Chapter Three: An Unfriendly Reunion

Grover suddenly froze in his tracks, an expression of terror appearing on his face.

"What is it, Grover?" asked Kendra.

"Uhhh… nothing," he replied nervously. "I'll be… right back."

Grover took off in the opposite direction. When he'd tracked their footsteps completely, he immediately got on all fours, scanning the sand frantically looking for the gun he'd left behind. As he ran his hands through the sand, a shadow loomed over him.

"Looking for this?"

Before Grover could say any words of thanks, he got a glimpse of the benefactor's face. He froze up in terror, unable to get any words out. The benefactor held Grover's gun in his hand and was staring down at him with immense contempt in his eyes. And Grover knew why. He'd met this individual once before. Aboard their old mothership, he'd made eye contact with this person as they walked past each other to confront their enemies. Grover had heard from X all too many times about how powerful this person had been in their fight, and these horror stories were, in Grover's view, about to come to life.

"Care to tell me what you're doing here… Xilian?"

With no intent of keeping his cover, Grover let out a terrified yell and turned tail and ran, stumbling over his own limbs trying to get up out of the sand.

"Hear that, Zan?" Milo asked him.

"Yep," replied Zan. "That's a Grover's cry of distress. Remind me to never let him out of my sight again."

The five Xilians simultaneously ran back in Grover's direction. It wasn't long before they ran into him. Or rather, he ran into them, knocking X over in a terrified frenzy.

"X! Oh, thank Eywa! It's... it's…" Grover struggled to get the words out of his mouth.

"It's who, Grover? What are you talking about?" X asked his crazed friend.

"It's… it's HIM!" Grover finally managed, pointing in the direction that he'd come.

Sure enough, Shinchi Ozaki stood several feet away, wearing swim-trunks and holding in his hand Grover's misplaced gun. A short distance behind him was Miyuki Otonashi, looking very much pregnant and with an irate expression on her face.

"Back for more, are you?" Ozaki asked his old enemies.

X's lip curled at the sight of his brother; the very same brother who'd beaten him senseless aboard his own ship. Ozaki stared back at X with equal contempt. The Earth's rejuvenation process had taken years, and now the root causes of the need for rejuvenation were standing before him. Despite his usual forgiving nature, Ozaki now had an overwhelming desire to punch his twin brother's teeth in. X had an equally overwhelming desire. The brothers took an additional step closer towards each other. Now they were arm's distance away from each other. Miyuki was backing away now, but Kendra, Zan, Milo and, to a lesser extent, Grover were standing close behind X, ready to back him up.

A small smirk appeared on Ozaki's face, as he stood face-to-face with X; a smirk that said, "Go ahead and throw the first punch. You'll only be proving me right." X was two seconds from doing as such when Kendra laid a hand on his shoulder. He looked back and could tell from her eyes what she was trying to communicate. His fists, which were originally clenched to the point of bursting his veins, began to loosen. As he turned to face Ozaki again, he found himself met with an unexpected fist to the face. X stumbled back and fell on his rear in the rough sand, looking up at Ozaki, who was retracting his fist. That was the last straw. The four Xilians took off like lightning at Ozaki. Ozaki braced himself for impact, his Kaiser instincts sharp as knives.

Zan charged him from the left, preparing a full roundhouse kick. Ozaki grabbed him by the leg with one hand and delivered a powerful right hook with the other. Zan fell onto the sand, dazed. Ozaki was quick to turn 90 degrees to face Milo, who had his right fist at the ready. Ozaki parried his fist and grabbed Milo's arm. With a swift movement, he judo flipped Milo on his back into the sand. He now had Kendra coming at him with a thin katana she'd concealed in her bag. She swung the blade at Ozaki's neck with expert precision. At the last minute, Ozaki performed a Matrix move and the sword passed over him, barely clipping his chest. Taking advantage of Kendra's open sword arm, he grabbed her by the wrist and swung her toward his right. Sure enough, Grover was making a swift move from Ozaki's right, not expecting to be body checked by Kendra via Ozaki. They rolled across the sand, coming to a stop on top of each other. Grover's face was as red as a tomato as Kendra swiftly shoved him off of her.

Ozaki was too busy admiring his handiwork at the Xilians picking themselves up off the ground to see his infuriated brother fire a bolt of Kaiser lightning from his hand. It struck Ozaki in the chest and knocked him head over heels across the sand. Miyuki let out a small gasp as X leapt into the air at Ozaki, another bolt of lighting ready in his hand. Ozaki was now forming his own energy attack in his hand and the two brothers' attacks were on the verge of colliding.

"ENOUGH!"

A thundering voice knocked X and Ozaki off their feet, canceling out their attacks. They slowly rose off the sand to see Sam approaching them with an extremely angry expression on his face.

"HAVE YOU BOTH LOST YOUR MINDS? ENGAGING IN COMBAT WITHOUT EVEN THE SLIGHTEST EXCHANGE OF WORDS?"

"What is there to say, dad?" X asked. "This asshole hit me first!"

"Oh I'm sorry. Did we lose track of the fact that YOU destroyed our entire civilization?" Ozaki retorted angrily.

"Man, you earthlings sure know how to hold a grudge…" X muttered.

Ozaki furiously tackled X to the ground, making haphazard attempts at throttling him. Sam snapped his fingers and a small burst of energy separated X and Ozaki.

"If you two are just going to fight, I see no reason for us vacationing here any longer!" thundered Sam.

"Wait… VACATION?" Ozaki asked in shock. "You mean you're not with them?"

"Yes. Vacation. Nothing more," Sam replied. "Peace reigns on our planet, so we took some time off. And what do you mean, with them?"

Ozaki looked disdainfully towards the city. A large hulking spaceship loomed over Tokyo, Japan.