“What the hell is that lunatic doing?” Sukuashi asked under his breath, watching as Yamucha sped through the city streets, screaming obscenities to the empty buildings. He was in the highest structure in the city complex, nearly double the height of the castle itself, suspended into the air by four tall, twisting legs, each made of the strongest Saiya-jin materials, blended into a perfect white shade, making it almost impossible to be seen from the ground. Sukuashi stood with his arms crossed at the edge of the lookout, watching Yamucha with intense, darting black eyes. Behind him were several high ranking officers, who before Yamucha’s appearance had been going over the battle plans, documentation, and maps of the planet’s snow fields. As soon as he had appeared however, everyone had come to a standstill, staring.

“Ah….I’m not certain, Sukuashi Sir.” One of them finally stuttered.

“Is his power level high?”

“No, Sir. A human, Sir. And it appears as though he is very weak in power.”

Sukuashi watched him as he spun his vehicle around in a circle, kicking up snow and screaming something that was too distorted by the wind for Sukuashi to understand. It had been his original impression that an entire group of Earthlings had arrived on the planet, but it looked as though it was just this lone rider. His brow furrowed in thought, and he followed Yamucha’s erratic course with calculating eyes. This doesn’t make sense. If the Earthlings were aware of ChiChi’s disappearance, and I’m certain that they were, why would they only send one lowly human being after her? Why the large ship, instead of a single spacepod? Why go through all the trouble of secrecy, landing out in the snow fields, just to barge into the city and create such a ruckus?

“Something isn’t right.” Sukuashi said suddenly, turning to face the officers behind him. They snapped to attention, and tore their eyes away from the crazy human below, who was winding through the streets at a slower pace now, still screaming obscenities into the air. “I think the Earthlings are trying to deceive us.”

“Nani?” An officer asked. “Perhaps it was just the one Earthling.”

“Iie.” Sukuashi argued. “That makes no sense. They wouldn’t have sent just one to destroy us all, let alone a lowly human, when I know for a fact that Earth has a small Saiya-jin population of it’s own.”

This caused a bit of a stir. They murmured things between themselves, and shot each other looks of surprise and excitement. “Is it possible that the Saiya-jins have also come, that the human is but a servant among them?” They asked, and Sukuashi considered this.

“It’s possible that the crazy human is being used as a decoy, something to distract us from the real forces that they have brought with them.” Sukuashi reasoned. “Which direction did the human come from, and in which area of the city is he now?”

One of the officers was quick to grab a map and spread it out on a smooth counter before Sukuashi. The Saiya-jin leader held down the curling edges of the paper with both hands, and bent his head down low to view it. The officer pointed with a large gloved hand at the area straight before the city gate. “The human came in straight from this direction, and since then has stayed in this half of the city, riding in circles.”

“So he hasn’t even ventured into the other half of the city yet?” He questioned, shooting he officer a look.

“Hai.”

“Then perhaps our human friend is trying to distract us from what is going on in the other direction. Which means that our enemies are behind us, ready to attack at any moment now.” In a blur of movement, all of the Saiya-jins moved to the other side of the lookout, taking the papers and maps with them silently. They squinted and strained to see through the snow unsuccessfully, then Sukuashi turned on his scanner, turning his head slowly to catch any flicker of power. The scanner remained silent, and the setting stayed firm at zero, not budging an inch. He frowned then, remembering what the Namek had said when they first fought each other, about their scanners. “When will you bad guys finally realize that those little toys just don’t work anymore?” The Namek’s deep and patronizing tone came back to him. Obviously the people of Earth had developed some way of hiding their power from Saiya-jin scanners, which meant that they would be able to move about the planet nearly undetected. Unless….

“If we can’t read their power level, we will simply have to see them.” He reasoned, and ripped a spyglass out of the hands of a nearby officer. He focused on the area to the North of the city, and slowly moved, hoping to catch a glimpse of color in a sea of blinding white. As he continued to stare through the lens, his eyes blurred, then refocused as he caught sight of two specks of black moving slowly in the distance. Although they were nothing more than specks in the distance, Sukuashi suddenly realized that the black was actually hair. Through the spyglass, he could barely make out the heads of two approaching enemies from the North.

