A/N Standard disclaimer

I LIVE! So yeah, I didn't expect this to take as long as it did to get out. Being dad to a newborn that doesn't enjoy sleeping is tiring. Then I finished my university degree and worked full time. After that it took ages for my mind to reset and get back into the rhythm I needed. Not going to lie, finding the motivation took a long time. As it is, I still have stuff to do so don't expect a quick update but do expect one.

Thanks also to those who sent their congratulations for my new baby. It is mine, for those who were concerned, and he is beautiful.

I haven't proofread this as much as usual because I just wanted to finally get this out there. It had just been too long since the last one. So yeah, sorry if it doesn't meet people's standards but hopefully the story will still be interesting enough for you all.

On with the story!

…

CHAPTER 13 – SAIYANS AT WAR

WAR

Yesterday on the Citadel in the very chambers of the Council, King Vegeta of the saiyan people has declared that a state of war now exists between his people and the Batarian Hegemony.

While details are still scarce, this reporter has found out the reasoning behind this bold declaration. Yesterday, mere hours before the declaration of King Vegeta, a large pirate fleet, estimated to be at least a few hundred vessels, attacked the saiyan world of Mindoir, the latest home world of the saiyans. According to reports, this force was destroyed nearly completely, with only one ship escaping and the leader of the pirate armada taken prisoner.

Interrogation then took place and the saiyans claimed that the entire raid had been ordered and funded by the Batarian Hegemony, the hegemon himself being implicated. When the batarian ambassador, Jath'Amon objected to these claims, King Vegeta killed the pirate leader without question or comment, in full view of the Council and their guards. Further antagonisation by the batarian ambassador immediately led to the King Vegeta cutting him down in the meeting.

When questioned, the Citadel Council considered the facts and have each determined that the Council will not go to the defence of the Hegemony.

"The evidence presented, and not refuted by the pirate leader, was that the attack on Mindoir was ordered by the Batarian Hegemony, by the hegemon himself," Councillor Tevos of the Asari Republics said in an official statement made last night. "As the actions were made completely outside the laws of the Citadel and in violation of numerous treaties, by stepping in and defending the batarians would be tantamount to endorsing their actions, of which the Council does not. As a result, it was decided that the Council will not be stepping in to defend the batarians from any reprisals."

The fact remains however that the saiyans only number slightly more than three million according to the latest census, while the batarian population is more than forty billion. According to the experts though, the numbers game is barely a factor.

"Even with low numbers, the saiyans clearly have a strong advantage," General Oraka of the Turian Navy stated. "With either their abilities or technology they were able to defeat a very large turian task force at Shanxi. Their ambassador, Son Gohan, is the person credited with having won that battle by the survivors of that catastrophe. Then they somehow did the same thing to the pirates at Mindoir. In neither instance are they recorded to have lost so much as a single person, yet hundreds of thousands of others were incinerated. No, I don't think the batarians thought this through."

So there you have it. With their ability to teleport instantly to other locations, we have no idea how this war will pan out. No word has been received from either the humans or saiyans since this declaration was made public. More to follow.

…

"I don't agree with this Vegeta," Goku spat. "This is wrong."

"They attempted to enslave us, Kakarot!" Vegeta barked back. "They wanted our children as bed slaves! To rape at their pleasure! As king of this people, I will not stand still as they continue to threaten us, or anyone else with such actions."

"They didn't do anything to us! They couldn't even harm a single person on the planet! How can you justify killing so many people when none of us even received a scratch?"

"Dad," Gohan cut in, standing next to Vegeta. "It's not just us. They kill and kidnap and enslave others from all over the galaxy all the time. I was told that nearly half the population of the batarian planets were slaves. It has to stop and we are the only ones to do it."

"By becoming like Frieza?" Goku countered. "By killing whoever we want?"

"Don't you dare compare me to that monster!" Vegeta thundered. "I am getting justice for my people, as king! And saving a hell of a lot of slaves at the same time, so save that self-righteous attitude, you bastard!"

