The more things change, the more they stay the same…

She hauled her still sleepy shoulders to a sitting position on the couch, rubbed her eyes, and cast a glance around the den of her vast house.

"Wha--? What’s wrong?" softly, so as not to waken her other sleeping companions. In armchairs across the room, Eliza and Sharpener slept on, Eliza snoring softly. Elegant, Videl thought to herself.

Snow blinked across the television, and the clock above the mantle blinked 3:28 AM in cold blue light. Damn, we must have all fallen asleep. Chichi’s going to kill Gohan. Maybe that’s what his problem is. Her brow furrowed into a frown not unlike Gohan’s – when she got mad, Chichi was a person to be avoided at all costs. She turned her blue eyes back to Gohan, who was concentrating fiercely on the blank far wall, as if he was trying to see through it. He didn’t notice her.

"Gohan." A little louder, and Videl caught his attention. The savage look passed from his face, and his black eyes winked down at her gently, but still held an echo of worry.

"It’s…nothing. I was just dreaming." Looking at his vague attempt to mask a troubled expression, Videl didn’t believe him.

"Uh-huh. And I’m the Queen of Sheba."

"I can feel – dammit!" he cussed softly, casting a furtive glance at the sleeping forms of their companions. A-hah, Videl thought, now I’ve got him, and I think I can guess what it is if he won’t say it in front of Eliza and Sharpener.

She gave a half-nod and rose, moving silently through the darkened house and motioning for him to follow her. Videl dared not switch a light on until she rounded a corner, shadowed by her taller companion, and passed the stairwell which led to the upper floor, where he father could be heard snoring deeply and loudly. She groped for a light switch with the tips of her fingers, found one, and flicked it on. The lights in the kitchen responded promptly, temporarily blinding the two young people.

When her eyes adjusted to the bright light, Videl took a seat at the table and motioned for Gohan to do the same. With an apologetic scrunch of his nose, Gohan elected to stand, with his chin firmly in the trigger hold of his left hand. The concerned look returned to his face as he began to scowl again. Time to nip this in the bud, thought Videl.

"If you keep scowling like that, you’ll wind up looking like Vegeta." She giggled a little, as a mental image of the imperious Prince’s hair with it’s sharp ‘M’ lowered itself onto a picture of Gohan. Not pretty, she thought.

He gave her a sharp look, then his expression mellowed and she knew she’d broken him out of whatever funk he’d been in.

"So what is it?"

"I – I can feel…a great power that I don’t recognise, but in a way, I do recognise it. And it keeps fluctuating, like whoever’s emitting it is badly hurt. I was sensing it out, and a minute or so ago, whoever it is passed out, and I can’t find it any more." Instead of a usual serious frown, Gohan looked genuinely confused.

Videl busied herself tidying the dark ponytails that fell to her shoulders behind her ears. Finally satisfied, she looked up quizzically.

"How do you know that whatever or whoever was sending out that signature isn’t dead already?"

Gohan smiled. "It’s hard to explain, but when someone dies, it…feels…different."

His eyes passed to the inbuilt clock on the microwave, which reminded him, he was kind of hungry. His stomach began to growl in agreement and he blushed as Videl chuckled at him, then he flushed and slapped his forehead as he saw the time.

"Oh no! Mother’s going to kill me."

Even for someone as powerful as Gohan was, Chichi was formidable when she got angry, and despite it’s innocence, this all-night stopover wouldn’t go down well with her.

Videl watched these fears play across a face that was very much his father’s, and her curiosity got the better of her.

"So we should go and see what was creating those pulses." Switching the subject back to the reason they were standing in the cold kitchen, Videl hoped there was enough implied question in her statement to bring some life into Gohan.

"Yes. I mean – you want to come with me?"

"Of course. You weren’t thinking of leaving me behind, were you?" Videl dashed to the door and fumbled with the lock before it clicked open. Gohan couldn’t help but smile at her. Videl was one of the few girls who had never really cared what he thought about her. For a human, she was very strong, and she knew all of his secrets. Well, most of them, he thought. Maybe that was why he liked her so much. He’d even made her a part of his secret identity and taught her to fly, trained her. Now he wouldn’t dare sabotage the relationship developing between them by leaving her behind. He moved towards the door, she was already outside, hovering impatiently.

"’Patience is a virtue,’ Videl. Let’s go." He floated up next to her, and took off in the direction of the force he’d felt.

Although Videl was flying steadily and much faster than she used to, Gohan was even more impatient than she was to get to the site he’d felt out. He pulled up abruptly and beamed a little as she did the same. She’s not even tired, he thought. She never used to be able to go this far. But still…

"We’ll get there faster if I…" he trailed off, not wanting to offend her.

Surprisingly, she nodded in acquiescence.

"Okay. You can say it Gohan, I know I’m slowing you down. Do it, then."

Gohan reached for his power, and with a blinding flash faced her in Super Saiyan form, golden hair streaming in an invisible wind and black eyes a strange blue-green. The young half-Saiyan stopped his power-up and turned to her, extending a hand.

Videl took it gratefully; she was wearing out anyhow, despite how well she hid it, put her arms around his strong neck and held on for dear life as he accelerated beyond the sound barrier.

She was just beginning to enjoy the ride when the wind stopped screaming past her ears and Gohan spoke softly to her.

"We’re here." Seeing her puzzled look as she glanced around, he added "down there;" indicating with a slight dip of his head at a massive crater to their left.

Debris was strewn everywhere in smoking piles and a couple of small spot fires lit the crash site, if that was indeed what it was. It certainly looked like a crash site.

Keeping a protective arm around one of Videl’s shoulders, Gohan scanned the area for signs of life. So intent was he on finding the lost power he’d sensed he didn’t even notice the approach of his half-asleep father being dragged along by his little brother, Goten, who was only half-dressed. Nor did he detect the approach of an ever-irritated Vegeta followed closely by Trunks and a little more distantly by Bulma in a small aircraft. Videl gave Gohan a dig in the ribs, but in his Super Saiyan form he didn’t notice. Vegeta’s gruff, imperious voice cut in and snapped Gohan to attention.

"Are we having a moment? Or are we going to find what the hell was causing that disturbance?!"

Gohan’s head jolted upwards and he blushed a little before releasing Videl’s shoulder and mumbling a response to the Prince.

"Whatever it is, it’s down there, by that rock. And it’s unconscious." Another voice rumbled.

"Piccolo! You felt it too?" Gohan turned to his mentor and flashed out of Super Saiyan mode. Videl stood unobtrusively behind him. The big green guy still scared her a little.

Piccolo gave a grunt of assent.

As one, the assembled group looked in the direction Piccolo indicated and felt a minor life force, clearly hurt, definitely unconscious, and saw a huddled figure in the rock’s shadow. Could this have been the being emitting all that power? Impossible, surely.

Gohan floated protectively between Videl and the figure on the ground as his father, Piccolo and Vegeta descended warily to examine it.

Suddenly, Videl felt a sharp tug on her shirt and looked down in panic, only to find Goten looking offended and worried, waiting for a hug. Much as Gohan would have done, she put a hand on the little boy’s shoulder and watched as he visibly relaxed. Ridiculous, she thought. This kid could defend me better than I could defend him.

A small flurry of movement off to one side, and those in the air turned to see Bulma getting out of the plane she’d just landed, making her way cautiously towards the figure near the rock.

Vegeta hissed in irritation.

"What do you think you’re doing, woman?"

"What does it look like?" she retorted, hands defiantly placed on her hips. Vegeta snarled and cussed a little, then let her have her way.

All four converged on the crumpled body at the same time.

"Is… is it… alive?" Bulma stuttered.

"Just." Goku answered her, it didn’t look like Vegeta or Piccolo would. "But just barely. Whoever this is, is very badly hurt. But she’s passed out. She’s not going to hurt you."

"She?!" A chorus of startled voices queried at once.

"Feel it out, guys. As strong as it is, this energy is definitely female."

Goku was greeted by nods of disbelief that changed to abject shock as realisation dawned on the assembly. So it was true. The remarkable power they’d sensed simultaneously was indeed female.

Ignorant of the power the crumpled figure had sent out, Bulma moved to touch her, and was disgusted by the looks her action brought.

"What’s your problem? Scared of a woman? That’d be right." She smirked nastily, and her expression belied the gentle hand she extended to roll the figure onto her back for a better look. The figure groaned. Looking at her face, Bulma was startled and her face filled with compassion.

"This – this isn’t even a woman. She’s just a girl. And she’s hurt. We have to help her." Again she was greeted by disapproving looks. Getting those looks from Vegeta on an hour-by-hour basis was bad enough, but she refused to be looked down upon by a pig with black hair and a green, pointy-toothed freak! Bulma’s patience ran out.

"Well? This warrior you’re all so terrified of is a hurt girl, probably no older than Gohan." (This quip she directed at Goku, who began to look ashamed and put an embarrassed hand behind his head.)

"So help me move her, for Kame’s sake!!"

Slowly, grudgingly and a little warily, Goku moved forward to touch the oblivious form of the girl. Gohan tensed. He’d seen people play "possum" before, lost friends because of it, and he’d be damned if he’d let it happen again. Goku slid one arm underneath the girl’s back, the other under her knees and lifted her, then almost dropped her again in shock as she drew in a sobbing, agonised breath, half-opened her eyes and muttered something incomprehensible so quietly he wasn’t sure she’d said anything.

The eyes closed again, and her body fell slack once more.

Bulma moved to direct Goku toward the small plane she’d arrived in, and laid the girl on a recently un-capsulised stretcher. She reached out to brush the girl’s hair out of her face, and revealed a deep, swollen cut above her temple, which was probably the cause of the fainting. Her breathing was laboured, and from years of seeing Vegeta train too hard, she recognised this as a symptom of broken ribs. A deep laceration ran from the girl’s elbow to her hand, which was skewed on a peculiar angle. The rest of what Bulma could see wasn’t in much better shape than the face, chest and arm, and sent her hustling for the phone in the dashboard. On the seventh ring, a sleepy voice picked up.

"Corporate- no… Capsule Corporation. Dr Briefs speaking. How may I help you?" as Bulma related the story to her father, he became almost as excited as she.

"Dad, you need to boot the regeneration tank. We don’t know who she is, or where she comes from, but she’s in really bad shape." Bulma adopted her ‘worried mother’ voice, and that snapped Dr Briefs back into reality and promising to start up the tank right away.

Sticking her head out of the window, Bulma yelled out to the confused assembly.

"I’m taking her back to Capsule Corp to put her in the regen tank. She should be fine in a few hours, if she’s not too far gone."

"Fine, but we’re coming too," Goten declared on behalf of everyone, regardless of whether they cared about the injured girl or not. Bulma laughed.

"If you insist, Goten. But perhaps you should go home first and… uh… put on some pants." Goten glanced down at the boxer shorts and shirt he slept in, and flushed.

"She’s got a point, son. I think we should all go home, and meet at Bulma’s tomorrow morning – um, later this morning, um… you know what I mean." Ever the advocate for a nap, Goku made the decision for all of them. "Besides, your father’ll be worried if he gets up and finds you missing, Videl. Not to mention what your mother’s going to have to say to you, Gohan."

Both Goku and Gohan cringed, as if in anticipation of the ashes of wrath about to be dumped on their heads.

"Sorry dad, we were watching a movie with Eliza and Sharpener, and I guess we all fell asleep."

"I’ll take your word for it. We’ll both get yelled at anyway."

Videl found her voice.

"Um, Bulma? If it’s alright with you, I’d like to go back to Capsule Corp with you. Besides, I can ring my dad in the morning, and I’ll look after our – um – visitor on the flight back."

"No way," Gohan declared shortly. "We don’t know what we’re dealing with here, and you shouldn’t be putting yourself in danger."

"Gohan, I think it’s obvious this girl is no threat to us. She can’t even breathe properly. And besides, if she makes a miraculous recovery in the few minutes it’ll take to get back, I can protect Bulma."

A derisive snort from Vegeta. The thought of that puny girl protecting his mate seemed preposterous. But if he didn’t agree, he’d have to sit through another screaming row… and he wasn’t in the mood.

"What?" He barked, to revoke the meaning of his snort. "I don’t care what the rest of you do, but I’m going home." And with that, he blasted off in the direction of Capsule Corp.

The events of the night had been most disturbing for the Saiyan Prince. First the unease, which he put down to a little insomnia, then the incredible power, he’d sensed… and then she, whoever the ‘she’ was, had said that. It was clear that Kakarot was either deaf or had forgotten (which seemed likely, Kakarot being the fool he was), and none of their combined three offspring had picked it up.

"Help me," the beaten figure had said. "Take me to the new King."

In the back of the small plane, Videl mopped the brow of the mysterious girl, who was still out cold. Above all, despite the dust and blood intertwined with it, Videl was fascinated with the other girl’s hair. It was softer than silk, and the most extraordinary colour – a dark brown shot through with streaks of purplish-burgundy that glistened in the fading moonlight.

She yawned, tired not so much by lack of sleep than by emotion. And why had Gohan been so overprotective? She dismissed the thoughts that flowed immediately with a sharply exhaled breath. She’d think about it in detail later.

Bulma turned around, breaking her train of thought.

"What do you think? Will she be alright?" Bulma looked for reassurance in the younger girl’s face, and instead found an expression mirroring her own as each tried to derive comfort from the other. Videl sighed.

"I really don’t know. She needs to be in that tank, and fast."

Bulma’s eyebrows drew together in determination.

"Yes, we should hurry. Strap that stretcher down and find something to hold on to. I’m switching to turbos!"

The plane slowed, a click was heard, and then Videl was pitched backwards, smacking into the back wall with an audible ‘oof’.

Bulma grinned at her over their sleeping visitor.

"I warned you to find something to hold on to."

Back at Capsule Corporation, Dr and Mrs Briefs along with Yamcha, Tien, Chaozu and Krillin awaited the arrival of their new "guest". The four warriors had arrived with the sun, having also felt the disturbance, and were far more worried than excited. Dr Briefs, on the other hand, had taken to pacing like a child at Christmas and periodically scanning the horizon for any signs of Bulma’s plane.

Tien’s third eye proved a valuable asset – he was the first to spot the glimmer on the horizon that was undoubtedly Bulma’s plane. But what was that girlfriend of Gohan’s doing in there? He amplified his senses a little, and made out Bulma’s aura and another dying one. That must be the girl they found!

