Dragon Ball BE

Chapter One: Close Encounters

It began on Planet Vegeta, with three Saiyan babies getting their power levels tested in incubation pods. The Saiyan Prince, Vegeta, was maxing out at five hundred, a high level for a baby. Kakarot, the son of a low-class warrior named Bardock, was only reading at a two, making his only impressive feat the ability to cry incessantly. This constant noise was causing the child in the pod next to him, Broly, to fluctuate between 920 and...ten thousand?!

"Damned thing must be broken!" said one of the lab technicians. "There's no way a commoner could be born that strong!"

"Yeah," said another, coming over to examine the equipment. "But I don't think it is broken. We should tell the King about this."

Just then, Broly's father, Paragus, barged into the room with a portable monitoring device clenched in one fist. "Where is my son?" Paragus demanded. He had been keeping tabs on Broly's progress from a waiting room next door, and the device had alerted him to Broly's condition.

"Oh! Lieutenant Paragus!" the first scientist exclaimed. "Broly is...doing...fine?"

"Is it true?" asked Paragus. "Is my son really that powerful?"

"Y-yes, sir," answered the second. "I-in fact, we were just about to share the good news with the King."

"That will not be necessary," said Paragus. He had watched King Vegeta execute Saiyans before, simply because their power levels were greater than his own, and he knew a similar fate awaited Broly if he didn't do something about it.

So Paragus enlisted the two of them to design a shock collar for the boy, using the Scouters' power-sensing software as a trigger mechanism, and crafting it from the same material as Saiyan armor, so that Broly could continue wearing it as he grew. Paragus hoped this would condition Broly to keep his power below that of the Prince's, so as not to arouse the King's suspicions.

The two Saiyan scientists reluctantly complied with his demands, but their loyalty to King Vegeta was unwavering, and almost immediately upon completion of the device, they went to their King and revealed the truth of Broly's power and Paragus' betrayal.

King Vegeta thanked them for their service, and summarily executed them for their complicity in Paragus' schemes.

Luckily, Paragus was eavesdropping, and took the opportunity to get the infant Broly to a Saiyan space pod and send him away from the planet. Broly escaped safely, but after unsuccessfully trying to extract the pod's destination from him (which was, in truth, a random setting), King Vegeta executed Paragus.

*******

Several years later, Broly's pod splashed down in the ocean near a small island on Earth. On this particular island stood an iconic but well-removed, pink house. This was Kame House, home to the reclusive martial artist, Master Roshi, and his talking pet turtle,...Turtle.

Using his submarine, Roshi salvaged the crashed pod, and was surprised to find a young Broly inside, who woke and attacked Roshi when the curious old man grabbed his tail.

The child was quite strong and wildly unpredictable, destroying Roshi's left eye with a single punch. But Roshi was able to calm him with hypnosis before tending to his own wounds.

During the fight, Roshi noticed that there was something around Broly's neck, and that despite being able to instinctively read his movements and wound him, Broly was in constant pain from the gadget's effects.

Roshi briefly considered leaving the device around Broly's neck, as it seemed to only shock the child whenever the old man sensed a spike in his ki, and as terrifying as those spikes felt, it might be a good idea to keep such massive, raw potential in check.