"Dad," Gohan spoke up again, his voice calm. "I know you don't like killing people. You never have. You always want them to have second chances. It's why you gave Frieza energy to escape Namek. But this needs to happen. Our people demand it. And we can always revive the innocent back with the dragon balls if we miss any. But better to get rid of those who are enslaving the others who aren't as strong as us. There are billions of people out there that need our help. And more that need to be given protection in the future if they are left. I don't really like it, but I think this is the right thing to do."

"More importantly, this is happening because I say it is," Vegeta growled. "It's my job as king of our people to decide in what way I protect us. Removing the batarian leadership is the way that we stop any other morons thinking of trying to take any of us, just as I would remove Frieza from the head of his empire to protect us. We can't be everywhere, Kakarot. So I am removing the threat the way I see fit. It just so happens that I am also doing it in a way that matches with my apprenticeship to Whis. If you want to help, then go rescue the slaves. Pan is already going to be leading the children to give them experience."

Goku glared with his hands and jaw clenched. "I'm not okay with this," he bit out. "I'm going back to Earth to get the dragon balls ready. Every single innocent person that gets killed in the crossfire is going to be resurrected back to life."

Without waiting for a reply, he put two fingers to his head and used Instant Transmission to get out of there.

"Well," Gohan couldn't help speaking into the silence, "that went as well as I expected it to."

Vegeta grunted. "I think if it wasn't for the dragon balls then he would likely have started fighting." He turned away looking into the sky. "It doesn't matter though. The moment those freighters get here we are launching. First stop is the staging ground. Are you coming? Or are you going back to the Citadel?"

Gohan gave a weary sigh. "I am going to come with you. I am a saiyan, after all. Besides, I think it would be good for me to help dad to rescue slaves. And I will be picking up a few cargo freighters from the Alliance to help with transporting the all the ones we free to Nova Prime and Elysium to be processed before we send them back to their own people. Those are the only two garden worlds in the Alliance with the agricultural setup to be able to feed that many people without the strain on Alliance food production becoming noticeable too quickly. It's just lucky that the namekians and the yadrat are willing to give us food and supplies to help the slaves until we can get them home."

"Fine, go. I still have work to do." Vegeta smirked. "It's not easy being king during a war."

"Don't pretend you don't enjoy it."

"Ha! I'm already loving every second of it."

…..

"This is boring," Jathon whined, again, as he and Liskak sat at their monitoring station.

"What did you expect?" Liskak grunted. "It's outpost duty on Anhur, not the pleasure houses on Lorek. It's not supposed to be fun."

"I know, but I'm still bored."

Liskak growled. "Well, personally I hope that it stays that way and that we don't get those saiyans coming after us. I heard rumours of what they did to the fleet that went to their planet and what they did to Jath'Amon. I don't want to go out the same way."

"That's just scare-mongering," Jathon objected. "It's far more likely that they have planet defence weapons that were able to wipe out the fleet than it is for the saiyans to have weirds powers."

The sensor station let out a beep and Liskak leant over to check the readings. "I'm not so sure, my brother claims that he heard it from one of the bridge crew on Balak's… what the hell?"

Jathon leaned over eagerly. "What? What do you see?"

Liskak frowned. "Sensors read five people standing less than a hundred metres away. Raise the screens."

A flickering holodeck blinked on and the external cameras focused on the anomaly. Sure enough, five human-looking aliens were standing there with weird armour on in the barely breathable atmosphere with fuzzy looking belts around their waists.

Liskak felt his stomach drop. "It's them," he breathed. "It's the saiyans!"

Jathon frowned as he looked over the intruders. "They don't look so scary," he muttered.

One of the aliens lifted his arm and suddenly a large glowing ball flew up into the sky. Liskak blinked in surprise as nothing happened. Then, after a long moment, the saiyans twitched. Then they started growing, quickly doubling in size, then doubling again. Their faces lengthened to having a muzzle and they grew body hair all over. Liskak was horrified as he stared at the transformation taking place. Eventually, they were all thirty-foot-tall monsters, standing where the saiyans had once been.

"Pyjacks?" Jathon said dumbly. "They can turn into giant pyjacks?"

"Quick, send this to everyone," Liskak barked out urgently. "They need to know what the saiyans can do!"

