Gone Native : The Unstoppable Force (ch. 23) (Patreon)

It was impossible to tell who moved first between me and Superman. It wouldn't be wrong to say that we moved at the same exact time rather than one reacting to the other. However, while it was impossible to tell who instigated the clash, the entire planet felt it in the sonic boom that traveled across the globe, the impact of our knuckle colliding as we threw mirroring punches.

Superman frowned ever so slightly, instantly recognizing that I was stronger compared to our last clash. In terms of raw physical power, from that single blow, I would say we were near equals. The biggest gap was durability -- because when he pulled back his fist, I saw my blood on his knuckles, my skin splitting on his fist. But that didn't matter.

Rushing forward, I slammed into him, giving Superman my complete and undivided attention as we fought in earnest for the first time. I trusted Broly to have my back. It wouldn't matter how outnumbered he might be -- he would win. Superman's blue eyes narrowed, accepting the invitation for a one-on-one confrontation as we flew up and away, leaving the battle that raged behind us to fight our own.

"Was it them?" I asked him as we clashed, catching a blow with my forearm as I countered, slugging Superman in the face hard enough that his head snapped to the side, sending him flying back through half a hundred trees before he righted himself, just in time to block a kick.

"What?" Superman asked me, his fist traveling through my golden hair as I ducked under a retaliatory blow, only to get hit by the other, catching me in the cheek. I felt every tooth in my jaw rattle in place, making my gums bleed and filling my mouth with the taste of blood. It hurt, but it didn't knock me out. I remained in the fight, accepting the blow to kick him in the ribs hard enough that he bent around my leg. Though, it didn't stop him from lashing out with another fist, catching me in the stomach and returning the favor -- or, he would have if I hadn't cupped my hands to catch the punch, lessening its impact.

Using his hands as leverage, I twisted sharply, catching Superman in the side of the head with one of my legs and sending him straight into the ground. He carved a deep line through the trees sprinkled about in the neighborhood before he tore through several houses and reached the city, where he lifted himself up from the ground, but he continued flying back even after regaining control of himself, beckoning for me to give chase. I pressed the attack, once again clashing with him above the city of Gotham. "Was it the UN?"

His lips thinned and I saw the answer in his eyes. "Hm," I grunted, channeling my anger into my next punch, hitting him hard in the face, but he was ready for this one. His head didn't snap to the side like it had before, but he still clearly felt the force behind my blows. However, I did more damage to my wrist than I did to his face. That difference in durability couldn't be underestimated. "I have no issue with you, Superman. Stop protecting them and give them to me."

Superman lashed out, delivering a haymaker to the side of my head that, even with my forearm that was there to block it, didn't lessen the blow. I slammed through several buildings, offices of some sort, the feeble glass and metal shattering as I tore through it. A few buildings collapsed before Superman was upon me, lashing out with another fist. Something I noticed between him and his cousin -- Both Kryptonians favored fighting with their fists, either unaware or unwilling to seize the openings that could be taken with a good kick.

It made him predictable. I deftly dodged the attack, slamming my elbow into his nose, and he definitely felt that based on the grunt he let out. It might be a death of a thousand cuts, but I could hurt him now, even if I still hadn't made him bleed. Lashing out with my foot, I kicked him in his shielded S, sending him into a building that immediately began to collapse around him as he tore through its supports.

He emerged as a red and blue blur, slamming into me at great speed. "Those responsible have been punished," he told me, his tone grim. I clenched my teeth, delivering an uppercut to his chin, just as his fist caught me in the eye, snapping my head to the side. Blood dripped down from the torn skin on my eyebrow, getting into my eye, but I didn't care as I grabbed his wrist and slammed a fist down on his elbow, earning the first pained shout I'd heard from Superman.

"Not by me," I snapped at him, pressing the attack with a flurry of blows. He fought a bit different, I noticed as our fight carried us towards another city. Metropolis. We slammed through the LexCorp building, the same building that we had spoken on. It collapsed in a plume of dust, dust that was kept at bay by on the periphery of our fight from the force of our attacks.

