A Quest for Booty

Chapter 1: The Prince and the Talker
"I hypothesize that there is, in fact, a way to be free.

Free from this world and ascend into the next,

free from the gods who banished our ancestors so long ago,

and free to make our own path, our own future!

Now, allow me to go in depth with my analysis..."

-An excerpt from Demons and War: by Towa  Dämon

“King Beelzebub?” the servant asked.

The King, however, was busy swinging a sword with a gold handle around. Back and forth, back and forth. Mesmerized. Finally, after a minute of silence, the young king gave a glance to the servant and went back to swinging the sword around. Another minute passed.

“Um…my king?” the servant asked again.

Beelzebub waved his hand away from the demon, still watching his weapon, firmly grasped as if the demon was going to snatch it away from him. “Go talk to Aunt Towa about what you want. I’m busy.”

“B-Bu–”

“I said leave!” he shouted. He faced the servant, who was shaking in his leather boots. The sword was now firmly stabbed into the ground, out of the king’s rage.

“A-As you wish, my king.” The demon shuffled to the door. He glanced once more at the boy and noticed he was struggling to pull the sword out of the ground, like King Arthur, though not as successful. In fear of being yelled at again, the servant rushed out of the room, leaving the king behind.

The servant walked to a room not like any other in the Demon Realm. Before it was a large, metal door with buttons and dials all over. Next to that was a small intercom. The demon spoke into it, “Mistress Towa, I need to speak with you! It’s urgent! Hello? Are you there?” After he said that, the door started to creak open. The servant walked in.

The room was just as queer as the door, with machines, tables filled with vials of strange liquids, papers flown onto the floor, and unknown plants growing in the corner of the room. In the very middle was a demon woman, tinkering with a small device: Towa. Before the attendant could speak, Towa turned to meet him, lifting her goggles from her eyes.

“What is it?” she asked.

He gulped, looking away from the scientist. “U-um, well…Mistress Towa, t-there’s been another revolt…”

She slammed her fists down upon the table, breaking it in two and making the lackey yelp. “Another one? Another revolt?! If this keeps up, I’ll never complete my experiments!”

“Wh-what should we do?”

She sat in a chair, with her hand on her head, thinking. They sat in silence for quite a long time until Towa smirked. “Yes, yes…this is perfect!” she ran to a cabinet and pulled out a scroll with seven orange spheres on it. “Yes, yes, yes!” She hopped up in the air with glee, quickly wrote a note on the scroll and handed it to the patient footman. “Give this to a servant, preferably a younger one. Make sure he doesn't show the king this map, but make sure the bra-my nephew knows about Dragon Balls. Those being wish granting orbs on Earth. No exceptions. Don’t argue with any ideas he comes up with. Let the king do what he wants. If I found out you haven’t done what I said…well…I do need a new test subject for a rather…explosive experiment. Do you understand?”

The demon nodded and hastily ran out the door. Towa slammed the door behind him and laughed maniacally. “Of course, why hadn’t I thought of it before?! Send the boy on a dangerous and pointless mission that he can’t resist! There’s no way those Earthlings will let him gather the Dragon Balls, ahaha! And after they kill him, the throne will be left all for me. It’s perfect! No one will suspect a thing!” She giggled again. “The Demon Realm is mine!”

“Which one are you?” Beelzebub eyed his shadow-clad servant suspiciously.

“They call me Khulketti, sir. Woo!”

“Are you gonna follow me around the whole time?”

“That’s the plan, sir!” The brave messenger beat his chest and flew around the boy, his bony wings spread. “And if I bring you back in one piece, sir, Miss Towa’ll make me a king!”

“A king of what?!” Beelzebub’s words spilled out sharp as razors.

“Oh, uh, nowhere, I think…I-I mean…you’re the real king, Beelzebub sir, my lord, my king, your grace, your majesty, your worship, etc., etc…!!!”

“Shut up. I’m not the king–my dad is. We’re gonna bring him back. That’s the plan.” He gazed up at the sun spitefully. “Curse this damn sun…! Why did you bring me out here, anyways?” Beelzebub peered around; dust-beaten dunes expanded starkly in all directions. The boy thought he could make out a Krayt dragon skeleton laid across a far-distant dune that rose like a burgeoning, baby mountain in the distance, silhouetted by the deepening horizon. “There’s nothing out here, Khulketti.”

“Nah ah, sir, lookee!” His servant flittered about in the air, twirling like a twirler. Beelzebub had half a mind to shoot that pesky little irritant out of the sky. “Right here, sir!”

The strange messenger demon loosed himself down from the sky, streaking urgently towards a lone cactus that had grown at the base of the nearest dune; gracelessly, Khulketti landed in an awkward flop, skidding his way past the target, earning him mad bonus points. “Here’s the first one sir, lookee, I found it, I found it, I did!”

Beelzebub walked over to his companion, who was flailing in the dirt about twelve feet away. As he went, the sands seemed almost to give way, shaking as if something were moving (with great pace) underneath him.

“Man, he tried to eat it! I mean, lookee sir, this vulture almost ate a Dragon Ball!” Khulketti explained, pointing with one long finger to the bird carcass that lay broken and curled around the trunk of the cactus. In its withered, yellowed beak, an orange ball gleamed.

“Oh… cool.” It had two light orange stars on it, pale as honey. Beelzebub pocketed the ball, furrowing his brow. “Hang on, how’d you know that one was here?”

His reaction startled the younger demon.“Ah, I, well…Miss Towa…she…uh, I…” Khulketti squeaked, suddenly retreating about three feet into the air.

His bony wings for a moment cast a blanket over the sun in bursts that seemed to pulsate in rhythm with Beelzebub’s heartbeat. The air was already in his lungs, ready to be expelled violently, when the dune exploded in a white-gold rush. He swore; the Krayt dragon surfaced without a sound as it rose to pluck Khulketti from the sky. The messenger hardly managed a gurgled scream before he was sucked down into the swirling sands.

Beelzebub sprung into the cloudless sky, exhaling slowly. He stared into the sand and in mere moments, the desert looked the same as it did mere seconds prior. The boy flew back down and stomped his foot into the sand. “You stupid servant! You could’ve at least told me what Aunt Towa told you!”

Suddenly, the Krayt dragon reemerged from the sand, ready to pounce. He fired a blast at the creature’s chest, which shot through the Dragon’s body. The Dragon’s movement halted as it lay dead in front of the prince. The sand sizzled as Beelzebub was about to walk away. However, he looked in the hole and saw the disgruntled body of his former companion. He didn’t care about him (although it was very disgusting to see that ). No, what stood out to him more was a slightly torn scroll. Careful not to get any of the blood or who knows what else on himself, he made a weak ki glove and grabbed the scroll. The demon opened up the scroll, walking away from the body. On it were orange spheres, each marked in a specific location: a map. Strangely, the balls themselves moved on the piece of paper. Obviously an incantation put on by Towa.

“Well I guess that was karma for not telling me you had this, Khulketti.” The prince crossed off the Dragon Ball marked on the map with his finger. “Alright, where to next?” he asked no one in particular. The closest one (besides his) was around…East City? West City? It didn’t matter to him. All that mattered was that he could find the balls. He flew off to his next destination, leaving the desert behind.

“Interesting. Very interesting,” Old Kai said, looking into his crystal ball. Normally, he’d be ogling the reporters or Chi-Chi or Bulma (well maybe not the latter; Vegeta does get mad at him for doing that), especially since he was at a party filled with them. Granted, Abo and Kado had just scared all of them away, but they were coming back now, after they had settled down. But Old Kai was focused. Kibito Kai heard this and, curious, walked away from the food platters and sat by the ball. He looked into it and saw a small imp-like demon.

“…Who is that?”

The ancestor rubbed his chin and spoke, “That, young one, is the son of Dabura.”

Kibito Kai was shocked. “D-Dabura has a son?”

Elder Kai nodded. “And he’s here on Earth collecting the Dragon Balls as we speak.”

“Shouldn’t we do something?!” Kibito Kai’s wildly dramatic tone had quickly become his signature skill.

“Nah, it should be fine. Beelzebub is nowhere near the power or the evil Dabura was. It should be fun to watch him search for the balls tho–” Old Kai saw a beautiful girl. “On second thought, I’m going to look at that fine looking lady right there!” As the old man, along with Master Roshi and Oolong, went to look at the girl, Kibito Kai stared down at the crystal ball.

“…I’m sorry, elder, but if he’s as dangerous as Dabura…” He remembered Kibito being blasted into tiny little bits by the King of the Demons. The fusion grabbed the crystal ball and teleported away from the party without a second glance.

Aunt Towa’s crudely-drawn map led Beelzebub to a corner of the busiest road in West City.

He had half a mind to curse this damn sun too. There were so many humans he felt sick. The boy’s father used to (this was many years ago now) tell him bedtime tales about humans, about their nasty foulness, their greed, their lack of passion. They moved in grey-black crowds around him, dead-eyed and persistent. Beelzebub wanted to throw up.

A shirtless man sprinted indecisively along the sidewalk, a bright green cape tied around his neck, a lanky, green, boot-like hat jammed down over his ears. He was shouting something profane and throwing lentil beans into the crowds, but no one cared. Beelzebub picked up one of the lentils from the ground and tried it but it wasn’t good at all and he couldn’t understand why everyone wasn’t as nonplussed as he was.

