The Royal Exception

One time, King Cold took his family to the adults-only resort known as the Pink Oyster Cult on Poonjab VII. It was a really great vacation.

Brothers Cooler, Frieza, and Nitro were brought along because their father was the tyrant of the universe, and no one could question his judgment. Nevertheless, Cold was passed out in a chair in his hotel room, a glass of ice wine held dangerously in his partially-limp hand. Uncle Arcterial had locked himself in the bathroom, and Uncle Icer had gone down to the space sauna to relax his muscles. It was a horrible situation, the kind you’d find yourself stuck in during a hooker transaction gone wrong.

This was all to say that the young Arcosians had no one watching over them. So naturally they did the sickest thing imaginable: playing nine hours of Space Super Smash Bros. Melee. It really is a good game. Really, if you don’t base your OCs moves off of some character from this game, what the fuck are you wasting everyone’s time with? Clearly the best and most aesthetic fighting combinations exist only in this game. Now, I know what you’re saying – nostalgia poisons the logic of an otherwise competent brain. And you’re right. I have no counterargument for such a simple, but profound observation.

After Nitro was caught spamming Space Whoopi’s usual bullshit, Frieza threw his controller into the TV.

“I call this a Death Beam, worm!” the lipstick-wearing fool screamed at his younger brother, sending a bullet of purple energy into Nitro’s chest.

“Shouldn’t it be able to kill him if it’s called that?” Cooler asked, smirking to himself at his great joke, just a beauty.

“Shut up, Cooler! I could’ve done it if I had wanted to! I just don’t want to be called a fratricide is all.”

Though he was wincing and bending over, clutching his chest, the youngest brother was nonetheless filled with enmity. “Why not?! You look like one!”

“Oh yeah?! Want to say that again, Nitey?!”

Frieza bitch-slapped the purple boy with his tail, sending him flying into a wall. A painting of some rotund alien with six arms, a bowtie, and a kazoo, fell to the ground, its glass cover shattering. Nitro lunged at Frieza, elbowing him hard before tackling him and pinning him against Daddy Cold’s bed (thus far unused). The two began to wrestle while Cooler grabbed a box of knob-naub crackers to watch (he was too cool to jump in, being the eldest).

Their father snored, his mouth agape, his body splayed on the chair like someone had blown his brains out a fortnight back and forgot to clean up the mess. Somehow he continued to cling to that ice wine. Even in sleep, the emperor of the universe held tightly to his dearest possession.

He had his brother by the throat, choking him mercilessly. Nitro was turning an even deeper shade of indigo. Cooler was frowning off into the distance, chewing on the tip of a thrice-baked cracker, lest someone peek in through their hotel window. He had to look cool and all. That was when Nitro released an explosive wave, sending Frieza into to the ceiling, where he got stuck real tight in between the drywall in a crater. Cackling at his brother, Nitro shot up at him, headbutting him in the chest, back-flipping, and releasing a slew of light blue energy balls into Frieza’s helpless body.

Cooler nodded to himself. That was just how Frieza liked it, after all.

“Insolent maggot!” the young tyrant screeched, ripping himself from the ceiling and causing several chunks of it to rain down around them. Luckily, not one piece hit their sleeping papa, but that’s not to say a little nugget didn’t dive into his wine glass. “How dare you besmirch my beautiful face?!”

Frieza’s fist made contact with Nitro’s. The windows shattered from the impact. They traded blows, dancing around the bed, sneering and spitting at each other like a couple of Inovian viper drones. Then Nitro caught Frieza’s tail (the young fella had been attempting another bitch slap) and bit down on it hard.

Screaming, Frieza yanked his tail back and fired another Death Beam into Nitro’s face. This time, when his brother fell, he did not get up.

“Bastard…!” Frieza was huffing, holding his tail gingerly. The teeth marks were visible even from where Cooler lounged. “He bit me…! He bit me, Cooler! Can you believe it? What a savage!”

