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The sunset on this planet is burning blue. It’s sapphire in the middle and fades out to lighter shades before the clouds furthest just have a dash of cyan.
“How come it’s blue?” Raditz demands. “It’s in the same system as Planet 378.”
Nappa points up at the sky and wiggles his fingers at it.
“Atmosphere.”
Vegeta, all of six years old, glares up at the sky. His mouth is set in a determined line and even though he’s the youngest and smallest, he commands their respect. Raditz, who’s eight, didn’t get it at first. He’s third class and always around those who were the same as him. He tried to talk to Vegeta like he would have spoken to anyone else in his squad and learned quickly that that wasn’t the way.
“The way the sun reflects the atmosphere here makes it blue.” Nappa spits on the ground. “Shame Frieza has to take it.”
Neither child is sure what to say to that. Either way, it’s two days until the full moon so they set up camp.
“I can do it myself,” Vegeta huffs, voice scratchy and indignant.
Nappa inclines his head. “Of course, Your Highness. But we should wait. For this one.”
He gestures to Raditz who’s close to the fire, curled up so he’s little more than legs and hair.
“Right,” he says snidely. “Raditz is still too weak to not rely on his ape form.”
“Am not!” he bleats, his voice muffled by the fact that he’s still hiding in his own hair.
But there’s no more disagreement. They sit around the fire as the blues fade into blacks and then it’s just the orange glow. At times like these, they almost feel like a unified group rather than the sad remains of their race. Nappa looks at the two children he’s been charged with. He was the highest ranking general in the Saiyan army but the King had assigned him to his son when he was born as little more than a bodyguard. He took the job with honor and maybe that’s what saved him. He turns then to the pile of hair that’s Bardock’s boy. Strange that he survived, a dumb stroke of luck, but he figures that’s responsible for him nonetheless. He’s a weakling but he’s also all that’s left.
“Do you want to hear a story?” he asks.
Raditz perks up, peeking above his bent knees. Vegeta tries to look bored but Nappa sees the way he leans in a bit more, eyes big. Despite his posturing, he’s still just a little kid.
“Back before we settled on Planet Vegeta,” he says, “We lived on Planet Sadala.”
“I know that,” Vegeta says in a cross voice, sticking his nose up in the air.
“Me too.”
Nappa sighs and shakes his head. “That’s not what the story’s about. Now listen.”
And, surprisingly, they both do.
“When I was a boy on Planet Sadala, there was something that happened once when I was out playing with my friend Argulia.”
The name gets a small little gasp from Vegeta that the boy probably doesn’t realize he’s made. He wrings his hands.
“Mama,” he whispers and then seals his mouth shut. Pretends not to care.
He’s been that way since word came of their planet’s destruction. Nappa plays along with it because he’s his Prince but he knows he misses his parents. Misses their home. He plays along for himself, as well. He doesn’t want the anger to engulf him. Doesn’t want to throw himself at Zarbon or Dodoria and get his ass killed, leaving these two children to Frieza’s whims.
“What happened?” Raditz asks.
“You see, there’s a Saiyan legend,” Nappa begins again, “about the trickster. Do you know it?”
Vegeta looks confused but Raditz nods his head.
“The trickster was a third class warrior,” he says. “But he was so wily and so cunning that the moon goddess noticed him. After he betrayed her wicked sister, she raised him to the stars to be her aide.”
It makes sense that he would know. Third class loved the trickster. He was their folk hero, worshiped more than the goddess in some places.
“My papa told me it,” he says and Nappa can just imagine what kind of spin Bardock put on it. “What’s that gotta do with your story?”
“I’m getting to it.”
Raditz lets out a whimper and hides behind his knees again. Some Saiyan he is, Nappa thinks. Takes after his mother--weak and soft. Even he felt bad when he yelled at Gine and saw the tears spring to her eyes.
“So we were out play-fighting, the way you do when you’re a young cub--you know.”
Vegeta might not. He never spent any time around children his own age. The King would take him on missions and he trained with them. Raditz, though, nods in excitement.
“Yeah! One time when we were fighting me and my friend Tur--”
“Anyway,” Nappa says, cutting him off. “We were out playing when all of a sudden the sky went blue like that sunset here. Bright and vivid, bluer than your sleeves.”
Vegeta looks at the material covering his arms and frowns.
“And then we heard it. Laughter.”
“The trickster,” Raditz whispers.
“Me and Argulia decided to investigate where the light came from--”
“Why?!” Raditz screeches.
“Because we’re Saiyans, stupid,” Vegeta snarls. “You’re so pathetic.”
Nappa sighs in agitation and chooses just to continue.
“So we follow it and the laughter gets louder and louder and then we saw him.”
“Who?” Vegeta asks.
His voice is a whisper as if he’s afraid to be heard.
“Not sure,” Nappa says, “but he looked like a typical third class warrior. He had that hair, you know?”
He puts his hands up near his head.
“Like papa!” Raditz exclaims. “And--”
“Anyway,” he says, bulldozing over him. “We saw him and he looked right at us and winked. Then he was gone. And we weren’t sure what we saw.”
“The trickster,” both boys say at once.
“Maybe,” he says. “Maybe.”
Later, he makes them both go to sleep, even if he knows that he can never make Vegeta do anything, and he looks into the horizon. He remembers it, clear as day. Walking with Argulia and hearing the laughter. Seeing the man, eyes glowing even in the middle of the day. A smile on his face and then a finger to his lips to tell them to be quiet. And then he was gone. He’s thought about it over the years, but the memory persists. With Argulia gone, there’s no one to share the memory. He looks up at the stars and thinks, in the distance, he can hear laughter.