Just ahead, a moss-furred fox sold jackalope kabobs from a dirty, banged-up metal cart. Beelzebub recoiled in disgust as a man with a balding, uneven head ordered three. He stopped in front of another vendor whose cart was yellow and bright and clean and bought one bottle of water with a dapper show of his courtly manners. When the water seller asked for a random amount of zeni, Beelzebub, not knowing what zeni was, spat a blood curse at him and swiped one of the bottles before bounding off down the street. The man’s uproarious shouts were lost in the crowd.

His feet and the map led him down a polluted little alleyway that sprung crookedly from the main street. A scarlet dragonfly hovered in front of his goggles. The boy blasted it away, his ki illuminating the entire tucked-away world of grime and garbage. In that instant, he caught a flash of orange in the corner of his eye.

“Give it back…! I only need six more to get my wish,” the gnomish, blue-skinned shrimp of an imp wailed. He wore an outfit that might have been meant for either a king or a jester (Beelzebub could not tell). The tiny little maggot had pointed ears, though, and that made the prince grin from ear to ear. In his left hand was a bottle of GP Cola; the petulant creature sipped from it with marked tedium.

“You’re a miserable little toad, arentcha?” Beelzebub said with a sinister chuckle.

“A-a…a toad?! Why you little… How dare you speak to me like that?! I’m Emperor Pi–”

Beelzebub tossed the ranting despot aside like yesterday’s baby-infested bathwater. He held up the shining six-star Dragon Ball, rolling it between his fingers. “Man, this is way easier than I thought it’d be.”

There were a few awkward moments of silence. Nothing moved except for a shaggy grey alley cat scrounging for morsels in a heap of garbage.

Well past what could be considered good timing, a blooming flare of blinding light materialized in front of the Prince of the Underworld. And from that light tumbled a certain man who is the venerably oblivious Kibito Kai, but Beelzebub didn’t know that yet.

Kibito Kai’s hair was outrageously long. He looked absolutely ridiculous. “Nice hairdo, you old minger! You know, I’ve been around all sorts of demons in my life, and man, I gotta say, you’re the ugliest one I’ve ever met! Gah, it’s not even close!”

Kibito Kai rather fancied his hairstyle; the pink baby demon would do well to hold his tongue, the grand old fusion thought. There was much and more the Supreme Kai could say about the kid, but he held back because he was an adult and he had been taught how to act. He admired anyone who had the courage to step into the real world still wearing their playing-pretend cape, though.

“Stop right there!” Kibito Kai shouted, doing the jazz hands maneuver. Beelzebub swore under his breath. He never expected that. The Dragon Ball fell from the boy’s outstretched palm. With a choked gasp, the prince realized he could not move. That ugly purple freak had paralyzed him.

Ecstatic, the squealing imp ran for the fallen Dragon Ball, dropping his GP Cola out of excitement. However, before he could reach his prize, the god waved one of his hands to the imp, sending him into a wall with a powerful gust of wind. He then grabbed the Dragon Ball, keeping the boy frozen with his other hand.

“I’m not taking any chances with you,” Kibito Kai boldly stated, forming a ki ball in his other hand.

“Wait, wait! I-I was joking about your hair!” Beelzebub desperately pleaded.

“I won’t let you endanger the universe!” His hand outstretched an inch away from the prince’s stomach, singeing his chest. Suddenly, a flash of blue went past the Kai, and in an instant, Beelzebub was gone.

“W-What?” He looked at his other hand and saw that the Dragon Ball was gone too. “What?!” Kibito Kai shouted. A second later, a red man approached him.

“Yo. Why did you leave the party to attack some kid? I thought you were supposed to be a good guy,” the red man said. The blue flash that took the Dragon Ball and Beelzebub stood on the other side of the alley, although with neither of the items in tow. “Do you understand what you’re doing? You’re letting the next King of Demons leave! I can’t even imagine what he’ll do!” the Kai shouted. He looked at the two again, with a look of realization. “…I see what you’re doing. You didn’t become good at all. It was just a lie.”

“W-What?! No, no! It just seems kind of bad to try to kill a kid,” the red man said.

“You just tried to kill Goten and Trunks an HOUR ago!” The duo were speechless at this fact. Kibito Kai then formed energy in his hands. “My job is to not destroy anything…but like with Buu, I have to make exceptions for universal threats…” He outstretched his arms parallel to one another, aimed at the two who intervened and fired. Both fired their own respective blasts at the incoming energy, negating all of the ki completely. “…And I’d say the King of Demons with three wishes at his fingertips is a big enough threat.”

“Hey, I’m not the king, my dad is!” Beelzebub shouted back. “You look like a mangy little shrew!”

“Y-you…you monster!” Kibito Kai stuttered. His eyes grew shifty and his brow moist. As the two aliens approached, clothed in identical sets of white-and-brown armor, Kibito Kai took a step away from them like a filthy casual. “I-I-I…I-I’m w-warning y-y-you…! I killed the cunning magician Bibidi!”

“Who’s that?” one of the huge, round-as-a-berry aliens grunted.

“He was a frail old man who lived four million years ago!!”

“Oh.” This time, light formed around the other aliens, and when it cleared, there was only one left standing–a purple-skinned, armor-wearing fusion of Abo and Kado, who quite easily surpassed the capabilities of Kibito Kai.

The lavender-cheeked mortal god eked out a squeak. Taking a deep breath, he was engulfed by his own light and disappeared again.

Abo and Kado defused. Beelzebub walked over to the two bulbous aliens tossing the six-star Dragon Ball in his palm. “That was sick, thanks! You’ve gotta teach me how to do a move like that!” he said boyishly. “Who was that idiot anyway?”

The blue one shrugged. “One of the natives, we presume. He was at that party.”

“I couldn’t wait to get out of there,” the red one interjected. “That party was about as bad as my ex-wife was at givin’ me-”

“Settle down, Kado,” his brother cooed. “He’s just a kid.”

“Yeah, yeah, Abo. You’re right.” Kado’s eyes shifted around the alleyway with suave dexterity. “So kid, what were you doin’ with those Dragon Balls, eh? You don’t look like you’re from around here.”

“No way! I’m not a loser from this backwater dump. I’m Beelzebub, the Prince of the Underworld!” The boy pocketed the ball and folded his arms, scowling at the two. He refused to say another word.

Abo cleared his throat. “No, of course not. We would never assume such a poor thing of you. So kid, what were you planning on wishing for once you collected all of those balls?”

“I was going to bring my father back to life.”

“How did he die?”

“I don’t know! I don’t care!” he sneered at them. “I just need to find five more balls and he’ll be back!”

“What will you do with the other two wishes?” Abo coughed with an up-turn of his nose. “Surely you’ve planned what you want with those, too?”

Flustered, Beelzebub bit his lip, trying to think, but his mind had gone painfully blank all of the sudden. “I…I don’t need to tell you that.”

“Surely not,” Kado grinned, “but you can’t blame our curiosity.”

Sucking water from the stolen bottle, Beelzebub scoffed. “You want one, don’t you?”

Abo nodded his head vigorously prompting Kado to hit him in the back of the head to make him stop. “Abo, you fool! You are just as dumb as you look!”

“My apologies, Kado, my brother. I was overcome with unbridled excitement,” Abo apologized.

“Hey, kid, forget what my brother said. He’s not all there. We’ll be your bodyguards,” Kado spoke quickly, redirecting his voice to the young demon. “We’ll make sure that purple guy doesn’t come back and try to kill you again.”

An empty soda can slid slowly down the alleyway, chased by that monstrous tom cat with the shaggy grey fur. The boy made them wait longer than he could have. “Fine. You two can have one wish if you protect me.” He didn’t like giving them the wish, but knowing that that ugly guy with the pointy ears would probably be back, he reckoned this was a fair enough trade.

“Kado, I find this most disagreeable!” Abo whined. “I thought you were taking me to The Guac tonight, now where will I go to party?!”

“Quiet you raving lunatic, we can party after we get our wish!” Kado whispered sharply in his brother’s ear.

“Oh yeah, I like that kind of party!” Abo replied with enthusiasm.

“I know you guys are aliens, but can you stop being so weird around me?” Beelzebub cut in. “Let’s go. There’s another Dragon Ball not so far from here. We can reach it before nightfall.”

Beelzebub took to the air, his pink aura forming weakly around his body. He didn’t wait to see if they would follow.

The god teleported back to the outskirts of Mr. Satan’s party, panting rapidly. “Oh…oh this is no good…I-I only thought I had to face the kid! Not them too! I need backup…” Just as suddenly as he appeared, he was gone.

Unfortunately for him, he teleported right in the middle of the conga line that was made, and he ruined it. Oolong, Yamcha, Krillin and Tarble fell to the ground and were more confused than anything. “Guys! You need to help me fight this demon kid!” he exclaimed. However, he was mostly ignored by his allies, except for Krillin.

“Hey, you don’t have to be hung up on whatever you’re talking about now. There’s a party going on!”

The deity considered this for a millisecond, but quickly neglected the idea. “This is a universal issue! There’s no time to wait around and play games!” Well…maybe fishin-no, he thought to himself. ''I will not make the same mistake I did with Buu! Buu…yes, that’s it!''

