POV.. COAST OF OCCUPIED EUROPE, NIGHT
The sea was violent.
Black waves crashed against jagged cliffs, lit only by distant searchlights and the burning wreckage of a downed Hydra transport ship half-submerged in the surf.
Dura stood at the shoreline, stolen boots sinking into wet sand.
He hadn't destroyed the convoy out of anger this time. He'd done it cleanly. Efficiently.
Hydra had been hunting something in the water and whatever it was, it radiated power old enough to feel… familiar.
He closed his eyes briefly.
Then the ocean answered.
The water parted.
Not dramatically. Not with spectacle. It simply moved aside, as if obeying a sovereign will.
A figure rose from the sea.
Tall. Broad-shouldered. Skin pale under moonlight. Black hair slicked back, eyes burning with restrained fury. Green trunks. Bare feet gripping stone like claws.
Namor of Atlantis.
Bullets rained from a distant Hydra emplacement, stitching the water and cliffs with tracer fire.
Namor didn't even look at them.
The bullets flattened against his skin or ricocheted harmlessly into the sea.
He stepped forward.
The Hydra gunners screamed as the ocean surged upward, crushing their position beneath a living wall of water.
Namor's gaze finally locked onto Dura.
"You are not human," Namor said, voice carrying effortlessly over the storm.
"And you are not of this world's surface nations."
Dura met his stare calmly.
"Neither are you."
That earned a sharp, humorless smile.
"You stand on the edge of my domain, boy," Namor said. "And you carry power that stirs things best left sleeping."
The ground trembled as Namor landed fully on the shore.
The air pressure changed.
Dura felt it then raw physical might, ancient and unyielding. Not ki. Not magic. Something primeval.
Interesting.
Namor lunged first.
The impact was thunder.
His fist connected with Dura's guard and drove him backward through stone, carving a trench through the cliffside. Dura flipped mid-air, landing hard but controlled.
Namor was already there.
A second punch.
Dura caught it easily.
Sand exploded outward as their feet dug trenches into the earth. The air screamed.
Namor's eyes widened just slightly.
"You resist me," he said, surprised.
"Few on this cursed surface can."
Dura twisted, redirecting the force, and slammed an elbow into Namor's ribs. The Sub-Mariner skidded back, tearing through rock, then stopped himself with a roar, bruised and annoyed.
The ocean surged higher.
Namor raised both arms.
The sea answered.
A tidal wave crashed toward Dura, dense enough to pulp tanks.
Dura inhaled.
His aura flared emerald.
He stepped forward and split the wave with a ki-reinforced strike, water screaming past him on both sides like parted heavens.
Namor laughed, full-throated and wild.
"Good!"
"At last, something that does not break!"
He charged again.
This time, Dura met him head-on.
Fist to fist.
Shockwaves rippled across the shoreline.
Dura kept his power equal to his opponent.
For long seconds, neither yielded.
Then Dura disengaged, leaping back, aura dimming deliberately.
Namor halted, sensing the shift.
"Why stop?" the Atlantean demanded. "This battle is unfinished."
Dura looked past him to the horizon, where searchlights multiplied.
"This world is not where my war ends," Dura said evenly.
"And you are not my enemy."
Namor studied him closely.
"You will bring catastrophe to this world," he said at last. "Whether you intend it or not."
Dura met his eyes.
"So will you ," he replied.
"If you keep answering surface wars with oceans, humans don't like what they can't claim."
For a moment, something like mutual recognition passed between them.
Then Dura vanished, his presence collapsing inward until even the sea lost track of him.
Namor stood alone on the shore, fists clenched.
"Another powerful land dweller," he muttered.
"The surface breeds them like storms."
POV, PLANET OF THE SAIYANS ,
ROYAL OBSERVATION CHAMBER
The scouter footage ended in static.
King Vegeta sat rigid on his throne, tail lashing once, sharply.
"He didn't simply flee," the king said coldly.
"He disappeared completely ."
The elite commanders shifted uneasily.
"No residual ki signature," one said. "It's as if the child exited reality itself."
King Vegeta's fingers tightened.
"No Saiyan does that," he snarled.
"No normal child does that."
Silence followed.
Then one elite spoke, carefully.
"If he can leave… others may learn to as well ."
The king rose slowly.
"Then he becomes a variable," King Vegeta said.
"And variables invite rebellion."
POV FRIEZA'S FLAGSHIP
Frieza floated lazily, tail swaying, eyes half-lidded as the report finished.
"Vanished?" he echoed pleasantly.
"How delightful."
Zarbon hesitated.
"Lord Frieza… should we increase surveillance on Planet Vegeta?"
