

Vegeta glanced over the papers and whistled. \"Hn. She must have certainly been desperate for a daughter; your mother could have as easily handed over most of her kingdom for the price she paid.\"
thisthis time the others in the valley had taken notice of the conversation and were standing nearby watching curiously. Vegeta glanced at them and continued. \"And with your mother now dead, you decided to steal your papers and flee the planet,\" he said.

\"Hai,\" Gato admitted. \"I overheard the heirs of the estate talking. They didn\'t have any interest in keeping me around and were going to auction me off; I knew that because of my appearance I would never be sold into a gentle household, so I ran away. The trade ship that was about to leave seemed my only way off, and I took my papers with me so no one could lay claim to me.\"

\"Vegeta, I don\'t understand all of this,\" Bulma said. \"Are you two saying that Gato is some kind of slave?\"

Vegeta snorted. \"All men on his planet are slaves. I couldn\'t stand their filthy race.\"

\"Then how-?\"

Vegeta sighed in irritation. \"Do I have to spell it out for you, woman?\" he snapped. \"The brat\'s mother paid Freeza very handsomely to use me as breeding stock.\" His face flushed in anger and embarrassment and he turned away.

Bulma stared at him for a moment in shock. \"Then...that\'s why that picture...\" Her voice trailed off.

Vegeta snapped to attention and looked at her. \"Picture?\"

\"Gato has a picture of you that went with the pedigree. I was surprised, because of your appearance in it; it makes more sense now.\"

Vegeta mulled the information over in his mind. \"Hn,\" he said. \"I know what picture you\'re talking about. They\'re standard on that planet, so people can see exactly what they\'re getting.\"

Vegeta\'s father walked up beside him. \"You were aware of the boy\'s existence all this time, and you never bothered to inform anyone of it?\" He raised an eyebrow disapprovingly.

Vegeta looked away. \"I didn\'t know if he lived or not, and for the most part I didn\'t care; at the time I had more important things to deal with. Freeza made sure from the start that I would have no contact with the brat; he was afraid that I would pass on my saiya-jin ways.\"

A sleepy voice spoke up from behind the elder Vegeta. \"If I recall correctly, his statement was \'filthy monkey habits\'.\" Zarbon walked to the front of the group, yawning and rubbing sleepiness from one eye.

Vegeta sneered at him. \"Sleeping in the middle of the day, Zarbon? Surely being alive again isn\'t that boring.\"

Zarbon glared in response. \"Lay off, Vegeta,\" he said. \"A person doesn\'t sleep much in Hell, you know. I\'m just catching up.\"

Vegeta waved his hand in irritation. \"Whatever,\" he snapped. He turned back ato.ato. \"You\'re obviously going to have to stay here, to keep you out of trouble,\" he said. He turned to leave, but stopped with an afterthought. He half-turned back toward those standing around. \"And someone get him cleaned up and in decent clothes; I don\'t want him walking around looking like some cheap whore.\"