“There.” He pointed. “The enemy is approaching from the North.”

“Sir, what is our plan of action?”

Sukuashi thought for a moment. He had other things that he desperately needed to take care of. Pi had not disposed of Koronu as ordered, and that was dangerous enough by itself. His mate knew too much, and he knew that she would not have a problem displaying all of his actions to the Council, even if she had to go as far as dragging ChiChi before them in proof. Also, if the Earthlings had come to ChiChi, that meant that they were threatening to steal away his property, and being of a selfish nature, this did not make Sukuashi all that happy. He didn’t really have the time to be fiddling around with the arm y, protecting their empire. He had much more important tasks, and entirely too little time to accomplish them. It felt as though the weight of responsibility was crushing him clear through his armor, and a thought suddenly occurred to him. The army needed a leader, and he had basically just sentenced their actual leader to death. It had seemed clever at the time, but now he cursed his rashness in the situation. Now he had the entire military to command, and he simply did not have time for it.

The best course of action was to simply give the army a bit of direction and then set them off on their own. After all, they were trained soldiers, prepared for battle and blood; they could take care of themselves. He cleared his throat. “Ignore the single human invader. He is nothing but a decoy. Our enemy is approaching from the North. Send the soldiers to the snowfields and fan out to circle the enemy and overtake. Equip as many soldiers as you can with stun guns, with the paralyzing ray up to the fullest notch. The humans will be no problem for us, but if they have brought the Earth Saiya-jins with them, there may be trouble.”

Marron sighed. No sooner had everyone else left their sights, Piccolo told them to get back inside the ship, where he securely locked them away from the rest of the world. The mood between all of them was a feeling of disappointment. They had come so far and gone through so much, only to be left behind in the dust, or rather in this case, the snow. Not that Marron minded all too much. Now that she was here and faced with all of the heavy opposition, the weight of the enemy seemed almost too much for her to bear. She sat at the kitchen table next to Goten, with her chair scooted slightly closer to his own, her eyes trained on him, but her thoughts somewhere else entirely.

“Do you think everything will go okay?” Goten suddenly asked, and she snapped to attention, nervously pulling at one of her blond pigtails.

“I hope so.” She answered, and looked down at her hands, clasped in front of her on the table. Both of her parents were out there, and regardless of whether or not she had been fighting with her father, she would be devastated if something happened to him. She suddenly felt very guilty for the way that she had been treating him. He had only been trying to protect her, she knew….But she was struggling to stand on her own two feet, and she simply couldn’t do that with him always there, helping her up. She was at that age now when she had to start living for herself, discovering herself, and Kuririn didn’t seem to understand that. With her parents practically at war with each other too, it was almost impossible for her not to take a side. Her mother had always seemed to understand her, to understand every feeling that crept into her heart, almost as if they shared one life. How could she not side with her mother, especially when she actually agreed with her this time?

“Me too.” He agreed, then closed his eyes and sighed. “Wow, so much has happened to me lately that it’s just exhausting. I think I’ve gone through more emotional turmoil the past few days than most people go through in an entire lifetime.”

“Are you going to be okay?” Marron asked, and had the sudden impulse to reach out and grab his hand, to protect, to comfort. Goten was usually so cheerful and full of life, so carefree and fun. It was strange to see him this way, to catch a glimpse of the serious side of him. She had never been sure that it existed, because he hid it so well behind laughter and a voracious appetite. Now that she was seeing it though, she found it oddly attractive. Besides the cheerful part of Goten that she loved so, there was a deeper, more soulful part. It made her want to know everything about him, to reach into his mind and heart and read everything was laid out before her.

Goten opened his eyes quickly and nodded. “Of course. It’s just an awful lot to take in just a few days. What about you?” He asked thoughtfully. “Your parents are fighting, I noticed. Are you doing okay?”