Frieza smiled wider.
"No," he said softly.
"Let the monkeys stew in uncertainty."
His expression darkened just a fraction.
"But prepare my training chambers," he added.
"If Saiyans are learning new tricks… then so shall I."
POV, PLANET VEGETA, LOWER DISTRICTS
A child was born.
His power level barely reaching 30.
A low-class infant with wild black hair and a scream that shook the air far more than his numbers justified.
"Kakarot," the nurse muttered dismissively.
POV. FRIEZA'S FLAGSHIP, HIGH ORBIT
Frieza stared at the holographic projection of Planet Vegeta.
Beautiful. Violent. Proud.
And wrong.
The image flickered, reports stacking over one another. Abnormal infant power spikes. A child who vanished from reality itself. Another with power beyond projections, exiled yet alive. Rebellion murmurs. King Vegeta hiding data. Saiyan battle records showing growth curves that bent established norms.
Frieza's smile never reached his eyes.
"I had hoped," he said lightly,
"that fear alone would keep them obedient."
Dodoria shifted uneasily.
"Lord Frieza… the Saiyans are still loyal. Their numbers... "
Frieza's finger tapped the arm of his throne.
"Numbers," he echoed.
"Are meaningless when a species learns how to surpass its cage."
The room dimmed as Frieza rose.
"Send the order," he said softly.
"Operation: Extinction."
Zarbon stiffened.
"At once, my lord."
Frieza floated toward the viewport, tail swaying like a blade.
"Kings who dream," he murmured,
"must be reminded why gods exist."
POV. PLANET VEGETA, BARDOCK'S SQUAD QUARTERS
Bardock woke up screaming.
Not from pain.
From certainty.
His visions had always been fragments ghosts of fire and blood. This time, it was clear. Too clear.
The sky burning.
The planet cracking.
Frieza's silhouette against a dying sun.
Bardock bolted upright.
"It's tonight."
Gine grabbed his arm.
"Bardock, what's wrong?"
"Get our son ," he snapped. "Now."
He didn't wait for questions.
Within hours, whispers spread like wildfire.
Scouters crackled with intercepted transmissions, Frieza's fleet mobilizing. Not patrol numbers or suppression.
Annihilation numbers.
Bardock stood atop a war platform overlooking the lower districts, blood-red moonlight bathing his armor.
Saiyans gathered, low-class, mid-class, elites who'd grown tired of kneeling.
"You've all felt it," Bardock roared.
"The leash tightening. The lies."
Murmurs turned into snarls.
"Frieza isn't coming to punish us," Bardock continued.
"He's coming to erase us completely ."
Silence.
Then a voice shouted,
"Then we fight!"
Bardock slammed his fist into his chest.
"We fight," he agreed.
"Not as savage dogs but as Saiyans."
Above them, the artificial moon projectors ignited.
The sky turned crimson.
POV. PLANET VEGETA, GLOBAL
Tails lashed.
Bones cracked.
Roars tore the atmosphere apart.
One by one, then in waves, Saiyans transformed.
Great Apes rose across the planet, towering titans of muscle and fury. Power levels spiked catastrophically.
Ten thousand.
Twenty thousand.
Two hundred thousand.
Over sixty percent of the Saiyan population answered the call.
The planet shook beneath their feet.
King Vegeta watched from the palace balcony, face pale.
"Idiots," he whispered.
"You still don't understand what you've provoked."
POV ORBIT ABOVE PLANET VEGETA
Frieza's fleet arrived.
Hundreds of ships blotted out the stars.
The first volley came down like judgment, energy barrages ripping into Great Apes, vaporizing cities, boiling seas.
The Saiyans answered.
Apes leapt into the sky, hurling ki blasts the size of mountains. Dozens of Frieza Force ships detonated in fireballs.
For a terrifying moment,
It looked like hope.
Bardock, transformed, tore through a battlecruiser with his bare hands, roaring defiance into the void.
Power level 330 000
"COME DOWN HERE, FRIEZA!"
....
Frieza did.
He descended slowly, casually, hands behind his back.
The battlefield went quiet.
Even the Great Apes hesitated.
Frieza looked… small.
And then he released a fraction of his power.
The air collapsed.
Dozens of Great Apes were crushed flat mid-roar, their bones pulverized by invisible pressure.
Frieza sighed.
"You see?" he said gently.
"All this noise… for nothing."
Bardock still charged.
So did thousands of surviving saiyans .
Ki beams converged on Frieza in a blinding spear of light.
The explosion was apocalyptic.
When the smoke cleared,
Frieza was still there.
Unscathed.
He raised one finger.
