Virgin Whiskey

A Dragonball oneshot

By

EvilFuzzy9

Rating: T

Genre: Friendship/Romance

Characters/Pairings: Android 18, Krillin; [Lazullin]

Summary: A story about nothing in particular. Just Eighteen and Krillin drinking and talking. [K/18, Lazullin]

Number Eighteen let out a sigh as she downed another shot of whiskey. She was visibly tipsy: a flush in her cheeks, an uneven smile on her lips. The stool she was seated on creaked as she shifted her weight.

"Maaaan, this is the life. Don'tcha think so, dear?" the so-called 'android' said to her boyfriend, who sat beside her.

"Nnngh," Krillin groaned miserably, resting his hand on the counter.

His eyes were squeezed shut, and the dark peach fuzz of his unshaven head gave the monk-turned-martial artist a distinctly grungy appearance that made him seem right at home in this dark and dusty dive of a bar. A jukebox in the back droned out a tinny rendition of some wannabe cowboy's drunk crooning, and the air was thick with the acrid, pungent scent of tobacco smoke.

Eighteen patted Krillin on the back, humming to herself.

"Booze always tastes better when you drink it with a cute guy," the blonde said, idly rubbing her boyfriend's shoulder. "You know? Makes it more exciting."

"I... think I'd prefer cute girls, personally..." Krillin mumbled, blearily turning his head to face Eighteen. He gave the woman something that might have passed for a smile, if you turned your head sideways and squinted.

Eighteen snorted, and she gave Krillin another slap on the back. This one was hard enough to nearly buckle the legs of his stool, although the diminutive man didn't seem to notice.

"Flirt. Are you calling me cute?" She gave him a sly look. "Be careful what you say, handsome, or you might just get more than you bargained for."

Krillin chuckled, then winced. He clutched the side of his head.

"Oh, ow," he grunted, making a pained face. "I did not think it was possible to get a hangover while you're still drinking."

Eighteen laughed.

"You don't have very much alcohol tolerance, do you?" the attractive cyborg mused.

Krillin mumbled something noncommittal in response.

Eighteen pinched his cheek.

The barkeep – an ugly, hairy, misshapen thing that might have been human – gave Krillin and Eighteen the evil eye as he wiped a dirty glass with an even dirtier, muckier rag. His head was lumpy and vaguely potato-shaped, with a gap-toothed sneer and upturned nose. He wore a greasy, yellowed apron that may have once been white: in faded, half-vanished lettering, it said Lique & Ur's, the name of the establishment.

It was a slow hour for the bar, on a slow day, at the slowest time of year. Leek & Ore's was dead tonight, but even during peak business hours you'd almost never catch more than four or five customers at a time.

This bar was a dingy, grungy, hole-in-the-wall sort of place, the kind of establishment you might expect to find in the worst parts of Mos Eisley, or one of the better parts of Detroit: a murky little pocket of filth and warm piss disguised as booze where the most miserable and desperate sorts of people could squirrel themselves away from respectable society until the break of day. Rick & Orr's was not the kind of place you would expect to find a happy couple, let alone two of the strongest beings on the planet.

But expectations be damned, it was where Krillin and Eighteen were that night. Better to drink away their troubles where none of their friends could see them.

"You hear about Yamcha?" Krillin sighed after a lengthy moment of silence. He sat up, wearily lifting his head from the table. "Nearly got his house repossessed over that whole doping scandal."

Eighteen met Krillin's eyes. The two of them were the only customers there, aside from one ill-favored old bloke nursing a watery ale at the far end of the bar.

"Really, now? I thought the accusations..."

"Were trumped up? Yeah, he tested clean as a whistle."

Krillin waved a hand vaguely, gesturing in a way that even he probably didn't understand. Eighteen frowned, though nodding at the confirmation of what she had thought.

"I see..." she murmured, though her expression indicated that she didn't actually see at all.

"Well, I don't really know how it works," Krillin admitted, "But I guess someone really didn't like him, because there was a whole fuss over those test results. Thought they had to have been doctored, or something. So there was a bunch of re-testing, and his career got put on hold while this was going on, and I guess Yamcha lost a lot of money during this time."

Number Eighteen nodded slowly.

"Better than an ordinary human could possibly be..." she said quietly. "I suppose it makes sense why some people might think he was using performance enhancers."

Krillin shrugged, glancing mournfully at the half-empty glass of scotch before him.

"I've watched his games, you know," he said slowly, slurring his words a little. "He holds back. A lot."

"Fairness, huh...?" Eighteen mused, looking thoughtfully up at the ceiling. "I always did think that was a load of bull."

"Maybe, but you know how Yamcha is. He doesn't want to raise too many questions," Krillin said, peering sidelong at his girlfriend. "Hates talking about the past to anyone who wasn't there for it."

"I can relate," Eighteen mused.

"Me too," Krillin sighed.

Another moment of silence passed between them.

"When did things get so complicated?" Krillin wondered, speaking half to himself. "It wasn't always this way, you know, not in the old days. We used to be proud of what we'd accomplished with our training. It was an honor to wear the Turtle School's emblem on our gi. Now we hide our strength, and try to pretend like none of it ever happened. What's changed? When did become shameful to be who we are?"

"I wouldn't know," Eighteen said. "I wasn't there for the old days. But I can see why it would be prudent to hide our... true capabilities. People like to have the illusion of security, to pretend that they're at the top of the food chain. It's asking too much of humanity to expect them to accept that a small handful of people have the power to destroy the world a dozen times over. They don't even like their government to be that powerful."

