To those that have given this story a favorite and a review - huge thanks for the support and interest! The fic's entering the climax of its first major story arc, so I hope the conclusion is both enjoyable and exciting. As always, reviews, feedback, comments are welcome!


Age 762

Planet Woda

Of the myriads of planets scattered across the Galaxy, Planet Woda could consider itself lucky. It suffered a lot when the Frieza Force invaded its system twenty years ago and subjugated the world – the entire southern hemisphere of the planet was now uninhabitable, dotted with craters and the remains of fires – but it was not selected for a purge and planet sale. Its considerable sources of microbial life for the production of healing chamber fluid meant that it too valuable to destroy – so, those who remained alive after the invasion had to contend to their life as servants for the Emperor of the Universe. The local government structures were kept – a small assembly was allowed by the Frieza Force with the explicit task of organizing the remaining population and executing orders for above. As long as they provided their quota of healing chamber fluid, everything could have continued without disruption.

Today, the guards of the Frieza Force laid dead, their bodies strewn across the streets of the planet's capital, while the Wodan Council was happily negotiating with a new face.

"As long as you provide me with the army necessary to expel the Frieza Force from this sector, you will be able to live as you wish, and you won't have to deal with any quota," Lord Trombone explained, flanked from either side by a handful of new demonic children giggling and smirking. He towered well over every single Wodan in the room – the four-headed tripod species with fish-like features were rather short in stature, even discounting the Namekian's impressive height.

"And are you certain that you would be able to defeat Lord Frieza?" one of the council members asked the obvious question, with a sceptical tone. After a brief laugh, the Namekian answered:

"I will let my abilities answer this question. This is not the first time I have gotten the chance to fight against the Frieza Force, I have fought, and beaten, the best I can offer – none can even try to kill me."

Months have passed since he managed to pull himself out of Planet Boiler and escape back into space. Enough time has gone by for him to reevaluate his strategy – without a large horde of children he grew over a long time before the arrival of Articho's posse, Trombone had to rely on what he could gather from the billions of inhabitants across the galaxy. Space piracy wasn't going to be as useful – but stoking rebellion against the horned pinkish alien menace was a new facet to consider. There was hardly a planet in the Galaxy which had a positive opinion of Frieza – it was either open or suppressed contempt.

Like, for example, Woda – as soon as they came to contact with someone who could possibly fight Frieza, they threw themselves right into his hands.

"If so, then we will be able to provide you three thousand of our strongest warriors, each one able to handle several soldiers of the Frieza Force at once – including the supplies necessary for them."

The optimistic chatter among the representatives soon turned to worry, however, as a clerk from behind the room approached the council and whispered to them.

"We have received a transmission from a transport ship, directly to us..."

"Open up a call. It might be important."

A screen flashed on one of the walls of the meeting hall, and the silhouette of a Saiyan in armour suddenly appeared, startling the Wodan Council and getting Trombone to grit his teeth. How did he track me down to here?!

"Good day, subjects of the Frieza Empire. My name is Articho, and I am the commander of the Articho Force, the elite unit which has been assigned on anti-piracy operations in your sector," he spoke, with a voice slightly filtered and muddied by the distant transmission. The room surrounding him was dimly lit, so almost the entire body of the Saiyan was covered in ominous shadow. "We are in search of Trombone, a Namekian pirate warlord wanted for the destruction of hundreds of convoys and dozens of planets all throughout the Galactic Rim."

"Is that true...? I thought he was a rebel...?" one of the Wodan councilmembers whispered to another besides him. Trombone could hear this – and it did not leave him satisfied. Articho continued speaking:

"If your planet houses Trombone, and tries to join forces with him, the Frieza Empire will answer with brutal consequences. If you are, in any way, familiar with the Saiyans, you know that my people aren't known for their kindness."

The Wodans indeed knew about the Saiyans – especially that this species of ape-transforming alien conquerors with thousands of genocides under their belt was supposed to be extinct. If a Saiyan was now on their trail, do they even have a chance of survival?

"As for you, Trombone, if you are there and listening..." Articho leaned ever so slightly closer. "Be afraid. Your time is coming to an end. If you dare show your face and challenge us, you will witness that even your so-called immortality will not save you."

The screen went black.

"That was..." one of the representatives muttered out after some silence. "That was Lord Frieza's elites!"

"I-I need to find a bomb shelter," another mumbled out, rushing around the room. He was joined by a third one, yelling:

"No, a transport ship!"

"Silence!" Trombone suddenly announced, forcing the entire assembly to stop and listen with his thunderous voice. "This is nothing more than a bluff. This Saiyan, Articho – I've fought him before, and there's nothing he can do to me. There will be no change to our deal, while I..."

He waved his hand, ordering his mutated minions to head after him. The Wodan Council, having happily negotiated a deal with the ancient conqueror mere minutes ago, now quivered in fear at what they had just unleashed.

"I'll find that bastard."