"Never by you," Superman retorted, punching me in the gut, and this time I wasn't able to catch the blow and it knocked the air from my lungs. "You're emotional. You're lashing out."

A hollow laugh escaped me as I fought back, recovering easily by attacking at one of his knees with the intention of ripping it from its socket. "I've never been accused of being emotional," I noted. Just the opposite, usually. From others and myself.

Superman frowned, pausing in his attack, "You care about your people. I didn't see that before, but you do. It's not a bad thing, King Tarble. If anything, I respect you for it. But you know as well as I do that if we hand over the perpetrators, they won't receive justice. You'll just murder them and call it that. You need to be able to see the difference between Justice and Vengeance."

I let out a dismissive scoff, deciding to take up the offense if he wasn't willing to. "You're keeping my men's murderers away from me for my sake?" I questioned, not believing it for a second. "I would have thought you would be smart enough to come up with a better lie." I lashed out with punches and kicks, and for every one that he blocked, two more struck him. How much they hurt him was anyone's guess, but compared to our last bout, I was performing far better.

Superman didn't simply take the attacks either. For every attack that I landed on him, he returned it with full force. Each blow struck with bone-rattling force, striking me with the kind of overwhelming strength that I could only compare to Froot.

"Why are you fighting us?" Superman pressed, not answering the question. "Justice could have been done if you just waited. No one wants a war! And no one wants people in office that would commit war crimes," he snapped at me, catching me in the ribs at the same time I punched him in his throat. It was a good thing I had healed up, otherwise, that punch would have landed directly on my heart because of my previously broken ribs.

Clenching my jaw, I fought harder, not responding. I slammed a fist into Superman's face, only for him to accept the blow to deliver one of his own. In some ways, our styles of fighting were as similar as they were different. Every window in the ruined city of Metropolis shattered as the shockwave sent ripples through the air. I found myself flying back, slamming through buildings again, then a bridge, then miles of dirt from the sheer force of the blow.

He hadn't pulled that punch. He hit me with all his strength. And I was still alive.

The progress was tangible.

A hand went to the bone at my necklace, recalling the words that had been said to me by the Saiyan God. I had found my reason. But it was heavy. Almost too heavy. It felt like I was drowning, suffocating in the depths of space with no clue where to go or what to do. That reason, my reason, was the only reason I had bothered to leave planet Sadala. Otherwise, I would have been content to die there.

But there was an undeniable truth to Superman's words. A truth I had already realized. I was making mistakes. I was acting a fool. The first time I ever lost control of my emotions, I murdered my team. The second time, I executed Adonis. And now, I was fighting the forces of Earth for reasons that made every punch feel so incredibly light and inconsequential.

Why was I fighting? For vengeance? To repay the sacrifice of my men? To appear strong so my enemies wouldn't sense weakness? Or was I fighting because it was familiar? Because it was easier? Because it was fun?

"I miss the war," I admitted to myself, rising up from a mile of dirt and stone. Things made sense, then. I knew what I was supposed to do. I was good at it. It was never easy by any means, but it felt easier than being at peace. More purposeful. As I rose through the earth, I gazed down at the knucklebone threaded through my necklace. It weighed an incredible amount in my hand, feeling so heavy that I could barely bear to lift it.

My reason hadn't changed. It was still the same as it had been when I first clenched my fist around it.

Things would be different. That was my reason. To make things change. To change myself.

I wanted to have fun. I wanted to find something so funny that I couldn't breathe from laughter. I wanted to do something for the sake of doing it. I wanted… to enjoy myself. To rise above the war. To regain the pieces of myself I had to carve away.

So, with my reason in hand...

I had made a fist.

