New Beginning

“FORTY SECONDS UNTIL IMPACT!” Warned the robotic voice.

“Calm down, woman! Where is the space suit? If I can get outside I can use my ki and blast them.”

“THAT WON’T BE ENOUGH, VEGETA!! THE FRAGMENTS ALONE COULD SEVERELY DAMAGE THE SHIP!! YOU WON’T HAVE ENOUGH TIME TO BLAST ALL OF THEM!!” She was going blue in the face and hopping up and down in fright.

“Then buy me some time, woman! Put the ship in reverse! Where is the suit?” Vegeta was much more accustomed to near-death situations than was Bulma, so he managed to stay relatively calm.

She pulled a red lever on the control panel, causing the space suit to drop down from a compartment overhead. They pulled it down and Vegeta began putting it on as fast as he could. “The shoes are magnetic, so you should be able to literally walk on the outside of the ship.” Bulma informed him, frantically helping him put on the suit. She sealed it shut in the back.

“THIRTY SECONDS UNTIL IMPACT!”

Bulma speedily typed a code into one of the computers on the control panel, causing the portal door to an airtight room to open up. “Once you’re in I’ll put the ship into reverse and then open the space door. Then you get on top of the ship and blast those meteoroids.”

Vegeta scrambled through the portal door, which shut tightly behind him. Bulma sat down in one of the launch seats and restrained herself, then pulled the reverse le The The gravitational forces within the ship changed suddenly and Bulma felt like her brains were going to burst out through the crown of her head.

She bit her lip. Such a sudden change in direction would waste a lot of fuel, a resource of which they were severely lacking. She typed in another code, opening the space-bound portal door in the airtight compartment. Vegeta crawled out the portal and onto the outside surface of the ship.

“TWENTY SECONDS UNTIL IMPACT!”

Vegeta reached the top of the spacecraft and looked up. The meteoroids were gaining on them fast. He swallowed the lump that was forming in his throat, and prepared to exterminate the meteoroids. In an instant he had powered up and began gathering energy into his cupped hands. It would take more than one gigantic energy blast to save them from these massive space rocks.

“FIFTEEN SECONDS UNTIL IMPACT!”

An incredible surge of energy erupted from his cupped palms and impacted the closest (and, perhaps, the largest) meteoroid, demolishing it. It broke into several smaller chunks that were still large enough to do serious damage to the ship.

He pointed his finger and shot smaller bursts of energy at each of the meteoroid fragments, shattering them further. His aim was to make them small enough so that they wouldn’t be able to do any serious damage to their space vessel.

This had bought them more time.

“TWENTY FIVE SECONDS UNTIL IMPACT!”

Bulma breathed a sigh of relief.

Vegeta released another enormous energy blast, annihilating the second largest meteoroid. The fragments were even smaller than before. He still broke them up further with short energy bursts from his pointed finger just to be safe.

The ship was beginning to gain momentum. Vegeta only had to blast one more of the meteoroids before the spaceship was moving fast enough to evade the rest.

Vegeta covered his head with his arms as several rock fragments rained on on him, two or three making large dents on the metallic surface of the Gravitron. The damage didn't appear to be overly severe.

Bulma pressed on the communicator button and kept her finger down on it. “Okay, Vegeta, I think we’re good to go. Thank Kami…” She could swear she heard him breathe a sigh of relief right before she released the button, switching off the communicator.

‘Wow…’ thought Bulma. ‘For once we got something done without arguing about it. Well then again, I guess you could say we had no choice. It was either cooperate or die.’

When Vegeta stepped back inside the ship, Bulma could see he was holding something in his gloved hand. It looked like some kind of space rock…or perhaps part of one of the meteoroids he had destroyed.

“Whatcha got there, Vegeta?” She asked, trying to get a better view of the object.

He took off his space helmet with his free hand to get a better view of the space rock. “Hmm…” He mumbled under his breath, scrutinizing it.

“Oohhh…” Bulma muttered, eyes growing wide at the sight of the glistening red stone. “…pretty...” She had to admit that she was utterly fascinated by shiny things.

“Of course it’s pretty, woman! It’s kranakotrite…there’s only one place in the universe this is found…”

Bulma reached for Vegeta’s open hand, still captivated. “Kranakotrite…it deserves a prettier name. Can I hold it, Vegeta?”

Vegeta jerked his hand back. “NOT with your bare hands, woman! It’s a highly corrosive mineral. It’ll burn right through almost any organic matter.”

Bulma pouted, “But…but it’s so glittery and…and shimmery…I wanna make a ring out of it…”

“No, you fool! Can’t you see that this is a valuable clue as to our location?! We must be near the asteroid ring of the Kranakonian Solar System. That’s the only place in the universe where this substance is found. Great masses of kranakotrite encircle the whole system.” He paused, and ran over to the control panel where he typed a command into the computer. The overhead screen switched on, giving the two a telescopic view of the direction in which they were headed. “There it is, woman! The Kranakonian Star! We just passed through one of the least dangerous sections of the asteroid belt.”

Bulma could see that the ship was approaching a great swirling system of planets and moons orbiting around a central star, which Bulma assumed was the Kranakonian Star Vegeta was referring to. “Uhhh…V-Vegeta, have you by any chance been here before?”

“No.” Came his simple reply.

“Then how do you know so much about it?” She asked.

“My next purging mission was to be on the Planet Diosa. Every forty-eight hours the planets of the Kranakonian System become aligned, and poi point in the direction of the Diosan solar system. Planet Diosa should be the fifth planet from the central star, which happens to be very close to your su siz size. It was rumored that many of the refugees from Frieza’s various planet raids escaped to that planet. Fortunately for those Diosan bakas I ditched that bitch Frieza to find the Dragon Balls before he could send me on my next mission. We might be able to find Saiyan space pods on that planet. If not, then we will most ainlainly find some mode of transportation that can get us back to your Planet Earth.”

“How long will it take to get there?” Asked Bulma.

“Two days…roughly. The planets are almost in alignment, so we shouldn’t have to wait too long.”

"Thank Kami...I can't wait to get home." Bulma collapsed into a seat.

"I can't wait to get away from YOU, woman." And just like that, the bitterness between the two space travelers returned.

"Well the feeling IS mutual, you jerk." She spat back, she stood back up and strutted off into the bathroom, slamming the door behind her.