Bulma brought the plane down gently on the back lawn, and lowered the hatch at the back before stepping quickly out of her seat and motioning for Yamcha and Krillin to move the girl from the back and inside to the waiting tank.

All was well until Yamcha lifted the girl’s limp form to place her in the tank, and yelped in fright.

"Sweet Mother of Dende! Bulma! Get over here! This girl’s got a tail!"

Bulma nearly dropped her clipboard in shock. It was impossible. But it was true. Wrapped loosely around the girl’s waist was a graceful, monkey-like tail the same colour as her hair.

From the top of a flight of stairs, Vegeta had been watching their fumblings with some amusement: It wasn’t often someone new showed up, and especially not one who intrigued him as much as this one did…

Trunks interrupted his daydreamings with a shrill "DAD!"

"What?! What’s your problem?" Vegeta snapped back at the little purple-haired six year-old whose hair was still ruffled from sleep. Chikusho… the kid doesn’t even look remotely Saiyan, let alone like the son of a Prince.

"Th-th-the girl we found –" Trunks panted in his excitement. "The girl they found has a tail like you and Uncle Goku used to have. That’s what mother says."

"How many times do I have to tell you?! That imbecile is NOT YOUR – what did you say?" Vegeta paused, mid ranting-roar.

"The girl has a tail." Trunks replied dutifully.

"I heard you the first time. I’m just having trouble believing it."

"Mother wants you to go see. As quickly as you can." The little boy was bouncing from one foot to the other, and the movement was driving Vegeta nuts. Regardless, he restrained his legendary temper. I must be getting soft, he thought.

"I – I’ll come down in a minute, boy. Go find something to blow up, ne?"

"Okay daddy." And Trunks bounced off, ready to spread the news of their stranger new visitor to anyone willing to listen.

Vegeta leant against the doorframe, unsure of his legs and his stomach in knots. It can’t be, he mused, but it is. The strength…what she said…the tail…everything’s falling into place. That girl’s a Saiyan warrior!

Goku, Chichi, Gohan and Goten arrived in the laboratory area of Capsule Corp with Chichi still screaming at her husband and eldest son and Goten walking with his hands over his ears.

"It’s that damn Piccolo, I tell you! He’s a bad influence on Gohan! Look what that green bean has him doing now! Sneaking out at nights! Not calling! Creeping around the countryside at all hours looking for a single person! How could one person be that important?! Goku! Goku, are you listening to me?!"

Actually, Goku had quit listening to her rantings a couple of hours after they got home. Sure, it’d been late and all, but it was an honest accident on Gohan’s part, and she didn’t have to get so worked up about it. Sheesh. But he answered her regardless, or he’d have to listen to another hour’s screaming fit.

"Yes Chichi, I’m listening."

"And what about you, Gohan?!" Chichi was so hysterical, Gohan didn’t dare do anything but nod, and shoved his hands deeper into his pockets.

"Take your hands out of your pockets!"

"Yes, mother."

Hearing the commotion, Mrs Briefs stuck her head out of a doorway and greeted the family in her usual chirpy manner. Somehow, this had a pacifying effect on Chichi, who calmed down somewhat and let the tension out of her shoulders and her fists unclench.

"Good morning everyone!" Mrs Briefs said brightly. "I suppose you’d like to see our new visitor. Come right this way."

In the tank chamber, a multitude of faces were pressed against the glass. After a quick exchange of greetings, Bulma stepped back and gave her place to Chichi, and Goten, Goku and Gohan floated above the others to peer at the figure in the tank.

"Vegeta confirmed it, Goku. This girl – whoever she is – is at least part Saiyan." Bulma said softly.

"And how did His Majesty confirm it? Huh? I suppose with all his wisdom, he looked at the tail, said ‘Yes, that’s a tail, she’s Saiyan’, I’ll bet." Yamcha spat bitterly. He had no love for the alien Prince who’d stolen his girlfriend.

"Quit being such a pig, Yamcha. There’s more to it than that. Yes, he confirmed the features as Saiyan, but we also checked the DNA from some blood samples from both of them, which indicated the presence of a specific acid which can only be isolated in a solution of…" Bulma prattled on in heavy scientific terms gleaned from years of studying Vegeta. Yamcha was immediately sorry for his sniping. Jeez, anything, even Vegeta himself was better than listening to this stuff.

When everyone had had their fill of staring at the newcomer in the tank, Bulma insisted they leave her be and retire to the living room where Mrs Briefs awaited them with her standard smorgasbord.

While the assembly, now grown to include Goku, Chichi, Gohan, Goten, Videl, Trunks, Dr and Mrs Briefs, Piccolo (although he stood outside), Krillin, Tien, Yamcha, Chaozu, Puar, Oolong and the recently arrived Master Roshi lounged about, lulled into a sense of contentment, Gohan started in alarm as he sensed a massive, thought suppressed, power level coming towards them. Other head shot up moments after his.

Could it be the mysterious girl in the tank? Bulma tapped into the room’s surveillance camera with the notebook computer on her lap, and shook her blue hair. She was still recovering, although her vital signs were getting stronger by the minute.

Whoever she was, the girl certainly recovered like a Saiyan.

"Hi, guys."

A familiar voice greeted them from the doorway.

"Trunks!" Gohan exclaimed in excitement.

"What?!" exclaimed the little Trunks.

"Not you, the future you! Did you come back for a visit? Gohan queried the lavender-haired youth at the door.

"Kinda. I came to tell you that I’ve defeated the androids in my world. And I thought I’d hang around for a couple of days, if you don’t mind." Future Trunks gave his usual half-smile, and was shocked by a sharp little voice at his knees.

"Hey. Who are you? And why do you look like me?" little Trunks demanded in a manner quite like Vegeta’s. Bulma reproved him, and future Trunks quickly pulled his long hair back into a ponytail. The last time he’d met up with his little self, he’d nearly had his hair ripped out.

"Well," Goku said, standing up and gesturing for the older version of Trunks to take a seat. "It looks like it’s story time, and do we ever have one for you!"

Chichi sighed as the two stories were relayed. This was going to be a long day.

Inside the regeneration tank, the mysterious girl was beginning to wake up. Curling her fingers a little, experimentally, she found she was not in open air, but in a fluid somewhat thicker than water. Despite this, she could breathe comfortably, and became aware of the mask over her mouth and nose.

She floated for a long moment, trying to recollect the events that had led to this strange sensation. She had been tracking a powerful life force for months, and had managed to isolate the signal to a small planet – Earth, her pod’s computer had informed her – and she must have crashed. That was the only explanation.

Pain. She remembered pain – in her chest, her head, down her arms, her back – but that was gone now. How could she have recovered so fully? Unless she was really dead, which seemed unlikely. She curled her fingers slowly, in what she hoped seemed like a reflex to any observer, and dug her nails into the palm of her hand. They bit in, stung a little, and confirmed her suspicion she wasn’t dead after all.

Vaguely, a face entered her mind’s eye. A man’s face. The look on that face was pure innocence, echoed by the look in his black eyes that matched his spiky hair. She’d known someone with hair like that before. No, he couldn’t be. Impossible.

Still unwilling to open her eyes, she put her situation into perspective. She had crash-landed on what must be Earth. She had been hurt, and a man with black hair and black eyes had taken her to a healer of some sort. She could still feel all of her limbs.

I can’t find anything else out unless I take a look around, she thought. Indeed, she opened her eyes a crack, and saw through a greenish fluid that the room she was in was empty. I have to get out of this tank-thing. But how? She pushed experimentally against the thick glass. It didn’t budge. Tail wrapped protectively around her waist, she gave in to her impulse and began to panic.

A warning beep went off on Bulma’s computer, which she had set on a coffee table for her Trunks and Goten to play with so she could listen more freely to the story being related by the future version of her son.

"Mom! Goten broke your computer!" Trunks squeaked.

"Did not!" Goten squeaked as loudly as Trunks.

"Did too!"

"Did not!" Then a joint cry of:

"MOM! He’s picking on me!"

Chichi rolled her eyes and let Bulma deal with their little spat. She’d done enough screaming for the day as it was. Bulma sprang from her seat and hurried to the two boys.

"Neither of you broke it. That was the alarm from the tank room!"

She closed the program the boys had been playing with and switched back to the camera she’d patched in to. Sure enough, the vital signs were back to normal but a little high, as though the girl was panicking.

"Of course!" she slapped her head in exasperation. "She’d be terrified, she may not have been in a tank like that before, and there’s nobody in there to let her out. Come on, dad!"

Bulma grabbed the shoulder of her father’s lab-coat, and dragged him with her, thought he needed little encouragement, and dashed for the tank room.

Inside the tank room, it was just as Bulma had expected: the girl in the tank was searching wildly for a way out, looking at her with terrified eyes.

Bulma dashed across the tiled floor to the control panel, and while she tapped out a sequence her fingers knew by heart to release the fluid and the lock, she held her finger up to the girl, telling her to wait.

The fluid began to drain, and the look of panic on the girl’s face began to fade, replaced by one of wariness and mistrust.

Bulma lifted the hatch, and the girl backed into the far wall of the tank, taking the mask off her face and drawing in controlled yet worried breaths.

"It’s okay, we won’t hurt you. We only want to help you. Come on." Bulma clichéd, yet meaning every word. She extended a hand to the cowering figure, which had begun to assume a defensive posture.

Somehow, the frightened girl knew this voice. It occurred to her at once. This was the woman’s voice that had made that other man pick her up when she was hurt. For a reason she couldn’t define, the girl relaxed a little and decided to trust the blue-haired woman who smiled reassuringly at her, and reached for the hand held out to her.

Stepping unsteadily out of the tank and dripping wet, she felt a little stiff, but far from hurt. And the woman’s warm hand moved to her shoulder, guiding her out of the room.

"Let’s get you cleaned up. You can’t walk around looking like that." Bulma looked searchingly into the girl’s face, examining for signs of comprehension.

"Can you understand me?"

The girl stood dripping on the floor for a moment. She could understand the other woman fairly well – the language she spoke had been taught to her as a child and she remembered much of it, despite the fact she never used it. Not trusting her voice, she nodded, and was pleased with the relieved look this brought to the white-coated woman’s face.

"Good," smiled Bulma. "Then maybe you can tell me your name. We can’t call you ‘hey you’ forever."

A pause. Bulma deliberated over how well she’d been understood, then finally:

"Jadali. My name is Jadali, but I am most often called Jade."

"Well, Jade, I’m Bulma. You’re at my home, and I’ll look after you. Come with me." In a gesture that disconcerted Jadali somewhat, Bulma took her hand and led her down a long hall.

Stopping in the doorway of a beautifully furnished bedroom, Bulma waved Jade inside and pointed to the small ensuite.

"You can wash in there. I’ll get you some clean clothes. I’ll be back soon." And with that, Jade was left alone in her new surroundings.

She scrutinised every inch of the room she’d been left in, and then for lack of anything else to do, entered the adjoining bathroom.

After quickly discerning how to work the shower, Jade stood under the steaming water and felt the stiffness, which Bulma later attributed to being a side effect of the regeneration tank, melt away.

She found a comb and tidied her hair into a plait, then critically observed her reflection in the steamed-up mirror. Not even a bruise, and I know I had broken bones. That tank is better than I thought.

Bulma snapped her out of her musings, entering with a pile of clothes for her to try on. She hummed happily to herself as she set out the unfamiliar garbs for her new guest.

"Maybe you could try this with this. It should fit you." Bulma held up a dark blue sleeveless shirt and a skirt that fell to mid calf.

"Thankyou, Bulma." Jade eyed the clothes suspiciously, unfamiliar with the cut and design, but donned them anyway. The result made Bulma laugh out loud.

"Oh my – you can’t wear that."

The clothes she’d handed to Jade were far too big on her slender frame and looked utterly ridiculous.

"Um, they were some of the smallest things I had… let’s try – "

"Bulma? If you don’t mind, do you have the pouch I wore on my belt somewhere? I have my own clothes in that. But thankyou for trying." Jade tried desperately not to offend the woman who was being so kind to her.

"Of course. Over there, on the dresser. It had some jewellery in it we thought you’d miss fairly quickly, so I brought it in for you."

"It’s not really jewellery."

"Oh?" Bulma was puzzled. It certainly looked like jewellery to her.

"Watch."

Jade rummaged through the bag and held out a jewelled wrist guard that looked like something from an ancient set of armour in triumph. She snapped it on, and flicked at one of the gems on the upper face of it. Bulma stifled a gasp as Jade now stood before her fully clad and armoured to the teeth.

A black bodysuit not unlike Vegeta’s had appeared about her upper body, sleeveless and high-necked. On top of that, a gleaming breastplate made of some metal that looked rather like gold to Bulma, also gem-encrusted; below that she wore a black skirt, cut on a sharp bias and split up one side to allow her to move, and solid, polished boots that reached to her knees. Another wrist guard had blinked into reality, an exact duplicate of the first. At her hip, a dagger in a jewelled scabbard made itself known as it glimmered in the sunlight streaming from the bay window.

While Bulma stared in amazement, Jade quickly reattached the pouch of "jewellery" that Bulma had misjudged to a loop on the dagger belt.

"Wh – who are you? A princess or something?" Bulma had picked her jaw up from off the floor and found her tongue. Jade laughed softly.

"Of course not. Does my attire displease you?" she asked with such seriousness that Bulma couldn’t help but laugh back.

"Not at all. That’s a beautiful outfit. But you don’t need to get dressed up for us."

"I’m not. This is what I usually wear. Most people where I come from dress this way." Jade was obviously becoming uncomfortable, and Bulma quickly noted this and changed the subject.

"There’s a lot of people waiting to meet you, you know. Do you feel up to it?"

Ah, the people who owned the voices she’d heard must be here.

"It would be disrespectful of me not to. The… the man who picked me up, with the black hair… is he here?" her brows furrowed into a frown of concentration that reminded Bulma distinctly of Vegeta.

"Goku? Yes, he’s here. And a few others. Are you sure you want to come?"

"Yes." Jade said with determination. Here goes nothing, she thought. Perhaps these people can help me find the New King.

In the living room of Capsule Corp, Jadali’s unintentional entourage waited none too patiently for news from Bulma.

They were suitably surprised when Bulma stuck her head round the doorway.

"I think this is someone you guys want to meet."

She walked in the room, followed closely and uncertainly by a dark-haired girl in an unfamiliar outfit who attempted to stay hidden behind Bulma.

Grow up, Jade snapped to herself. Some part of her went into an automatic diplomacy mode, and stepped forward, surveying her startled crowd of onlookers.