Taking in a deep breath, I centered myself. "Ahhh…." A low groan escaped me as I exhaled, clenching my hands into fists as I felt a stir in my aura. It strengthened, swelling in size and potency, welling up deep inside of me. It offered itself to me instead of forcing me to pull it up kicking and screaming. Almost as if something deep inside of me was clicking into place. Like setting an old broken bone. "Ahhhhhh…!"

I heard the crackling of electricity around me as my aura came alive, bringing forth the stench of ozone as it burned the air. It filled my nostrils as my power ripped up the ground, fluctuating and sparking. The clouds above began to stir, darkening as my power resonanted with them, and massive bolts of lightning began to strike the ground with thunderous force. Huge chunks of earth were ripped from the ground, my power acting as if it had become its own gravity well, crushing and destroying the earth that flew too close. Behind me, I felt the ocean begin to surge, only it wasn't because of Queen Mara or Weather Wizard.

My hair shifted, the golden locks drifting up, growing slightly based on the single lock that drifted between my eyes, heavy enough now to break free from the limits of Saiyan genetics. My muscles bulged, power surging through my veins, seeking an outlet, but I forced it to compress. I had forgotten so much of my last life, but I knew what this was.

"AHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!" A scream ripped itself from my throat as the transformation completed, my golden aura shimmering around me along with the crackles of electricity. I hadn't expected it. I had feared what the Guardians might have required for me to take another step on my path to reclaiming what had been taken from my race. The horror of becoming a Super Saiyan was indescribable.

However, now I stood as an Ascended Super Saiyan.

I opened my eyes to see Superman flying across from me, a worried frown on his face. "That transformation wasn't as violent as the first one," he told me, sounding oddly worried for me. I knew what he meant. The Super Saiyan transformation was… intense. It dragged up the moment you became a Super Saiyan in all of its horrible glory. As an Ascended Saiyan, it was… different.

Letting out a small breath, I nodded, "It is different," I admitted to him. If tragedy had been the catalyst for becoming a Super Saiyan, then becoming an Ascended Saiyan was reached through acceptance. To accept what had happened and not let it break you. It took the desire to move on, to move past the old wounds and their grip on you, to be truly realized. I met Superman's gaze, "Thank you for waiting."

"We don't have to fight, Tarble," Superman stated, revealing why he had waited. He still wanted to talk.

To that, I offered him a small, but genuine smile. He was as stubborn as he was hardheaded. "Perhaps not," I admitted to him, and that clearly caught him off guard. "But, we should finish this."

Something in my tone put him on edge -- his eyes narrowed in suspicion, a frown tugging at the edges of his lips. He sensed the change in me, but he couldn't put a finger on what it was. It was understandable. He barely knew me, and not even I really understood it.

The only way I could describe what had changed was… that I had been drowning for so long, and I hadn't even realized it. For the first time in weeks, I could take in a breath of air. The reason that I had found to continue on had felt like it was crushing me under its incredible weight, and finally it felt easier to bear. Still heavy, but it wasn't like I minded the challenge.

Ascending, I readied myself and waited for Superman to ready himself as well. Then I moved.

The distance between us shrank in a fraction of a second, giving Superman just enough time to widen his eyes before a fist slammed into his face. His head snapped to the side, his lip splitting, sending drops of blood flying out in a mist of bloody spittle.

For the first time, I made Superman bleed. He seemed shocked by the flash of pain in his face as he hit the ground, flying back to Metropolis in a blur every bit as fast as the one I had arrived here in. Our levels of strength had been comparable before, with him holding the edge when he didn't pull his punches.

But I hadn't been able to make up for the difference in durability. It had been rather arrogant of me to assume that I could defeat Superman as a Super Saiyan. I had underestimated him far too much. As an Ascended Super Saiyan, though?

Now I had a good reason to feel confident.

I took off after him, closing the distance in less than the blink of an eye. Superman looked up at me, looking slightly dazed. I kicked him in the stomach, and he proved that he still had his wits, or at least his instincts, about him, because he blocked the kick even as it sent him flying into the ground with enough force that it leveled every building for blocks in that direction. My hearing proved to have grown sharper because, even as the tons of glass, concrete, and metal fell, I heard Superman speaking.