Ships of conscripted Wodan troopers occupied dozens of planets across the sector throughout the following month, witnessing surprisingly vacated Frieza Force bases and factory complexes – all abandoned relatively recently, as well. The retreat, as the troopers reported after trying to figure out what happened, must have been organized – there was no sign of fighting, nor any bodies that might have been left behind, while weapon and armour storages were completely emptied. Few believed that this retreat and the message of Captain Articho were not connected.

Whoever this Articho was, he was personally not familiar to the Wodan soldiers – however, Lord Trombone appeared to know him very well, and was vehement that the Saiyan must be hunted down. He was good at hiding, however, in a manner that was uncharacteristic for one of his kind.

Was he even in this sector?

Alarms suddenly rang out in the facilities of Planet Frieza 11751, a desolate planetoid in an asteroid belt that once had a small forward base of the Frieza Force. Two Wodan soldiers hurried towards the computers after dropping their weapons.

"Four Attack Balls heading our way..." one of the soldiers muttered, reading the signals. A display above the computer's control panel displayed the four vehicles, surrounded by a familiar white aura, speeding past stars towards their location. "Large power levels inside of each one, too."

"It's probably them," the older soldier answered. "Give a call to Woda, either way, we aren't going to hold if they arrive before we receive any backup."

The first soldier did as he was ordered, pressing a button in the vast keyboard in front of him with his extruding tentacle to open up communications with headquarters – as expected, it was almost immediately forwarded to Lord Trombone, and the Namekian warlord announced that he will head there as fast as his ship can. This news attracted his personal attention.

If the Articho Force was heading their way, though, what could they possibly be here for? Standing guard across the citadel complex, the Wodan soldiers considered a few possible theories. Perhaps the abandoned mining facilities on the other side of the planet, rich in ore for the production of Battle Armours, was necessary for them, or perhaps they were simply planning to use the world as a jumping point for an invasion of Woda itself? Oddly enough, though, the four balls were heading not from the outside of the sector occupied by Lord Trombone and his Wodan allies, but from somewhere within...

The flagship of the Namekian warlord's new force arrived to the planetoid first – unlike his first ship, inspired by the designs from his home planet, this was a sleek triangle shaped starship donated by the armouries of Woda. It touched down in front of the abandoned base, letting out Trombone and an even larger flock of mutant children off its ramp.

"Where is the Saiyan?" he immediately asked, cutting to the point. One of the soldiers assigned to the base raised their tentacle to look down at a scouter watch attached, then answered:

"According to calculations, the Attack Balls should be landing about... now."

Suddenly, Trombone's ear twitched and he turned his face towards the left. While the multi-headed Wodans could not hear anything, his Namekian hearing picked up a few faint thuds on the other side of the planet. Four ki signatures were congregating there as well. Cracking a devilish smirk, the warlord stated:

"I hear them."

Finally, he will get his opportunity for revenge on that pathetic whelp and his team for the humiliation. Every day knowing that Articho was out in space, plotting against him, incensed Trombone more and more – irrationally so – and it was finally time to lay that frustration to rest.

With a powerful aura roaring around him, Trombone took off to the sky – followed by his Demon Clan, but all of the mutant Namekians soon found themselves outsped, as no matter how fast they tried to follow, the warlord sped off to the distance in a flash. In mere seconds, he had already circled the planetoid and dropped down on the edge of a large, old crater, in whose centre the four Attack Balls had landed, leaving smaller craters of their own.

Smirking, the Namekian leapt down the edge of the crater and approached the impact site – one after another, the other Demon Clansmen dropped down from the skies as well, following after him. With distinct popping and whizzing sounds, the doors of each of the pods opened and-

"...What."

The shrieks and giggles of Saibamen filled the air, startling the warlord. It was not the Frieza Force elites who departed from the confines of the pods, but these green, plant-like, mindless creatures...

"But... that doesn't make any sense... I sensed a much higher battle power than that of ordinary Saibamen from these ships..."

Suddenly, the scouter watch on Trombone's wrist beeped – the soldiers he had left in the base were speaking to him again, and in a worried voice:

"Uh, lord Trombone, sir... We're getting new reports. This must have been something else – Articho and his Force are on Planet Liqid right now, and they're destroying everything in sight."

Another soldier, from the same base as the first one, communicated to Trombone via the watch as well:

"The Wodan Council just sent a message down to the army that you were supposed to stop this, sir Trombone, uh, Lord, and they're not happy that you were here..."

They have all been deceived. He, Lord Trombone, has been deceived!

One of the Saibamen who crawled out of the pod raised its eyes at the towering Namekian standing in front of it – frustrated, Trombone pointed a finger at it and detonated it from the inside, reducing it to no more than a pile of body parts. The other Saibamen received the same fate as soon as they crawled out of their pods, some barely even aware that they were under attack by the time of their demise.

The Namekian warlord stared off to the stars above.

"Liqid. I'll catch you there, then, Saiyan..."