Before either of them could so much as twitch a muscle, one of the giant pyjack monsters opened its mouth and a fired a massive yellow ball of energy straight at them. They never had a chance to do anything as the world ended in an explosion of white, erasing them from existence.

…

Pan looked at the teenagers that she had brought with her to Camala. It wasn't her first choice to bring kids for this mission but as this planet was the batarian's centre of element zero production and Vegeta had the idea of giving it to the humans for the help if giving them all the ships to carry slaves, it meant that she had to be more careful in destroying all of the buildings in their efforts to remove the alien government and their citizens. Sure, the kids had less control over their power than an adult would, but because they also had less power, they were far less likely to destroy something they didn't mean to through collateral damage. They were still strong enough to be able to handle the pitiful forces that the four-eyed freaks were going to throw at them, but it would take a few hours longer to free the slaves, without stepping in herself. Still, Vegeta was a fan of sending the kids. He said it felt like the glory days of his youth when he was sent to conquer planets on his own or with Nappa. He thought it was great experience for growing warriors. So here she was leading thirty teenagers to conquer a planet. Oh joy. Luckily, this planet had a much smaller population than other planets, only a few million citizens and another few million slaves. It made it easier than taking a normal residential planet.

"Come on you losers!" she barked at the junior saiyans. "Any batarian or other alien holding a gun is considered the enemy. Any batarian or other alien that is wearing a collar around their neck is a slave and is not to be harmed. Anyone messes that up and they face me in training for a week!"

She took a moment to enjoy the satisfaction that their terrified faces brought her. There were not many things better for a combat teacher than to know of the fear that they can inspire into their cadets.

"Squad leaders," she barked. "Wait for my signal and move out. Remember to focus on military buildings."

The kids all looked confused. "Uh, what signal?" one of the squad leaders, Gerrett, asked.

She raised a hand and sent a ki blast at a building that was obviously a police station. The ball of yellow energy whizzed through the air and into the building in barely an instant, instantly demolishing it to a burning shell of concrete and steel.

"That one."

With a whoop, the young fighters flew off in groups, letting off ki blasts and destroying vehicles, ripping of slave collars or just physically picking slaves up and bringing them back to an open field, far away from the fighting. Pan flew above them as they went about their jobs. Making sure that none of them got carried away and destroyed anything that they needed to give over to the humans or accidentally kill someone by mistake.

Thankfully, despite their excitement, their discipline was paying off. As the groups moved from town to town, none large enough to truly be called a city, they were able to quickly take out any opposition that stood in their way. The surprise attack and the speed that the saiyans moved through the settlements making it impossible for the batarians to mount an effective defence. Not that it would have mattered. The few times an armoured vehicle or tank came out, it was destroyed by a ki blast from the saiyan teenagers who moved on without care.

They saved the main city for last, going for an encirclement formation as the teams attacked from six points roughly equal distance from each other around the city. The batarians put up what Pan considered a token resistance. Their guns shot weird little pellets that were smaller than the bullets that the humans used to use but moved a lot faster. Not that it mattered to her though. She could still see them easily enough and the little pellets were not powerful enough to pierce the skin on the kids that she brought with her on this mission. On the other hand, it might be useful for dodging training later. Something to think on.

A series of explosions near a warehouse brought her out of her musing and she scowled as she saw it. In an instant she had phased over to the now burning building to see what was happening. There were three of the older kids, led by one called Dennis, a half-saiyan boy born on Earth.

"Dennis!" she barked. "What the hell do you think you were doing? I said no blowing up buildings near the industrial sections. What do you call this?"

Dennis had the grace to at least look sheepish. "Sorry Lady Pan," he mumbled as he rubbed the back of his head. "We didn't mean to blow it up. We were just trying to clear out the building but it turned out that the batmen…"

"Batarians," Pan corrected with a glare.

"Right, them," Dennis continued with a wince. "Anyway, we were making sure it was clear when one of them threw a grenade at me. I hit it away but it turned out that they were storing more grenades here and I hit the grenade towards them. It went off and… yeah." He gestured to the destruction around them.

She glared at him a moment longer, then reached over and cuffed him on the back of the head. "Be more careful next time. If there were innocent civilians nearby then you could have caused them to be hurt or killed because of your mistake."