Krillin winced.

"Yeah," he murmured. "...I remember when I would have felt the same way, to learn there were guys like Frieza and the Saiyans out there." He laughed weakly. "Hell, I'm about as outmatched by the likes of Vegeta as an ordinary person would be by me. I know humans just aren't powerful, or special, or meaningful in any way, as far as the grand scheme of things... but it's still a hard pill to swallow."

"Maybe things will change, though," Eighteen said, seeing the look in Krillin's eyes. "Sooner or later humans will have to accept that there are other kinds of life out there. They'll..." She paused, then shook her head. "...We'll be forced to find our place in the Universe. And then we won't have to hide."

Krillin smiled glumly.

"Maybe," he said, and he sounded just a little bit hopeful. "If we're lucky, it'll happen soon."

Eighteen chuckled softly.

"If we're lucky," she agreed.

Krillin smiled a little more happily at her. He took another sip of his whiskey, then, and grimaced.

"Ugh... that's nasty," he muttered. He shook his head, as if trying to expunge the taste from his memory. "No wonder it was so cheap."

"It helps to have an off switch on your taste buds," Eighteen said by way of agreement, nodding her head.

Krillin made a face.

"Seriously? That seems like an odd feature."

Eighteen shrugged.

"Gero was the kind of guy who threw as many ideas into a project as he could fit."

Krillin seemed to accept this comment without need for further explanation, and he closed his eyes for a moment. Thinking about something, perhaps.

A few minutes passed in silence between them. It wasn't an awkward pause, something that suffocated them with its quietude. It was a companionable thing, a sign of wordless cameraderie between man and machine.

"You hear about that Satin guy?" he asked. "The one they're saying beat Cell?"

"Mr. Satan," Eighteen replied, nodding slowly. "Also known as Hercule, the Strongest Man Alive. Born Mark, to parents Zeb and Lue-Beeb. He is the current master of Satan Kempo, and current defending champion of the Tenka'ichi Budokai."

"Ah... Yeah, him," Krillin said a little lamely. "Hercule Satan. I hear they're planning on renaming Orange City in his honor. You know, since he took credit for beating Cell and all."

"Considering Orange City's record high crime rates, that seems like a rather dubious distinction," Eighteen drawled, a slight smirk quirking her lips. "Apparently people starting looting and rioting during the Cell Games... and then never really stopped."

"Huh. You don't say." Krillin took another swig of his whiskey, faintly grimacing at the taste. "Hope they don't expect him to clean things up."

Eighteen smiled at her boyfriend, blue eyes skirting across the light pinkish blush which dusted his cheeks.

"You're jealous of him," she observed.

Krillin's cheeks gained a new level of erubescence wholly unrelated to his buzz.

"Ehehe... Maybe a little," he chuckled a hint nervously. "If I'd known it would be that easy to take credit for Cell's defeat..."

"You probably could have made a lot of money off of sponsorship deals," Eighteen said lightly. "More than enough for us to move out of Kame House."

Krillin looked Eighteen in the eye.

"Do you think I should have?" he asked her.

"You could have," she replied ambiguously. A moment of calculated silence passed, before she graced the former monk with a rare smile. "But I know you wouldn't have. You're an honest guy, like that."

Krillin smiled. He scratched his cheek with one finger blushing.

"Gee, really? Haha... I guess I've really grown up, haven't I?" he mused.

"I wouldn't know," Eighteen said, but there was a playful lilt in her tone.

"Liar. I know Roshi's been telling you all about what a rotten punk I used to be."

Krillin shoved Eighteen playfully, actually managing to make her shoulder budge by a couple of centimeters. His girlfriend let loose a quiet, tinkling laugh.

"Did you really start training with him just so you could get a girlfriend?" she idly teased.

"It worked, didn't it?" Krillin said defensively. His face was beet red.

Eighteen chuckled. "Yes, I suppose so," she mused, leaning over.

She planted a kiss on Krillin's cheek.

His blush could have beaten a tomato for redness.

A/N: I never really followed Dragonball or Dragonball Z while it was ongoing – I have vague recollections of coincidentally seeing a couple episodes, of course, because DBZ (like Pokemon) was everywhere when I was a kid – so I didn't ever get into it. Not, at least, until a year or two (or three?) back when my brother randomly dropped off a box of anime DVDs from a friend, including several DBZ movies.

After watching a couple of them one day when our internet was out (with Japanese audio and subtitles, because weaboo) I began to get interested in the series. Partly out of morbid curiousity.

...I think. I'm a bit fuzzy on when I first really took a crack at that monolithic epitome of shounen manga. I may have tried to read the manga online before then, but a good chunk of the scanlations I could find were AWFUL in quality. And of course, there's also the TFS abridged version of DBZ, which may also have been what first got me interested in the series...

Well. The point is, I didn't get into Dragonball until I was a grown man who had already immersed himself for years in other manga and anime. It's not as nostalgic for me as, say, Digimon Adventures, the first few seasons of Pokemon, Zoids (does anybody else remember that show?), or even (OBVIOUSLY, given the bulk of my portfolio...) Naruto.

So I look at Dragonball from the perspective of an adult who likes anime, and find that what I appreciate about the series is not the fight scenes or power ups (though Toriyama could certainly draw some dang compelling battles), but the characters... and the humor.

This may be why Krillin is my favorite Z-Fighter, and Lazullin my favorite couple.

(Lazuli is apparently 18's canonical original name, according to Toriyama-sensei)

Updated: 8-21-14

TTFN and R&R!

– — ❤