The divine being ran up to the one who had once been his mortal foe: Majin Buu. “Buu! I need your help!” Buu was busy eating food and ignored him completely. “B-Buu! I’ll give you loads of food and candy if you help me!” This caught the Majin’s attention.

“Hm…candy? What kind of candy?”

This was his one moment, his one shot–the choice between life and death. “Uh…very, very tasty candy!” Nailed it, he thought to himself.

Buu nodded while eating a whole plate of sandwiches. “Buu help you. But Buu want to eat all this yummy food before eating your candy!”

Kibito Kai was flabbergasted. But…Buu’s the only one who will actually help! Think, Kibito Kai, think! “But…uh…isn’t candy made from bad guys tastier than any other candy?”

The Majin put his big oven mitt hand on his chin and nodded ecstatically. “Buu remember when he ate that fun red guy! Tasty, tasty cookie!”

The god sighed in relief, knowing now that at least Buu was on his side. “Do you remember those red and blue Frieza soldiers from an hour ago?”

The pink man-child drank an entire punch bowl and looked down at the ground. “…Those meanies broke Buu’s best plate. Hercule made that plate!”

A puff of smoke blasted Kibito Kai in the face, making him freak out. ''Of course! I can’t get Buu that mad or he’ll cause another rampage! And if that happens…'' He shuddered at the thought and waved his hands back and forth in front of Buu. “Y-Yes, they did that because they’re b-bad people…so I need your help to beat them up! Then you can turn them into candy and…uh…if you do that…a piece of their candy brings…back plates?”

Buu clapped his hands. “Super, super! Candy like shiny balls?”

“Y-Yes! Their candy is…Candy Corn Crunches! They can bring plates back from the dead!”

The excited Majin hopped up into the air with his arm held up high. “Buu bring back plate! Buu make it great! Let’s go, let’s go!”

Buu pulled his former enemy across the grass. As he was being pulled along, the Supreme Kai thought, I’ll have to ask Hercule what that plate looks like later…

“Argh…who would have thought that a Super Elite like me could have lost! Woe is me!” This obviously amazing and stunning man was Jaco. Today, however, was not one of his best days. First, he lost a card game to the Galactic King. Then, his stereo broke. Finally, he dropped his sandwich on the flight to Earth! Oh, and there was also that red-skinned alien soldier, formerly of the Planet Trade Organization, who had just beat him to near death. That too. Now he was just barely standing up, in his signature pose, of course.

The invader started walking around the Patrolman slowly and methodically, stopping once or twice to examine the look on his prey’s face. Finally, he stopped with his back turned to the elite. “How pitiful. The strongest of the Galactic Patrol reduced to a bumbling fool…” He tilted his head just enough so that Jaco could see his cold, emotionless eyes and his grin, which reminded Jaco of that one time he had been on janitor duty–disgusting, wet and slimy. “Although I suppose you already were that before this. Perhaps even more so.”

Determined not to give up, the Super Elite boldly stated, “I am Jaco! The Super Elite! And it is my job t-” He was cut short by a right hook to the face, which knocked off one of his earpieces and caused him to fall to the ground.

“You talk and talk and talk, don’t you?” the alien shot back, his dark skin glistening with sweat. He held a rusty canteen in one hand, drinking from it every few seconds and sometimes spitting the liquid out onto the dusty, crater-streaked ground. “Do something already. You can’t, can you?”

This had been a routine traffic stop–the alien had been speeding wildly. Jaco was merely doing his duty. He hadn’t expected things to go so poorly. “Look, what do you say we call it a misdemeanor speeding ticket a-and…and I let you get on your way, sir?!”

“Most days I’d’ve killed ya,” the demon-like alien mumbled, pacing around Jaco. He stood more than three times the height of the Patrolman. He took another long drink from his canteen. The alien wore what looked to Jaco like an older model of Planet Trade Organization armor, black, white and green, black-and-white fingerless, armored gauntlets, and a dark crimson cape. His hair was white and stuck up in parts in awkward asymmetry as if he’d just woken up. “But today…I’ve got places to be."

He spit on a space rock. Jaco shivered and tried to do his pose again. Tired of looking at that pathetic windbag, the alien bandit shot Jaco with a ki blast, sending the Galactic Patrolman flying off into the distance, and jumped back into his ship. The engines roared, burning white and yellow and black, and in an instant, the alien had disappeared into the void of space.

Chapter 2: The Hunt Escalates
Buu was flying through the sky, dragging the Kai along. “Again today Buu will go soaring through the sky! Buu’s enemies, I’ll dish ‘em up in candy pie!” Buu sung ecstatically.

“B-Buu, can you stop f-for a second, please?” Kibito Kai pleaded.

Suddenly, Buu halted his movement, yet Kibito Kai’s momentum just went on, tearing Buu’s arm off and flinging the deity towards the ocean. The Majin looked at his wound for a moment and simply regenerated it. Meanwhile, the god was still flinging downwards, but quickly flew back up to Buu.

“B-Buu, that’s not what I meant!”

The Majin looked around, seemingly ignoring his ally. After a few seconds, Buu responded by asking, “Where bad guys?”

The Kaioshin held his hand on his face. Augh…how stupid of me! he thought. Quickly, he regained composure, grabbing Buu’s hand. Just as he was about to teleport, Buu looked at his third arm that Kibito Kai was still holding. He grew a big grin, thinking up an idea. He snatched his third arm from his ally and flew away from him. “H-Hey, Buu! What was that for?!”

He giggled and shouted back, “Buu change his mind! Buu want you to play fetch! Then me beat up bad guys!” The Supreme Kai was about to conjure up a response, but before he could, Buu ripped his third arm into four pieces and threw them into the ocean down below. He pointed down below. “You get five of me now! No cheating!”

“B-But you only threw four pieces!”

Answering his question, Buu shrunk himself down and flew down into the water, laughing hysterically. Kibito Kai sighed. I knew I should’ve gotten Piccolo first…he said to himself. But with no way to turn back without Buu getting mad, he flew into the water to win the game and get this over with.

Piccolo was of course Kibito Kai’s favorite - or rather, he had been Kibito’s favorite before they had fused. The Eastern Supreme Kai had felt utterly indifferent about Piccolo. And now here they were, two mortal foes with the fate of the universe at stake, now reduced to playing a game of fetch.

“More gravy! I want it thick, damn it! Thick as blood!” King Himohimovich bellowed, raising his silver spoon riotously. “And bring that spiced pumpkin cake! It better be hot! If it’s not, I’ll cut off all your fingers and feed them to my giant Grasshopperra!”

The feasting table shook with rage. Cluttered with platters of pheasants and fowls and peacocks and stuffed turkeys, laden with brown sugar gravy, toasted with walnuts and seared paprika, and bowls of giant lizard tongues, boiled and dried, pulled tough as jerky, and pitchers of chilled arbor wine imported from Gingertown, the table concealed the slouched, potato-like form of the king, who wore a stained white shirt underneath his purple and brown fur robes, partially dyed in the style of old Vanutia.

His denizens were pale grub-people, the kind that one would associate with locusts and hedgehogs, not people so much. The king himself was human, as his twelve-and-a-half chins attested to, and he was a wise and benevolent ruler in his time. His kingdom of Swietvol was, for lack of a better term, a backwater cult compound located deep in bowels of an untamed forest where at least seventy-three species of dinosaurs dwelled.

King Himohimovich was a man of justice and pleasure, and he mightily enjoyed his feasts. Almost as pleasurable as food (of which he desired nothing spicy and nothing beyond the conventions of polite society) for the good fat man was the fighting pits. So enamored with the fighting was he that an arena had been built inside his feasting hall, just below his own raised feasting table (which was thrust before his throne like an airplane tray). The arena was small, only able to hold two or four combatants. On either side of it, the grub people’s own tables were arranged in long, cramped lines.

He came in through the bathroom window - or, rather, the privy window. The king didn’t have any running water in his forest-swallowed kingdom. Abo and Kado, much too large to fit in through the window, punched a hole through the wall. Small and dank, the privy exuded no signs of being the private lair of a king of Earth to the demon boy.

“That works too, I guess,” Beelzebub said, jumping to his feet (he had, in his boyish impatience, fallen flat on his face trying to crawl in through the window).

“I wanna kill him!” Abo pouted.

“Please Abo, my brother, my twin, my partner of horrific, unspeakable crimes, you must control yourself. We don’t want to destroy the Dragon Ball, after all!” He nudged Abo hard in the thick of his belly.

“I’ll handle it,” the prince told them as he led them out of the stinking privy to where shouting, music, and the aroma of food was coming from, down the dark-lit, dusty hall. Lining the walls were rows of mannequins in antiquated armor, rust-iron colored, the visors all pulled down. Beelzebub shivered.

The king was munching on a piece of a drumstick and saw the little boy walking into the room, along with his bodyguards, looking at them and piquing his interest a tad. They looked much more different than any of his subjects. Could they be…tourists? he thought to himself. However, the king hadn’t been expecting any tourists, nor did he even allow tourists in his kingdom without him signing a bunch of papers, which was quite a hassle. Might as well start off kind to them at first…maybe they just lost their way and couldn’t fight against the urge to take a peek inside my magnificent castle! The king slowly got up from his chair, and walked over to the strangers, drumstick still in hand and his fat jiggling with every step.