"Yes, Lady Pan," Dennis bowed.

"Good," she said, letting the anger bleed out of her voice. "Now continue and do better."

She flew back into the air to see that the other teams had almost finished their missions and were converging on the government building in the centre of the city, where the largest concentration of batarian soldiers were cowering behind their defences. As the teams cleared the last of the buildings and halted just in line with the buildings that edged the open space in front of the government build, she flew down and landed softly in the middle of the open area near the front gates, completely unconcerned with the weapons that were pointed at her from the soldiers hiding behind walls for safety.

"Listen up!" she called out. "I am here to accept you surrender. Lay down your weapons and you can live."

A batarian voice barked out a harsh laugh as a four-eyed alien dressed in what was clearly supposed to be ceremonial clothing moved into view.

"You think we are that stupid?" the batarian demanded. "All this destruction and we can just walk away? Here's what I think of your offer." He spat on the floor.

"The offer is genuine," she glared at the alien. "And it's the last one you are getting."

"Ha!" he barked. "Here's my offer. Men of the Hegemony, the one that manages to knock her out, gets to keep her! FIRE!"

Instantly the area lit up with muzzle flashes and a cacophony of noise from dozens of weapons being fired repeatedly straight at Pan.

Pan grit her teeth at the presumption that any man, let alone a weak batarian man at that, could decide that she would be someone's property. Ignoring the hail of pellets, she phased out and appeared directly in front of the batarian leader, raised her hand and ki blasted his face. The batarian had less than a second to react before he disappeared in an explosion that wiped him out so thoroughly that there wasn't even a stain left where he had been standing.

All around her, explosions tore apart the meagre defences that had been put in place by the batarians as the kids had their turn, their much lower power levels not doing much more than blowing her hair about as if by the wind.

Finally, after what felt like a much longer day than it really was, the last of the explosions died down and the planet was completely in saiyan hands.

"Well," she said with a long-suffering sigh. "That felt like it took too long."

"Oh, stop being such a wuss," Vegeta Jr said with an eye roll. "This took less than a day to conquer the planet without our intervention. The kids did good."

Pan grunted in annoyance. "Fine," she conceded. "It was nice to break up the monotony of training the kids. Now I get the job of helping former slave children grow up normally."

Vegeta Jr shrugged. "It will probably be challenging, going by what Gohan said. We have to help them completely change their mindset and adjust to freedom before we help them become strong enough to defend themselves."

Pan frowned at that. "Strong enough… you mean we are training them to use ki?"

Vegeta Jr shrugged apathetically. "Don't know but possibly. Grandpa is considering it. Besides, it's not like they will ever become powerful enough to hurt us."

She had to agree with that point. Maybe with proper training and time, a krogan or an asari could get stronger over a thousand years than even old Krillin had become, but it would be nowhere near what the saiyans could do.

"Come on," she said. "Time to round the kids up and head on over to where the cargo ships are going to pick up the slaves. You did call them in, right?"

"Uh…"

"Dammit Junior."

"I'm doing it now, geez!"

…

Kori looked around at the world of Aratoht, or rather, what was left of it. they had been here for about three hours now and all the slaves had been separated from the non-slaves, the children were taken out of the combat zones and everyone else had been basically destroyed. All the military buildings were lying in rubble, the spaceport had essentially been erased, except for the landing pads and the government had been removed. The batarian armed forces had tried, he guessed, but they just were no match for Super Saiyans in combat.

"Hey Andur," he called out.

"Yes, Kori?" Andur asked, not looking away from the now freed slaves that were loading into whatever spaceships they were able to borrow from the humans or could salvage from the batarians.

"Do you ever feel like we are just too overpowered?"

Andur looked back at him, confused. "What do you mean by that?"

Kori couldn't help gesturing at the world around them. "Well, we did just conquer a planet in a few hours, freed tens of thousands of slaves and essentially made hundreds of kids orphans. Their whole army would have been completely helpless against even one of us, yet we have a half dozen Super Saiyans and a SSG here to do the job properly. There is literally no force in our galaxy that stand up against us. So, I ask again, are we overpowered?"