"Might need a little help here. I don't think… I've ever been hit that hard," I heard Superman admit as he began to rise from where he fell. I waited for him to get back to his feet, my arms crossed as I took stock of the situation. My power had increased dramatically, surpassing what I had achieved stacking the Wrath State and the Super Saiyan multipliers. With them both, my base power was multiplied by sixty.

As an Ascended Super Saiyan, my base power appeared to have been multiplied by a hundred. Yet, I was already feeling the strain. I hadn't begun to master the Super Saiyan transformation, and the Ascended Super Saiyan was twice the multiplier it was. My body didn't feel like it was dying from being ripped apart from the inside out like it did when I combined the Wrath State, but there was a noticeable drain on my endurance.

I wasn't quite ready for this transformation. Not yet. But, for now, its awesome power was mine and I intended to use it.

Despite staggering from the blow, Superman rose up, blood dripping down his chin as he eyed me with newfound caution. The gap in power had shrunk considerably. Yet, even with this newfound power, Superman was still stronger than me. However, instead of the difference being some… two hundred million pl, it was a mere fifty million. At the heights we stood at, that fifty million might as well be a five pl difference. Noticeable, but far from insurmountable.

"Thanks for waiting," he said, wiping the blood from his chin before looking at it, as if he wasn't used to seeing his own blood. I can't imagine that he was. His durability couldn't be overstated. Planet busting attacks that would have killed Frieza simply broke on his chin. The fact that I had to become an Ascended Super Saiyan just to make him bleed was honestly astounding.

"Of course," I said, offering a small nod. "Shall we wait for your reinforcements?" I asked him, making his lips thin as he realized I had heard him. His eyes were unfocused -- he had all the signs of a concussion, his first one, I would imagine. I don't think he intended to say that out loud though.

His hands clenched as he squared his shoulders. He might not be used to pain, but he wouldn't allow it to stop him. Just like how I hadn't allowed it to stop me. "No, I'm ready to continue." he said, the tension swelling between us for a moment before we both exploded into action.

We clashed above the city, each time delivering attacks that discharged destructive force onto the city of Metropolis around us. The shockwaves forced the remaining buildings to lean away, tilting further and further under the constant bombardment of force. Until it simply became too much and the remaining buildings snapped, collapsing where they stood and going unnoticed by myself and Superman as we traded a barrage of blows. The Kryptoian held nothing back, I found, slipping underneath a punch and delivering a powerful blow to his ribs.

I think both of us were finding ourselves surprised by our limits -- him with never having explored his, and me with my newfound power. I slugged him in the face, snapping his head to the side, but he fought back just as hard with a punch that caught me in the chin. Mine was the cleaner of the blows, sending him back, opening up a hole in his guard that I exploited with a kick. He flew back, slamming into the water of the nearby ocean with explosive force, and I dove in right after him.

He was waiting for me beneath the water, preparing a punch that seemed to pull the sea within in its wake, and his knuckles slammed into my forearm as I quickly raised them to block. Retaliating with a kick at his knee, I revealed it to be a feint and returned the broken nose that he gave me. His head rocked back, blood drifting out his nostrils into the water, but no sooner had I hit him, he was counterattacking. The sea around us shifted and writhed, surging and falling in great tsunamis as we traded blows until we found ourselves fighting in a pocket of air beneath the waves, the force of our exchange keeping the water from approaching us at all.

Such was their intensity that the depths of the ocean were pushed back entirely, leaving us dry as we continued to sink lower and lower until I found myself standing on sand that hadn't ever seen the light of day. I reinforced it with my ki, making it stronger, strong enough to act as a foothold as I continued to clash with Superman.