“Why hello there, tourists! It seems you don’t understand the laws set in place in my magnificent kingdom of mine! Now, let me just read them off to you…” With that, he took out a tattered and torn scroll in his pants pocket and started reading off the laws. The prince, however, didn’t notice him at all and took a glance at his own piece of paper.

“So, the Dragon Ball is right in this room, right? It shouldn’t take very long to find it.” He looked around the room, noticing missing pieces of the wall, covered with graffiti, the tattered rug, the king’s throne just being a Mr. Satan branded chair and most importantly, how small the room was. He turned his head to his bodyguards and shouted, “What are you waiting for?! Help me find it!”

As the trio split up, the good king had finished reading of his list and was quite shocked to not see his unwanted guests in front of him. Oh, the nerve of such ravenous foreigners! Going against their king! The fat man hopped in front of Beelzebub once more. “Now, now, young child. I think you don’t know who you’re de-”

“And you’re dealing with the Prince of Demons here. Now beat it.” He turned to Abo. “Did you find the ball yet?”

Abo was clearly not looking for the Dragon Ball and was inspecting a moldy piece of cheese, wary not to touch it. “Uh, no luck yet.”

Mr. Himohimovich’s interest was peaked with the mention of the ball, as well as the mention of royalty. Could he be here to conquer my kingdom?! How arrogant of this “Demon Prince”! Well, I’ll show him! Oh, yes, I’ll show him! The king finally spoke to the boy about this obviously pressing issue, “A…Dragon Ball, you say?”

“Do you know where it is?” Beelzebub hastily asked.

The king grew a big grin for gaining the boy’s attention and continued: “Why, of course! Someone as majestic as I would have a Dragon Ball! It’s orange and has stars in it, correct?”

“Yes! Now tell me where it is!”

“Now, now, don’t be so hasty. As I was sa-” Beelzebub, however, was having no patience for this king and threw him into a wall, squashing a grub person.

“Listen, I’m not here to play games with you or to waste time. So just give me the Dragon Ball NOW!

The king coughed. “T-Take it easy, please…I will give you what you want. B-But only on a single condition!”

“I SAID I DIDN’T WANT TO PLAY GA-”

“I just want those to fine young gentlemen to spar for me in my fighting pit! Just one little fight!”

Abo and Kado immediately caught attention to this and before their boss could object, they said in sync, “We accept!”

“You two idiots! Why do you want to spar with each other?” Beelzebub shouted.

“We always like a good spar, ya know. How else would we decide over who gets the wish?” Abo replied.

“Heheh…you're being silly bro, obviously I’M getting the wish!” Kado responded.

“No, no, that wish is MINE!” Abo argued back.

“No, MINE!” At this point, Abo and Kado had their heads put against each other, each with an angry look on their face.

“You know what, fine, whatever. The sooner you two stop arguing the quicker we can get this done. Whoever wins can have the wish, alright?” Beelzebub said.

Abo stepped into the ring first, his belly swaying proudly. “My brother, you will lose,” he said like a robot, like a man straight outta Tallahassee. “The wish will be mine, when I wish it of course.”

“No, Abo, you’re wrong,” said Kado, stepping into the ring on the other side very formally and with significant class, “I’m going to win!”

Beelzebub yawned and sneered, “Come on, you two, I don’t have all day!”

Abo beat his chest and stomped his feet; Kado did the same thing because they’re twins. The king found his throne again and began to engorge himself upon his moldly feast. His legions of grub minions resumed their meals as well, shaking with fear. “Onward and upwards, they say!” King Himohimovich roared. “In this place, there’s never any ice cream!” he sang merrily.

The grub people muttered a respectful “harumphh”. Abo punched Kado in the face, and it hurt Kado a lot, and he screamed and fell over and clutched at his bruised face like anyone would after getting punched in the face. Kado jumped up and kicked Abo, who kicked him back. Kado then kicked Abo, and Abo kicked Kado. Once Kado had been kicked, his body began to hurt, and he flailed on the ground crying. Abo, having seen his brother perform this dastardly sneak attack before merely shot an energy blast at him, sending Kado flying like a ragdoll into a wall.

Kado was getting mad now because his brother Abo was not getting mad. “Haha, Kado, you are not blue like me,” Abo jeered. “I will win the wish surely!!”

“I am Kado, the brother of Abo!” Kado screamed passionately, flaring up his aura around him and shooting towards his brother like a sky-fallen meteor. “I will make the wish!!”

“No it is not fair, brother, the wish should belong to me, Abo, the greatest of us both!” His aura appeared around his body too, bathing the room in shining light. The grub people, of whom there were plenty, let out gasps and hollers and shouts and a few catcalls, and no less than three sneezes. Abo jumped at his brother; a clanging, thick sound of skull-on-skull collision rang throughout the room.

Himohimovich, the King of Gluttony, winced loudly, spitting chicken skin all over the place. Beelzebub, receiving one little piece on the corner of his chin, was not amused. He picked it off gingerly, eyeing the king like a bored assassin.

In the fighting pit, the light had faded. Abo and Kado were on the ground, passed out, blood leaking from wounds on each of their heads where they had made contact with each other. “Well, that’s a shame,” Himohimovich burped. “Those were some weird-looking cosplayers. Hang on… you’re a weird-looking cosplayer too!” he said, his eyes blooming with horror. “It’s against my divine law to be a cosplayer!”

“What are you rambling on about now? They just did your stupid fight, now give me the ball.” Beelzebub was crouching on a seat next to the king, but at the conclusion of his statement, he stood up on the chair and held his arm out and made a motion with his fingers, as if he were wanting someone to come near so he could whisper to them about free real estate.

“Oh, Grasshopperra, kill this little business tycoon!” Himohimovich shrieked. At once, three grub people ran over to a door and pulled it open. As they did, something huge and gnarly shrieked from within. A moment later, a huge grasshopper-looking creature came bursting through the door, impaling one grub man upon its sharp, spider-like pincer, and grasping a second in between its mandibles, tearing apart the soft grey-blue flesh like it was cotton candy. The third one went running for his seat, lest his supper get any colder.

Beelzebub, being the Prince of Demons, was unimpressed, and he hardly even cared to see the giant freak-animal racing down towards the table. The king flung his gnawed-clean drumsticks into the air and rolled away under the table, but the boy stood his ground, glancing at the animal with a bored look.

“Haha, your guards are knocked out, now my pet Grasshopperra will eat you alive, and you’ll never get the Dragon Ball, teehee!!”

The Grasshopperra drew near, wailing loudly. Some of the grub people, as scared and full of despair as they were, began to spontaneously self-combust, burning away into piles of ash, unable to contain their inherent biological energy within a corporeal, sentient form.

Jumping into the air to dodge the beast’s pincer, Beelzebub back-flipped over it, and landed calmly on its back. The giant insect-looking thing, for a moment confused, spun its head around, dripping saliva and growling uncertainly. Beelzebub sighed. “I’m up here, you stupid bug.”

It tried to look up, hearing the boy’s voice, but Beelzebub drew forth a black ball of ki between his devilish hands and held it; as it floated in midair, he raised his elbow over it, and slammed it down on the energy. The energy shot into the top of the bug’s head faster than light and exploded in a sphere of bleeding white. The throne, the feasting table, and Himohimovich’s prized banquet of almost-eaten food, was splattered in the liquid tar of Grasshopperra’s life’s blood. Leaping off the falling bug carcass, Beelzebub tore his foot through the thick, ancient wood of the king’s feasting table. He found Himohimovich cowering underneath, sucking on a chicken bone.

Beelzebub kicked him out from under there. Himohimovich rolled from under the table, skidding out onto the stone floor, leaving thin streaks of blood behind him. Wailing, he called for his supporters to help, but none of them rose. “Give me the Dragon Ball,” Beelzebub told him, “or I’ll kill you and take it anyways!”

“You’ll never find it!” the king wheezed desperately. “You won’t, I-”

A flash of light engulfed him. Beelzebub’s pink palm faced the king. Smoke wafted through the room and was dissipated. What remained was Himohimovich, wearing a suit of fat and excess skin, which thankfully covered his nakedness well. At once, something heavy and glass-like dropped onto the stone floor, giving a tinkling, ringing sound.

Scowling, Beelzebub used his telekinetic powers to pick up the Dragon Ball and make it float over to him. Unwilling to touch it, he covered the thing in his energy, in a ruby-red haze of ki, hoping that no germs could survive at the temperature he was cooking up.

Once the ball had cooled again, Beelzebub grasped it from the air. It had five light-orange stars on it. He put it in his pocket with the other two. The king threw his chicken bone at Beelzebub, but it missed and clattered against the stone dais leading up to his throne. “H-hey… get back here! Let’s finish this like men, eh cosplayer?!”

Beelzebub ignored him and walked over to the unconscious alien brothers. “You two were utterly useless, ugh,” he whispered to himself in disgust. “Maybe you don’t deserve any wishes at all.”

At that, Abo sat up in delirium. “Finland!” he screamed in sleep-terror.