"I believe I owe some of you my life. My name is Jadali, although you may call me Jade."

The room looked at her in silence. Her accent was noticeable, theirs was obviously not her language, but the thing they stared at was her. With her gleaming purplish hair, slender frame and dazzling attire, Jade looked quite attractive, but that wasn’t all. Jade’s face, although creased with concern, was strikingly beautiful.

Impossibly deep, clear green eyes narrowed with discomfort, but she withstood their visual assessment of her without obvious complaint.

Hands as elegant as the rest of her clenched a little, and unobtrusively moved into a slight defensive blocking position.

Gotcha, Goku thought to himself. You must be a warrior if you do that on impulse.

"Quit being so rude! How would you like it if everyone stared at you like that?!" Bulma’s irritated voice cut the silence and eyes studied shoes.

"And have some manners!"

This was met by shy raisings of hands and quietly spoken greetings, until Goten and Trunks pushed their way through.

"I," said Trunks in an exaggerated effort to sound regal, "am Prince Trunks, of the Saiyans, and this is my companion, lord Goten." Goten blushed and nudged Trunks in query as the purple-haired boy performed a dramatic one-armed bow.

"Trunks! Stop that." Bulma chided her son and turned to a rather disconcerted Jadali. "His father is a Prince, so he gets carried away with new people."

"Sorry." Trunks apologised half-heartedly. "I suppose I should introduce you to everyone. This is…" the little boy, aided occasionally by comments from his friend, introduced each and every person present quite politely to Jade in a manner that startled even Bulma. Where’d he learn to do that? Bulma thought.

Trunks had dropped his attempt at a regal tone, and was finishing his list.

"And this is my Uncle Goku. He’s Goten’s dad."

Goten suddenly became shy, and ran to hold onto his father’s loose pants. Jade’s eyes met Goku’s over his head, and exchanged a silent dialogue that was noisily interrupted by Vegeta storming into the room.

"KID! How many times do I have to tell you that KAKAROT IS NOT YOUR BLASTED –" Vegeta paused, noticing the newcomer.

"And who the hell are you?"

"Vegeta!" Bulma snapped at him. "No wonder Trunks has a mouth like a sewer pipe, nice example you’re setting for him! And why are you being so rude?! The poor girl just survived a crash and got out of a tank on a strange planet, and the last thing she needs is your bloated ego – " She trailed off, trying to make sense of whatever was passing between Vegeta and Jade.

Jade dropped her eyes, mouthing silently the name she’d just heard.

"Tell me, are you Prince Vegeta of the Saiyans?"

Vegeta gaped in open-mouthed shock. The girl had addressed him correctly, and in his native language. The confused people surrounding them seemed to fall away, and all that existed was the two of them.

"I am," he said, falling comfortably into his first language, "and who wants to know?"

Jade walked to within a metre of him, then dropped down gracefully on one knee. She reached for the dagger at her hip, and held the handle out to him.

"Forgive me, my Prince. Forgive my impertinence. My name is Jadali, and I come to serve you. Dispose of me as you see fit, my lord."

Vegeta took the dagger from the kneeling girl and ran his fingers over the shining blade.

Trying desperately to break the intensity of the scene and to make his father speak so he could understand, Trunks called out, confused.

"Jade?… Jade? I was only joking, you don’t have to do that. Jade? Daddy?" when this elicited no response, his lip began to tremble and his mother put a hand on his shoulder.

"Leave them be, son. I want to see where this is going." She mumbled.

Vegeta looked at the bowed head before him, ready to service his every whim. It had been a long time since someone had showed him the respect befitting of his status, let alone done it right, and besides, he was curious. He adopted his more princely voice and tapped Jade on the shoulder with the hilt of the dagger she’d offered him.

"Get up, girl. That’s enough."

She rose to her feet, keeping her head respectfully bowed. For some reason he couldn’t fathom, Vegeta was bizarrely moved by her display of faith and loyalty.

"It’s okay, you know. You can look at me."

Jade flashed a quick look at the stern features, then her eyes focused on her feet again.

"I said look at me. And tell me who you are, and why you’re here." More sharply, and Jade held his gaze while she spoke as he directed.

"My Prince, I am Jadali of the planet Ismir. I am here because my father told me that should he die, I must seek out the Prince, so that I may be of use to him. To you, my lord."

Vegeta chewed his lip thoughtfully.

"Very well. But it is obvious to me that you are no full-blooded Saiyan. Why should I bother with a halfbreed?"

"It is, of course, up to you what you do with me. But I think, my Prince, that you may find me useful." Jade did her best not to let fear show in her eyes. Prince or not, she didn’t really want to die, and this man might very well kill her on the spot.

"How powerful are you?"

The inevitable question.

"My Prince, I surpassed my father in strength when I was ten years old."

Vegeta snorted.

"And who was your father? A mercenary, I suppose."

"No, my Prince. My father was Broly, and he was a Super Saiyan – and I surpassed him with ease." Jade had started to snap a little, and caught herself.

Kid’s got some spunk after all, thought Vegeta. And it seems Broly didn’t waste his life up until the point that we killed him.

"Alright. You’ve satisfied me so far. But it seems you’re still weakened by your accident. I suggest you stop the formalities, I never liked them anyway. Also, the armour is not necessary, but otherwise I’m pleased to have you. Now run along, and we’ll speak later."

"Yes, my Prince."

Vegeta turned on his heel, folded his arms and went to leave the room.

"Jadali." He said her name lowly and followed it in a split instant after with the dagger he’d taken with him accidentally. She raised an arm and caught the blade easily between two fingers. Had she missed, she would have lost an eye.

Vegeta almost smiled, half-smirking.

"Good." Was all he said, and left the room.

Jade half-smiled herself. Mission accomplished.

"N—Nice catch," Bulma stuttered in bewilderment.

"What in Kame’s name was that?!" Yamcha blurted.

Jade continued her half-smile and sheathed the dagger.

"I found what I came here for, and it was right under my nose."

Videl stood up and eyed Jade suspiciously, then her expression softened and she beckoned to the other girl to join her, Gohan and the older version of Trunks.

Bulma watched with satisfaction as Jade moved toward the group of young people, and was unintentionally surprised by the girl’s outfit once again.

What she thought had been a full catsuit was joined at the back only to her shoulderblades – from there it was open to the small of the girl’s back. Even though Bulma was no warrior, she had noted the incredible quality of the armour Jade wore, and it seemed strange that her back was so unprotected.

And there was something else: on Jade’s back there was a tattooed picture of a small phoenix and a barely visible scar that ran neatly above it in a perfect horizontal line. Bulma opened her mouth to query the girl, but then shut it again. The kids would ask her about it eventually, and Trunks would tell her. Best not to meddle – let the girl make some friends.

Uncomfortable as the idea made her, Jade sat down with the strange other people. They won’t hurt you, she reassured herself, so stop acting like a baby. Besides, you’re in the Prince’s service now, and you don’t want him to think you’re a coward. Also, there was something imperceptibly comforting about the faces of the two youths that seemed ready to protect the other girl. Something familiar about their structure that made Jade feel at home. A-ha. They’ve got Saiyan blood like me. But where are their tails? Prompted by this impulse, Jade was compelled to ask them.

"You have Saiyan blood in you veins, just as I do. Am I correct?" she cast her green eyes on Trunks and Gohan, who looked shocked.

"How do you know that?" Trunks had been fairly convinced he looked more human than Saiyan, and someone pointing out his heritage without being told was rather disconcerting. He looked at Gohan, and they both looked back at Jade.

"I’ve always been trained to pick up on such things. You look very much like the Prince in the face, you know, Trunks. I assume he is your father?" Jade picked her words carefully, not wanting to alienate potential allies before she’d made them.

Trunks bowed his head, giving her a sad half-smile.

"Yes. He is my father."

Noticing her companion’s shoulders stiffen, Videl tactfully changed the direction of the conversation.

"I’m sorry if I wasn’t supposed to ask, but what was that thing with Vegeta? It seemed pretty intense from where I was standing." Videl asked the other girl with complete sincerity, and a small part of her gloated a bit as she saw Jade’s shoulders set and her fingers curl defensively; reciprocating the discomfort the scene with Vegeta had brought on the rest of them.

"I offered my service to the Prince."

Gohan piped up in righteous outrage.

"You gave him a knife and virtually offered him your neck. He could have killed you!"

"Dagger," Jade corrected gently. "And it is his business what he does with me. He accepted my offer and I am bound to him. It is the Saiyan way."

Gohan’s face hung aghast, and before he could explode again, Videl placed a restraining hand on his arm. Jade noticed the gesture much as she’d noticed the hurt in Trunks’ eyes when he spoke of his father, and the disgusted look Yamcha had given when she’d bowed before Vegeta.

"You disapprove?" pointedly, with a whiff of the airs and graces Vegeta often laid on.

"He – we just don’t understand it yet." Videl groped desperately for something to break the silence that followed.

"So, that was the Saiyan language? I’ve never heard it spoken before," she added sheepishly.

"Yes, that is Saiyan. But do the two of you not speak it?" again she addressed Gohan and Trunks.

Trunks responded to the negative.

"We’ve never heard it spoken before, let alone speak it ourselves. I mean, father yells at me sometimes in it, but doesn’t speak it directly."

This was curious. Who ever heard of Saiyans who couldn’t speak their own language? Jade was rather confused by their strangeness and discourtesy towards the Prince, but as far as she knew, anybody with Saiyan blood knew the language by instinct.

"You know it. You’ve always known it. I’ll teach you to relearn it, if you like." Jade offered, still trying not to alienate the other young people, as peculiar to her as they were.

Videl eyed her suspiciously.

"If you speak Saiyan, how did you learn our language?"

It looked like it was time Jade spilled the beans about her origins.

"To answer you fully, I’ll have to tell you about the place I come from. I was born on a planet called Ismir – a little place that had never been touched by the Saiyan race or by that white-skinned devil Frieza. That was, until my father arrived. He was just an infant, but so strong he managed to survive the explosion of Vegetasei and also protect his father. They crashed on Ismir by accident.

"Father and my grandfather, Paragus, found a beautiful, lush world compared to the barren one they’d seen destroyed. It was inhabited by a minor warrior race who, even though they were strong, were peaceable. They were settled but still rather tribal – they respected their world, and above all were skilled in the art of magic. But they didn’t use it, it was a part of them, if that makes any sense. Mages, you might call them, I am unfamiliar with the words you use to describe such people.

"These people took my father and grandfather in, and as he grew up, my father took their head shaman’s daughter as his mate. She was very beautiful, I am told, but she died after I was born. I was raised by my father, my grandfather until he died, and by the head shaman.

"The shaman woman, Ikura, taught me many things, among them how to read faces and to tell when lies are being told.

"From hearing my father speak his own language – on the rare occasions he did – I learnt to use my ‘memories’ from my Saiyan half to understand him.

"Ikura decided I had a gift for language, and began to tell me a story of her childhood. I won’t go into detail, but Frieza’s father, King Cold, took her as a slave when a ship she was in crashed by accident into one of his base planets. On board, she noticed all the races spoke the same language and was told to learn it, as nobody could understand her. She was told the language was universal, but rather complex. And she taught me.

"She wouldn’t say why specifically, I think it was because she sensed I wasn’t destined to stay on Ismir. She died just before I left, and I use the gift she gave me in honour of her."

Jade looked up from her memories into a sea of astonished faces. Despite her accent and heritage, Jade’s voice was sweet and her lilting tone and lazy vowels reminiscent of an exotic language were somehow hypnotic. Goku scratched the back of his head in deep thought.

"Well, as long as it’s Twenty Questions time, I have to ask: the power level you sent out just before we found you… was that really all you?"

Jade snapped out of her retell and gave Goku a tiny guilty smile.

"Not really. I was hurt, so I formed a field around myself and bounced what I had left for as long as I could, in the hope that someone could sense it. It worked."

Yamcha looked at her in a new light, ardent as always to send himself on an ego trip.

"So that huge power you manifested wasn’t what you really have?"

"No."

"I didn’t think so." He stretched and flexed a bit, and paraded out of the room like a prize rooster.

I’m going to have trouble with that baka, Jade hypothesised. She’d already taken a complete and irrational dislike to the human man – he was far too vain for her liking. And it was clear that he didn’t like her much either.

Chichi stretched theatrically and batted her dark eyes at the clock on the wall. Fair enough, this strange girl was fascinating and told them intriguing stories of her world, but it was getting late and Gohan had school tomorrow.

"Goku? I think it’s time we went home. I have to get dinner started and Gohan has school tomorrow."

That was the first time Chichi hadn’t yelled at him all day, and Goku wasn’t about to push it.

"Alright, Chichi. Gohan, Goten, come on. We’ll go home and give Jade some time to get used to this place. You can visit her another time, okay?"

"Okay daddy," Goten chirruped at his father’s knee.

Gohan stood somewhat reluctantly, and was joined by Videl who moved to go home too.

"I should go too. The last thing you need is my father putting in an appearance." She rolled her eyes dramatically and everybody laughed in sympathy.

"Yeah, we should probably all stop being so nosy and go home too," Krillin added with a stretching yawn.

Thank goodness for Chichi, Bulma thought privately, if she hadn’t spoken up I don’t think they would have left. Everyone bid polite farewells, drifting away, and for some strange reason the family that had moved to leave first were left still standing in the near-deserted living room. Promising to come back and visit soon, Chichi and Goku walked toward the door while Goten made for the window.

"Use the door, Goten." Chichi ran a hand over her face in exasperation, then watched happily as Gohan bid Videl goodbye, passing his hand over hers as she leapt off the windowsill in the exact gesture Chichi had just chided Goten for attempting.

Gohan ran to join his family, and the room fell quiet.

Jade, Bulma, both versions of Trunks and Dr Briefs looked at each other in the silence. Curiosity overcame discomfort, and Jade spoke up.

"If you don’t mind, I’d like to take a look around. I will come back soon." She moved toward the window Videl had taken off from, and Bulma’s mind went into matchmaker mode.

"Hey, Trunks can show you around –" Bulma placed a restraining hand on her little boy. "—not you, you." She gestured with a nod of her head towards the older version of Trunks.

Dammit, not this one too. No matter where he went, no matter what he did, a version of his mother was always harrying him about this girl or that girl. Rather than face her, Trunks got up wordlessly and followed Jade out the window.

"DOOR, PEOPLE!" a frustrated cry from inside, and Trunks felt a little better.

