I want to live like animals, careless and free

"Now!" Vegeta shouted into his scouter, leaping down from his perch on the huge chunk of raw sandstone, and running towards the crashing ships, Nappa on his heels, screaming as they led the charge.

Vegeta could just make out the soldiers pouring out of the ships, panicked and unprepared; someone managed to shout them into a formation as the line of Sayajin came at them, forming a rough wall of shields and projectile weapons. Vegeta laughed as he cut through the first line, using one humanoid as a spring board as he blasted the two men to either side and went for the first breathing thing in front of him. Nappa was next to him in the fray, staying close to his side as they tore through flesh and bone, spraying blood across the already red sand.

Vegeta hovered just at the edge of a berserker rage, wrecking havoc across the battle field as he moved toward the center of the circle. As Kold's soldiers realized they were surrounded by an ever tightening circle of battle-hungry Sayajin, they fought more desperately, as all cornered things do. Vegeta paused longer and longer with each new enemy to face him, loving the half-hope that blossomed when he let the first few hits connect, before he plunged his flattened hand into the chest cavity and ripped their still-beating hearts out of them. He was careful to step on the discarded muscles, even though he knew the insult would be wasted; they wouldn't be alive to know that only the heart of a respected enemy, no matter how hated, was acceptable to eat. By grinding the hearts of his enemies under his feet, he disregarded their experience and fighting prowess; if there was anyone on the battle field that could have held his attention for longer than five minutes, he might have considered eating their heart. It wasn't likely, though.

Vegeta blasted the last few enemy soldiers with a final ki blast, and screamed his primal triumph to the darkening sky; the berserker rage pushed him over the final edge, and he flashed gold. Lightening flashed around him, striking close and fizzing away from his aura as he continued to scream; the Sayajin around him threw their own heads back, and screamed with him, raising their own power.

Vegeta couldn't have known it at the time, that this battle would go down in Sayajin history as his greatest triumph, couldn't have known that his own strides as king would only be superseded by his son, could never know that because of his own ascension to Super Sayajin, in this time and place, would usher his people into the glory he would work so tirelessly to attain for them. Had already worked so tirelessly to attain for them.

When Vegeta ran out of breath, and lowered his head and his power, he focused on the old Sayajin coming toward him across the charred sand. Jardinier wore only loose furs wrapped around him, instead of armor, his scarred face was weathered and craggy, and even though his hair still stood on end, it was white as snow. Most Sayajin only ever lived long enough to see a few streaks of grey.

Vegeta knelt, as every king before him had done, in the presence of the Gardener.

"You have done as promised," Jardinier stopped in front of the kneeling king, reaching out to finger the stiff golden hair. "Our enemies are destroyed. But more, you have become Super Sayajin. Now you must train your son, and bring him into his full power before he mates with the Lunarian princess. This one must not suffer the same weaknesses as the one from the future,"

Vegeta looked up sharply, green eyes wide. "You know of-"

"Name a thing I do not know, little king." Jardinier grinned crookedly, revealing still sharp, if yellow teeth. "When the boy is ready, bring him to me. I will unlock his power, and we will see if Joyeuse Sang will truly choose him."

Vegeta stood as Jardinier walked back out into the desert, leaving both king and army to scatter.

"Namek?" Nappa asked after a long, quiet moment, as Jardinier's outline faded into the red heat waves.

"Yes," Vegeta nodded, and turned back toward the palace, where he knew Bulma would already be waiting at the hatch of a perfectly stocked ship and orders for the fleet to follow them.

Nappa flanked him all the way back, dogging his every step. Vegeta had grown used to it, over the past few weeks; the huge Sayajin suffered the same way Bardock did, in that he had outlived his prime, and too soon his all would be worth nothing. Vegeta doubted if there were a worse fate for a Sayajin soldier, or any man who lived for the next fight like a drowning man waiting for a lifesaver. That was what it meant to be Sayajin; to fight for as long and as hard as possible, until Chaos came screaming down around you, and if you were lucky, you died with a bang and not a whimper. Vegeta knew he would live long past his prime, not just because his son would have too much of a heart to kill him and take the throne, as was proper, but because if Joyeuse Sang was really going to choose the boy, then Trunks was going to go gallivanting off across the universe on every kind of adventure imaginable. Vegeta felt a moment of jealousy, as he eyed the purple head asleep against Bulma's shoulder as he followed her up the hatch of the ship; the fights, the challenges, would almost never stop for the boy, for a long, long time.

Vegeta sighed and leaned back in the chair he'd strapped himself to in the cockpit, and watched his mate pilot them out of the solar system; if Nappa could go and chase his death, long after his prime, then maybe fate wouldn't be so cruel as to leave nothing left for Vegeta to fight as he aged. He turned to study the burly Sayajin for a moment, and wondered how the old Sayajin had made it so far to begin with.

Trunks cooed from the co-pilot seat, and Bulma leaned over to shush him; Vegeta smiled at the fall of her hair and the way she stuck her tongue out at him before she turned back to the machinery, and realized it wouldn't be that bad, if the woman kept her wits and her near-suicidal tendancies.

Trunks threw up all over the display screen, and Vegeta threw his head back and laughed as Bulma screeched and flailed around for a moment before she remembered to unbuckle herself; not so bad at all.

A/N: A little gore, a little fluff. Vegeta's a hard line to walk.