A single energy wave carved through the battlefield, bisecting Great Apes, vaporizing elites, turning mountains into glass.
"You disappoint me monkeys ," Frieza said, voice cold now.
"I gave you strength. I gave you purpose."
His eyes hardened.
"And you dared imagine freedom."
POV. BARDOCK
Bardock reverted mid-air, body broken, armor shattered.
He floated, barely conscious, staring at Frieza.
"My son…" Bardock rasped.
"Will stop you one day …"
Frieza paused.
Then he smiled.
Above them, Frieza raised his hand.
A sphere of energy formed—small, radiant, inevitable.
The planet trembled in terror.
"Sleep now filthy ," Frieza whispered.
"Your story ends here."
The sphere fell.
POV — SPACE
Planet Vegeta screamed.
Then it was gone.
A sun now exists where a world had been.
Frieza watched the explosion reflect in his eyes.
"Clean," he said, satisfied.
"Efficient."
POV — HIGH ORBIT, DYING SKY
Bardock was still conscious.
That alone was a miracle.
His body floated in the vacuum just above the atmosphere, armor shattered, one arm hanging useless, blood drifting away in frozen red motes. Below him, Planet Vegeta burned, cracks of molten light spider-webbing across its surface as Frieza's death sphere descended.
The screams had already stopped.
Saiyans were proud creatures. They didn't beg. They didn't whimper.
They fought until there was nothing left to give.
Bardock coughed, blood bubbling at his lips despite the vacuum, his body stubbornly refusing to die quietly.
"Heh… figures…"
His scouter cracked, flickering and still clung to his face.
Static filled his vision.
Bardock laughed softly.
"So that's it…"
With trembling fingers, he tapped the scouter's side panel.
A hidden function activated, one he'd modified himself after years of paranoia and bad dreams. A compressed burst transmission. One shot only. No reply possible.
Target: Infant Deployment Pod #K-337
Designation: Kakarot
His son.
Bardock swallowed, throat burning..
"Damn it… I never planned on being the sentimental type, but gine rubbed off on me. ."
The planet shook again Frieza's attack tearing through its core.
Time was gone.
Bardock leaned closer to the scouter, forcing his voice to stay steady.
SCOUTER RECORDING, ENCRYPTED
"Kakarot… if you're hearing this, then I was right."
Static crackled, but the image held.
"Listen to me carefully. You don't know me yet. Hell, I didn't know you either. But that doesn't change what comes next."
A distant explosion flared beneath him, lighting his scarred face.
"The one who destroyed our world, the one who ruled us, he's not a god. He just wants you to think he is."
Bardock clenched his fist.
"Don't hate him blindly. Don't rush toward revenge. Live. Grow. Learn how strong you can become."
His voice cracked for the first time.
"Saiyans aren't meant to kneel forever."
Transmission window collapsing.
"You might grow up alone. You might feel like you don't belong anywhere."
Bardock smirked faintly.
"That's fine. You were never meant to belong."
"Surpass us. Surpass me. And when you finally face the truth of what you are, "
He paused.
Then spoke with absolute certainty.
".. make the universe answer for what it did to us."
The scouter flashed red.
"Live, my son."
END RECORDING
POV. BARDOCK
The transmission ended.
Bardock exhaled slowly.
"Good…"
He turned toward the descending sphere of annihilation, toward Frieza, watching from a distance with detached interest.
Bardock forced his broken body upright.
"HEY!"
His shout echoed through the void, raw and furious.
"THIS ISN'T OVER!"
Frieza's eyes narrowed slightly.
Bardock gathered every last scrap of ki left in his body every ounce of rage, defiance, and pride.
A small blast formed in his palm.
Pathetic compared to what loomed above.
But it wasn't about power.
He hurled it anyway.
The blast struck Frieza's barrier and vanished without effect.
Frieza tilted his head.
"Still struggling?" he said coolly.
"How very Saiyan of you."
Bardock grinned through blood.
"Damn right you piece of shit."
The death sphere struck.
Light devoured everything.
POV. SPACE, FAR AWAY
A small pod drifted silently through the void.
Inside, an infant slept, unaware of fire, unaware of loss.
The scouter mounted beside the pod crackled.
A soft beep sounded.
Then Bardock's voice filled the pod, low and steady.
The child stirred.
Somewhere deep inside him, something listened.
Elsewhere..
Frieza turned away from the explosion, already bored.
Behind him, the universe quietly disagreed.
More Saiyan children lived.
One on a distant world, carrying a father's final truth.
Another beyond reality itself, who would one day learn what had been lost.
And Frieza,
For the first time in his long life,
felt the faintest chill run down his spine.