“Abo, my brother, my twin, what was that?” Kado yawned, sitting up too.

“Come on, you.” Beelzebub kicked Kado in the soft of his belly. “I got the ball. Let’s go.”

“Oh yes, of course, very well. We did very good, didn’t we, kid?” Kado asked eagerly. “Aren’t we the best bodyguards in the universe, eh Abo?” Abo grunted something fierce in response.

“No… no you aren’t,” Beelzebub said, shaking his head. “But whatever. You’ll just have to get the other four Dragon Balls for me all by yourselves.”

He blew a hole through Himohimovich’s stain-glass window depicting the king’s favorite feast from his dreams. He had never had the resources to make that dream a reality, unfortunately, so he’d gotten the best artistic grub person to make him a stained glass depiction of his deepest and darkest desires. Sometimes he liked to eat his moldy leftovers and imagine he was eating that feast, and it was real sad. Would that he had the skills to make pudding himself.

Now he stood alone in his throne room, naked and without a Dragon Ball, his pet Grasshopperra dead, his grub people having witnessed his humiliation in its entirety. His last chance had been to challenge the little weeb-looking cosplayer to a fight to the death - one he was sure he could win simply because of how much larger he was than the boy. But Beelzebub had mocked him, and Beelzebub was gone: the three foreigners jumped through the window and flew away like they were swans in search of moistening tuna.

“Get back here, cowards!” Himohimovich shouted after them, shaking his fist. “Come back and fight me like a real man!”

But when he turned to face his grub people, King Himohimovich realized that not one of them had broken out in applause, nor had any of them been reduced to tears by his remarkable show of force just then with those wonderfully kingly words of his.

They were, all of them, standing - either on their tables or on the ground - their arms crossed, their eyes narrowed, their desires clear to him. King Himohimovich screamed. The crowd broke, screeching war cries of their own, and ran him out the hole in the window his foes had just left through. It was through that window he jumped to escape their murderous grasps and plummeted five hundred feet to the bottom, where a moat had been dug a long time ago, but had since dried up. His body ruptured against the cracked clay floor, and not even one grub person ever went down there to see what became of his corpse.

Paprikan looked out of his space pod, seeing the beautiful stars in the sky. Sadly, his favorite star had been destroyed long ago, so he didn’t much care for them. What he did care about, however, was the planet in front of him, which he was fast approaching. He tapped his red scouter. “Hm…I wonder if this thang even works now,” Paprikan said to himself. About a minute later, his ship landed on an icy tundra.

The Makyan stumbled out of it clearly drunk and looked out at the barren land. “WHERE THE HELL AM I?!” he shouted. Quickly, he clicked a button on the side of his scouter. It did nothing. “Stupid broken scouter, now of all times you HAD to break!” Frustrated, he kept clicking other buttons, all off which didn’t do what he wanted them to. The PTO officer tossed the device into the snow. “Of course I couldn’t trust those scientists with even that! I swear, imma kill one of those cheeky buggers when I get back! Probably that one who didn’t get me my Space Chips at Spacey’s. Yeah, chip guy. HEAR THAT CHIP GUY, YUR GUNNA DIE TONIIIIIGHT!”

Paprikan fell into the snow in a doozy and scratched his head. The soldier laid there, staring up into the sky, but grew bored of the sight rather quickly and turned to his ship. Suddenly, it dawned on him. “They gave me a chip to do that radar thingamagig! Why din’t they leave note somewhere remindin’ me?!” Too lazy to get up, Paprikan rolled back to his ship, and fell back inside. When he got in, he rummaged through the compartments, tossing aside empty bottles of space whiskey and Makyan apple cores, eventually finding a tiny computer chip in one of them. “Of course past me had ta be disorganized…note tah self…give past Paprikan a freaking cleanin’ lesson.”

Once again, the soldier rolled out of the ship and stood back up, chip in hand. “A’ight now I just…” Paprikan shoved the chip on his head, expecting his scouter to still be on his face. After a moment of confusion, he scowled. “Bloody…note tah self again. Never throw away scouters! NEVER! Now where did I put it?” The Maykan looked around the tundra and out of the corner of his eye, he saw a little fluffball-like animal dig into the snow, scouter in its little hand. The soldier blinked once in disbelief and then shouted at the top of his lungs for five minutes straight.

Beelzebub was in the middle of the street, looking at his map. He had hoped that Abo and Kado would at the very least help him look for it, but they were busy sitting on a bench and licking some ice cream. “I’m surprised they even took the boss’, uh, ‘Demon Coins’.” Abo said to his dear brother, who was licking his strawberry ice cream.

“Well the boss did also hold a blast to their face so that may have something to do with it,” Kado retorted.

The boss finally looked up from his map, and saw rows of cars honking their horns at him. The demon glanced at his bodyguards, motioned his head to the left and started flying off in that direction. Kado had already finished his delicious delicacy and started flying off, but Abo had not. Hastily, he tried to finish his chocolate ice cream, but the treat fell off of his cone and onto the street, where it was soon run over by a car. He cried out, “No!” and fell to his knees. “My chocolate ice cream…I promise I will avenge you!” He then licked the chocolate on his lips and flew away with Kado.

The trio had arrived at a small house very close to a building labelled “Capsule Corp”. Although the bodyguards were very interested in going to the big dome shaped building, Beelzebub was not. He took a closer look at the building. It was a tranquil place: much smaller than the towering skyscrapers in West City. Not to mention that there was actually a small lawn, with a flowers covering the grassy ground. There was also a decently-sized tree right besides the sidewalk leading up to the door. Beelzebub walked up the the front door and kicked it down with no hesitation.

He, along with his bodyguards, walked into the house. “Alright, spread out around the place. Find the ball.” Beelzebub ordered.

“Can the person who finds it first get another ice cream cone?” Abo asked. In response, Beelzebub glared at him and walked forwards and to the left into a kitchen.

“Ooo, is there ice cream in there? If there is, it’s mine!” the blue bodyguard boasted.

“Focus for once! It’s like you take a month to get anything I tell you done!” his boss shouted from the other room.

Abo sighed and walked to the right into a living room; Kado went straight through the hallway to the rest of the house. As soon as Abo walked into the room, he saw a small little box on a medium sized table with six chairs around it. He opened the box and saw the shining glow of an orange ball with seven stars on it. He quickly grabbed it and ran into the kitchen, tripping onto the floor. “H-Hey, boss! I found it!” he claimed, showing the Dragon Ball in his hand.

Beelzebub snatched the ball from his guard’s hand and examined it for a few seconds, taking a bite out of an apple from the fridge. “Hm…good work. There’s ice cream in there, if you want it. We’re only staying for five minutes until I find out where we’re going next and when I finish my apple. Make it quick this time,” the demon prince said, pointing to the open fridge. Abo rushed to the fridge and grabbed a whole container of chocolate ice cream, opened it and stuffed a handful of it in his mouth. Kado quickly rushed in the room too and was about to reach the fridge when his boss slapped him over the head. “You didn’t do anything useful yet to deserve any food in there. Put more effort into looking next time and maybe I’ll get you something,” the child responded.

Beelzebub flinched, however, when he heard a voice coming from outside. “Don’t worry, Ryori. Bulma’s making a new radar, alright? Everything’s going to be fi-hey…what happened to the door?!” the childish voice outside said.

Before the demon boy could think of a plan, two children barged inside to see the devious trio. One was a short boy, looking about 12 years old, wearing a dark maroon hoodie and jeans. He had long, spiky hair and greyish eyes, though at the moment they were bloodshot. On closer inspection, Beelzebub noticed that the boy had a brown, furry tail as well. The other boy also looked to be around the same age. He was quite skinny and had shaggy brown hair with blue eyes and wore a dark red shirt with blue jeans. This boy, presumably this Ryori in Beelzebub’s eyes, looked more surprised than angry and didn’t say a word.

The boy with bloodshot eyes, however, noticed the demon boy holding the Seven Star Dragon Ball. “What are you doing in our house?”

Beelzebub glanced at the Dragon Ball and glared at Abo and Kado. “What are you two idiots doing? Do your job!”

“I mean, they’re just kids-” Kado was about to retort, when Beelzebub shouted back, “I don’t care! Just knock them out!”

“Ryori, stay behind me. I’ll take care of this.” The tailed boy said.

In response, Ryori nodded and said, “Alright, Ledas,” then ran outside.

“You’re seriously going to regret breaking into our home.” Ledas shouted

“You’re just a kid,” Beelzebub said smugly, folding his arms. “We’re not scared of you.”

“Now that I’m a good guy, I’m not scared of anyone!” Abo declared, rushing Ledas, his fist raised. “Die, kid!”

Without flinching, the boy caught Abo’s fist, holding it back with casual ease. “That’s all you’ve got?” Ledas shrugged. “Well that sucks for you.”

He threw Abo into the TV. The entire wall that it was hanging from collapsed on top of Abo, covering him in dust and smoke and debris, and he did not get up. Poor little alien blueberry. From outside, Ryori began to wail. “That was my favorite thing in the whole house! Why Ledas why?!”

“I’ll avenge you Abo, my brother!” Kado said passionately, flinging himself at Ledas with a form so sloppy and reckless he had to be a good guy.

