Iiovana the Sweetheart, and Phoenix the Hunk

Wow!  So many R/Rs!  I’m really astonished!  And you know what the best part is?  NOT A SINGLE ONE OF THEM IS BAD!  ^-^  Wooo, I is sooooo happy!

Q/A:  Saturn-hime, this should answer you’re question.  I hope I didn’t confuse many of you, but I meant for the voice to be Hector’s.  **winces** Please don’t hurt me.  I thought about putting his name after what he said, but decided against it, and look what it brought me.  **Pudgoose bangs her head against a wall** BAD PUDGOOSE!  BAD PUDGOOSE!  BAD!

Disclaimer:  I don’t own Dragon Ball Z, or the characters.  I wish I owned Vegeta though…. That’d be… entertaining… ;)

Steal after my heart, would you?

“NO WAY!” Chi-Chi shouted, staring at the TV in X-Commander Bardock’s house.  The reporter had just gotten through announcing the names of everyone the Prince had selected.  “YOU’RE KIDDING ME!”

“Miss Briefs?” Bardock repeated in a whispery voice.  His face was full of confusion.  Kakarroto looked at Chi-Chi, who was blinking repeatedly, stunned.

“What it is?” he asked her.  “What?”

“Bulma,” Chi-Chi repeated.  “Bulma…. You remember my friend, right?  The one we sat with at lunch the other day?”

Kakarroto thought a minute.  “The blue-haired one?”

“Yea!”

“What about her?”

“Kakarroto, boy, she’s not Sayian!” Bardock interrupted.  “She’s not from Vegetasei!  She’s from Earth!”  Kakarroto’s eyes must have widened twice their normal size.

“Bulma’s… an ALIEN?!?” he screamed.  Chi-Chi nodded.

“So am I.”

Kakarroto gaped at her.

“Well DUH son!” Bardock said.  “It’s kind of obvious!  Neither one of them has the Sayian female’s slightly muscular build, nor does Miss Briefs have a Sayian’s dark coloring.  And neither of them have tails… damn, sometimes I think you’re as slow as a snail….”

“I never knew…” Kakarroto whispered.  Chi-Chi giggled at having him stare at her so, and he blushed, rubbing a hand behind his head.

“But Bulma… I never thought it’d be BULMA!” Chi-Chi whispered, staring at the TV reporter.  He was now talking about Zoë, and how close her father and King Vegeta were.  Zoë’s smiling picture appeared on the screen, and Chi-Chi shot it the bird, scowling.  Bardock snorted with laughter.

Bulma awkwardly carried her heavy suitcase.  Everyone she walked by not only stared at her, but they moved farther away from her, as if she were carrying some sort of deadly disease.  Bulma rolled her eyes at them.

She sighed with relief as the palace came into view.  Large, ancient, solid, and beautiful in a medieval way, the palace stood in the center of Vegetasei’s largest city.  It really was a sight to behold.

It was just then that Bulma realized that she had not a clue of what this Phoenix guy might look like.  He could be any one of these people she was passing on the street.  Unless he was a bird…

She snorted.

A flash of burgundy hair caught her eye, and Bulma sighed, realizing who it was.  Oh well.  Maybe Zoë knew this Phoenix guy.  It was better than being left behind.

Bulma, unable to think of any other choice, headed towards Zoë.  The witch was looking better than ever; with her hair shiny and brushed, lipstick the color to match her silky locks, her ample bosom well expressed in a black tube top, a mid-thigh black skirt, and burgundy knee-high boots, Bulma thought she might as well go all the way and put up a huge sign above her head saying, ‘COME AND GET ME GUYS!  I’M A SLUT!’

“Of course, I was on the top of Vegeta’s list,” Zoë was telling another girl.  Bulma immediately recognized her as Cleopatra Taylor, Zoë’s friend.  “He and I are like, so close.  I don’t know why he even bothered holding this contest!”  Cleopatra nodded dumbly, staring at Zoë like a zombie, and completely missed the insult.

“Right Zoë,” Bulma shouted at them.  Zoë looked up in Bulma’s direction.  As Bulma approached them, the blue-haired female gained a pitiful voice and expression.  “You’re so much better than the rest of us, Zoë.  I mean, whoa, I don’t even know the purpose in my existence anymore!”  Zoë sneered at her.  Cleopatra, noticing Zoë’s look, sneered at Bulma too.

“Just look at what the cat dragged in,” Cleopatra growled.

“Oh how original!  You must have the IQ of a genius, right?” Bulma asked her, sarcasm dripping off every syllable.

“I can’t begin to fathom why Prince Vegeta would pick someone like, you, Bulma Briefs,” Zoë said lazily.  “I really thought he could do better than that.  You’re not that pretty of a girl, you know.”  Bulma clenched her fists, shaking with anger.  She raised a finger up at Zoë, and pointed it right at her throat.

“Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, Zoë,” she hissed through clenched teeth.  “And if the beholder just happens to be a whore, then I suppose I don’t fall into that beholder’s category.”  Zoë’s eyes flashed with anger; Cleopatra looked from one, to the other, wondering if a fight was about to start.  Zoë had a look of murder on her face.

“Why…you…”

“Hey guys!” a girl’s voice broke in.  All three of them turned to see a very pretty girl dashing towards them.  “Were you girls all chosen by Prince Vegeta too?”

“Who are you?” Zoë asked.

The girl smiled, panting slightly.  She looked several years younger than all of them, and was small in frame and height too.  She had miniature black spikes on top of her head, and her large eyes were slightly lighter than any normal Sayians’.  They were an almond-color of brown, the same as her tail.  She was wearing a red t-shirt, baggy jeans with holes ripped near the knees, and had large-hooped earrings in her ears.