Jadali frankly wasn’t in the mood for company, and was minorly irritated with Bulma for pressing the young man on her. For goodness sake, she was seventeen and well and truly capable of looking after herself.

But maybe you’re not, a little voice nagged at the back of her conscience. Maybe you’re not as independent as you think you are…not as strong…not as fast…you’ve put yourself completely at the mercy of these people…what have you gotten yourself into? The voice seemed to sneer. Shut up! I can handle this. I have to. She spoke harshly to herself and shook her head to clear it.

Flying alongside and a little behind her, Trunks was quite impressed with the façade of control Jade had managed to erect around herself like a granite wall from the moment she’d walked into the living room.

It didn’t seem possible to him that anyone could remain so completely calm in a world so foreign. Maybe it was just his natural reticence, but Trunks recalled being distressed and unsettled when he was fronted with people he’d had information on for the first time. She knew nothing about them. She had to be hiding something.

Up ahead, Jade pulled to a graceful halt and hung vertically as she called back to Trunks.

"I’d really like to…work some things off my mind. Maybe you should go back now. I rely on my speed, and I don’t think you’d keep up – no offence intended." She gave him a pointed green look through her eyelashes. She’d fully understood Bulma’s intentions, and she had no intention of fulfilling that little whim of hers.

Trunks gave her a piercing blue stare in return.

"I won’t know until I try. Do you mind?" He raised an eyebrow in innocent challenge. There was no way that this girl could be faster than a Super Saiyan.

Jade flashed him an even-toothed smile, shrugged her shoulders, and disappeared.

Kame, she’s fast, alright. But not fast enough! Trunks raised his own power level and blasted off after the dimming signature as fast as he could.

Far ahead, Jade streaked through the sky above an ocean, moving so fast that the backdraft from her movement parted the deep water to its sandy floor. The wind whipped some of her hair loose from the braid and it stung her face as she flew. Well, I’ve certainly given him a shock. She bared her teeth a bit in a smirk of triumph, and then almost fell from the sky as she sensed a now-familiar ki at her feet. Jade rolled over and looked in honest surprise into Trunks’ grinning face.

"Surprised?" he asked her, despite the fact her surprise was screamingly obvious.

"You haven’t seen the half of it, little Prince!" she called back, then true to her word, blasted far ahead of him.

Trunks was almost at his threshold speed, annoyed that a girl he didn’t know could possibly surpass him. He only had one option left, unless he admitted defeat. Not likely. Without a second thought, he burst into Super Saiyan form and took off after Jade in the world’s most unlikely game of Chasings.

Far in the distance, Jade felt Trunks closing in on her again. She knew she was capable of much more, but didn’t really want to embarrass the poor fellow. She nearly went head-over-tail when Trunks pulled in front of her, forcing her to stop.

"You’re a Super Saiyan? I thought as much. You hide much from your father." A look of pure rascality crossed her delicate face. "Last resort, little Prince?"

Trunks "harrumph-ed" a bit and dropped back to his normal form. He looked into her mischievous features and felt his cheeks redden. Glad of his long hair, he ran a hand through it and let some fall over his face to hide the effect she’d had on him.

I may hate to babysit, but at least she’s pretty. No, she’s more than that, she’s beautiful. And fast, he added with a grimace. Whoa, let’s get off this train of thought, Trunks, he thought to himself.

"You don’t seem surprised. Have you seen a Super Saiyan before?"

Amusement filled her face, and she looked prettier.

"Seen one? I am one, little Prince." To prove her point, she powered up and faced him with golden hair streaming and eyes a different type of green.

She began to look more pleased with herself than ever as she saw Trunks’ stunned expression.

Embarrassed by her own actions, Jade flashed back into her normal mode, and to keep her own reddened cheeks from Trunks kept her face down.

Pallor under control, she met his gaze again, and got the impression he’d been staring.

"I’ve had enough of a warm-up. I think I’ll take a rest on that island down there. Join me if you want."

Without waiting for his response, she floated down and took a seat under a tree. Trunks landed a few metres away moments later. They smiled ruefully at each other. He knew she was faster than he was, and she knew he was a more powerful Super Saiyan than she was.

Where is this going? They thought in stereo.

Breaking the stalemate, Jade reached into the pouch on her belt and pulled out a glittering ruby. She blew on it, then quickly placed it on the ground as it exploded in a puff of red dust and left a spread of food unfamiliar to Trunks on the ground.

"Hungry?" she asked politely. Trunks wasn’t sure. He’d never seen stuff like that before.

"What is that stuff?" he queried

"Try it and find out. If it doesn’t kill me, it won’t kill you." He eyed the food warily and turned back to her. "Don’t worry, your blue blood will protect you, little Prince."

Well, now it was a matter of preserving his dignity and Trunks wasn’t about to be frightened off by a strange girl he hardly knew. Picking up an unusual piece of fruit vaguely resembling a mango, he took a tentative bite. Whatever it was, it was sweet, and tasted like honey.

"Not bad. What is it?"

Jade put down the gourd-like thing she’d been drinking from.

"Never mind."

Stretched out on the grass after their impromptu picnic, Jade and Trunks talked freely about their strange lives.

"You’re braver than I thought you were, little Prince. I sensed from the moment I laid eyes on you that you were old beyond your years," Jade mused as she watched patterns form in the clouds above, sending an occasional blast into them to make them form what she wanted to see.

Raising himself up on one elbow, Trunks’ brow furrowed and he looked as well as he could into her face.

"Why do you call me that? I’m no Prince."

Without taking her eyes off the drifting puffs of white, Jade replied simply:

"Yes you are. Your father is a Prince, and that makes you one."

Newly aware of this simple truth, Trunks raised his eyebrows, then let his pale hair fall over his face.

"Maybe so, but there’s more to it than bloodlines. I wouldn’t know the first thing about it. There’s…something…about my father that makes him noble and regal and a prince. I don’t have that something, whatever it is."

In an unexpected gesture, Jade sat up, brushed the hair away from his face to push it behind his shoulders, and stooped her head to look into the sad blue eyes.

"Yes you do."

"I don’t!" he was frustrated, and started to snap. She snapped back at him the same way.

"You do. Listen to yourself. You thought you couldn’t speak Saiyan, but you’ve been speaking it since we landed."

Trunks’ eyes widened in shock. He really had been speaking the foreign language without realising it. Making a conscious effort to maintain the alien tongue, he deftly changed the subject with a quick "let’s go back."

Flying side by side back to Capsule Corp, Trunks and Jade took a roundabout route at his behest. After cruising along in silence, Trunks remembered a little detail his companion had failed to expand on.

"Hey, didn’t you say you were a wizard or something?"

"Mage," she corrected. "Yes, I’m half Mage just as you are half human."

"Could…could you show me…I dunno, a trick or something?" he finished sheepishly, knowing how childish he must have sounded to her. With anyone else he wouldn’t have cared as much, but spending time with this strange, lovely girl had awakened a long-neglected sense of vanity in him, and he didn’t want to look dumb.

Expecting her to snap at him as his father so often did, Trunks was quite surprised when she simply shrugged and slowed to a halt.

"If that’s what you want. Here’s an idea. How would you like having your tail back?" she asked him quite seriously.

"Tail? You can do that?" disbelief clouded his features.

"I already have."

Trunks looked around in shock, and sure enough, he had a tail again! Long and dark and furry, it curled around his waist at the mere flicker of his thoughts. Although he couldn’t remember having one, it felt familiar in a way.

"Th—thankyou. I think," he stammered and looked back at her. Jade flicked her own tail experimentally to see what he’d do, and almost laughed out loud when she saw him struggling not to imitate her.

"Let’s get back. Your mother will be worried."

"In some ways, I really, seriously doubt that. But you’re right, we should get back. Maybe we can get in some practice before nightfall, if you like." For all his casualness, Trunks wanted badly to test himself against this unknown quantity standing in front of him. And besides, this could be interesting.

When they landed back at Capsule Corporation, Trunks and Jade were greeted by a panicking Bulma who ran them over visually with a fine-toothed comb.

"Where have you two been? I was worried sick! Are you alright? Did you get lost?" Having never seen Bulma in "worried mother" mode before, Jade shrank back a bit behind her tall companion, and let him take the brunt of the affectionate assault.

Embarrassed, Trunks was compelled to try to stop the display.

"Mother. Really, we’re fine."

"Just fine? You must be starving. Come on, let’s get you something to eat." She grabbed each of them by a hand and dragged them off to the kitchen.

After virtually force-feeding the two young people, Bulma asked casually about Jade’s origins other than what she’d already divulged, what she was doing with Vegeta, how she got here…the questions were driving Jade nuts, but she answered politely regardless.

Aside from her arsenal of questions, Bulma was armed with another thing – a matchmaker’s eye. She spent the whole evening surreptitiously watching what passed between her son and the new girl. She was fairly sure she’d found a winning combination, despite what they might say.

Bulma yawned and glanced at the wall clock.

"Goodness, no wonder I’m tired, it’s half-past one. Come to think of it, we should probably all go to bed." She glanced kindly at Jade. "You must be tired."

Jade nodded affirmatively, despite the fact she wasn’t. The trip in the pod and her stint in the tank had contributed to give her a massive case of jetlag.

The three bid each other goodnight, and Bulma saw Trunks and Jade to their rooms. Lying in the massive bed, Jade was far from drowsy and had no hope of falling asleep. She gave in to her impulse and moved towards the bay window, slid it open as noiselessly as possible and floated out the window to sit on the domed roof of Capsule Corporation. Off to one side, city lights twinkled like gems and on the other stars sparkled vividly.

A slight scraping followed by a slight movement in her peripheral vision caught her attention, and Jade braced herself. Raising her fist, she turned and found herself peering into Trunks’ stunned face.

"Don’t kill me!" he pleaded.

"What are you doing out here?" she asked him gruffly.

"Same could be asked of you."

"I’m counting stars." A pause.

"Couldn’t sleep?" he questioned knowingly.

"No. Time passes differently here. And I suppose that’s your problem too." He nodded slightly, then as they sat in silence; an idea dawned on him.

"I know what’d tire us out – we never did get that practice in. You up for it?"

"Fair enough." And she took off away from the city lights to a less damageable area in the countryside.

Instead of finding a spot to practice, Jade’s mind shifted to the beautiful glittering city. She turned on her heel and flew back past him.

"Where are you going?!" he called frantically.

"Sightseeing. I don’t have cities like this where I come from. We can practice any time, but this’ll only look the way it does during the night. Come with me," she called to him, and took off towards and far above the lights.

They flew side by side above the glimmering skyscrapers, ducking and weaving playfully between the massifs. Trunks sighed.

"So, this is what my world used to look like." He smiled sadly, found a spot to land on the tallest skyscraper he could see, and related his story more thoroughly to Jade, who listened in sombre silence.

"For what it’s worth, I’m sorry." She gave Trunks one of his own half-smiles, then found herself yawning, which set off her companion.

"I think we’ve ditched the insomnia," Trunks added as they flew back to Capsule Corporation, "But I don’t think Mother needs to hear about how." He grinned.

After bidding Trunks goodnight, Jade crawled back into her bed and slept more soundly than she had for a long, long time.

Late the next morning, Vegeta had come out of his gravity chamber and sensed the return of his newest, if only, follower. Wiping the sweat from his brow, he decided it was time to test the kid out – see if she was worthy of being in his service.

Feeling as though it were time he started looking like the Prince he was, Vegeta self-consciously made for the bathroom to shower and donned some new armour – the set he’d had Bulma make with the royal symbol on the left breastplate.

Making his way huffily towards the power he sensed being emitted from Jade, Vegeta passed a glaring Yamcha who called snidely after him, "look at you, all dressed up and no-one to rule." The fool would pay for that later. He had more important business to attend to.

He found his new charge in the main living room, chatting to the older version of his son, who was turning his sword excitedly in his hand. Sword? The little bitch of an android broke that thing. I don’t know why Bulma kept it.

"Father! Look at this! Jade fixed my sword!" Trunks couldn’t help but call out in his jubilation. He’d sorely missed the weapon.

"Hhmph. Whatever. Girl, you come with me – it’s time I tested your worth." He glanced at Trunks, who looked slightly miffed at being ignored.

"Come to think of it, you come along too, boy. You’d be a better match for her than I would be. I might kill her by accident." He sneered and walked without another word out of the room.

"He doesn’t know?" Jade whispered when Vegeta was safely out of earshot.

"No, and please don’t tell him." The pained look flashed in Trunks’ eyes again. Then he quashed it and added, "this could be fun."

Vegeta led his young train through the maze of halls and rooms, and only stopped to look back at them when he’d reached his destination – one of the vast open gardens of the complex, relatively free of trees and perfect for his purpose.

Jade stood aside from her newfound friend, and working up the audacity, uncurled her tail from her waist and let it hang gracefully where it fell. She caught the flicker of the Prince’s eyes, and felt something akin to jealousy beginning to radiate from his regal features. Without warning, instinct kicked in, and she wound her tail firmly back in its usual position.

Vegeta watched her trying to read him with some amusement – it wasn’t often anyone gave a damn about what he thought. He adopted his first language with as much pomp as he could muster.

"Now. It’s time you proved your worth to me, girl. Spar with my son and I will decide your value from what I see. Hold back nothing, I will be able to tell if you do." He nodded impatiently towards his son, encouraging him to get things underway.

You’re able to tell when someone’s holding back? Bullshit you can, Trunks thought in annoyance, but complied anyway.

"Shall we use weapons, my lord?" Jade asked in all seriousness.

Vegeta snorted.

"It appears the boy is eager to be reacquainted with an old friend of his own, but you can’t fight him that way. You have no weapon." The girl is more foolish than I thought, he added in his head.

"If your son fights with a sword, then so shall I, if it pleases my Prince."

Vegeta snorted again.

"What, going to pull a sword out of thin air? I insist you show me how."

"Very well, my Prince."

A quick flex of her long fingers, and Jade held in her hand a gleaming, jewel encrusted broadsword. Vegeta tried in vain to stifle his shock, and Trunks smirked to himself in satisfaction.

"How the hell did you do THAT?" Vegeta gave way to some of his amazement and let a fraction of the pomp slip.

"May I speak freely, sir?" Despite the fact he was losing his cool, Jade maintained her deference towards Vegeta.

"Yes, of course," he snapped, "And I told you to stop that."

"It’s the Mage blood I have. The sword itself was just a child’s trick," she added in a tone verging on bitchiness before she caught herself, but couldn’t help adding, "If I could give your son back his tail, I think I could manage a weapon, wouldn’t you suppose?"

