Zombo groaned as he woke up from his nap on the cold crystal floor of Kerrosite IV. His lanky, ivory limbs scrambled on the floor until his twined tendril fingers found purchase and he managed to pull his sloping form into a somewhat stable position.

"Let's see..." Zombo glanced between his wrists. On one was a bright metal bracer with two large buttons facing him, one flashing green, the other sitting at a dull red. There was a clear orb mounted on it, and inside that, a green ring that swirled eternally in place. On his other was a dull, scratched-up device with a single large screen and a keypad beside it.

He pushed a few buttons on the latter and the screen lit up with the image of a five-strong group of Saiyans. "Just five..." He chuckled to himself. They were close, standing on one of the many crystalline satellites that orbited Kerrosite IV. The nebula shielded him from view, but he knew all too well that they'd be able to sense him soon enough – that's why he'd timed his nap.

His eyes flicked to a large, vibrating device embedded into the floor. It made a beeping noise, then shot out a perfect purple sphere. He rushed over, grabbed it, and hit the flashing green button on his wrist.

"We will return for his body before long." Yarro's steady voice assured the four Saiyans that walked around her. Their eyes were scanning their surroundings while they adjusted to the micro-gravity of the satellite beneath their feet. "This villain has showed us one of his cards, and so we know he must be here."

"And that means we'll get to drag him home in chains." Mizna nodded, as he hopped off of the asteroid and towards one of the many orbs that filled the crystalline sea. "I don't know how the bastard knew Kewka would hop through that valley, much less time his energy wave so long beforehand, but you know what he's not too clever for? The Yarro Sq-" His feet touched the orb.

It exploded, sending shards of shrapnel and energy tearing through his body. He whimpered as he floated in space, barely alive, barely for a few moments longer. "Y-Yarro." He held out his hand to the woman, who floated over and took it in hers. "M...make sure...w-we win." Golden energy sparked between their hands, and he was dead.

Zombo laughed at his screen and hurriedly wiped off his saliva.

A third Saiyan was dead, and Zombo thought that he'd done rather well with that one. The delayed energy blast had been a stroke of genius, if he said so himself, and an excellent way to take down the first of them. The second, the inconspicuous bomb placed just right, had been just as clever, but they'd seemed to stop thinking that prancing around was an acceptable way to challenge him. So, he'd had to get even more cleverer.

And the simplest way to keep them off guard? Make even the safe floors dangerous. A couple of resets, a handful of well-placed cracks, and the last of them had been caught up in a wave of molten carbon that just about fried their brain on hit! The goodbyes never got any funnier, at least to Zombo.

But, he hadn't quite figured out how to take out another when the remaining three landed on Kerrosite IV and charged at him. They were faster, of course, the female with the tied-up hair apparently the fastest, but she'd only got halfway across the asteroid by the time he'd hit the button.

The problem with being a persecuted genius was that they tended to send competent people after him. That was obviously why he'd been caught so many times before, but with his gift, he got to be as clever as he wanted without anybody to tell him different. He had all the time in the world to be smart, and he decided to make good use of it, by taking advantage of the uncontrollable factor known as luck.

Or, uncontrollable to anybody but Zombo. A few drones, every time, and he'd watch the ensuing fight every time. Three Saiyans, more robots. A slight adjustment to their flight pattern, the replacement of a motor or two, and soon enough...he had it. Another one of the girls, dashing at just the right moment as Yarro sent out a beam of emerald energy, just powerful enough to tear through the drones...and the girl's ribs.

Another one defeated! Zombo couldn't help but holler at his own predictive ability, the fear that must have been running through their minds. But, they pushed on. The deaths of their comrades seemed to make them that much more motivated – judging by how the stone-faced female almost reached him on this iteration. But, she couldn't outrun time.

The second-to-last Saiyan was proving especially difficult. He was too tough for the drones, too aware for friendly fire, and too wily to step on anything that had even a slight chance of exploding. Zombo rattled his brain over and over again, until he realized something – a cut this Saiyan had received in the last drone battle, treated with some medigel. That was the key.

Zombo just had to be quick about it, in one of the mourning sessions, have one of his drones slip by and swap the medigel for a poison he'd printed. It was marvelous, he thought, as he watched the second-in-command be unable to punch or dodge his way out of a slow death. There he was, on the screen, growing more and more weary, until his legs could barely keep him up.

And then he'd died, with the same sad scene Zombo had seen a thousand – at least a thousand – times before. A sad farewell, a promise to defeat him, holding hands...frankly, he was sick of it, but this last one? She wouldn't get a mourning. There'd be nobody to do it for her!