“Did you kill him?” the other boy asked, mild interest in his voice. He threw another handful of knob-naubs into his mouth.

“No! He got off easy! If I wanted t–”

Suddenly, the bathroom door swung open, and there stood the horrible, pointy-nosed Uncle Arcterial. Like their father, he preferred their species’ second form over all others. The boys, all in their first forms, were intimidated not only by his height, but by his glare. His cheeks were dark as blood, and the look in his eyes had to be lividity if anything.

“What the hell is going on in here?!” he roared at them. “I thought I told you kids to play your video game and be quiet!”

“Nitro was spamming.”

“He was, he was!” Frieza agreed hastily. “Look what he made me do! It’s tragic!”

They all gave a moment of silence to the sparking video screen with the control halfway lodged in it. But Arcterial wasn’t buying their tomfoolery. His eyes darted around the room, noticing the carnage.

“Frieza…” he growled.

“It’s Nitro’s fault, isn’t it Cooler?! Tell him, brother!”

Cooler shrugged apathetically. “I had nothing to do with it.”

“You’re going to explain this to your father when he wakes up. Where’s Nitro?”

“He’s sleeping. He got rather tired.”

Their uncle looked like he had just swallowed a spoiled space crab. “Oh, that’s real good, you two.” He moved out of the bathroom just then, and that was when they noticed that not only was he not wearing his armor, but he was wearing a velvety lilac bathrobe. He looked altogether regal, kind of. Arcterial knelt next to Nitro, who was crumpled on the far side of the room, behind the bed. Then, he stood back up, shaking his head. “Meh, he’ll live. Here…” The man reached into a pocket and pulled out a few space woolong notes, handing them to Cooler, not Frieza. “Go down to the gift shop and buy something. Don’t come back until it’s dinner time, got it?! I don’t want to hear you two cause any more of a ruckus!”

“I didn’t do anything,” Cooler reminded him. “Don’t make me kill you, uncle. How dare you slander me.”

“Shut it, you little worm.” He returned to the bathroom, preparing to close the door. Suspiciously, their uncle was waiting for them to leave first for some reason. “Now get going. I won’t ask you again!”

“What are you doing in there, uncle?” Frieza asked. “You were in there an awful long time. Is something the matter? I thought you slipped in the shower and knocked yourself out.”

“You have a big mouth on you, Frieza. Too bad you aren’t my son. I wouldn’t put up with such insolence, I’ll tell you! Go! Begone!”

His roar made them shiver and scamper, and soon the door was slammed behind them. It was only when they were outside that the two realized they didn’t have a hotel key on them.

“How much did he give you?” Frieza asked eagerly, greedily eyeing the wad of bills Cooler was holding. “Is it a lot? Brother, let me hold it! Can I? Please? Be a good brother now!”

“No way. You’ll spend it all on candy, or something stupid.”

“Well, how much did he give you?! Half of it’s mine! I demand my share, brother!”

“Uncle Arcterial said no such thing, Frieza.”

“Cooler…”

The older boy folded his arms, stopping in the middle of the hall. “You know I’m stronger than you. Do you really wish to challenge me? I’m not a pushover like Nitro.”

Seeing his cause lost, the other boy averted his eyes and folded his arms too out of spite. “Hmph. Just take me to the gift shop already. I want to shop, shop, shop!”

Their wing of the hotel was remarkably vacant. Not a space alien was to be seen as they found the elevator, took it to the main lobby, and passed the massage parlours. It was only when they reached the sauna huts that they met their first vacationer.

He was a bloated, green-skinned Jolean with a cream-colored mohawk and a great bushy mustache. As he wobbled down the hallway, clutching a brown-tinged bottle of something poisonous (and delicious), the man sang to himself:

“You press that bottle to your lips, hic, I wish I was your space whiskey, hic, ‘nd don’t forget ta fuck her right in the pussy… Oh, and I wanna like to check her for space ticks, harharhar!”

He found himself highly amusing. Frieza had a look on his face like he’d pissed himself in his space pod.

