Dragon Ball: A Better Bulma

"So, Midori is going to have another child? How nice, Turbo will have a new baby brother or sister!" Arale celebrated excitedly, jumping around an anxious Midori, who looked at her husband worriedly. 

"Hehe... it seems my inventions always have flaws," Doctor Norimaki said with a flushed face, and only Bulma, sensing the man's emotions, could tell the true context of his words. 

"Never mind, but now I know why I've been feeling so sick lately, I thought it was a temporary thing, but not 9 months," Midori said with some reluctance, but at the touch of her stomach, a smile of motherly love came over the blonde woman's face. 

Her husband approached her, giving rise to a warm couple moment that was soon ruined as Arale embraced both man and woman with much emotion. Furthermore, the little gynoid's eyes focused on her creator and gave him a stern look. 

"Now I need a more adult body! I need to be a good big sister!" Arale shouted, making Doctor Norimaki nervous, and when he saw Bulma chatting with Goku and the others, an idea popped into his head. 

"I know! Why don't you ask that young lady you met to help you with this? Aren't you two friends or something? She's a genius just like me! And she has more money!" Doctor Norimaki whispered the last sentence, not knowing that Bulma could hear him quite clearly.

"Really? Hey Bulma!" Arale ran towards Bulma, bumping into the blue-haired girl in a comical way, luckily Bulma was able to avoid falling, but Arale hugged her legs before making a puppy face at her. 

"Bulma! Will you help me grow up? I'm a robot who wants to be a pretty woman!" the question was so sudden and strange that it could be misinterpreted if one didn't know the context, then Bulma suspected it was Arale's strange ability. 

Everything around the gynoid tended to distort like a children's cartoon, a Japanese cartoon of her past life to be exact, which might be why such strange things happened wherever Arale went. 

"For that, I would have to have an academic exchange with Doctor Norimaki, which is partly why I am here. But I never really expected you to tell me what you are," Bulma said, causing Doctor Norimaki's eyes to shoot flames. 

This is just one example of Arale's uncanny ability to turn anything into a cartoon. The infamous 'Toon Force' so to speak. Norimaki approached Bulma and pulled a disk from his back, handing it to the young woman. 

"If Arale and my son trust you, there is no need to hide this. She is one of my greatest creations. 

Here are my projects and researches! Just give me a good price for them, okay? I have a child on the way and my finances are a bit tight!" Doctor Norimaki's sincere words surprised Bulma, who did not take the disk, but just looked at the strange family. 

"How about teaching me? I have a capsule that can build a house, and we have nothing urgent to do," this was the main point of Bulma's arrival here. 

She wanted to study with Doctor Norimaki and learn from him, she didn't expect to be able to replicate his strange ability to create absurd things, but she knew that with Norimaki, many of her plans could be easily realized. 

"Fine, I'll be your teacher with honor! Teaching Doctor Brief's daughter sounds like a good idea," Doctor Norimaki readily agreed, knowing that Bulma had no ill intentions toward them. 

How could Arale allow someone with bad thoughts towards him or his family to come so close to his home? Besides, Turbo, his psychic genius son, seemed to like her. 

"Then let's celebrate this good news by eating, shall we? Before the food gets cold," Midori said, finally bringing everyone to the table. 

Aside from the oddity of watching a completely mechanical robot eat food like it was nothing, the dinner went rather smoothly. Sure, Goku decided to tell the others about his fight against Pilaf, but he hid the fact that Dragon Balls existed. 

"Wow, I had heard about that Pilaf guy, he sent me a letter asking me to meet him, but I felt that he was a dangerous guy, you know? Luckily, Arale took care of the men he sent to capture me when I decided to refuse," Doctor Norimaki said, getting Bulma interested in the matter. 

"Oh? Does Pilaf seem to be interested in other scientists?" asked Bulma, causing Doctor Norimaki to nod. 

"Yes. Many of us in the scientific community are somewhat isolated, you know? Except for that guy Gero and your father Brief, few of us are the ones who become well known. 

Pilaf mentioned his intention to recruit other doctors like me, but from your story, it sounds like he's working alone. A giant robot suit? That's a good idea," Doctor Norimaki said, quite interested in such an idea. 

"It was strong, but I'm getting stronger and soon it will be just another toy," Goku said, disdaining the mechanical enemies, but Bulma gave him a gentle pat on the head. 

"Do not be so confident, technology can do wonders. Maybe we should create a way to sense mechanical objects," Bulma said, causing Goku to glance at Arale, who was still eating. 

"Can I fight Arale? You said she was a powerful robot," although Goku felt the same instinctive fear, he wanted to test his strength against Arale, who turned her head towards him. 

"You want to fight me? I'm really strong," Arale said, showing her flexed arm as if he wanted to pull a muscle.