Once Trombone's starship arrived to the atmosphere of Planet Liqid, it was met with a sombre, brutal aftermath of a lightning-fast strike. Factories, housing districts and citadels alike were left in ruins, and the casualties numbered in the thousands, if not millions. The Wodan soldiers staffing Trombone's spaceship kept receiving flurries of reports – not only further detail on the destruction caused by the Articho Force, but also the impact this had on the supply chain to Woda. Liqid was one of the first colonies established by the Wodans when they were venturing to space, before the arrival of the Frieza Force – due to its large abundance of resources, it was transformed into a factory world, and much of the production on their home planet was moved to this world, allowing the Wodans to live a luxurious lifestyle at home. At least, until Frieza's forces arrived and they all were forced to slavery, even on their homeworld.

The ship slowly touched down in a small clearing, in what was used to be the surroundings of a machine parts factory, and Trombone stepped off the ramp to the surface of the planet, followed by his underlings. They were greeted by chilling winds and ominous silence.

"What monsters..." one of the Wodan soldiers muttered, shuffling out of the ship and inspecting the corpse of a civilian worker strewn across the side.

"This was a surgical strike," another Wodan explained, stepping out of the ship with a stout stance – the epaulettes attached to each one of his three necks signified that he was a high-ranking officer. "They must have planned this in advance, and struck when we were unprepared. As soon as we realised what was going on, they turned around and left. Not only that, but this Saiyan must have also known about the importance of this world to our economy..."

Or, somehow, realized it during their conflict.

A soldier suddenly rushed to the Wodan commander, getting his attention – he was carrying a large display. As soon as he arrived, the soldier yelled:

"Commander! We've intercepted a transmission from the Articho Force!"

"How so?"

"For some reason, this message was not encrypted... so, all it took was just for us to listen on the radio. It's important information, too – see here..."

Hearing the commotion next to the ship, Trombone turned towards the two Wodans, and many of his demonic spawns did so as well, quizzed. The display turned on and revealed a video feed coming from the cameras inside one of the rooms of a Frieza Force spaceship, where two of the soldiers of the Articho Force were walking past and discussing the aftermath of the battle on Liqid.

"I'm surprised Trombone did not show up. Surely, someone like him would not have been so clueless as to miss an obvious invasion," one of the soldiers spoke, the voice slightly filtered by the video feed. Trombone recognised it instantly – it was that annoying woman who sliced off his arm once. Another, deep voice which Articho attributed to the tall blue musclehead, answered:

"Perhaps we overestimated him. We'll return back to base on Vando IV, then see where we can attack next."

The display went black afterwards.

"That's where we will be heading next," Trombone suddenly announced, getting the attention of the Wodan soldiers surrounding the ship.

"I don't even know where Vando IV is, isn't it completely abandoned...?"

"You are stepping past the boundaries of our deal, Namekian!" the Wodan commander suddenly yelled, getting Trombone to briefly wince and respond:

"...What?!"

"Your deal with the Wodan Council was that you would protect us and our worlds from the Frieza Force. So far, you have been unable to do so, and have in fact endangered Wodan lives with your reckless hunt for Articho, so-"

Suddenly, the commander's complaints got shut down and his tentacles clutched onto the central one of his three throats. All Trombone needed to do was to raise his hand and his telekinesis choked the alien out until he collapsed to the ground – at which point, the Namekian abandoned the grip and moved along.

"If nobody else of you wants to disrespect the law of power, we shall be heading to Vando IV shortly."

None of the other Wodan soldiers dared to protest – they were completely eclipsed in power by the warlord.

"You... You fool... Don't you understand?!" the downed commander suddenly gushed out in fury. "Why do you think that message was not encrypted?! It's because... that's what he wants us to hear! It must be... some sort of trap!"

"Trap?!" Trombone turned towards the commander and yelled back. "Nothing this ape could possibly come up with can entrap me. Or destroy me. Or kill me. That's what immortality means. And if he thinks a convoluted plan to bring me to some place could possibly work... then he is the idiot in this confrontation."


The shadow of a Wodan starship cast upon the surface of a desolate, lifeless rocky world, as if observing its plains and jagged rocks in search of any signs of life. Vando IV was far from the worst location to set a temporary base upon, but a rather terrible place to life. Once, it orbited a binary star system and had a temperate climate, but the larger of the two stars went supernova a few hundred thousand years ago and left behind a black hole. Miraculously, Vando IV survived the explosion, but the supernova killed all life on its surface and the subsequent decline of sunlight left it cold and desolate.

Someone acclimatised to the cold could survive on its surface – the atmosphere was still breathable, somewhat – but nobody wanted. Tucked away deep in Wodan-controlled space, it went by unnoticed – so, it was a reasonable enough location for a raider base.

There were better options, but, perhaps the Saiyan was simply not familiar with them.

Trombone watched their approach towards the planet and dip into the atmosphere on the starship's bridge, with his arms folded. Suddenly, he turned his eyes to the side – his sixth sense drew his attention to the far distance. He could feel something else approaching this world, at the same time as them.

The Namekian cracked a wide, toothy smirk.

They've caught 'em.