The following story takes place between Trunks' warning about world-destroying androids and the wrong two androids' arrival in South City. I originally started writing this story in late 2013 due to my natural draw towards "odd couple" friendships and the belief that, if forced to be in the same room on a consistent basis, Vegeta and Krillin could find themselves in the oddest friendship of all.

So kick back, relax, and maybe review a little. After all, it's always nice to thank the lady who makes you sandwiches.

Now available concurrently on AO3. Enjoy.

PROLOGUE
FOR THE SECOND TIME

If there's one thing not many (living) people know about Prince Vegeta – and certainly wish they had when begging for their lives – is, while the Saiyan Prince judges the worthiness of a race first by its strongest warrior, its cuisine comes in a surprisingly close second. It's a trait Vegeta picked up from Frieza when Vegeta was young, which is the reason why he doesn't advertise it (or much else about himself) to anyone. The last two people to know about it were his former servants: Raditz, who only seemed to find it hilarious when the Prince was not around, said publicly that it was poetic to eat meals prepared by those they were about to massacre; while Nappa, thanks to his sometimes cultish loyalty to the crown, learned how to determine a good dish from a bad one through smell. Vegeta wouldn't have believed it either if he hadn't eaten the results.

Frieza knew too, but Vegeta's never considered him a person, so it's hard to include him. When Frieza learned about it, he had a feast prepared so he could bring King Cold by and how him just how "precious" his little Saiyan Prince was, pricking up Frieza's eating habits as he had, but oh, don't worry, this childish trait would be beaten out of him soon. Frieza would make a good soldier out of him even if his race couldn't even survive a small meteorite.

This was around the time Vegeta started having vivid dreams of pinning Frieza's against his throne suffocating him with balled-up fists of Volcor shit while screaming, "Oh look, the Great Lord Frieza sure likes shanopa, doesn't he? Isn't he just PRECIOUS? Look at him just TAKING ALL THAT PRECIOUS SHANOPA DOWN HIS PRECIOUS LITTLE THROAT! But don't worry, Daddy, don't worry. I'll make a good little BITCH OUTTA HIM!"

Though these dreams were disturbing even by Vegeta's standards, they made him love good food all the more.

Vegeta grew up though and realized in his early adolescence that killing Frieza with food was a really stupid idea, so he trained. Trained until his bones broke and his hands bled and his muscles ripped in two. He'd lock himself in the training room for days, sweating so much through the pain that his body stopped flushing out impurities and moved to water instead. And during those moments when he'd grasp for life and hang onto it only through pure force of will, he would see his mother swaying through the room, humming a melody he can't remember that's replaced with an increasingly loud and rampant white noise. He'd stumble after her, falling over himself to catch the shortness of her gown, but it always dissolved through his fingers; and then, just as he felt his final breath, she would whip around like the scythe of Death and engulf him in warmth. When he was younger, he'd give in and find himself in a healing tank days later with a carving for twelve course meals; but adolescence made his anger coat his veins like the stiffness of a new leather jacket, so he started pushing her away, wake up in the healing tank anyway, and later only eat raw meat so he could see the blood spill from his mouth, down his armor, and onto his lap and plate.

This hatred would consume him until the end of his days, and Frieza, who knew a wild animal when he saw one, sent him into the universe in the name of empirical expansion.

He was unstoppable. He never lost a fight. Not against those ingrates in the Northern Galaxies, anyway. He and his fellow Saiyans devoured entire worlds, preparing them with the blood of their inhabitants and the salt of their conquest, cooking them with the energy that dominated the Saiyans' entire beings and made their muscles scream for more. But Vegeta's gut burned just as much as his lust for blood, and to make their trips less routine, the Saiyans would sometimes kill enough people to attract the planet's strongest warrior and eat really damn good food while they waited for them. Some planets had such delicacies that Vegeta would kill the warrior and bring Frieza the cook instead. Frieza would bitch and moan until he tasted the food, then quietly hurry the cook into the royal kitchen when no one was looking.

Those were the days when Vegeta felt an honest connection with his only subjects left, the two men who would (as far as he knew) help him restore the Saiyan throne someday. Vegeta had ill-formed plans once he surpassed the legend itself and became the Super Saiyan – plans that spanned far beyond any empire Cold had ever ruled or Frieza had ever grasped. But when engaged in combat day in and day out with these men, he became synonymous with them, their bid for glory the same heartbeat. It was only there that he felt in control of himself, even when he was doing Frieza's bidding.

Vegeta has always been his own, though. The moment he learned of a tangible way to put Frieza and his family six feet under, he abandoned them. It was not honorable, but revenge this deep never can be. He grieved not for Raditz, his right-hand and confidant; nor Kakarot, the lost Saiyan child Vegeta admittedly cried over when he first learned of his continued existence and later whose cold, dead hands he planned to pry the Dragon Balls from; nor Nappa, who had cared for him since he was young, who loyalty some days was the only thing that reminded Vegeta that he was a prince at all, because Nappa was weak and had no place in Vegeta's new world. Vegeta came to Earth to take and destroy, to leave the planet in a spiral of dust to signify his first victory as intergalactic warlord and self-made god.

But here he is. On Earth. For a second time. Earth wasn't supposed to exist for there to be a second time, but things never go as planned for Vegeta, which is something he only admits to himself late at night when the aches in his muscles make him blasphemous. He had been taken in like a wounded dog that had bit its owner but had not been put down out of pity. His pride had died here the moment Kakarot leapt from that fluffy yellow cloud (how embarrassing) and had downright buried itself when he agreed to stay, but its rebirth mulls on this planet as all the same. Defeat Kakarot. Kill his weird friends. Make it so something in the universe made sense again. They are even helping him become stronger. The sheer insanity of this causes Vegeta to ponder more than he likes and makes his food not digest as well.

It's because of all this that, when Vegeta truly meets Krillin for the first time, he doesn't kill him on principle.

Sponsor: The following chapter is brought to you by beginnings. Beginnings: The things that start the things that end the things that start.

(Additionally, the following chapter was revised on November 6, 2017 to address minor grammatical concerns. There have been no changes to content).