Even as we fought, I felt his style changing, adapting to fight a foe that could actually hurt him. Before he had simply leveraged his durability to accept blows because doing so left his opponents open for him to hit them even harder. In his shoes, I wouldn't have done anything different. However, now, his durability had been overcome. I could make him bleed. I could feel his bones shifting under my hands and feet, just as I felt mine shifting under his. How he had fought before simply wouldn't work on me.

Yet, he wasn't able to adapt to me fast enough.

I drove a knee into his diaphragm, cupping my hands above my head, and slammed them down on the back of his neck as he bent forward to retch. He blasted through the reinforced sand and stone, tunneling through the crust of the earth. Without our fight to hold it at bay, the millions of tons of water raced down, washing over me before forming into a cyclone as it rushed to fill in the hole that Superman had carved out. He made his own hole, blasting forward when he righted himself and tackled me.

In an instant, we erupted out of the water into the sky above as he sent us both flying towards Wonder Woman. Grabbing Superman by the cape, I heaved him at her, using him as a shield to catch the sword that would have taken my head off. It just barely nicked Superman's skin. Flying across from them, I saw Wonder Woman's lips thin as she realized I was far more powerful than I had been in our previous fight -- a fight that she had lost.

I felt a flash of power, warning me of another attacker. My heart dropped when I saw who it was.

"Broly!" I shouted, a split second before Broly slammed into me, his eyes blazing yellow. I caught his punch, feeling the power of it. More than that, I felt the sensation of magic brush against my palm. My eyes narrowed into slits, realizing my mistake. Broly had always been so obscenely powerful, I had put too much faith in him, not considering that he might fall prey to more underhanded tactics.

It was a good plan. To turn my greatest ally into my enemy.

But just because I could recognize that it was a good plan didn't mean raw rage didn't flow through my veins as Broly incoherently screamed, his power increasing as he slipped deeper into the Wrath State, deeper than he had ever before. I had always feared that I wouldn't be able to stop him if he had ever reached Stage Ten. Even Stage Five was a danger.

A snarl found its way onto my face as I kicked Broly in the stomach, folding him around the blow before I sent him flying down into the ocean below. It wouldn't stop him for long, but it gave me enough time to glare at Superman and Wonder Woman -- both were puzzled by the turn of events, I saw that in their eyes.

Then they received an answer, making their expressions twist into a scowl as if they had bitten into something bitter. An unsavory method to win. To control Broly and use him against me.

My reason was clear. I still desired to change.

Yet, I was still who I was.

"Your weaknesses are well documented," I told Superman, and that proved to be his only warning before I formed a ki ball in my hand. I didn't know enough about Kryptonite to mimic it's radiation effects. Yet, I knew Kryptonians gained their power from a yellow sun. It was why their empire had expanded, then shrunk into a single planet that orbited a red sun. Where they were no stronger than the average human.

Kryptonite was beyond my knowledge and abilities.

Mimicking the properties of a red sun was a simple matter.

The red ball of ki left my hand, tossed high into the sky. The effects that it had on Superman were immediate. I almost didn't know how to describe how his power just bled away -- in a split second, the fifty million lead he had on me in raw power vanished into nothing, then turned into a fifty million lead in my favor. A single second, and he lost a hundred million pl. And the drop in strength showed no signs of slowing as Superman cried out in pain, wilting in the face of the red sun I created, and falling from the sky.

I didn't like it. When I defeated Superman, I wanted it to be because I was his better. This wasn't how I wanted to conclude our fight, but I cared more about Broly than I did my satisfaction..

Superman would have fallen right out of the sky if Wonder Woman hadn't caught him. His strength dwindled by the millisecond, bleeding power as if he was hemorrhaging blood. She met my gaze, alarm in her eyes.

"Release Broly of your control," I ordered, no hesitation or a single thought of mercy in my words. The fact that Broly hadn't already attacked told me that he was under their control. I could feel him fighting an imaginary foe in the ocean below. He lacked an Nth metal necklace. If he drowned down there… power or not, Broly still needed to breathe.