“I’m Iiovana Veen.  Pleased to meet you!”  She extended a hand to Zoë, who stared at it as if the younger girl were offering her a piece of rotting meat.

“Ignore Zoë,” Bulma interrupted.  Iiovana looked at Bulma curiously, and smiled wide when Bulma grabbed her hand, and shook it.  “I’m Bulma Briefs.”

Iiovana studied her, her mouth slightly open and upturned into a smile.  “I like your hair,” she said after a moment.  “Did you dye it?”

“Um… no.  I’m not Sayian.  I’m from Planet Earth.”

Iiovana’s eyes widened twice their size, which was huge, considering that she already had large, beautiful eyes.  “Cool…” she whispered.

Bulma nodded.  Suddenly, Zoë laughed cruelly, and Bulma turned to look at her, curious, yet already knowing that Zoë was going to say something snide.  The witch was pointing to Bulma’s large suitcase.  “You ditz!  Why’d you bring that?”

Bulma looked down at her suitcase momentarily, confused.  “We’re going to live in the palace, right?”

“Well yea, but everything we’ll need will be provided for us there!  Make-up, clothes, entertainment, you name it!”  She laughed again.  “You are such a bimbo!”

“Can it Zoë,” Bulma hissed, blushing.  Gosh was she ever embarrassed.  Leave it up to Zoë to do that for her.  Zoë doubled over with laughter, and turned back to Cleopatra, who was laughing just as hard.

Iiovana frowned at Zoë, and blinked.  “Well that wasn’t very nice,” she muttered.  Bulma turned back to look at her, her cheeks still stained a light pink.  “I mean, she could have just let you know quietly, or something.  It’s not that big of a deal.  I do stuff like that all the time!”

Bulma laughed once, surveying Iiovana.  The girl was sweet.  No wonder Vegeta had chosen her.

“Do you go to Poleino High?” Bulma suddenly asked her.  “I’ve never seen you before.”

“No.”

“Oh.”  That’s funny, she thought.  I thought that he’d only be getting girls from our school.  “Then… how does Prince Vegeta know you?”

“King Vegeta knows my father.  My father is Second-in-Command.”

Bulma nodded.  “Cool.”  Iiovana smiled.

“Is this the group of girls that are supposed to meet Phoenix?” a female voice asked.  Bulma, along with the rest of the girls, looked up to see a girl just as sleazily dressed as Zoë approaching them.

“Madonna, you made it!” Zoë squealed.  The two girls hugged each other tightly, giggling like idiots.  (Sorry to all you girls out there that like to giggle, but I’m a little bit of a tomboy.  I grew up with two brothers, what do you expect?)

“And… I’m guessing that’s Madonna Freeman?” Iiovana whispered to Bulma.

“I suppose.  I’ve never met her before,” Bulma replied.  “She must be one of Zoë’s friends.”

“Right.  So that would make the other one…”

“Cleopatra.  I know her.  She is just as stuck up as Zoë.”

“Got-ya.”

“Ah!  Ladies!  So glad to see you all could make it!”  Bulma looked up to see an extremely handsome man approaching them.  He was probably in his early twenties, Bulma guessed, and reminded her so much of a hunk that she’d meet on a beach.  But even though he was hot, there was something about him that unnerved her a little bit….

“Gather round!  Gather round!” he said.  Bulma pulled the suitcase along with her as she moved into the small circle that was forming, and the man noticed it.  He raised an eyebrow, but instead of harshly laughing in her face like Zoë did, he merely smiled playfully.

“Um… Miss?  You won’t be needing that.”

She nodded.  “I know.  But I’m carrying it around, just because I have the urge to!”

He laughed gently, and a look in his eyes told Bulma that he understood perfectly what had happened.  She blushed again, but he changed the subject.

“Well girls, let me introduce myself!  My name is Phoenix.  I’d first like to congratulate you all on your big success.  Out of billions of females in the universe, you all were chosen because you were the best of the best!”  Zoë flipped her hair around, smiling smugly, and tilting her head so that her locks trailed seducing down her shoulder.

“And when to we get to meet the Prince?” she asked.

“At dinner tonight!  There’s going to be a large dinner, celebrating your arrival.  Now,” he turned around.  “If you’ll all just follow me.”

Bulma took a deep breath, and Iiovana and she looked at each other.  With a shrug and a smile, they followed Phoenix.  Iiovana took Bulma’s suitcase out of her hands, and lifted it up easily.  She smiled at the surprised look on Bulma’s face.

“It will be much easier this way,” she said.  “I’m a lot stronger than you.”

“Well I don’t want to… to be rude or anything,” Bulma muttered, blushing.  Iiovana waved a hand dismissively.

“Forget about it.  Come on!”

And the two girls headed for the palace with everyone else, hope in their hearts, smiles on their faces, and a new friend by Bulma’s side.

Hope you liked that chapter.  I tried to end it on a ‘non-cliffhanger’ type note.  Did it work?  Well anyways, I was thinking about you guys’ Christmas present.  Hmmm… when should I give it to you????  I really can’t decide!  So, I guess I’ll leave that job up to all my readers!  When you R/R, (or if you do) recommend a time that you would like, and I’ll see what I can do.  Merry Christmas everyone!  Now, excuse me if you will, but I’ve got a Steelers’s game to watch!  ^-^  Steelers against Ravens for the AFC championship!  ^-^  Wooo!