Raditz couldn't believe his luck. No one was dead. He hadn't even blown the triclops apart when he slapped him on the back of the neck! His newfound power, and subsequent control, was frightening and fascinating all at the same time. But it made capturing his brother and nephew a hassle. Kakarot was a picture-perfect replication of their father. The same hairstyle, the same face, the same blasted scars. The only thing that Raditz didn't recognize purely as his father's was Kakarot's eyes… those softer eyes. They didn't belong with a prideful killer like Kakarot… or that was what he assumed. His brother's body was torn apart with scars, littering his face and arms. Raditz… paused for a moment. Was his brother… the last REAL representation of the Saiyans? Kakarot, from how it seemed, was a born warrior, no question. Whereas Raditz… allowed himself to grow soft. Why?
Vegeta. It was always something to do with Vegeta. The long-maned Saiyan quietly placed his brother and nephew within his pod, his signature scowl growing deeper by the second. The prince of their race, the one man proposed to be Super Saiyan, the one man with power that rivaled Zarbon and Dodoria when they were mere children, had changed him. Nappa tried his hand at bringing them up—the elderly Saiyan quickly turning his back on Raditz himself when he softened around others. It was not an attitude fitting for a soldier of the Planet Trade organization. He learned ever so quickly that despite Vegeta's hopes… you couldn't hold onto that innocence for long.
Yet, the Prince could. He spared anyone he was capable of, evacuated native races… it infuriated the lower class Saiyan. Raditz would be bringing Kakarot into a life of false hopes—to be softened by Vegeta until to be broken down into a killing machine by Frieza. No matter how many resistance groups they helped form or outs they tried to take, Raditz would always be a killer… and he accepted that. Why couldn't his comrades…?
His thoughts were interrupted by… great. The earthlings again. A citrus-colored short one, and… a tall green man. Wonderful. If he wanted a fruit salad, he would have stopped by Frieza Planet 79. As the pair landed, a small, chalk-white earthling landed beside the two—it was the triclops' companion from earlier. Though, he remembered beating the midget to a pulp… Raditz supposed it didn't matter now. As the three earthling warriors lined up, he noticed the green man's eye twitch. Was it… fear? He suspected as much. With all three warriors seemingly prepared, Raditz began to speak.
"So. Come to retrieve Kakarot, have you." Krillin's brows raised as their foe spoke.
"Kakarot? Who—" The turtle hermit student was cut off by Harp, the lean green fighting machine taking a solitary step forward.
"Yes. We're here for Goku. So I'd suggest you step away from them before things get ugly." Raditz couldn't help but chuckle at their threats. For the one step Harp took… Raditz took none. Instead, he proceeded to vanish, only to appear behind the three, throwing a swift kick toward their backs.
And just like that, the warriors were laid flat upon the grass, with the exception of Chiaotzu who had rebounded off of the pod. Wind quietly blew over the unconscious bodies. Was… that it? The earthlings had just… keeled over so easily. It was… pathetic. Enraging. And his brother was amongst them.
Then it clicked. The reason why they had lived so long. It was Kakarot. He let them live. Was it pity? Hunger for a battle? Simply to have subjects to rule over, like some king?
Like Vegeta?
Raditz snapped to face his brother in the pod, his boots crunching the sand beneath them as the lanky low-class stomped toward his pod. His brother, his flesh and blood, was like the Prince. So what if he was prideful like a true Saiyan? It exhibited the same, sickening mercy that had earned him beatings from Zarbon and Dodoria, the same mercy the Prince instilled in him, the same mercy that resulted in the death of those he once tried to save. No. He wouldn't have it. With the press of a button, his pod quietly opened. His brother lay slumped over his son, unconsciously protecting the boy. If his brother was polluted with the earth's weakness, their Prince infecting all he could contact with faulty ideals, and the once other similar to Raditz refraining from talking to him… then it seemed he'd need to take things into his own hands. Raditz cast his brother aside, the younger Saiyan's body falling atop the others that had come to rescue him.
"You want Kakarot so badly? Take him. I don't intend on following orders anymore."
His nephew was the perfect Saiyan. A hybrid, sure… but a blank slate. No influence from Frieza. No Prince, or faulty example of a father to dilute him. Just… Raditz.
"You and I are going to have a wonderful future together… apprentice." The doors quietly closed, giving way for the spherical vessel to rise into the air, promptly vanishing within a blanket of clouds. And as the Saiyan son of earth slowly awoke atop the unconscious bodies of his allies and looked up toward the sky, he felt something… odd. Like a presence, a heavy weight had been lifted.
Elsewhere in the ever-expanding vastness of the universe, a small, pink god loses her temper at a lavender-haired boy for yet another consequence of his time-altering shenanigans.