Wonder Woman's eyes flashed for a moment, "Cease your attacks on Earth," she bartered, using the hand that she had against me. It was a prudent move. I respected her for it. It was one thing to be good natured, and another thing entirely to let good nature get in the way of good sense.

To answer her, I raised a hand above my head and gathered my ki. A ball of light condensed above, growing larger by the second. It punched through the heavy storm clouds above, carving a path as into the stratosphere I pushed it higher and higher up so it wouldn't be affected by gravity as much. All the while, it grew larger and larger by the second, dominating the sky as it surpassed the moon in sheer size.

"I'm not going to ask again," I told her. There would be no compromise. Not when it came to Broly. I would destroy this planet and every one on it in a second if it meant he was unharmed.

"You wouldn't," Wonder Woman accused, thinking I was bluffing. "You value life too much for an action so cruel." she said, proving just how much her opinion had changed on me. The Justice League had formed out of fear of me and what I would do. Now, she was accusing me of lying that I would destroy the planet Earth if Broly wasn't freed.

I met her gaze evenly, "Are you willing to bet Earth on that?" I asked her, my voice cold. "Humanity is in a parallel dimension for safety, but it will become humanity's home if I destroy the planet." I pointed out as Superman weakly met my gaze, searching it. I had dropped the red light, but his strength was slow to return.

There was a beat of silence, two wills clashing against each other. They didn't budge.

So, neither did I.

With a simple gesture, I dropped my arm and the massive ki ball above began to fall. It would completely annihilate the planet, leaving only a precious few that could possibly survive the blast. Myself and Broly among them, which was all I cared about at the moment. Wonder Woman appeared horrified as she watched the dark blue ball of light fall from the sky, pushing aside the clouds as it shone brighter than the sun.

Superman had a different reaction. He flew under his own power, breaking away from Wonder Woman, and without a word he flew upwards. I watched him go as he raced to the ki ball, reaching it in a second before he placed his hands against its surface and began to push. He fought against its weight and gravity while I merely watched him fight against it in his weakened state. He slowed the immense ki ball quickly… then it stopped falling all together.

Then he began to lift it. Single handedly, Superman pushed back the attack that would have obliterated the Earth, taking it back into the depths of space, his burden easing the further away he got from Earth's gravity. Both of them sailed past the moon…

Then Superman chose to detonate the ki ball. Without air to transfer the explosive surge of energy, he alone took the brunt of it as the sky became pure light. I heard Wonder Woman gasp, worried for him. She shouldn't be. It would take far more than that to kill Superman.

Take him out if the fight, however? That's what I was counting on.

I felt him get blasted back, sending him towards Earth and that was when I made my move. I raced towards him, seizing the opportunity while I had the chance. I could feel how injured Superman was, but the fact that he was still here told me something important. In the blink of an eye, I was before Superman's wounded form -- his skin burnt, his clothing reduced to ash, while he bled profusely from a number of cuts.

Placing a hand on his chest, I took him down to Earth's atmosphere-

And then I was somewhere else. A clinical looking room with a number of humans inside of it, standing on a circle that's glow dimmed with our arrival. There was a beat of silence as I took in my surroundings -- I noted the medical beds on standby, the team of medics that froze in place the moment they saw Superman hadn't arrived alone.

Slowly, I turned my gaze to the man that stood directly across from me. Tall with a solid build, clean shaven from his jaw to his head, and his deep blue eyes met mine. There was no panic there. Only defeat as he realized that this was my victory.

I was within humanity's safe haven while their protectors were outside of it. The entire species was completely at my nonexistent mercy.

"Shit," Lex Luthor spoke, summarizing his position rather nicely.

"Indeed," I agreed, tossing Superman to the medics as I strode forward, my gaze never leaving his.

He held up his hands, a slow and deliberate motion, and in a calm voice, as if nothing was wrong, he spoke.

"Then as the President of the United Nations of Earth… I offer humanity's surrender."