She WHAT?! That just wasn’t possible! Tails don’t come back! And yet, as he glanced at Trunks, sure enough, he had the tail that had been removed when he was born. What kind of witch is she?

Struggling to maintain his characteristic aloofness, Vegeta faltered a little before proclaiming:

"Very well, we’ll speak of that later. Now you have your weapon, show me what you can do. And Trunks? That goes for you too."

For all her tricks, this girl can’t match the power of a Super Saiyan, he sniggered to himself.

Nearly startled out of his gold-toed boots for the second time in as many minutes, Vegeta drew in a sharp breath as the strange girl nodded to him, the stood facing Trunks in Super Saiyan form. He was compelled to call out to her:

"Where did you learn to do that?!" Jade faced him, keeping one eye on Trunks, and replied simply

"I told you I surpassed my father when I was ten, Majesty."

"Whatever. Get on with the blasted match." Temper fraying, nerves ragged, Vegeta was becoming impatient with everyone and everything.

Jade drew the long, curved blade in front of her chest, and in an unexpected gesture raised the other hand to blow a kiss to her opponent. Trunks was so stunned he fell off-guard, and she used this momentary lapse of concentration to attack.

Clever little thing, Vegeta thought in spite of himself.

A fast and furious battle ensued, but few blows managed to find home – Jade was too fast and Trunks far too skilled with his weapon of choice to let her land a blow. Again, the pair was far too evenly matched to be effective against one-another.

Throwing air-punches and locking weapons isn’t going to impress the Prince, and I need this, Jade thought viciously to herself. To hell with this sword crap, I’ll take him out the old-fashioned way!

And she did. Dropping the broadsword to the ground, Jade streaked forward, took Trunks’ feet out from under him, and caught his chin with her fist as he fell down.

Bitch! Trunks took a moment to wipe away the blood that ran from his lip. But it was clever; another part of his mind told him. Well, two can play at that game!

He took to the air, and feeling out the ki of the girl who moved so fast that she couldn’t be seen with the naked eye, instinctually struck out. He opened his eyes, and to his great satisfaction, his fist rested on the dark silk of the plait at the back of her head. He hadn’t caught her, but almost.

Jade was stunned. But it’s my own fault, I was too cocky. She turned in perfect synchronisation with Trunks’ movements and the two danced around each other in a way that was so natural to both of them it was strangely beautiful.

Cunning little wench, Vegeta gloated inwardly at the wise decision he’d made taking the girl under his wing in his own peculiar way.

"Enough!" he called out sharply.

In quick obedience, Jade let go of the arm she’d twisted behind Trunks’ back and he let the energy blast forming on his other hand dissipate. They floated easily to stand in front of the Prince.

Vegeta surveyed the two young warriors critically. Blood still ran from where Jade had clocked Trunks in the mouth, and it seemed the girl was favouring one shoulder, hiding it well but for the spreading bruise appearing there.

"It appears my faith in you has not been misplaced. Very well Jadali, I accept your offer." The girl bowed her head gratefully. Seeing in her stance that she was losing the formality that irritated him, for effect, Vegeta added ominously, "Do not disappoint me. Now, scat. I have better things to do than play with children."

He stomped off without another word.

Jade studied her boots blindly, a half-smile on her face. She had noticed in the short time she had been there, that the Prince hardly ever called anyone by name; and he had used hers twice in as many days. Musing to herself, she didn’t notice Trunks talking to her.

"Hello in there?" she smiled up at him, and he continued. "I said I’m going inside to clean up. Mother will have a fit if she sees me like this, even though it’s not serious. You probably should too, unless you fancy the idea of an afternoon in the regen tank."

Jade shuddered – she hated that thing with a passion.

"You’re right. I don’t want to upset her." She moved to go inside, but he stalled her verbally.

"I’m going into town to meet Gohan and Videl when they finish school. You want to come?"

"Might as well, I’ve got nothing else to do and I’d rather not face Twenty Questions inside, if you know what I mean." She shot him a knowing glance. In the short time they’d know each other, Trunks and Jade had come to understand each other incredibly well for strangers.

"I’ll wait for you in the kitchen in about half an hour."

"Half a what?" She looked puzzled, and Trunks remembered his language wasn’t really hers, let alone measurements.

"Never mind. I’ll be in the kitchen in a little while." He touched his lip, which still stung somewhat. "By the way, nice right hook."

Cleaner, and feeling much better than she had, despite a little stiffness in her shoulder, Jade walked into the kitchen after using Trunks as an anchor point to negotiate her way around. In less than ten minutes, she’d managed to get lost in the vast complex, and she’d be damned if she’d mark herself a fool by asking. She’d walked with purpose, ignored the stares of the occasional worker she passed and had finally honed in on Trunks’ location.

"You made it. I thought you must have gotten lost. I was about to come looking for you." Trunks teased her from his seat at the table, where he’d been flicking through magazines left there by his mother.

She screwed up her face, sat down, and looked pointedly out the window, feigning wounded pride. If she made him speak first, she’d be in a stronger position, a part of her knew.

"You look different."

I win, a childish voice giggled in her thoughts. She glanced down at her attire, and wondered what was so different.

"I just ditched the armour, like the Prince said." Having spent most of her time around Trunks, Jade had picked up his colloquialism.

The expression sounded so strange coming from her that Trunks laughed out loud, to her consternation. He sobered.

"Ready to go?"

"Of course." She stood up, moving towards the door, and Trunks was acutely aware of the long slit in the skirt she wore for battle that revealed most of her leg, and the backless catsuit she wore above it.

"Wait," he pleaded helplessly. "You can’t go out dressed like that."

Her face tightened.

"And why is that?"

Now you’ve done it Trunks, explain to her how you don’t want her to dress like that in front of anyone but you. He stammered for a justifiable reason.

"Um – because – that’s a fighting outfit." His meek excuse amused Jade quite a lot.

"Well, what do you suggest I wear, then?" the dark green eyes bore into his uncomfortable blue ones.

Trunks glanced down at the table and spotted the magazines. He picked one up, and flipped to a page depicting a blonde woman in jeans and a light purple v-neck sweater. He held it out for her to see.

"Can you make this?"

"That looks really uncomfortable," she sighed. "But if you mean ‘can I do it’, then of course. Child’s play."

She flicked her fingers intricately and instantly faced him in the outfit he’d indicated. She looked down at the foreign outfit.

"I look ridiculous. What would the Prince say if he saw me dressed so absurdly?"

Trunks laughed at her again. She didn’t look ridiculous at all; in fact, the outfit he’d picked suited her perfectly down to the sweater that set off her hair.

"I don’t think the Prince would mind. He’s got some doozeys in his wardrobe."

"Doozeys?" she gave him a familiar look of puzzlement.

"Never mind. Let’s just leave it at ‘he wouldn’t care’ and go, okay?" He smiled at her and led her purposefully through the complex and out the door.

Jade had moved to take to the air as soon as she cleared the door, but Trunks had pulled her back, and they walked through the crowded city streets.

"Why can’t we just fly? We’d get there much faster," she argued through irritated green eyes.

"It makes people…uncomfortable to see others flying around. Kind of freaks ‘em out, if you know what I mean." Trunks studied his boots, avoiding the impending glare. But it didn’t come. Instead, when he looked up, Jade looked frustrated and confused, and jammed her hands further into her pockets.

I’ve got to remember this world is even stranger to her than it is to me, he made a sharp mental note of. Looking down at the crown of her head, he found her looking so isolated and unhappy that on impulse, he reached out one arm and put it around her shoulder. Jade stiffened, realised there was no threat in the gesture, and relaxed a little.

"I’m sorry. This is a strange place and I don’t understand it yet." A barely audible whisper, followed by a deep sigh. Trunks tightened his grip on her shoulder and drew her closer to his side.

Rounding a corner, the pair was confronted with the vast expanse of Orange Star High School, though they were early and it hadn’t ended for the day. Instead, they made for the park directly across the street to wait for Gohan and Videl.

They sat in a comfortable silence broken only by twittering birds and the dim rumble of traffic. Jade listened intently to the song of a robin in a tree above their heads, and startled Trunks by mimicking it so well that the little bird flew down and hopped on her outstretched finger. He watched in wonder as she spoke quietly to the pretty creature in a language he didn’t understand and stroked the red plumage on its chest.

Jade reached out her other hand, opened her fist and presented her new friend with the grain it contained. Where the hell did that come from? He remembered the sword, the outfit and his tail curled around his own waist, and kept his mouth shut. The robin hopped onto the hand with the grain, and Jade drew it nearer for him to touch. He extended a gentle finger to touch the glistening feathers, but at that moment the bell went at OSHS and the bird flitted away, annoyed with the commotion.

Trunks scanned the emerging crowd for his friends, and as he did, brushed the lavender hair out of his face.

"Hey," Jade vied for his attention, and got it. "If you get to pick my clothes, then I get to fix that hair."

She reached into her pocket, produced a band like the one in her own hair, and smoothed his hair back into a ponytail out of his eyes.

"It was driving me rocks."

He burst out laughing.

"Nuts. It was driving you nuts." Her cheeks reddened and she tried desperately to save face, her previous disparity gone with the robin.

"Rocks, nuts, same thing. There’s Gohan." She pointed towards the school, and sure enough, she’d picked Gohan and Videl walking along with a blonde haired girl and a tall guy in a varsity jacket.

Videl was pretending to listen intently to Eliza’s babbling – it never changed anyway and she’d heard half the news three times already. Spotting Trunks’ pale hair above the crowd, she found an excuse to cut her friend off.

"Gohan! Over there." She indicated Trunks standing with an unfamiliar and even at that distance obviously pretty girl in the park across the street. For some childish reason her heart sank. For all she adored Gohan, this version of Trunks was so different from the one she looked after sometimes she was intrigued, and besides, he was extremely handsome despite the fact he reminded her of Vegeta.

Gohan waved to Trunks and as he waved back, Eliza spotted him.

"Oh, who’s that? Friend of yours? Come on, introduce me." Eliza grabbed Videl’s arm and dragged her along after Gohan. With a shrug, Sharpener followed them.

"Hey," Gohan called out cheerfully. He recognised the girl standing near his friend. "Jade? Is that you?"

"Of course it is." In a tone that would not have shamed Vegeta, she added, "I’ve had enough of being mollycoddled. I’m stuck here and I might as well learn my way around."

Gohan raised an eyebrow and Trunks smirked. Eliza, dragging Videl behind her, burst onto the scene with Sharpener hot on her heels.

"Who are your friends?" she asked the audience in general. Gohan introduced them with an embarrassed hand on the back of his neck, shooting his Saiyan friends an apologetic glance.

"Eliza, Sharpener, meet Trunks and Jade."

For reasons beyond her control, Jade extended a delicate looking hand to each of them. She nearly crushed the one Eliza held out accidentally and softened her grip to that of the other girl’s as she shook hands with Sharpener.

The tall blonde youth stared into her face, then turned her hand over and moved to kiss it theatrically. Jade yanked her hand out of his grasp, and dealt him a blow to the face that sent him flying smack into a nearby oak tree. Acorns and leaves rained down from above as he sat there, stunned, looking adoringly at the girl who’d nearly knocked out his teeth.

Trunks looked down at her sharply and addressed her in Saiyan.

"Jackass or not, that was rude, Jadali."

She smirked back up at him and eyed the figure under the tree struggling to its feet.

"Yes. It was." And she left it at that.

Walking down the broad footpaths of the city towards Videl’s house, Gohan figured out what was nagging at him about Jade sending Sharpener flying into the tree. Trunks had reproved her, but done so in another language – and as far as Gohan knew, Trunks wasn’t bilingual.

"Hey, Trunks, I have to ask – since when can you speak another language?"

The question caught Sharpener’s attention, who was walking along massaging his jaw.

"I – um – just picked it up recently. I’ll explain it to you later."

Videl used this momentary distraction to grab Jade’s arm.

"Why’d you have to hit him so hard? You could have taken his head off!"

Jade’s eyes creased in mischief.

"I didn’t hit him hard."

Videl looked flabbergasted.

"You still could have taken his head off."

"Yes, I could have, and by my own customs I probably should have. Let the fact that I chose not to be a sign of my good faith." She smiled wickedly.

Eliza butted in and addressed the Saiyan girl.

"So, you from out of town or what?"

"You could say that."

Rounding a corner, Videl groped around in her bag for a key, produced one and let the group into her house. Looking around the vast foyer where Videl dropped her things, Jade unintentionally locked eyes with Sharpener again. She glared belligerently as he stared at her, and she took hold of Trunks’ arm to encourage him to quit it. She didn’t want to break anything in the other girl’s house, it wouldn’t be civilised.

Trunks looked down at her – from what he knew of her, Jade wasn’t the type to be intimidated by nothing. She indicated Sharpener with an irritated flick of her eyes, and Trunks understood. It’d take quite a display to discourage the blonde idiot, and it was a show he’d get, or Jade would lose patience and knock his block off.

As the small group stood around waiting for Videl to organise herself so they could leave, Trunks raised the arm Jade was holding onto and pulled her close against his chest. Sharpener eyed this suspiciously. Pleased with the response she was getting, Jade shifted her arms and hugged Trunks low around the waist, cuddling into him as he placed a hand on her head, and she shot Sharpener a filthy look she hoped said take the hint.

Sharpener wasn’t alone in his observations. Eliza was beginning to look annoyed, having thought she must have been in with a chance with the handsome purple-haired stranger, and Gohan looked towards them, puzzled, and gestured for an explanation with his open hands.

Trunks rested his chin on top of Jade’s head, indicated Sharpener and Eliza (who was frankly beginning to bug him) with his eyes and scrunched his nose to display his exasperation. Gohan understood, and smiled slyly back.

Videl walked back into the room, having changed her clothes, and sensed something amiss. She glanced from Trunks and Jade (who’d let go of each other when they sensed her coming), to Gohan, to Eliza and finally to Sharpener who kept his face down and scuffed his shoe on the floor. She frowned.

"Alright, what’s going on in here?"

"Nothing important," Gohan answered noncommitantly. Then, to still Videl’s mouth before she opened it again, he walked over to her, threw her over his shoulder affectionately and made for the door.

After seeing Eliza off, Trunks, Jade, Gohan and Videl made their way back to Capsule Corporation. Walking along the wide streets, Jade again ached to just take to the air and get out of the commotion. Despite the fact it would irritate her new friend, she gave up, tapped Trunks on the shoulder and declared she’d fly home.