“Hello there,” Cooler said politely. “Would you mind telling us where the gift shop is?”

“Giff…? The hell…?!” He braced himself on a wall to prevent himself from falling over. The dude had these real meaty chins too, and they jiggled like space pudding every time he lurched. “Why you wanna go there…? Lemme tell ya somethin’, midgets…” he breathed, kneeling next to them and patting Frieza on the shoulder all loving and such. “Bitches love space flowers. They don’t need nothin’ else. I’m tellin’ ya, hic, it don’t matter what you get ‘em! They’ll get wet for anythin’!”

Cooler gave Frieza a look. “Alright, thanks.”

Further down the hall, which was carpeted in ancient crimson-and-gold patterning with many a stain and many a scorch mark, they ran into a pair of lithe Zar-degar girls wearing nothing but g-strings and pink furry boots and gloves.

“My dears, my dears, come a little closer now, just a little closer,” they sang sweetly, ushering the young Arcosians towards an open door which steam was leaking out from. “Come, stay a while. You came here to relax, didn’t you? Relax with us…”

Smooth as her voice was, Cooler and Frieza did not understand why she would want them to go into the sauna with her and her friend. After all, they’d never even met these girls before.

“Who are you to speak to the Emperor of the Universe in such a tone?” Frieza reprimanded them. “Show some respect! We’re royalty.”

“Oh my, they’re kids! Look at them! Mother of Zalama…! I-I’m so dreadfully sorry, we didn’t–”

“Good day, we’re closed!” the other girl said hurriedly as they rushed behind the door and slammed it shut.

“That was weird.”

“Your face is weird.”

“Nuh uh, your tail is all misshapen now that Nitro bit it.”

Frieza gasped. “Don’t say that, Cooler! It’ll heal up. It will!”

“Sure it will.”

They wandered on for a while more until they came to the lobby. Beyond the relatively pedestrian food vendors and clerk desks, they spotted what appeared to be something fancy: ‘The Bald Man in a Boat’. This shop, if it could be called that, was all glitz and all pizazz. If the radiating fuschia sign wasn’t enough, an animated light display just above the name of what appeared to be space beans raining down over the name added that extra bit of flair necessary to pull them inside.

Well, that and the fact they could see Nitro inside through the window.

“How’d you get down here?” Cooler demanded when he and Frieza ran in there. “Frieza knocked you out cold!”

“Uncle Arcterial threw me out. He said it was super important business. Look, he even gave me a space woolong to spend at the gift shop!”

Frieza’s face drew up in a pout. “Cooler…! How many space woolongs did Uncle Arcterial give you?”

“Let’s see…” He unrolled the stack, counting in his head. “Seventeen.”

“Haha!” Frieza jumped up and down with glee, pointing at his little brother. “Uncle Arcterial likes us more than you! Give me my rightful ₩8.50, brother.”

Nitro gritted his teeth. “Shut up, Frieza!”

Cooler rolled his eyes in annoyance. “I only have paper bills, idiot. I can’t give you half a woolong. We’ll split it three ways. Six for each.”

“Hmph, fine. Just give me mine!”

He did, and his brothers began to finally calm down a little. “So… this is the gift shop, eh?”

“They have all sorts of cool stuff here, look,” Nitro said eagerly, gesturing to a shelf of green and white bottles called ‘Passionate Licks: Space Watermelon flavor’. “Look, it’s a whole space watermelon flavored drink! Can I get it, Cooler?”

“Spend your money however you want.”

“Where’s the candy?” Frieza asked in annoyance. “I don’t want to drink that nasty stuff.”

There were aisles of g strings and the mysterious flavored Passionate Licks drinks. There were also aisles full of what looked like space-badger suits and lizard suits and even costumes – maid outfits, nurse outfits, and even mock battle armor. There weren’t any accessories or refrigerator magnets to be seen. It didn’t make sense.

“Excuse me, excuse me!” Frieza cried, slamming his hand down on the attendant’s bell, shattering it beneath his palm. “Customer service!!”