The boy kicked him in the throat, and Kado went sailing through a number of walls, causing the roof to partially cave in. He didn’t seem to mind, even as Ryori was shrieking from outside. “Your turn,” the boy said defiantly, walking up to Beelzebub.

Now Beelzebub was royalty, and he despised anyone who dared to talk to him so bluntly and with so little respect. “You two are useless!” he complained loudly. “What’s the use of having bodyguards if they can’t guard me from one stupid kid?!”

Ledas slapped that fool across the cheek. The power was enough to make Beelzebub fly back into the kitchen, landing hard against the refrigerator and not getting up again. The Seven Star Dragon Ball rolled from his grip and slid slowly across the cherrywood floor. Snatching it up coolly, Ledas looked around for any sign of Abo or Kado, but saw nothing.

“We are using the Dragon Balls to wish back Ryori’s brother,” Ledas said adamantly, walking up to the crumpled figure of the Prince of the Demon Realm. “I’m not gonna let anyone prevent that from happening.”

He was bleeding and seeing stars and the wind had been knocked out of him, but still, Beelzebub managed to sit up and glare down that kid with the hatred of a thousand mustaches. “Y-you…” he stammered, trying to think up a clever insult that would surely make Ledas drop the Dragon Ball and flee and also magically heal all of his wounds, but no such insult came to mind.

“I don’t like thieves. You’re gonna pay for that.”

“I don’t… have…” Beelzebub panted. Ledas reached him, grasping him around the neck and bringing him to eye level, “any…”

The boy’s grey eyes flashed. “Yeah?”

Beelzebub coughed, grinning a bloody grin. “I don’t have any…” he breathed, his lips curling into a thin smile, “a-any money…”

The boy’s head slammed into the marble countertop violently. He dropped Beelzebub groaning, seeing black, and slipped and fell.

It was neither Abo nor Kado who stood before Ledas now, but a purple monstrosity many times uglier than Bulma when she wears the guacamole like Ledas saw that one time he accidentally barged into her room and Vegeta was there and it was awful and why was he thinking about that now?

There was ringing in the boy’s ears. The purple beast roared with deep laughter. “Looks like you can’t deal with our secret technique!” the creature boasted. “Now, I oughtta put you out of your misery… oh wait, I’m a good guy now, so I’ll just beat you until you’re nearly dead.”

“You’re almost as stupid as you look!”

Springing to his feet, Ledas raised his fists, seething with anger. Beelzebub stumbled over to the other side of the kitchen, following the rolling Dragon Ball, which the boy had dropped too after that last sneak attack. Just before he reached it, however, the Saiyan teleported over to him, stepping on the demon’s fingers and making him cry.

He had never been treated so poorly in his life, and this was beyond an outrage to the poor Beelzebub. He looked around for anything he could use to hit Ledas back with. That’s when he saw the can of what looked like spray paint on the left side of the sink. Jumping back, he reached for it, pointed it at the boy, and sprayed.

The Saiyan boy screamed and fell to his knees, covering his eyes, as the paint, evidently a pinkish hue, sprayed all up his face and into his hair. “Hey, come on, boss, I wanted to finish him off,” the purple Abokado complained.

“Say one more word, and you’re not getting a wish!” Beelzebub yelled, drunk on his newfound unlimited power. He screamed like an old man whose skin was melting for no good reason other than he needed to look older as he drew closer to Ledas, emptying the pink spray paint all over the boy’s face, trying to blind him. “I am the God of H-”

The Saiyan punched him in the throat, and Beelzebub dropped. “That’s an interesting technique,” the pink boy muttered, facing Aka. “I can sense that you’re a lot more powerful now. Too bad it won’t be enough.”

Aka grinned. “Oh yeah? Why don’t I show you what I can really do!”

He lunged at Ledas, but the boy swerved his body to dodge the fist, slipping closer to Aka in the process. Aka tried to hit him again and instead punched the refrigerator, destroying another wall. Ledas wasn’t even trying. He was still wiping his eyes. He spun and flipped to dodge, but none of his efforts were very strenuous.

“I’m done playing around. Dieeeeee!!” Aka had an anger problem, and when one has an anger problem, they become reckless.

Needless to say, it took him only five or six blows to utterly destroy the kitchen.

From outside, Ryori was running in circles on the lawn. “What are you doing, Ledas?! Why are you letting him wreck the place?! Where are we going to live? I loved this place!! Why?!”

Why equals fry, nerd, Ledas wanted to say, but Ryori didn’t have super hearing like him so he wouldn’t have heard.

Aka’s blows were predictable and slow, and he reminded Ledas of Nappa. The boy had surpassed that old stinker years ago. He knew just how these huge, lumbering fighters operated. They had little stamina, and as long as one could dodge their blows, they would wear themselves out quickly. So it was with Aka, though in the process, he destroyed about half of the house.

When sweat covered the big alien’s face, and when his blows started to come in clumsy, arcing patterns, Ledas decided enough was enough. He grit his teeth and blinked, and his hair shone with gold.

“Ah… y-you…” Aka stammered, realizing with horror that his life was repeating itself again, as it so often did. He knew what came next, how unpleasant that would feel, and there was not a thing he could do to stop it.

“I’m using the Dragon Balls,” Ledas told him. “And I’ll kill you if you try to stop me again.” He kicked off the ground, teleporting around Aka to confuse him. Bouncing off what remained of the ceiling and the walls of the living room now, as they had moved there during their fight, Ledas made sure that Aka had no idea how to predict his movements. That was clear just by how the big man moved his head. He couldn’t even see Ledas at this speed.

Landing quietly behind Aka, the boy dropped to his hands, kicking out the big alien’s legs from under him. As Aka fell, he teleported in front of him, elbowing the alien downwards, cracking his armor, making him spit blood. The boy’s arm slid up, his fist connecting with Aka’s chin, and the alien went flying at a wall again, this time shooting out a window, narrowly missing Ryori, and slamming into the tree in the front yard.

Aka’s head had gone all the way through the tree, and he lay there sideways, partially through it, unconscious, dripping dark blood on the grass.

A man in a hover car passing by dropped his toothpick as he squealed in shock. He stopped for two moments to stare and then sped off before slamming into a parked hover car three blocks down the road.

Ledas dropped out of Super Saiyan and walked over to Beelzebub, legs shaking and teeth clenched. “You heard what I said to your bodyguards, right? Leave now.”

Beelzebub glared at the boy and took a minute to think. As much as I hate to admit it, I can’t beat him in terms of power. But I can’t just give up my wish! Think, Beelzebub, think! Aha! I could give him one of the wishes. Yes, yes, I can say I can do the work for them!

“Well?! Leave!” Ledas shouted.

The prince in response put his hand out, with the other on his chest, breathing heavily. “Wait. Wait. I’d like to strike a deal with you.”

“You’re in no position to bargain.”

The demon boy quickly took out the three Dragon Balls he had collected thus far, catching the tailed boy’s attention.

“I’ve already been searching for the Dragon Balls before I went into your place. We both want a wish, right? If you give me the Dragon Ball, I promise I’ll do the heavy work of getting the Dragon Balls and wish back that kid’s brother,” Beelzebub said, pointing to the still-distraught Ryori.

Ledas glanced at the Dragon Ball then back at Beelzebub. “How do I know you aren’t lying right now?” Beelzebub froze, but before he could even try to respond, Ledas spoke again. “Fine. I can easily find the rest of the Dragon Balls if I had a radar, but I see this as an opportunity for you to make up for what you did to the house.”

“But you could’ve stopped the house from being destroyed in the first place!” Ryori retorted.

Ledas put his finger on Ryori’s lips and made “sh” sounds. “I can just make Cardinal give us more money to buy another house. A bigger house!”

The other boy rubbed his chin. “Well, I did want a new bathroom…”

Ledas patted him on the back. “That’s the spirit!”

“So, can I have the Dragon Ball now?” Beelzebub asked.

Ledas wagged his finger. “Ah, ah, ah. Don’t get so hasty now. I still don't know if you’re lying to me. Instead, I think it would be best if I held on to it now and you come back to me when you have the rest of the Dragon Balls so that I can make the wish myself.”

“Where are we going to meet you?”

The tailed boy pointed to the big building next door. “Just head over to Capsule Corp when you’re done. We’re going to be stayin’ there for a while anyways. It takes a while to build a house, you know.”

The demon boy nodded. “Right.” He then walked over to the tree, with the two bodyguards lying on the ground. He then promptly kicked them, making them jump a few feet up. “Come on. We’re leaving,” Beelzebub ordered, looking at his map.

“But boss, I want the wiiiiiiiiiiiiish!” Kado whined.

“Oh be quiet. We negotiated an agreement. We’re going to go to that building and give Ledas one of the wishes when we have collected all of the other balls,” he said, tilting his head at Capsule Corp.

“So we do get to go into the big building! Yay! Horrah! What a happy day!” Abo cheered.

“Shut up” Beelzebub said as he, along with his incompetent guards, flew away.

He was a sick and desperate animal. There wasn’t as much space whiskey left as he had hoped. Trudging through the snow, he reached for the bottle in his pocket. It was a dirty bottle, and the liquid inside was the color of immolating bile. He tore the cork out with his teeth and sucked it dry.