"I thought we went through this before," he said sternly as Videl and Gohan looked on, "It’s cruel to scare people like that. When they see you, they’ll probably think the Apocalypse has come early."

"They won’t see me," she responded, half-pleading and half-stating.

Trunks ran his hands over his hair.

"Really? How could they miss you?"

"You just did, little Prince!" her voice faded echoingly and when he looked down, to his surprise she was already gone, only a wavering after-image standing in her place.

Trunks took a frustrated kick at a signpost, and Gohan clapped him on the shoulder.

"Trunks, old friend, I think you should probably cancel your plans for a career as a drill sergeant." He said with mock-seriousness. Videl burst out laughing, and Trunks scowled like Vegeta as they continued to walk.

Vegeta ran a finger delicately around the rim of the glass in front of him. Across the table, Jade sat silently, awaiting his request.

He obviously wants something, but he won’t ask, she muttered to herself. He cleared his throat, and she snapped to attention.

"I said we’d speak of it later, and now I think it’s time we did." He ran his fingers along his jawline in a gesture of extreme discomfort. "You claim you gave my son back his tail, and sure enough, he has one. Did – did you really do that?"

"Yes, my Prince."

"Why?"

"Well sir, because I wanted to. He asked me to show him magic, and so I did." She folded her hands in her lap and studied them intently. "Does this displease you, my lord?"

Vegeta sighed resignedly.

"No, it doesn’t displease me at all. The fools on this planet cut off Kakarot’s and my own sons’ tails at birth. That displeases me. But if you really did what you said you did, I have a boon to ask of you." His voice trailed off.

There it is, Jade thought to herself. She made an intricate flick of her fingers, and looked up shyly.

"It is done, my Prince."

Vegeta’s eyes flew wide, and sure enough, his tail was back. He’d missed it like he would have missed his right arm, and he curled the furry length around his wrist to examine it. It was genuine. He looked up, flushed and suppressing his excitement, and went to make an awkward thankyou to the girl sitting across from him.

Her eyes caught his, and she shook her head.

"You’re welcome," was all she said before she got up and left the room, her own tail trailing loose behind her.

"Jadali!" a bark from Vegeta called her back. She raised a questioning eyebrow.

"I have to ask: what’s with the outfit? If your hair was blue and you were older, you’d look like the woman." He chuckled as Jade’s cheeks reddened.

"At least it’s not pink," she reflected honestly.

"What the – ?" Vegeta stopped laughing. "BULMA! TRUNKS! –"

He launched into a tirade that could strip paint and stormed off to harass the unlucky people who’d told Jade about the pink shirt.

Trunks had cooled off by the time he, Gohan and Videl made it to Capsule Corporation. He reached out with his senses for Jadali’s energy, and found her in the living room with a minor power, probably his mother.

He beckoned for Gohan and Videl to follow him, and they walked into the vast room to find Jade and Bulma laughing together like sisters.

"Hey, what’s so funny?" Trunks queried when they stopped to draw breath.

Bulma burst into another fit of giggles, and was promptly interrupted by Vegeta stalking through the room. He snarled viciously:

"What the hell is so damn amusing, woman?! And you –" he gestured towards Jade, "are just as bad as her."

He picked up his stalking where he’d left it and exited the room post haste. Bulma and Jade started to laugh in earnest again.

"Well? What is it?" Trunks repeated patiently, at the same time noticing that Jade had changed back into her usual outfit. Bulma made a visible effort to stop.

"Jade just cracked her first joke."

"Uh-huh. And why is Father so mad?" Trunks could see his mother intended to drag this out for as long as possible.

"’Cause he was on the receiving end. He finally got some back!" she giggled again and blew out.

It was obvious he’d get no sense from his mother, so Trunks turned to Jade.

"Okay, what’d you say to him?" Great, all I need is father in a bad mood. Trunks rubbed his temples, feeling a tension headache coming on.

Jade gave him the same smile she’d used before they’d sparred the day before.

"Oh, so you finally got here? I thought you must have been lost. I was going to look for you."

"Great, first she jokes, now she mocks. Just tell me what you said to him."

"He was insulting my outfit. I agreed with him and then I said ‘at least it’s not pink.’ I hate pink. After I said that he went off screaming."

"Oh no…" Trunks slapped his forehead and Gohan doubled over laughing.

The days passed blissfully at Capsule Corporation. Jade’s schedule involved helping Bulma in the lab (for someone unfamiliar with Earth technology, she had a knack for it), flying aimlessly or sparring with Trunks, trying to please Vegeta and spending time with Gohan and Videl.

Jade was beginning to accept her new world and the unusual people in it.

Late one night as Jade, both versions of Trunks and Bulma sat in front of the television, the phone rang. Bulma picked it up and was surprised to hear Videl’s voice on the other end of the line. They spoke companionably for a few minutes, and Bulma ended the conversation with an ominous ‘they’d love to’ that worried the young people. She set the phone back on its stand and resumed her seat.

"Who was that?" Trunks asked as casually as he could.

"Videl. She invited you two to go on a picnic with her, Gohan and two of her friends tomorrow. I forget who she said they were. I told her you’d be delighted." Bulma smiled wickedly at the older version of her son.

Still maintaining his attempt to look casual, Trunks shrugged his shoulders in compliance. In perfect sync, Bulma and Trunks looked across at Jade. Her face was drawn and tight like she was in pain, and she had been unusually quiet all day. She held her shoulders stiffly, and as she shifted slightly, oblivious of their gaze, the movement woke up the little version of Trunks, who’d been dozing on and off with his head in her lap. He looked up at her sleepily.

"What’s wrong, Ja?"

The pet name he’d made up for her snapped her back to her senses, but not before the visiting Trunks seized the opportunity to ruffle her feathers.

"I know. She’s scared of the blonde guy."

Bulma looked confused.

"Who? Sharpener? What about him?" Trunks smiled evilly.

"The last time she saw him, she smacked him into a tree." Bulma smirked in satisfaction.

"Thatta girl, Jade. If he bugs you again, thwack him harder."

Jade hauled the sleepy little boy to lean against his older self, and stood up tensely.

"No, it’s nothing like that, baka," she growled at Trunks, "I’ve felt strange for a few days, and it’s getting worse. I think I’ll sleep it off."

She turned to leave the room, and Bulma switched into Mother-Mode and hurried after her, stopping the girl in the doorway. She placed a hand over Jade’s forehead and measured it against her own temperature. Jade batted the hand away gently.

"It’s not that kind of feeling. I – I can’t describe it, at least not in this language."

She switched to the Saiyan dialect and described the strange sensation. Trunks frowned in concentration and translated as best he could for his mother.

"From what I can tell, it’s like that feeling you get when just before something terrible happens, except it’s eating badly at her."

"I’m sure it’s nothing," Bulma patted the taut shoulder reassuringly.

"I don’t think so." Jade’s reply was barely above a whisper. She hugged herself tight, wrapped her tail protectively around her waist and left the room wordlessly.

Curled up in her bed that night, Jade began to dream. She was somewhere dark and damply quiet, still consumed with a feeling of dreadful premonition.

Somewhere from within the shadows, a familiar voice called her name.

"Ikura? Ikura, where are you? I’m coming!" Jade broke into a run and headed in the direction of the sound.

In front of her stood the old shaman who’d raised her, bathed in a white glow. Jade reached for the old woman’s hand in a traditional gesture of greeting, and her hand passed straight through her. The phantasm shifted, and in Ikura’s place stood Trunks. He looked down at her sternly.

"Don’t do that. It might frighten them."

"What? I don’t understand." Jade queried the ghostlike figure that was becoming more solid by the moment.

"I forgot, this isn’t really your world." He reached down and held her close, then moved to kiss her on the mouth. As their lips met, a terrible roar filled the void, and hands ripped Trunks out of her grasp. Broly screamed in a madness that Jade had never seen so bitingly severe.

"Papa?" she queried the bejewelled man with the smouldering aura. He turned his pupilless eyes to her.

"What are you doing, child?" he spoke softly, dangerously, and tightened his grip on Trunks’ collar.

"What you told me to do! Please, put him down."

Broly snarled viciously and moved to set Trunks back on his feet. Then, without further warning he screamed again, and his scream mingled with the youth’s as Broly punched a hole through his chest.

Blood spattered Jade’s face and she cried out in horror. Broly calmed down and faced her, this time he was someone else, someone she never wanted to see again who smiled prettily and spoke with her father’s voice.

"Face it, it’s meant to be."

Blood dripped from the long fingers and Jade cried out again.

She awoke abruptly to the force of someone shaking her shoulders.

"Jade? Jade, wake up, you’re having a nightmare."

Her eyes snapped open and she found herself looking into Trunks’ concerned face. Bulma hovered, worried in the doorway. She’d tried to rouse the sleeping girl herself, but Jade’s thrashings coupled with her strength were too much for the human woman, and Bulma had shouted for Trunks.

Now he gripped her firmly as she slumped in exhaustion, suddenly aware of her surroundings. She looked up into the troubled blue eyes, and sighed with relief before throwing her arms around his neck. Stunned, he hugged her back; stroking her hair as gently as he’d ever touched a hurt animal.

"He killed you. Then – then –" Jade’s voice cracked as she broke down and began to cry, something she hadn’t done since she was a small child.

Trunks didn’t know who ‘he’ was, but he knew a traumatised person when he saw one, coming from the world he came from.

"Shh, it’s okay. It was just a dream. I’m not dead. See for yourself." He forced her chin up to look at his face. She closed her eyes after a moment, and the hysterical tears cascading down her face began to dry up.

Standing in the doorway, Bulma watched this exchange with some satisfaction. Seeing the immediate danger had passed, she sighed and headed towards the lab where her father was no doubt waiting for her already.

"Do you want to tell me about it? Sometimes that helps you forget bad dreams. Gohan taught me that. My Gohan, that is."

"No, I…" she blushed, thinking of what had almost passed between them in her nightmare. "No."

She looked so small and frightened and alone in that instant that Trunks pulled her onto his lap and pressed her head against his chest. Normally Jade would have thumped anyone for doing that, but she missed comfort, and returned the hug. They sat there, simply rocking each other for a long time.

Later that morning, after Jade had pulled herself together and worked off her embarrassment via a short and sharp sparring session that left Trunks badly bruised, she changed into a ‘normal’ outfit and the two of them sat out the front of Capsule Corporation waiting for their friends.

A pair of squirrels scurried down from a nearby tree, and Trunks fed them with nuts he’d brought along just for that purpose. One hopped onto his shoulder, and Jade leant across to pat the furry little ears.

Across the street, two children were playing loudly with slingshots, and without warning a pebble streaked past Jade’s right ear, nearly taking the squirrel’s tail off. She reached up and caught the small projectile effortlessly, but turned to glare at the little boy and girl who stood looking mortified towards them.

"S—sorry," the little boy called out. The girl cringed behind her playmate, and Jade concentrated a small energy blast, harmless, to shoot at them for their recklessness.

Trunks caught the motion and looked down at her sternly.

"Don’t do that. You might frighten them."

Jade blanched beyond pale and nearly fell off her perch in shock. He said that in my dream, and then he died.

Trunks waved the children away, and at that moment Videl and Gohan pulled up with Eliza and Sharpener in a skycar.

"Jadali." Trunks mocked his father’s voice that always hit home.

"Hmm?" came the inattentive reply.

"Come on, let’s go."

When she made no move to do so, Trunks hauled her to her feet and helped her into the shining red vehicle. She murmured a greeting and studied the hands wringing in her lap. Gohan turned around to look at her. He frowned at what he saw.

"Jade, are you okay? You look awfully worried about something."

She dismissed his concern with a shrug of her shoulders and a half-hearted smile, throwing in a little colloquialism to distract him.

"Nah, I’m fine."

He laughed and turned back around.

By the time they reached the spot Videl had picked for their picnic, Jade had snapped herself out of her uneasiness to the point where it wasn’t noticeable.

Deciding to ensure everyone thought she was alright, Jade resolved to toy with the blonde youth who hung on her every word. Despite the fact she didn’t need any assistance, she allowed Sharpener to lift her out of the car and didn’t push him away the instant her feet touched solid ground. She looked up at him demurely, thanked him through the piercing green eyes and trotted ahead to catch up with Trunks, who looked thoroughly confused. He queried her in Saiyan.

"What the hell was that? I thought you despised him."

Jade gave him a cheeky grin in return, not even vaguely reminiscent of the distraught figure he’d held earlier that morning. I crown thee Queen of mood swings, Trunks thought, looking at the mischievous face.

"Don’t you ever play with your food?" innocently, sweetly.

"That’s not funny." He ran his fingers through his loose hair in a gesture of exasperation, hiding a half-smile. The girl was spending far too much time around his mother.

Later that afternoon, the six of them lay back on the grass watching the clouds passing overhead. They spoke in sleepy monosyllables, until Eliza broke the silence with a keening wail.

"I broke a nail! And I left my file in the car! Someone come with me to get it." She looked pointedly at Trunks, who’d sensed it coming and feigned sleep. She huffed and puffed, and finally dragged Sharpener back to the car with her, which was parked about half a mile away.

"Really Videl, you could have parked closer." She stormed off to find the nail file.

Videl didn’t care; she’d planted the item in the car deliberately so she could talk alone with her Saiyan friends. She propped herself up on her elbows, suddenly full of energy.

"There’s a couple of things I’ve been dying to know. You’re all warriors in your own right, but you never talk about what you do with me. Why not?"

Gohan batted a butterfly away lazily.

"Not much to tell."

"Don’t give me that. Of course there is. If you think it’s boring, try me. Disgusting, bloody, I don’t care. Just talk to me."

She doesn’t need to hear about that stuff, thought Trunks with protective irritation. His mother had always wanted to know details, and he’d figured out how to disgust her. Maybe it’d work on Videl too.

"Alright then. Gohan, who was your first kill?" lazily, casually, like he didn’t care. It was the tone that had frightened Bulma, and it was working here, too. Gohan picked up his tenor, and shaded his eyes with one forearm.

"First thing I actually killed was Cell, and we all know about that little incident. Your turn."

"Frieza. Sliced and diced him. You have anything you’d like to contribute, Jade?" he rolled his head over and encouraged her to speak with his eyes. Adopting the careless casualness of her companions, Jade spoke.

"Deliberately or accidentally?"

"Deliberately."

"This year or in the past?"

"Just get on with it."