Hastily, a man sprinted out from behind the counter, pulling up his pants. He was wrinkly purple-skinned horned man with a massive brow. “Hmmm, whassat? What do you want now, huh? I was on break!”

Frieza screamed, “I’ll break you in half if you don’t tell me where your candy is! I want to buy six woolongs worth.”

“Candy…? What are you talking about?”

The Arcosian’s voice dropped to a dangerous low. “Is this not the gift shop?”

“Yeah, why?”

“Gift shops sell candy.”

“Yeah, uhm, I don’t think this one does, midget.”

“Why you…!”

His little face was getting all purple with rage. Cooler tackled him, and Nitro stomped his tail down.

“Father is already going to kill us for what you did to his room!” the older boy whispered in his ear. “Don’t make it worse for yourself! He’ll ground you for a year if you kill that man.”

“Hmph.”

Cooler stepped away, but Nitro was a tad too slow, leading to Frieza’s foot finding his stomach. The youngest brother fell to his knees coughing. Needless to say, to the purple horned man, this was an odd sight to behold. Nitro remained kneeling and coughing, but the other boys didn’t pay him the slightest bit of attention. Only the strong survive, after all. There isn’t any room for weakness in the royal family.

“What would you recommend we buy?” Cooler asked the man. “What’s the most delicious thing you sell here?”

“D-delicious…? Uhm, do you, uhm, do you mean somethin’ that’ll get you excited?” Cooler nodded naïvely. “Well… that would be our deluxe 180 color page Wet Hamster space jugs special!!” He pointed proudly to the wall behind him, where a white plastic barrier was erected over several rows of magazines. On it was taped a simple message: ‘Top secret: adults only’.

“We’ll take one.”

“That’ll be fifty-five space woolongs, thank you very much.”

The brothers glanced at one another in muted panic. The allure of this top secret space hamster thing had gotten them pretty excited. Even Frieza wasn’t liable to bitch about candy anymore. He wanted to see what those 180 pages (in color!) were hiding from the general public.

“Oh. Can you give us a moment, please?” They huddled together, a little ways away from the man, making sure he couldn’t eavesdrop on them. This was a top secret royal meeting. “Nitro, distract him for a second… Frieza, get ready to grab that hamster mag when I make my move.”

The other boys nodded. In a flash, Cooler air dashed over to that aisle with the Passionate Lick bottles, snatching up one of the space mango variety, and returned to the counter. The man seemed mildly surprised, but moved to the cash register nonetheless, assuming the boy wanted him to ring that up.

Not so fast. Twisting off the cap like he was decapitating a squealing space rat, Cooler aimed the bottle at the purple man and sprayed it all over his face. Nitro stepped aside just in time to dodge the splash residue. Sometimes that kid could be clutch, but it wasn’t too often, and it wasn’t too impressive. He was the youngest brother, though. You gotta go easy on the ones most likely to be lustin’ for the meatpipe.

As the fancyman cried out and slipped, Frieza flew over the counter, plucking up three Wet Hamster magazines. In the next moment, they were flying away, purple and blue auras glittering around them as they cackled in innocent glee.

They were making their way back to the hotel room (for it was getting rather late, conveniently), thumbing through the magazines together. It was real nice that Frieza got his brother one, even though he hated his brother. Nitro had barely muttered a ‘thank you’, but that had perhaps been enough. Frieza loved making people grovel before him. It was an obsession of his.

“I don’t get it…” Frieza complained. He had already checked every single page, front and back, and found nothing he liked. “What’s the point of this? It’s just a bunch of aliens without any clothes on.”

“There are some weird close-ups,” Cooler agreed. “Look at this woman’s stink flaps. Why would they put that in here? Is this a joke? How disgusting!”