“Seventy-seven cunts, fuckin’ hell mate,” the Makyan grunted to himself. He belched a breath of the fire wine, amber sparks curling around the corner of his lip.

Something moved in the snow. His energy came out like a rolling tide of fire, melting the snowscape utterly. Nearby, a frozen lake cracked and boiled. The trees went up in fire. Paprikan threw the empty bottle at the sky. He could feel the water in the air, his breath frosting before his mouth.

“Come out, come out wherever you are!” he said angrily, swaying as he walked about, looking for any sign of the creature. The land and had been burnt to a crisp; nothing moved. There weren’t even any birds making music. Everything was so remarkably peaceful. “The fuck you went, bitch?”

He vomited. Staggering to his feet, the drunk Makyan took to the sky to get a better view. But all he could view from up there was a realm of ash and rising smoke. Even his space pod had been destroyed in the explosion. “You fuckin kidding me…”

There had been so much precious space alcohol in his pod. The loss hit him hard in the gut, and he threw up again, the wind blowing it back into his face. “That’s it, that’s enough, I’m gonna go clean!” Paprikan declared. He hiccuped. “A-and with my first wish, I’ll wish I never want another drink again!”

Silence persisted.

He had waited for the infrastructure to collapse. He still didn’t know if Bael was alive or dead. He hadn’t been keeping up. “Fuckin’ dead, scum!” he shouted wildly, his voice reverberating through the stillness. “I outlived you, cunt!”

He had spent most of his time drinking, and remembered very little. He had wasted not just weeks or months of his life, but entire years. With the Dragon Balls, he’d get back on the right track. “I juss wanna be a successful space judge at the Citadel,” he complained miserably. “I wanna be the most respected man in the universe!!”

He was none of those things, and he wasn’t even close. Dreams were easy to think up. He’d found that always to be the case.

There was something - someone - in the distance. Paprikan’s aura was the color of spoiled wine. He shot after it.

Beyond the carnage and burnt trees, a very furry humanoid was trekking through the snow, its back to the Makyan. He landed in the snow behind it, clearing his throat. “Ahem, good sir, do you know where I could find the nearest-”

The beast’s reaction was to tense its shoulders and melt into sandy smoke. As the smoke drifted back, past Paprikan’s body, he felt a tingling sensation wash over him. It wasn’t entirely unpleasant, but the power behind it, the unabashed prodding sensation it produced, was enough to make Paprikan lose his sense of balance. He fell face-first into the snow, the darkness washing over him, something deep and full of hunger whispering coldly in his ear.

He never felt the cold, just that old familiar empty feeling, that one that gnawed away at him constantly from just below his ribcage. He missed his scouter and wished he hadn’t been such a damn fool.

“Alright, now where are you?” Kibito Kai was swimming in the water with his eyes closed, trying to sense the bits of Majin Buu scattered about the ocean. He quickly locked onto a ki signature and flew towards it, seeing a piece of Buu lying in between two rocks. Kibito Kai tried to grab it, but was sprayed in the face with ink from a squid who camouflaged itself onto the rocks. Angered, Kibito Kai wiped the ink off of his face and snatched the piece of Buu. “I wish I could’ve been fishing instead of, well, being like a fish!”

Kibito Kai closed his eyes again, trying to sense the other pieces of Buu and realized that three of the remaining pieces were all heading to one area. Is Buu realizing that this game is pointless? No, Buu isn’t like that, he thought while swimming to the area, lowering his ki.

Eventually, he ended up facing a large circular rock formation and hid behind a rock. This was because it was surrounded by humanoid shark people, about ten feet tall each. Some held swordfish blades, others rode on seahorses, and some even with belts with starfish, of course with shark teeth on the end to make them more deadly. Most of them wore the same garb, looking akin to Roman attire, but one stood out - a hulking behemoth among this shark clan, standing easily at twenty feet. His face, arms and legs were bright red, this being blood to not only scare his prey, but to attract the sharks to him. The rest of his body was a bright blue. He wore a bright orange headband and held a giant squid on his back, along with two large swordfish blades and starfish shurikens on his belt. This was obviously the captain, who stood over what the rock formation protected, which the Supreme Kai could not see.

Before the Kai could act, three sharks flew to this captain and held out bits of Buu in their hands. “Oi, captain! We sensed these balls of energy! They have immense powah!” one of the sharks said.

The captain grabbed one of the Buu balls and closed his eyes, sensing the power emanating from it. “Good work,” he said in a deep voice. “It seems that merely setting up the ritual was enough to get attention from Ke Akua o ke Akua already. We shall bring these spheres of the gods to the ritual.” And so, the captain flew down towards the city, leaving Kibito Kai to contemplate what to do.

Argh…if I don’t get those bits of Buu, he won’t even come with me! I have to get them back! he thought to himself. Do I kill them? No, no, they’re nowhere near a big enough threat for me to get involved. They’re just simple natives worshiping gods. I can’t exactly walk in either…wait a minute! Yes, I just have to wait until the perfect moment. He then teleported into the city, observing the shark warrior and waiting for the perfect moment.

Meanwhile, the captain landed in front of a battered-down coliseum, heavily guarded by the shark people. One of the guards noticed the captain and did the shark salute: holding his back fin with both of his arms. “Mano Koa! Elder Mano Kahuna has been waiting for you to attend the ritual.” Mano Koa smirked, nodded and walked into the building.

Inside were a dozen shark people, clad in red robes and silver crowns, sitting above the bottom in rows. On the bottom row was an older shark, also wearing a red robe, but differing in that he wore a gold crown. His body too was covered in red, also blood.

Mano Koa saluted to this old shark, placing the spheres on the floor. “Elder Kahuna. I apologize for the wait. I just didn’t want to leave the perimeter unguarded for a long period of time, so I thought it best to wait.” He then picked up the spheres and gave them to the Elder.

Mano Kahuna could sense the immense power coming from the orbs and placed them around a drawing: a circle with multiple squares in it. In the middle of this ritual circle was another orb, this one being orange with three stars on it: a Dragon Ball. The elder smiled and said, “Good, my young warrior! Now, if you’ll excuse me, you’ll have to go up into the balcony for me to start the ritual.” Mano Koa bowed and swam up into the balcony with the other twelve shark people.

The shark chief took out a dagger, presumably found from a wrecked ship, and held it up into the air. He shouted,“Ke Akua o ke Akua and all other gods! I, along with all other Atlanteans, return to you your gracious gifts given to us in exchange for everlasting power and beauty! Along with those of the Yeti and Manu Clans, we raise our hearts to your limitless energy!” He then sliced the dagger along his arm, dripping blood in the water, though it looked no different due to his bloody skin. Then suddenly, Kibito Kai, who was overseeing the whole thing from a remote part of the stadium, teleported to Mano Kahuna.

Now, Mano Kahuna did not expect the god to appear so suddenly and stumbled back a little bit, quickly bowing to his deity. The other twelve Atlanteans swam down and also bowed. “K-Ke Akua o ke Akua! Oh, it is truly an honor to see you!”

The Kai rubbed his head and grabbed the pieces of Buu along with the Dragon Ball. “Um…yes, it is I! Your great god! I, uh, appreciate your support and love for me! Now, if you’ll excuse me…”

He was about to run off, but Mano Koa spoke. “ My apologies, Akua, but I would like to see the true power of our god to motivate myself to become even stronger. I’ve been waiting for years, ever since you appeared to me in a vision when I was but a little shark.”

Mano Kahuna was shocked at his. “M-Mano Koa! What do you think you’re doing?!”

The shark captain shoved his chief onto the floor, ignoring his warning.

“I’m kind of-”

“Ke Akua o ke Akua!” the glorious bloody shark man bellowed, but Kibito Kai could only barely hear him because they were underwater. He drew one of his swordfish swords and pointed it right at the Kai’s chest. “You won’t get away from me! I’ve spent my entire life training for this day. You can’t run now!”

He could. But he didn’t. That was mostly because, at exactly that moment, Majin Buu re-appeared. “No fair, no fair!” Buu pouted, boiling the water around him with his steam as he approached the Kai and random shark guy. “Buu hide forever, and stupid purple guy never come find him!”

Majin Buu was pretty mad, but Kibito Kai had a Dragon Ball, and he wasn’t too sad anymore. So long as he had this ball, Dabura’s son wouldn’t be able to make a wish. “Hey… nice Buu… um, look, when we return to the surface, how about I buy you a candy bar, would you like that?”

The pink demon screamed and played a mean belly. His little broken-off pieces were floating above his head like a cracked halo. “Buu want chocolate now!” His head tentacle was flopping about like a cat’s tail. “Buu hungry!”

“Buu, shut up!” the Kai shouted. “You can have your chocolate-”

“You tell Buu to shut up?! You shut up!”

The Majin’s arm stretched forward, hitting Kibito Kai hard in the jaw, sending him tumbling into a wall. The shark guy spun on his heels and faced his new gargantuan threat. Raising his swordfish sword, he sliced savagely through Buu’s head tentacle. The piece fell like a severed leaf blowing in the wind, the ocean currents whisking it away and out of sight. Buu hardly reacted to the act of disfigurement.

“You try to hurt Buu! You make Buu mad!”