"Okay. I made my first kill when I was six. But it was an accident, I was deflecting a blast and it hit a man." Stunned looks greeted her.

"You were six?" Videl stammered.

"Yes. Kind of old, huh? If you want deliberate examples, it’s kind of difficult. You know who my father was, and he took me with him when he trained. By ‘train’ I mean ‘destroy a planet’s inhabitants,’ of course. It’s hard to remember individual incidents." She had adopted a casually cruel tone that surprised even Trunks. Videl looked shocked.

"So, you’ve…killed a lot of people?"

Jade stared directly into the other girl’s face.

"Sweetie, to use one of your phrases, I’ve killed more people than you’ll have hot dinners." Videl blanched, but sensed a flaw in the statement.

"Isn’t it ‘you’ve had hot dinners’?"

Jade turned her gaze skyward again.

"Maybe, but I meant what I said."

Videl dropped the subject. Thankfully, Sharpener and Eliza returned moments later. The sat quietly, until Sharpener worked up the nerve to speak directly to Jade.

"Hey, why did you knock me into that tree when we first met?" he looked searchingly into her face for signs of remorse, but found none. Hearing the nature of Sharpener’s question, Trunks held his breath. Please don’t give him an encore performance, Jade…

In her soft lilting voice, she replied frankly:

"Because you asked for it." Sharpener was stunned, and sat bolt upright.

"What? How?"

She looked directly into his face, all lightness and humour gone from her voice, and the expression she bore was that of a warrior used to slaying her enemies for a misplaced hair.

"Think yourself lucky. The last person who tried to kiss me had every bone in his body damaged in some way, all from one shot. He’ll be lucky if he survived, I don’t rightly know if he did. And I did that because he irritated me. Just imagine what could happen if you really got on my nerves."

Sharpener did his best to maintain his cool.

"You’re funny when you lie, you know that?"

"I wasn’t lying, I don’t know how to." Her voice was cold and deadly serious.

"Really? But look at you, you’re even lighter than Eliza, and she’d be doing well to draw blood on me. What do you say to that?"

"Believe what you want."

Gohan felt the miniscule shift in energy that signified Jade’s struggle to control her Saiyan half – he’d felt his own Saiyan blood urging him to annihilate anything that stood in his way, and he didn’t particularly want to referee a match that would certainly result in the blonde youth’s death. He came up with a feebly veiled distraction.

"Hey, enough of that. Let’s take a look around, it’s beautiful up here."

And it was. They were sitting on the crest of a grassy knoll in a shady forest clearing. Down the hill from them, a clear brook bubbled and chattered over granite and sand, and birds twittered in the trees.

Gohan hauled Videl to her feet, and the two of them led off purposefully. Eliza, who’d spent the entire afternoon staring at Trunks, fell in behind them and a still-smitten Sharpener quickly joined her. Despite all her efforts to dissuade him, Jade was still the unintentional object of his affections.

Jade rose from her seat gracefully and moved to follow the others, but Trunks caught her arm and yanked her back.

"What’s the matter?" she asked cheerfully.

"You’re the matter." He returned in a fierce whisper.

"What did I do this time?"

"You don’t just tell people things like that. They won’t believe you and I don’t want to clean up the mess if you decide to prove them wrong. Just keep away from that blonde idiot, okay?" he hissed at her and she’d had enough and snarled back at him.

"Trunks, anyone would think you were jealous. Despite what you obviously think I’ll do, I’m not going to kill him. I’m not an undisciplined savage and I don’t appreciate being treated like one. To be perfectly honest, you people drive me crazy with your double standards and the way you dance around the truth. I’m sick of it, and if I had a ship I’d be out of here in an instant."

She folded her arms defensively and glared at him belligerently. Nothing but silence passed for a long moment, and the voices of their friends faded into the distance. Trunks broke the reticence in a gentle tone, peppered with something else Jade couldn’t discern.

"Were you…I mean, can you really not tell a lie?"

"Of course I could if I wanted to, baka. But it’s not part of who I am. Before I came here, I’d never heard a lie told. I could lie if I felt like it, but it would be so screamingly obvious that it’d be a waste of time," she snapped back at him hotly.

"Fair enough. Who did you nearly kill for trying to kiss you?"

"I’d rather not talk about it." The venom slipped from her voice and she hung her head.

"Would…would you do that to me for trying to kiss you?" Trunks braced himself for the slap he could sense coming his way.

"No." she said simply.

He crossed the small gap between them, pushed her chin up with one hand and stroked her hair with the other one. He stooped down to her height and kissed her on the cheek. A sharp sting met one of his own cheeks, and he looked with surprise into the glowering face beneath his.

"Do that again and I may have to hurt you." The glower turned into a smile, and he reached down to kiss her fully and sweetly. Their lips brushed, but the instant they did, their heads jerked away in surprise at the huge, uncontrolled power level they simultaneously sensed.

"Papa," Jade breathed in terrified recognition.

Further along the track leading back to the car, Gohan stood open-mouthed and stuttering, and reached for Videl’s arm, missed, tried again and caught it. One look at his face was enough for her to gauge what must have been wrong, and Videl quickly thought of an excuse to get him away.

"Where are Trunks and Jade? They must’ve gotten themselves lost. Gohan, would you go find them while we pack the car?" Gohan mumbled and set off jogging down through the forest to where they’d left the other two. As soon as he was out of sight of the others, he switched to Super Saiyan form and flew with the wind tearing through his hair towards the power signal he felt from the two other demi-Saiyans. Stopping on instinct, he powered down and landed on the forest floor in front of them. He noted the physical closeness, suspected something amiss and decided to ignore it. Now wasn’t the time or the place.

"Do you recognise that power signal, Trunks?"

Trunks screwed up his face in concentration.

"I was hoping it was just Goku or my father letting of some steam, but there’s no way it could be… it’s much too strong."

"It’s papa." Jade added more audibly, using the Ismiri language.

"You said that before. What does it mean?" Trunks and Gohan looked at her curiously.

"It’s my father. He should be dead, but it’s definitely him."

"Oh no…" Trunks groaned – the last time he’d faced Broly he’d nearly bitten the bullet, and from what he could feel now, Broly was stronger than ever. Gohan was more level headed.

"We’ll just have to kill him again if we have to. Sorry Jade, but your father is a creep, to say the very least. I can feel my father and Vegeta heading towards it, Piccolo too. We should go to them and figure out what to do."

A blinding flash and three Super Saiyans stood glowing in the clearing. They took to the air, Gohan in the lead, and headed towards the older Saiyans. Even though Gohan was flying near the speed of sound, Jade despaired of ever getting there and called a halt to their progress.

"We’ll never make it at this rate; hold on to my hands." She held one out for each of the others and set off at a speed four times faster than Gohan’s maximum. A girl is dragging me along, Trunks thought. Mother’d love this.

Gohan marvelled at the speed Jade dragged them along at. Despite the fact she was half-Saiyan as he was, he’d thought her to be about as strong as his little brother after she’d explained her original power signal. There was obviously much more to her than meets the eye. Before he could query her about their pace, she’d pulled up abruptly and the three stood facing Goku and Vegeta.

"Well, we’ve got most of the planet’s firepower right here, so what do we do now?" Goku gave an innocent tilt of his head as he thought.

"You’re a disgrace to your heritage, Kakarot. We track the bastard down and blow him to the next dimension." It was Jade’s turn to look stunned. How did he know it was her father? Better to wait and find out. Vegeta gave her a hard stare.

"Yes, we know it’s your father. I could’ve sworn he was dead before, but he’s obviously not and I’m going to kill him for good this time. If you have a problem with that, I suggest you go home." Jade swallowed hard and adopted the Saiyan tongue for its greater capacity for cruelty.

"I understand perfectly. He’s lost the plot and he’s dangerous. Nearly always has been. If I’m not mistaken, it’s the Saiyan custom for a child to kill a parent in order to assume a rank, is it not, my Prince?"

Vegeta grunted assent.

"It is. But why does it matter now? Planning to knock daddy’s block off, are we?" the implicit sarcasm in his voice made her angry. The decision she’d made in the previous moment was the hardest thing she’d ever had to do.

"I suppose I am." The casual cruelty in her voice startled Trunks. Even when she’d been messing with Videl she didn’t sound as serious as she did now.

"Well don’t bother, Jadali. You wouldn’t be strong enough anyway, and I have a bone to pick with him." Vegeta had switched back to the only language Kakarot and Gohan fully understood, signalling an end to the discussion.

You didn’t listen to me, did you, my Prince? Maybe you heard, but you didn’t listen. You’re blinded by your ego and you’re too afraid to put your trust in me, Jade sputtered into mindthought.

Thankfully, distractingly, the five assembled Saiyans felt a mass of energy coming their way and made out the forms of Goten, the present Trunks, Krillin, Tien, Chaozu and more reluctantly Yamcha.

"Daddy, what is it?" Trunks tugged at the gloved hand Vegeta had folded across his chest.

"Never mind. Go home to your mother," Vegeta snapped without looking down.

"But Daddy…" Trunks whined in a pitch that put Vegeta’s teeth on edge.

"NOW!!" he roared at the little boy.

"Um, same goes for you I suppose," Goku was never really an authoritarian figure and since Vegeta had done the yelling bit, he figured he might as well get Goten to a safer distance as well. Chichi would kill him otherwise.

Trunks’ shoulders slumped and he turned sulkily to his playmate.

"Come on Goten, let’s go." He floated unhappily back towards Capsule Corporation.

"Now, we’ve all got to keep our power levels down, or he’ll sense us a mile away." Vegeta assumed command and got a filthy look that might become a challenge from Tien and Yamcha. Trunks and Jade moved naturally to Vegeta’s right and left sides, assuming slight defensive postures that silenced the objection before it could be issued. Vegeta noted this with some satisfaction. The girl’s a good influence on the boy, and visually they’re quite impressive together.

"Who the hell is ‘he’?" Yamcha snapped at Vegeta.

"Broly. I thought you would have figured it out, but then again, you weren’t there last time, were you? You were too weak," Vegeta snarled back at him, enjoying the opportunity to ruffle the man’s feathers. But now was not the time. Vegeta was above all a strategist, and where he lacked a little strength when compared to Goku, he possessed a far superior mind for battle and outstripped Goku in leadership skills and sheer technique.

"When we find that bastard, first, Kakarot and…" Vegeta outlined his strategy to the floating assembly, who for the most part had to grudgingly accept the brilliance of his tactics.

"Well well, what have we here?" an unfamiliar voice cut through the crisp air as the warriors discussed directions they’d go to search for Broly.

"It looks like we don’t have to find him. I assume the big guy with the tail is Broly? Guys? Hello?" Yamcha was nearly knocked head over heels by a gust of power from the dark haired stranger that stood in their midst. They hadn’t even sensed him coming.

"Yeah, that’s him." Goku looked uneasily at the tall black haired man who stared back at him with a queer look in his eyes. He’s stark raving mad, Goku thought haplessly. But who’s that behind him?

Sure enough, a good distance behind Broly, stationed on a rocky outcrop stood a young man dressed much as Jade had been. He was too far away to make out any features, but it was obvious to the onlookers that he held himself strangely. Broly focused his attention on the girl standing on Vegeta’s left.

"Child, what are you wearing?" He looked down disdainfully at the jeans and sweater she’d donned. She shrugged carelessly and changed her outfit back into her armour.

"You were dead, father. I felt you die. And why did you come here?" she looked at the madness in his eyes and stayed tactfully out of his reach. Father or not, his madness made him dangerous.

"I was dead. But on my way to hell I met a doctor who cloned my body. So here I am. And I’ll ask the questions from now on," he added, silencing his daughter. "Put simply Jadali, I came here to put an end to Kakarot and Vegeta, but there’s also a couple of things I’d like cleared up. One, why did you nearly kill your betrothed? And above all what the hell are you doing here?!!" Broly’s good temper ended in an hysterical scream.

"I’m doing what you told me to do! I found the Prince! And it’ll be a cold day in Hell before I have anything to do with that freak Ragal! Now, for mother’s love will you talk rationally?!" Jade yelled back with as much volume as her father had.

Kid’s got lungs, thought Goku. Broly sobered.

"Child, you know I don’t really want to hurt you. Just get out of the way, let me kill Kakarot and Vegeta, and we can all go home, ne?"

"Can we put an end to the domestic unrest and get down to things?! It’s obvious you’re not going home without a fight, and I’d never deprive you of that," Vegeta interjected, taking up a defensive position. Goku took this cue and was quickly followed by Gohan, Trunks and Jadali. Goku stood on Vegeta’s right, Gohan on his left, and Trunks and Jade behind them, forming a spearhead with Vegeta at the front. A flash of golden light later and Broly was faced with five Super Saiyans. He shook in mock terror.

"Darn, now I’ll have to pull out the big guns after all." He screamed deafeningly and faced them not in Super Saiyan form, but the level beyond it. His hair stood up straight like Vegeta’s and one golden lock dropped in front of his eyes. Broly had reached the second Super Saiyan stage. Shit, thought Vegeta. This could be trouble.

"To put it as you did, Vegeta, let’s get down to business." Broly cracked his knuckles, and flew straight for not Vegeta, but Goku.

Expecting the onslaught to be aimed at Vegeta, Goku was caught dangerously offguard. He received a blow to the chest that knocked his wind out, and quickly teleported himself out of reach. Gasping and favouring his sore ribs, Goku appeared on the other side of the spearhead, and Gohan switched places with him.

Grinning wickedly, Gohan snarled at Broly.

"You reckon that’s a clever trick? Well guess what? It’s not as unique as you think." He released his hidden power with a thunderous shout that shook the surrounding countryside and gave Broly a mirror image of himself to look at. Then he attacked.

Broly and Gohan disappeared from view. Jade watched them closely and reported the fight to her companions. Deep within a cloud of punches, feinting, ki blasts and blocks, Broly and Gohan locked arms and ceased their rapid moving. Broly glanced evilly away from his young opponent’s glare and looked pointedly towards the open sky a little way off.

"She’s pretty in a human way. Do you often bring your mate to watch you die?"

Gohan’s eyes widened in shock, and feeling the presence Broly had hinted at, turned his head to find Videl floating behind Yamcha.

"Get out of here!" he screamed to her. Gleefully taking advantage of Gohan’s distraction, Broly thumped him in the face and when he hit the ground, Gohan was out for the count.

"Obviously your son, Kakarot." Vegeta glared distastefully at the black-haired sprawling body on the ground.

"Fa-ther…" A whine from Trunks, and Vegeta rolled his eyes.