But there was hardly any change in her arm, making the moment rather ridiculous and causing Oolong to laugh. Arale gave Oolong a dirty look but then looked down at her plate where a piece of bacon was. 

Arale took the bacon slowly and waved it mockingly in front of Oolong, and the young pig turned red, but he held back his cursing when he realized that the little Turbo Norimaki was looking at him with a strange smile on his baby face. 

'Right, I can't swear in front of a baby, especially if that baby can fly,' Oolong thought and went back to eating the rest of his dinner, he had saved the bacon for last. 

He was a pig man, but not a real pig, so it was nothing unusual for him to do that. So he stopped Goku from stealing his food, while he stuck his tongue out at Arale, who made a disgusted face at the sight of the leftovers in Oolong's mouth. 

"But you're not going to fight now, and Goku, it's my turn to fight, remember?" Bulma asked Goku, giving the boy a smile that made the young Saiyan's tail bristle. 

"Yes! I forgot, it's your turn," Goku said as he scratched the back of his neck, the excitement of fighting something he was afraid of making him forget his words to Bulma.

Chi-Chi, for her part, listened attentively to the stories that Doctor Norimaki began to tell, especially one of his most interesting inventions, a camera that took pictures that allowed you to see a person's future. 

Yes, Doctor Norimaki was one of the earthlings who had somehow tampered with time, only his camera was not harmful to the very crowded fabric of space-time.

The man even brought his camera and tested it on his wife first. After the camera printed the picture, a warm smile appeared on Dr. Norimaki's face before he showed it to the others.

In the photo, Midori Norimaki was sitting at the table, surrounded by a teenage Turbo Norimaki, a young woman, and a little boy. They were all smiling in the photo, and although it seemed to show a somewhat distant future, it showed an important point. 

Doctor Norimaki might have another child besides the one on the way, which seemed to be a girl. 

"The future is always changing; you know? A picture may be outdated when you look at it, but I like this future, three children is a good number. No, four. How can I leave out Arale?" said Doctor Norimaki, before he thought for a moment and took a picture of Arale.

The photo seemed to take a long time to print, a detail that caught Doctor Norimaki's attention, and he thought his machine had malfunctioned, but then a photo was ejected, and when he saw it, he was astonished at what he saw. 

For some reason, the photo played an unnatural looping sequence similar to a GIF. It was Arale running as usual, only her form was adult and she seemed to be running at high speed, so much so that a strange hedgehog-like but blue-haired figure stood in awe, though his figure was extremely blurred, somehow, whoever saw the photo could know that. 

"Did you just take a photo with a memetic effect?" asked Bulma, amazed and a little disturbed by the strangeness of the situation. 

"You'll get used to it, Arale is not a simple android, but this photo of her as an adult looks pretty good," Doctor Norimaki handed the photo to Arale, who looked at it with fascination.

Soon he was taking pictures of everyone at the table. For some reason, his son Turbo had clothes with the character 'Sora' printed on them. Oolong looked the same as always. 

Chi-Chi's picture showed her carrying a small indeterminate figure that seemed to have a tail like Goku's, while the young Saiyan's picture showed him in a strange environment, there was nothing unusual except that his eyes were a different color. 

"Bulma, why are my eyes green in this picture?" Goku asked curiously, but Bulma just shook her shoulders, not wanting to say anything.

She didn't want to lie, so silence was the best option. Bulma then turned her attention to the photo that had been taken of her. Bulma appeared in it, now more grown up, wearing a lab coat while dressed in jeans and a red blouse.

As if she knew this photo would be taken, she was shown making a peaceful gesture to the camera with a smile on her face. Bulma felt strange that she looked a little older than her current state, but she didn't think much of it because she probably wouldn't go beyond the appearance shown in the picture. 

It was all due to her nature as a plant, which allowed her to age very slowly. Though her current growth followed normal human norms, she had an intuition that it was because of her different nature from Vash or the rest of the Plants.

Bulma looked at the camera held by Doctor Norimaki with interest but then shook her head. Messing with the time was not a good idea, and knowing that her curiosity was too high, she decided not to ask for the camera for a closer look. 

Then she carefully put the photo away, feeling that the look she had in the picture was quite to her liking and that she would try to replicate it from now on. With that thought, the night went on. 

Bulma's group slept in a house created by one of the girl's capsules, each with their own room, including the newest member of the group, Oolong. 

Why did Bulma keep the boy around? Partly because Oolong, although somewhat unpleasant, was helpful and a person with a lot of common sense. Also, Bulma wanted to help him fully develop his transformation ability and try to emulate it. 

An ability to transform into whatever she wanted could help Bulma get used to the transformation of her flesh, an ability she was already trying to unleash, but it seemed that she had not yet met the requirements to use it. 

But for now, that wasn't on her mind. Tomorrow, she would try to fight Arale! Emphasis on trying, because it was more than obvious that she could never win this fight and she just wanted to test her limits.