Majin Buu acted like a fifteen year old boy who likes nothing more than the feet of little cat boys. That is to say, he lacked any composure. In his gross hunger, he latched himself onto the shark, breaking the sword as his body rolled against Mano Koa. Strong though he was, the underwater warrior was no match for the lazy power of an ancient, extraterrestrial demon who apparently was still actively absorbing the Grand Supreme Kai of Universe 7, but let’s just pretend that guy never existed, right?

Kibito Kai rubbed his jaw as he floated back to his feet, surveying the situation. He had been a mighty fool to enlist the help of so childish a child, so brainless a living creature, so hopelessly desperate an animal, that he questioned if he even knew, in his right mind, how many planets in the universe were inhabited by life.

Kibito Kai clenched his teeth, trying to remember. Closing his eyes, feeling the hum of the universe, he could feel all the life out there, dirty and distant and raging against itself in energetic lurches of destructive power. There were ten thousand or more, perhaps even ten times that. But his brain hurt when he tried to count, and the vision behind his eyes rippled when he thought about it, and so it was easier just to imagine a random number and get on with it.

The first number that came to mind was thirty-three. That was an ugly, brown number, cut down the middle, not half as pretty as eighty-eight, so he discarded it for a bluer number - not twenty-nine (that was too sharky), but twenty-eight seemed a sterile enough number for this purpose.

He realized his head was bobbing up and down. His mind was spinning with white noise. Kibito Kai wanted to return home and present Elder Kai with the universal tally. He’d finally done it - he’d finally outgrown his laziness and come up with a real number.

Kibito Kai was concussed, and as such, nothing he thought had any semblance of rationality to it. Being in the midst of this, he was entirely unaware of his rambling thoughts, and thus Majin Buu and Mano Koa were able to do battle for about twenty minutes, in which the shark man, whose power level could not have exceeded even one thousand, was holding back Majin Buu. That was how Buu liked to play. He was the kind of psychopath who would eat all of one food at a time before moving onto the next item on his plate.

Kibito Kai shuddered. The Dragon Ball was in his hand. It was warm; he remembered. The silent blue all around, desolate and empty, he felt innumerable eyes reaching at him from the deep. A severed head tentacle drifted by, carried by a lazy current.

“Ke Akua o ke Akua…! Please, don’t go!” Buu on his back, hanging onto him almost as if playing. “Let me fight you… I won’t let this opportunity pass me by…!” he grunted, tugging his foot forward through the muck, as Buu remained latched onto him.

The man’s strength of will impressed Kibito Kai. However, he was still nothing to the power of a god. Mano Koa took a starfish from his belt and, just before he threw it, Buu had an idea and latched a piece of himself onto it. The kai dodged the starfish with ease, but the weapon flew back at him like a boomerang and sliced his shoulder, its speed and power far augmented with Buu’s assistance. At the same time, Koa dashed at astounding speed and punched the god in the stomach, making him stagger back.

“This power…it’s amazing! Did you grant this to me, Akua?” the shark warrior questioned.

The Supreme Kai glared at Buu, noticing that the demon was transferring his nearly unlimited energy supply into the shark. “Buu! What are you doing? Get off of him!”

The Majin shook his head. “No. Buu think this much more fun than Hide and Go Seek!”

The fish ignored this conversation completely, overwhelmed by Buu’s power granted to him. His muscles flexed, shaking the blood off of him, revealing his dark blue skin and broke his bandana. He took out his other sword and augmented it by flowing ki into it. The immense heat evaporated the water around him, and made bubbles surround the weapon. “I promise, I’ll not let your gift go to waste, Akua!”

Swiftly, the shark slashed at Kibito Kai, who was able to grab it before it sliced him and broke it in two, though just barely. It seems I have no choice, but to fight at full power! He then flew up out of the water and into the air giving him time to charge up.

Koa discarded his broken blade and looked up into the sky. “Whether it be land or the sky, with this energy, it doesn’t matter! I shall rise above and strike any inferior prey down!” Koa swam up and jumped to eat the smaller god. With a well timed ki blast, the kai struck him in the mouth, sending the fish careening down to the sea. He huffed and puffed for a few moments, thinking the fight to be over. Just as he thought that, however, Koa unexpectedly flew up to his level.

“I shall prove to you that my skill and strength can surpass you! Do you hear that, Ke Akua o ke Akua? You shall face your end here! I will no longer be an Atlantean, but the one true Akua! You should have ignored our gifts, fool. For now your greediness shall be your demise.” Kibito Kai was quite surprised that a mortal, not even originally on the level of the weakest Saiyans, could be bolstered with so much confidence and bravado. This surprise put him off guard for the starfish shurikens flying at him, each tearing through his clothing and skin, at least for the first few. Then, he fired ki blasts at the starfish, cancelling them out and creating smoke.

When the smoke cleared, Koa was holding the giant squid. “Goodbye!”

“N-Not on my watch!” Kibito Kai started charging up his own blast.

After a while, Koa, along with an assisted Majin Kamehameha from Buu, fired excess amounts of ink at Kibito Kai, with the Kamehameha swirling around the ink. “Shin Gekiretsu Shin'ou'hou!”, the god shouted, firing a large blue beam of light.

The two blasts were equal, neither giving an inch for multiple minutes. Even if they did move, they quickly equalized once again. After so much time, Buu grew immensely bored. “Ah…Buu bored playing with you. I had fun!” The Majin latched off of the shark and flew away from the blast. Unfortunately for Koa, without Buu giving him energy, his power almost instantly reduced back to its original state. With such a measly power level, Koa’s ink blast, along with himself, was destroyed. His ashes fell into the water, leaving nothing behind.

Kibito Kai wheezed, huffed and puffed. He then looked at the now thoroughly satisfied Buu. “Please…don’t…do…that…again.”

“Mhm that’s right, Jeanpaul’s my baby daddy. I know he did, I know it, yes’m, he was the only one, mhm.”

“Jeanpaul, Jeanpaul, Jeanpaul!!” That man was older, a sort of worldly scholar with a high, shocked voice which crackled in decay all these light-years away. “Jeanpaul, Jeanpaul…!” came the more urgent tone.

“Gotcha!” Jaco squashed the last kialiki between his fingers. “Stupid space mites,” he muttered to himself, shaking out his Galactic Receiver again. Sighing, he put his hands on his hips, staring off at the sunset. The world was nothing but sand-baked mountains rising over boundless dunes. Awash in a sea of boiled gold, fleeting sunbeams cut jagged shadows around Jaco and his well-arranged and gentlemanly picnic bouquet. To their left, a flawless onyx obelisk was poking up from a sandy crater like a crooked tooth, casting a long shadow over the picnic blanket.

The Colonel was lounging on the far side of the blanket, munching feed from a plastic bucket cradled under one arm like some much-needed milk.

“What’s the matter, Jaco? Which one of ‘em turned out to be Archibald’s baby daddy? Jeanpaul, wasn’t it, ahehehehehehehueh?” the Colonel coughed miserably.

“No, it wasn’t Jeanpaul.” Jaco sighed and turned off the space radio. “That show must have aired years ago. I wonder if any of them ever showed up again in another episode.”

“That Rolando muppet, yeah,” the Colonel said petulantly. “He was a right tosser, a saladboy if you know what I mean.”

Silence was worse than stupidity. Jaco hastily turned the radio back on; he hated being alone with the Colonel like this. It did not feel right. Nervously, Jaco’s fingers brushed the dial, spinning it to another station:

“Galactic Patrolmen are still arriving on the scene here at the helium mines of Perneki Minor where officials have just released a statement about the more than seven hundred miners that were killed by a rogue officer of the, ahem, rapidly declining Planet Trade Organization.”

The news report cut to an eyewitness account: “Called himself Paprikan. Shiiiieeeet. Nasty-lookin’ dingus. Oh yeah, that was before he changed himself into a monster! His body was shaking with power, and I could feel the heat from where I was hiding - and he was laughing, laughing at us as he blew us…”

“Eyewitnesses have confirmed that the rogue officer boasted that he was headed for Planet Earth next. The Galactic Patrolmen will no doubt-”

“Oh, crap.” Jaco wanted to disappear completely. He knew what was coming next.

Lights blinked blue, yellow, green, blue, pink, yellow, blue. The Colonel languished in gluttony. “Jaco, he’s all yours,” the Galactic King said. Crisply did his voice journey across those light-years.

The Galactic Patrolman felt his eyes narrowing in reflex. Why me? Why does it always have to be me? He gulped and jumped into his ship, getting the heck out of there before the Colonel had time to look up from his bucket of space grease.

Dying sunlight clawed at his cockpit. In his mind, Jaco could see with his waking eyes, like a heartbeat, a pulsating image of Paprikan standing over him grinning, the fight already lost. His knuckles flexed as he gripped the controls; grinding his teeth, his cheeks burning hot with the rage of righteous injustice, Jaco pressed on with gathering speed, welcoming the challenge.

The limitless black lay ahead; faintly, a few stars managed to glare holes through the veiled deep. Ever since Bahkaar’s Plague had swept across the universe just a few years prior, killing trillions, quelling the last feeble attempts at empire this galaxy would ever see again, the universe had felt like a much quieter place. There had been times in his life, some in the not-so-distant past, when Jaco would have preferred such a reality.