Her heart leapt. He’s actually concerned about me! She marveled, her eyes wide. He actually cares about me enough to ask! He must have noticed the change of personality, sensed that something was wrong in my heart. Scenes ran through her mind then, pictures of her and Goten. There was laughing on the beach, a toast of wine in the flicker of candlelight, the wedding of course --- which she had been planning for years already. I would wear the huge white princess dress, and carry a bouquet of fresh, pink roses, each one perfectly formed and the same color as the blush on my cheeks, my bridesmaids all in pink dresses, each with a matching up-do. Goten in his tuxedo, looking so handsome and tall at the alter….

“Marron?”

She sighed dreamily. “I do.”

“You do what?” A loud voice called, and Marron was brutally awakened from her daydream. Trunks stood in the doorway of the kitchen, his mouth full of some sort of rice, a large bowl in one hand and chopsticks in the other. Marron noticed with a blush spreading across her cheeks that he had changed out of his white uniform and was clad only in a pair of sky blue boxers, which seemed to accentuate every single part of his amazing body. He leaned in the doorway casually, his head bent down over the bowl, hair falling into his blue eyes. Her jaw dropped slightly, and for a brief moment, she wondered if she had perhaps made a mistake falling in love with Goten when Goten’s best friend was so very handsome. Then Trunks brushed the lavender strands out of his eyes and stared at her with a look that plainly said ‘I’m gorgeous, I know’, and those thoughts were dashed away. Trunks was much too confident and much to egotistical for her taste. What she needed was someone sweet and pure, someone who would always cheer her up and make her smile. Although Trunks would always be a good friend to her, he simply couldn’t be anything more than that. Goten was something much more real to her, something that she could actually strive for.

Tayhei peeked her head over Trunks’s shoulder then, and Marron groaned inwardly. But how am I supposed to win over something like that? She asked herself, frowning. Tayhei shoved herself around Trunks and into the room quickly, gracing Goten with a dazzling smile. She took her seat on the other side of the boy, delicately crossing her long legs in front of her. Marron watched her uneasily, noticing how the white uniform complemented her perfect figure to the fullest. If I were Goten, who would I pick? The beautiful, intelligent, fashionable Tayhei? Or me? It’s like comparing Barbie to some dusty old rag doll.

“Where were you guys?” Goten asked them. “Fixing the engine problem?”

Tayhei and Trunks shared a look.

“There was no engine problem.” Trunks informed them, and scooped another bite into his mouth. “Tayhei just said there was.”

Marron stared at him in shock. She simply could not believe that Tayhei would lie about something so important. A lot of lives were in her hands, and she had seriously misled them. Even for someone as calculating and manipulative as Tayhei, that was pretty low.

“Nani?!” Goten’s jaw dropped. “Why?”

Tayhei shrugged, and tucked a stray, golden strand of hair behind her ear. “I didn’t want to leave ChiChi behind when we were so close. Of course, at that point and time, I was naturally assuming that I would be part of the adventure. I didn’t even fathom that they might leave me behind and make me wait like a child.”

“You lied??” Marron asked, still bewildered.

Tayhei shot her an annoyed look. “Yes, that would be the general idea. It seemed like such a waste to turn back, just because of one little stowaway.”

Marron glared back. “Two stowaways. I don’t believe you were welcome on this trip either, Tayhei.”

“It doesn’t matter anyway.” Goten pointed out. “We’re here, and there’s no turning back now. I have faith that we will make it out all right, no matter what kind of risk Tayhei took. Besides, you are both in good hands here. Trunks, Piccolo and I will take good care of both of you. I know I would never dream of letting anyone hurt either one of you. Isn’t that right, Trunks?”

He looked up from his rice and stared at Tayhei. “Well….I don’t know about Tay---”

Goten interrupted him, afraid of what he might say. “We’ll protect you both, I promise.”

Marron looked down at her hands with a frown on her face. I certainly hope so. She thought. Because I don’t know how I’m going to make it out of this alive without a little bit of protection and support. What had seemed so easy and simple on Earth had suddenly snowballed into something very dangerous and scary, and she thought that she might have gotten more than she bargained for by stepping onto the ship.

Chapter 55
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