This was it.

Vegeta's gaze was bored, but Daikon felt so full of energy he was nearly lightheaded. He'd realized that he didn't much care whether Vegeta let him back in to Capsule Corp or not. It would be nice, in a vague, not-have-to-sleep-on-the-floor kind of way, but it was a secondary concern.

This man had insulted his mother. His dead mother. That should be enough to explain the heat boiling through his veins, the need to fight, but it didn't. Not entirely. All his life he'd been defined as a Saiyan, a halfer born of filthy lust, and that's what he'd always thought of himself as.

But during the months he'd spent with Vegeta, and then the weeks with Krillin and 18, he'd learned more about Saiyans than he'd known in his whole life. He'd realized one night, staring out at the sunset with Krillin and 18 as they told him stories about the Saiyans they knew and carefully did not talk to each other, that he was nothing like any of these Saiyans, either the ones from planet Vegeta or the ones who'd grown up on Earth. They were all brave, and bloodthirsty, and passionate. Proud. Nothing like him at all.

He was a Brenchian, through and through.

It was what he'd yearned for his whole childhood, and now there was nothing he wanted to be less. And he thought, facing down Vegeta's bored, sharp stare, that maybe what was making his blood boil was the chance to become something more. If he fought with bravery— passion— pride— maybe he could be more than a failed Brenchian, more than a Saiyan out of place. Maybe he could belong somewhere.

Maybe that place could be here.

Song watched the two men square off from an upper balcony, Bulma smoking a cigarette beside her.

"It's important to let them get this out of their system," she'd said when Daikon had landed on the front lawn and Vegeta had gone to meet him. Song had been ready to go down there and smack some sense into both of them, but Bulma had stopped her. "Saiyans say things better with their fists."

On the lawn below, Daikon looked like he was facing down a snake. Despite being nearly two feet taller than his opponent, it was clear who had the upper hand. Vegeta was standing in front of him with his arms crossed lazily over his chest, somehow managing to look down his nose at someone looming over him.

Song could tell this fight meant something, more than just Daikon asking in the most violent way possible to be let back in to Capsule Corp. She didn't know what the two of them had to say that couldn't be said with words, but whatever it was had Daikon looking more scared than angry. Something about his expression—determined but wary—made Song's stomach tie up in knots. If it were her, she would have stayed away. But he hadn't.

Daikon leapt forward, Vegeta tensed—and then they disappeared. Song gasped.

Bulma rolled her eyes and took a drag off her cigarette. "Typical."

The boy had improved much more than Vegeta had expected. His progress in the gravity room had gone slower than Vegeta liked, and he had concluded that the boy, though more powerful than his father and still gifted with Saiyan potential for improvement, was not in the same league as himself and Kakarot, or even (Vegeta gritted his teeth to admit it) Kakarot's son.

But here he was, making Vegeta break a sweat even though scant weeks before he'd been sparring with him one-handed to keep things interesting.

What had he and that android been doing?

Daikon was amazed at the excitement coursing through his body. He was already exhausted, but he was more pumped now than he had been at the beginning. Fighting 18 wasn't like this. Her sparring sessions were tough, but they were just practice, even when she took the kid gloves off and really hurt him. Maybe it was the lust for blood he could see in Vegeta's eyes—the prince would really kill him if he faltered, something 18 was always careful never to do.

He didn't know, but underneath the need to prove himself was an excitement to do so as well. Was this what it was like to be a Saiyan?

So far Daikon had been fighting Vegeta completely on strength and instinct alone, but as the battle escalated, and Vegeta drew out more and more of his own reserves, he knew the moment was soon coming where he would need to implement 18's plan or die.

Daikon elbowed Vegeta in the mouth, knocking the Saiyan back onto one knee. He was astonished to see blood trickling down the man's mouth. Vegeta brushed at it, holding the back of his hand out and frowning to see red on his white gloves. He glared murderously at Daikon, standing up straight. He yelled, cords of muscle standing out on his neck, and his hair flashed gold.

Daikon froze, certain he was about to die.

"Vegeta is one of the finest tacticians I've ever met," 18 said, as Daikon tried to catch his breath. They were done sparring, and there was only one thing left to do before turning in for the night. She often did this, talking to distract him from what was coming. "But he forgets himself completely when he gets angry. Luckily for you, this is easy to accomplish."

"Yes, lucky," Daikon muttered, and 18 gave him a sharp glance.

"Yes," she repeated. "Look, you have no chance of beating him at all, but I'm trying to help you at least make an impression before you die. Here's what you do…"

Vegeta lowered his chin slightly, and Daikon unfroze. As the pure-blood Saiyan stood there roaring, Daikon tensed his body minutely, waiting for the right moment. Vegeta threw back his head and roared again, his aura climbing higher. At the moment when the roar ended, and just as the aura was diminishing back down to merely super-human and not godlike levels, Daikon phased out of sight and reappeared behind Vegeta, slamming his elbow as hard as he could into the Saiyan's back at a spot just above the base of his spine.

The reaction was instant and dramatic.

Vegeta gasped and fell to his knees, hair turning black again. He panted and choked, and Daikon, too unnerved, in the moment, to follow through with the second half of the plan, trembled and waited for his death.

"What the hell… did you do…?" the prince demanded between sobbing coughs of pain.

"Y-Your tail…" Daikon said faintly. "Weak point…"

Vegeta growled and spun around so fast the guttural sound barely had time to make it to Daikon's ears before he felt himself being slammed into a mountainside, the two of them having traveled miles away from Capsule Corp in fractions of a second. Vegeta had him pinned by his throat, his arm more unyielding than the rock he could feel crumbling behind him.

"Then why didn't you follow through and kill me?" he hissed.

Even if Vegeta hadn't been squeezing his throat Daikon wouldn't have been able to speak. He knew exactly why he had hesitated: his life had always been about taking a beating, not giving one. He was no Saiyan, and one measly fight wasn't going to change that. He looked into Vegeta's eyes, hoping he at least had what it took to die like a Saiyan, even if he couldn't live like one.

Vegeta gave him one last blow to the mid-section before releasing him and tossing him to the ground, taking to the skies without a word. Daikon lay where he had fallen and did not move for a long time.

He could still remember the first time he'd ever hurt his mother.

He felt ashamed of the way it was almost a fond memory, but it had signified so much. He'd been almost thirteen: limbs beginning to lengthen; voice deepening; power level rising almost daily. She'd been about to hit him for something, he couldn't remember why, just that it had been something trivial and that there hadn't even been much ire in her eyes. But he had reached up, almost in slow motion, and caught it.

The momentum of the blow meant that his unyielding hand had broken her wrist, and she'd had to use that week's paycheck for a time slot in a healing tank. She'd made him go hungry to make up for the loss, but he hardly noticed. All he could remember was the look in her eyes, something he'd never seen before or since.

It had looked a lot like respect.