Yarro flexed her fingers as she finally pinpointed Zombo's location. The deaths of her allies, her friends, had left her body rife with fury. But, she could control it. She knew she could. For the sake of all of the people who'd just suffered, for all of those who'd suffered at Zombo's hands, she was going to remain...calm wasn't the right word. Perhaps tranquil suited her better.

She soared towards Zombo. He was already laughing as she appeared on Kerrosite IV. He stopped in the fraction of a second it took for her to dart across the room, wrap her hand around his throat, and heft him overhead. He flailed his limbs around, apparently attempting to grab at the device on his left wrist. But golden sparks were already coming from where her fingers dug into his blubber-like throat.

"Hello, Zombo." Yarro's voice remained level as she met his eyes, and his limbs started to become limp. "My name is Yarro. The Heroes of Justice are here, and you are under arrest for crimes against galactic peace. I suggest you stop struggling, because my friends are dead and all that separates you from them is my mercy."

"H-How..." Zombo wheezed, as he ceased what little resistance his gangly body was putting up. "Y-You were...not this fast..."

"When I arrived? No." Yarro finished for the croaking creature. "You are not the only one capable of genius, Zombo. You may know where my friends would stand, how they would fight, but you seem to lack creativity. I'll spare you the details, but I've been perfecting a technique to drain power. I'd planned to use it on villains like you, but me and my comrades had a pact. If they were to die before me, they would lend me their power."

"Wh-What…!" Zombo's mind flashed back to the golden sparks that had came as Yarro mourned her allies, and had just came to be as she gripped his throat.

"The Yarro Squad is dead." Yarro was as still as a statue as she spoke, with Zombo held overhead while she floated in what was once his center of operations. But even as she said the words, Zombo could feel his bones tremble in the wake of her rising power "Long live The Yarro Squad."

"P-Please..." Zombo breathed. "Don't...kill me..."

"I won't." Yarro said. "There are things I need to figure out. You don't have the resources here for manufacturing the weapons you brought against us. A single industrial printer would take weeks to print that many drones, days for bombs like the ones you used, and resources to go with them. You could not have known we would come here, approach how we did, and pick us off with tools you did not know you would need."

"Please..."

"So there is something else going on here. When I walked into this room, you reached for this device on your left arm. I don't recognize it." She pulled her eyes down to the device that hanged on Zombo's limp arm. "It's obviously not the same technology as you're used to. You use cheap, industrial tools, but this looks new. It has something to do with ki, which you don't have much of." A single golden spark fell to the ground, and Zombo briefly faded from consciousness.

"So, it's a tool. And this ki is…inside the device. This ring?" She paused as her mind flicked through options. "It's not a bomb. It's not a weapon. A very simple interface..." She let her eyes go back to Zombo's blinking black ones. "Somebody gave this to you. Something powerful enough to turn a criminal with a low manner of cunning into a threat enough to kill my squad."

"It's...it's..." Zombo strangled. "Promise me you'll let me live."

"No."

"Please...it...it resets time." Zombo explained. "Like an alarm. I set it, with the green one, and press the green one to go back. The red one stops where you've set the alarm. Please..."

Yarro considered this, how this ability might have helped Zombo overcome her squad, and nodded slowly. "And your state is continuous despite the reset. Else you would lose your knowledge."

"Y-Yes..." Zombo wheezed.

Yarro nodded and planted her other hand on Zombo's chest. Gold rings formed tightly around all of his limbs, holding them place while he fell paralyzed to the ground. She knelt beside him and pushed two fingers against the flashing green button.

Yarro was standing beside The Yarro Squad, having just approached the vicinity of Kerrosite IV. She smiled as she looked over her squad, who noticed her smiling and smiled back. It was at that point that their eyes suddenly widened.

"Whoa, Yarro." Mizna said. "What just happened to your power level?" He asked, his eyes snapping to the other members of the squad to see if they could sense what he was sensing. "That's...that can't be right, right?" He asked.

"It is." Yarro said. Despite her most concentrated efforts, she couldn't keep the smile off of her face. "Follow me. I know where Zombo is." She said, and, without another word, flew straight to Kerrosite IV. Her squad arrived a few seconds after, to find Zombo tied up in golden rings on the ground, asleep. She was waiting for them to say something when she realized that Zombo was no longer breathing, her allies were frozen in place, and she couldn't hear anything. Then she sensed new people in the area.

"You know, we don't get many recruits like this." Said a young man in a long black coat, an easy smile on his lips. Behind him was a short pink woman, in unusual clothes, bending over to pluck the green ring out of Zombo's device. "Normally, we're the first ones on the scene – especially when it comes to artifacts like the Time Rings. I'm surprised you managed to solve it by yourself. Surprised and happy." He laughed. "Anyway, uh. Would you like to join us?"

Yarro's eyebrow quirked. "Who are you?"

"Well..."