Nitro was grinning boyishly. “I don’t know you guys, I kind of like it…”

At that exact moment, a door to their right opened, and out strode Uncle Icer, the blue-skinned baby uncle who was far younger than their daddy and Uncle Arcterial. He was wearing a midnight blue bathrobe, fine as lum-lum taffy, and had a strange look in his watery cyan eyes. The moment he noticed them, all the tension returned to his face, and he made them pause where they stood on the crusty carpet.

“What are you kids three doing down here?”

“Uncle Arcterial made us leave the room. He said he had important business to attend to. We couldn’t refuse him, uncle.”

“No, I should expect not,” the older Arcosian said wryly. “Now… what’s that you’ve got there?”

There was no use lying; there was no use hiding their prizes. He was too quick, grabbing Cooler’s magazine before the boy could come up with an excuse.

“This is the Wet Hamster space jugs special. It’s top secret, Uncle!” Nitro said earnestly.

“The man at the gift shop sold it to us. He said it was his hottest item,” Cooler explained, his voice guarded. He was yet unsure if Icer would grow angry at them for taking the top secret adults only prize from that shop.

“I see.” Their uncle flipped through the pages casually. “Do you know why this magazine was the hottest item in the shop?”

They all shook their heads. “It’s in color,” Frieza offered, but that only made the man laugh.

“No, that’s not it at all. Has your father already educated you lot in the method of reproduction?”

“No, of course not. Why would he tell us about something as stupid as that?!”

“That’s what these magazines are for.”

“Wha… how?!” The youngest son was the most perplexed.

“It doesn’t matter. Most Arcosians tell their kids about the space birds and the space bees at your ages, but…”

“Space birds and space bees?! What are you blabbering on about, uncle?”

“Watch your mouth, Frieza.” He took Nitro’s and Frieza’s magazines too. “It doesn’t matter. Men look at these pictures and it makes them want to mate with females of their species. But…” he muttered, incinerating the magazines with a flick of the wrist, “that’s not the case with our family. We’re mutants. I thought your father told you this already. We reproduce asexually – just our family. We’re special. It’s why we’re stronger than the average Arcosian.”

Frieza jumped up and down, stamping his feet, making the lights adorning the walls on either side flicker on and off several times. “What the hell…?! We paid good money for those, uncle! I’m telling Daddy what you did!”

The Ice Lord, as he was known throughout the universe, shrugged. “Go ahead. But that doesn’t change the fact that all of us are asexual. If you want an heir, you’ll have to make one all yourself. Does that scare you?”

Cooler scoffed; Frieza smirked; Nitro nodded, eyes wide.

“When a space man loves a space woman, they get naked together and hug it out for a while. A little while later, a baby is born. But for you three, you’re lucky. You don’t need the space women to make it happen. Count your blessings, kids. It’s cool to be asexual. Space bitches aren’t worth our time.”

“B-b-bu-bu-but… they love space flowers…!” Nitro cried. The boy became inconsolable.

Cooler slapped him in the face. “Nitro, get it together. We’re in public. There’s no crying in public.”

“He knows better than that. Slap him again, brother!”

“Make me!”

“Oh, so that’s how it’s going to be?!”

The boys stood in a circle glaring at one another, ready to kill each other at a moment’s notice. Frieza flipped off Cooler; Nitro made a childish face at Frieza; Cooler folded his arms and yawned. All their tails were in the air, and all their auras were around them again. This was about to get serious.

Icer shook his head in disbelief. “Get out of here, you three. What the hell… no wonder Cold drinks so much. If those were my kids…”

It was Cooler of all icy boys who attacked first. Icer would never have guessed it. He went for Nitro, not for Frieza, and the brawl commenced. Frieza meanwhile went for him, and Nitro went for Cooler. They all collided in midair. That was Icer’s chance. Sighing in annoyance (he’d need another hour in the sauna after this), the Arcosian hastily created a flaming blue glove of energy around his left fist, and then, without waiting to hear them beg, punched them in an explosion that not only knocked the three wrestling boys unconscious, but added another scorch mark to the regal, ancient carpet, and it was a marvelous, poignant moment of character development for everyone.