He floated, weightless, under a clear blue sky. Seagulls and sand whipped around him, gently propelled by the softest of breezes. In his arms was a bundle, wrapped in a deep red cape.

Vegeta had rallied the others, gathering everyone from Piccolo to Yamcha at Master Roshi's house, and told them all to be ready for the fight of their lives. Or, more likely, their deaths. From Kami's Lookout the Z-fighters had seen the battle between Goku and Superman. They had seen how massively, impossibly outmatched he had been. They had stared, transfixed with shock, as the Man of Steel had walked, nay strolled, through the Saiyan's strongest attack. They had watched, with horror and dread, as twin bolts of fire bore through his skull, and they'd all known what had happened. Their comrade, their idol, their friend had been killed. And his killer was right here, floating above their heads, the body of his victim in his hands.

Vegeta looked up at the man in the sky, his hands clenched into fists and his whole body shaking. With the sun to his back, Superman cast a shadow on the entire island. His face cloaked in darkness, Vegeta couldn't help but feel something he hadn't felt since he had been a child looking up at the strong and mighty face of his father in the royal court of Vegeta.

Smallness.

Here was a being so absurdly powerful, Vegeta could train for a thousand lifetimes and never even come close to such a level. How was that fair? How was that reasonable? Was the universe really so devoid of logic that something like that could exist?

Slowly, as if trying not to startle them, the Kryptonian came down from the heavens. Despite the intention it had the opposite effect on the Prince of all Saiyans. He could feel himself tense up with every inch of Superman's descent. Sweat broke out from his brow, and Vegeta was secretly glad that at least the sweat on Krillen and Piccolo's head was far more noticeable than his.

It was Chi Chi who made the first approach. She walked out, quivering in rage at the audacity of this man who dared to deliver the body of the husband he had murdered. Fearlessly she walked right up to Superman and raised her right hand. Seeing it coming, Clark turned his head with the blow, not wanting the woman to break every bone in her hand on his indestructible face.

SMACK!

The impact of her open palm on his left cheek left them all in shock. The Z-fighters, whom Chi Chi and Clark wholly ignored, looked on with a mix of awe and terror. Chi Chi glared at Superman, expecting hate and anger, but instead of the same red glow which had taken the life of her beloved, all she saw were baby blues. While her eyes were burdened with wrath, as fierce as the dragon's flame, his bore the burden of grief, born of those two great banes of life: tragedy and time. For the briefest of moments there was an understanding between these two, widow and alien, as the latter passed the body of Son Goku to the former.

This moment was shattered when Vegeta charged at the Saiyan-killer, screaming a battle-cry at the top of his lungs, his pride demanding he not allow this human woman to stand against the Kyrptonian alone. He had scarcely left the ground however, when Chi Chi shouted out.

"Stop!"

Something about her voice, strangled with tears, stopped the Prince dead in his tracks. He stared at the woman in disbelief. Didn't she want vengeance for her husband?

"Stop," continued Chi Chi, "There's been enough fighting. Just stop."

She grasped her husband's dead form, still wrapped in the Kryptonian's makeshift funeral shroud, and knelt down crying. Holding her love in her arms, she somehow knew that this was the end of Son Goku. There would be no Dragon Balls to revive him this time; Superman wouldn't allow it.