Broly turned his attention to Vegeta, who braced himself. They each raised a fist, and a streak came between them.

"Stop it. Now." Jade stood between them without any power boost from Super Saiyan form.

"What the hell are you doing, girl?" a joint cry of confusion from Broly and Vegeta. She turned to the snarling Prince.

"What I said I’d do. It’s obviously necessary. I told you before I surpassed my father when I was a child, and I’ve improved since then. I know you don’t want to believe it, but…" her voice trailed off and she floated over to where Vegeta hovered, face a dark storm.

She placed his hand on her arm and concentrated. Vegeta gasped in shock, and pulled away hastily.

"Why didn’t you tell me?"

"I did. About seven times."

"Am I interrupting something? I believe I was about to kill you Vegeta, and child? It doesn’t work any longer. You’re not stronger than I am any more. I made up the difference with that ‘coming back from death’ experience." He snarled nastily, knowing in his deepest heart he’d caught her out.

"No daddy," a tone of pure sugared innocence. "You see, I’ve got a surprise for you." Her dark green eyes glimmered wickedly. And she screamed, so loudly she shook the planet to its core.

In front of what remained of the assembly (well, those who hadn’t been blown away by the energy), stood a warrior with spiky golden hair reaching nearly to her feet. Jade had grown somewhat, and stood looking cocky and confident. In the third form.

"Im—im—impossible!" muttered Vegeta. The little witch is stronger than she let on, even to me just a moment ago.

"Father, you always pressed me to learn the ways of your people. You taught me only the strong survive, and children replace their parents. You want to hurt everything I’ve cared about since I arrived here. It’s time I replaced you." The cool manner and her extreme calmness surprised even Broly. He never remembered his daughter being so in control of her power, and he was worried.

Without even a blur to signify her movement, Jade came behind Broly, pressed a knee into the small of his back, grabbed a handful of golden hair and yanked so hard she broke his neck.

"You taught me too well, father," she whispered before letting his limp form fall to the ground.

Astonished at her transformation and brutality, Trunks still felt compelled to call out to Jade that Broly wasn’t dead.

"Not yet, but he will be when you get out of the way."

Muttering words nobody understood, Jade formed an intricate pattern in the air, and drew a ki blast into being. Without a further sound, she released it, and it grew in size and smashed into Broly’s broken form.

When the dust cleared, it was obvious from the scorched earth that Broly was no more, but Jade’s blast had been so accurate and tuned that she hadn’t knocked a petal off a daisy that grew inches from where the body had lain.

"Goodbye, father," she whispered.

She drifted to the earth and collapsed onto one knee. The form she’d assumed was draining, and it would likely take her days to recover. Seeing Vegeta approach, she forced herself to her feet to avoid appearing weak.

"You disobeyed a direct order to stay out of that. You kept your true power from me. I should obliterate you."

"Well excuse my impertinence, Prince, but I’ve just killed my own father without a second thought, and I’m busy trying to come to terms with it. Would you mind saving the lecture for later?" she snapped exhaustedly at him.

"You didn’t let me finish," Vegeta snapped back. "That was an incredible display, and you showed more than brute strength. I’m…proud of you."

Trunks landed stiffly next to her.

"I thought you said you didn’t lie," he accused hotly.

"I don’t. Why do you say that?"

"When you first got here, you said the power you let off as a signal wasn’t really your power; that it was echoed."

"I didn’t lie. I just omitted details." She smiled weakly and he ran his hands through his hair in a familiar gesture of exasperation.

"Bullshit." He beamed at Jade and hugged her tightly as she slumped forward in weariness, trying to lift an arm to return the embrace and failing dismally. He gathered her in his arms and watched as she passed out or fell asleep, which one he couldn’t tell. "Let’s go home."

Following his lead, the warriors (with Gohan slumped ineloquently over Goku’s shoulder) followed Trunks back to Capsule Corp to anxious friends and loved ones.

Three days later and Jade had fully recovered from her efforts, and was trying desperately on a regular basis to sneak away from the complex and Bulma’s eagle eye. She couldn’t help it, she was bored.

"You’ll never get better if you don’t rest," Bulma said with exasperation as she caught Jade with one foot on the windowsill, the third time that morning.

"But Bulma, I’m not sick. There’s nothing wrong with me." Jade cast the blue-haired woman a dismayed look, and as the blue eyes stared firmly back at her, she took her foot off the sill and sat back on the bed.

"Run any test you like on me. Just don’t make me stay in here. Please, I can’t take much more of this."

Bulma ran her hands through her hair in a gesture of exasperation much as Trunks would have. So that’s where he gets it, Jade thought offhandedly.

"If I let you out of the room, will you promise me you won’t go out of the complex without someone else?"

"Done," Jade squeaked happily, hugged Bulma’s shoulders and ran out of the bedroom to goodness-knows-where.

Blasted Saiyan genes, Bulma whispered in the back of her mind. Why won’t they let me take care of them? They’re not as strong as they think they are, and…

[Yes we are. Don’t be foolish, woman.] Vegeta’s thought cut into hers as he walked past her in the corridor.

"Is nothing held sacred from you?!" she hollered after him.

"Nothing you know about," he threw back.

In the living room, Trunks sat in front of the television with Videl and Gohan. The three of them had become quite close over the weeks since Trunks had arrived, and they mumbled absently to each other as the screen played a documentary about the life of Mr Satan, the "World’s Greatest Champion," while Videl rolled her eyes.

From the far door, Jade snuck into the room, pleased to see her friends in the one spot. Keeping her power level down to the point of almost nonexistence, she crept up behind Trunks, pressed her knees into his back and yanked his arms back playfully, at the same time immobilising him.

Trunks yelped in shock, and by some amazing reflex flipped himself out of her grasp and pinned her to the floor with his knees, one fist drawn back.

"Hello to you too," Jade laughed quietly, and his expression softened to a full smile.

"She let you out of there?"

"Don’t ask stupid questions." Jade replied in a Vegeta-esque voice. "Now if you don’t mind, I’m having a little difficulty breathing with you crushing my ribs like that," she added with a faint cough.

"Oops, sorry. Guess I don’t know my own weight." Trunks took his knee off her chest obligingly remembering her weakness, and she grabbed his shoulder, flipping him so she sat on top of him again.

"Sucker." The dark eyes, which had been hung with exhaustion, sparkled with their old fire.

"Bitch," Trunks spat out in amusement, before launching himself at her with energy he hadn’t had for days. As they wrestled happily on the living room floor, Gohan and Videl laughed till tears ran down their faces.

"What the hell is going on in here?!" a scream from the doorway, and Bulma stood looking shocked and worried. Trunks let go of Jade’s arm and she let the shoulder she’d pinned rise to a sitting position. The pair smiled guiltily and meekly.

"Oh, for pity’s sake. Just not in the house, okay?"

"Yes, mother." Trunks answered for both of them.

She left the room in pique, and Trunks complied with her request and resumed his position in front of the television set. Jade pulled a pillow out of the air and lay down beside him. The four of them stayed there in companionable silence until Gohan piped up with a very Saiyan request.

"Hey Trunks, you got any soda?"

Trunks shrugged his shoulders.

"I suppose so, I’ll go see. Anyone else want one?" He counted in mock concentration. "Now, let’s see, that’s one for Videl, one for me, one for Jade, and twenty-seven for Gohan makes thirty." He looked up in triumph that made Videl giggle.

"Alright, I’m going. Keep your shirt on."

Still peeved from being surprised previously, he placed on hand on the small of Jade’s back to push himself up. Her tail whipped out and caught his arm bruisingly.

"Ow!" he yelped again.

"Sorry, reflex." She released his arm, and he rubbed his wrist, then looked down in deep interest.

"What’s this?" his finger traced scar above the small tattoo on her back.

"What’s what?"

"The scar, of course."

"The pig whose bones I crushed gave it to me during a battle. You remember what I told you about how big my people were on honour?"

Aware she must have said it to Trunks when they weren’t there, Gohan and Videl humoured Jade and nodded affirmatively.

"Well, I beat him fair and square, and he got up and slashed me across the back. I’ll leave it at that," she added bitterly. Trunks made a mental note to question her about it later, although his mind was already making connections.

"Same pig," she replied in a tone implicit with ‘keep it up and I’ll pound you into the ground’.

"Excuse me, but I don’t appreciate being called a pig," came a voice accented like Jadali’s from the doorway. Behind him, Dr Briefs stood looking sheepish.

"Thankyou, Dr Briefs." Jade nodded politely to the befuddled man and he left in a hurry, sensing unwelcome tension in the air.

"Ragal, you stinking worm. I wondered where you’d slithered off to," Jade snapped viciously at the handsome young man whose face was marred by a scar across one cheek. If he’d had one more scar, he could have been a younger version of Yamcha. Trunks now understood why she disliked his mother’s old friend.

The language she’d fallen into was Ismiri, and although nobody except its two residents understood it fully, Jade had spent hours and days teaching Trunks the gist of the lyrical dialect. He translated roughly for Gohan and Videl, who sat in stunned silence.

The two Mages launched into a fierce tirade of verbal abuse, circling each other like fighting cocks and moving their hands in a way Trunks sensed was dangerous. He’d never seen magic used as a weapon before, and he sensed it wouldn’t be pretty.

"It’s beautiful…like they’re singing," Videl mumbled. Trunks nearly laughed out loud.

Jadali and Ragal paused in their insulting rally, and Ragal cocked his head curiously.

"Well, you’re a pretty one, aren’t you? Maybe you’d make a better mate for me than this little bitch."

"Yamcha?" Bulma said quietly.

"No. Even Yamcha isn’t stupid enough to have said that in my hearing," a regal voice rumbled. "Friend of yours, Jadali?"

She grimaced. "Unwanted acquaintance."

"Whatever. I’ve no time for pathetic weaklings like him. You four deal with it." He gestured towards the group of young people and left the room with a shrug.

"Well, that’s a first," Trunks reflected.

"Um, excuse me? I thought I was having a moment with my darling bride here." Ragal tapped an impatient foot on the floor.

"She’s not your bride, idiot!" Trunks let his temper loose and slugged Ragal in the jaw, sending him out the open window. This brought a disapproving look from Bulma, and he grinned with a shrug. "You said ‘not in the house’."
Outside, as Ragal pulled himself out of the trench he’d dug with his own nose, Jade floated down gracefully, followed by her friends, and eyes him with distaste.

"This is how I’ll remember you, if I choose to give you that dignity. Face down in the dirt. Where you belong." Jade raised one glowing hand, and fired from it. Obviously powerful, it blew back the hair on the bystanders’ heads and made Bulma grab for Trunks to steady herself, but the warriors amongst them could sense no ki. It must be the power Jade talked about as being a part of her, mother and son thought simultaneously.

Ragal produced a smaller blast of his own, but they fired not at each other, but into the air. Above Jadali’s head, the sky darkened as she closed her eyes in concentration, wind whipping at her hair as she stood perfectly calm, in a beautiful and terrifying display. The beam of light she’d shot out began to take form, and slowly a phoenix of pure light emerged from the brightness.

Jade’s eyes flashed open for an instant, shining with light like the phoenix above her, then she closed them and the phoenix opened its own.

Not fifty metres away, a leopard had formed above Ragal, and opened its eyes as well.

"This is the last time, Ragal. We will not meet this way again." Jadali’s sweet voice declared loudly, although her lips did not move. The sound was in their minds, and she had become the light phoenix, leaving her human form below her.

"It is at that," Ragal snarled. His voice, although the accent was the same, was not sweet or pleasant to the ear like Jadali’s was, and the leopard he had manifested glowed just as brightly, but with a deeper, obviously flawed colouring.

The two creatures lunged at each other, giving off flashes of lightning as they struck and feinted. Cavorting around in a deadly dance, the leopard took the phoenix’s wing in its gaping jaws, seemed to swell in size in proportion to the phoenix’s diminishing power.

"No…please don’t die," came the distraught thought from the ground.

Seeming to hear the mental plea, the phoenix broke loose, slashing at the leopard with its talons and acquiring a killing hold on the beastly creature’s throat before the sky filled with lethal radiance, and only the giant bird remained.

It called in triumph, flew upwards where it posed regally, then flew straight at Jadali’s body, surrounding it and uniting the two halves again.

Jade fell to one knee, gasping for breath as her friends ran to her.

Some distance off, Ragal’s body lay in a crumpled heap, and slowly faded away to nothingness.

[Thankyou,] rang a beautiful voice in Trunks’ head. Unsure of whether she could hear him or not, Trunks replied simply: [You’re welcome.]

Two days later, a bright and beautiful Sunday, Trunks set off for home.

On the front lawn of Capsule Corporation, his friends and family assembled to see him off and wish him good luck in rebuilding his world. Jade was nowhere to be found, and his heart sank. She’d already said her goodbyes, and wasn’t taking the loss of her first friend particularly well.

The last people Trunks farewelled were his alternate parents.

"You come back and visit any time, okay?" Bulma hugged the tall version of her son, and he squeezed her shoulders warmly.

He turned to Vegeta, restrained the desire to embrace the foul-tempered loud-mouthed father he didn’t really know but loved anyway, and settled for a handshake.

He flicked some switches, closed the hatch, and the time machine blinked back to the future.

Bulma walked inside with a heavy heart, saddened by her "other" son’s departure as much as the fact Jadali had refused to say goodbye. She sighed and walked into the kitchen, where she found a note on the table in unfamiliar, tiny script. Beneath it, she found a wrist guard that looked like something from ancient armour. Jade! Something’s happened to her! She struggled to read the tiny, neat hand.

Bulma held the letter to her breast. "I’m not mad, you silly girl. You just take care, okay?" she said to the open air, hoping that somehow her thoughts would reach across time and space.

"What the hell are you doing here?!" Trunks yelped in fright as Jade appeared on his lap.

"Hitchhiking, I believe you call it," Jade replied, flashing him a sneaky grin.

"I—I didn’t think – you never said –" His voice cracked, and she ran a finger along his temple to brush the hair from his eyes.

"What, goodbye? Why would I say that when I was coming with you? You’re sillier than I thought, little Prince." He smiled faintly.

"What’s my mother going to say? Bringing home strange girls with no warning…" Jade shrugged and settled against his chest for the journey in the crowded capsule.

"She’ll love me. The other one does, and you do. I pull stuff from the air. What’s not to like?" The faint smile on Trunks’ face widened and he kissed the top of her hair.

"Bitch."

"Sucker."