Andur looked thoughtful for a minute. "Yeah, but I am not seeing a problem with it."

Kori considered that for a moment. "Huh, me neither."

"… You think we could get away with training a few krogan to use ki for battle practice?"

"Oh, Kami I hope so."

…

Vegeta stood in the open cargo bay behind the atmospheric shield, staring down at the planet. The final battle in this pitiful exercise of domination that weaker races would call a war. Khar'shan, home world of the batarians. A dusky green sphere floating in space. The culmination of the saiyan people's rampage through the galaxy.

A month. That was how long the whole campaign took. Most of that time was spent travelling through lightspeed to the more remote locations that they hadn't been able to easily access during the previous years to place ki beacons, allowing for the instant transmission of his warriors to the batarian worlds. A month that had meant the liberation of billions of slaves, the destruction of ships and bases and outposts. A month that had meant the obliteration of the Hegemony forces outside of this single system by the saiyan war machine, leading to this last battle.

Vegeta could have attacked this world directly at any stage. Gohan had been to this planet nearly a decade ago on a diplomatic mission and had placed a ki beacon at a hidden location on the planet. Even without focussing, Vegeta could feel it from where he stood thousands of kilometres away from the planet, waiting for someone to use it.

The space in the cargo bay behind Vegeta was steadily filling up as the rescuing of slaves from the planet continued unabated. A few dozen other heavy freighters in their borrowed flotilla were likewise being used as the saiyans were continuously teleporting the newly freed slaves from their captivity to the waiting transports. Each one could carry several thousand comfortably, but even still, there were more than a billion slaves on the planet. A lot more. They had been doing this for more than three hours and half the transports that had originally arrived with them had already left, full of the slaves that had been liberated from the planet below.

Vegeta took a moment to look away from the planet to stare at a seemingly empty part of space. Out there, unnoticeable to the naked eye, was another ship that had nothing to do with the saiyan conquest of the batarians. It was a single news ship from the Citadel News Network. Vegeta himself had invited them to come to Khar'shan to witness the final battle of the Saiyan-Batarian War, as the news crews were calling it. Vegeta grunted to himself in dark amusement. War. If this was how the Citadel community fought their wars, then he could completely decimate the Council forces and become Emperor of the Galaxy without nothing but farts and dreams. Not that he wanted to. He wasn't Frieza after all. He was content being king over his own people and his apprenticeship with Whis.

Maybe it would come later. He had no illusions that this action would make the other races in this galaxy afraid of them. The likely responses would be that they would either ally themselves together as a way to possibly combat the saiyans if Vegeta started a war with them too, not that he would, or they would be too frightened to ever speak to a saiyan again in fear of having the same thing done to them. Not that it mattered to Vegeta.

It was eight hours later when the final slaves were freed and teleportation to the planet finally stopped. The cargo bay behind Vegeta was completely filled with the sweaty and frightened people that had been liberated from the planet below. Hundreds of ships had been taken and emptied and returned in the same time by other saiyans using Instant Transmission. All his warriors had returned from the planet.

It was time.

Without a word, he transformed to SSB and raised only a few bare centimetres from the deck, moving easily forward through the atmospheric shield into the open blackness of space. There may have been gasps of shock but he ignored them, knowing that the ignorance of the masses was a powerful thing that really didn't matter to him.

Once clear of the ship, he moved away slowly towards the planet ahead of him. He didn't go too far out, just enough to be visible from the Citadel ship and their cameras that he knew they had facing him now that he was in the open, though he wasn't sure if they would be able to see him properly through the glowing blue ki that was surrounding his body.

He stared down at the planet for a long moment, considering his options. He made up his mind and brought his hands up to his left shoulder, cupping them slightly as he began to focus his energy. He wouldn't be able to yell out his attack verbally due to the need to hold his breath in space, but that didn't mean much. He would barely need to use a portion of his incredible power. Just enough to send a message.

The glowing ball of ki energy in his hands grew larger as he continued to feed power into it, letting it build until finally, it was ready.

Gallick gun! he roared in his mind, firing a massive purple stream of ki. The attack flew faster than any ship could manage short of light speed and in no time at all, collided with the planet.

…

Baktor groaned as he sat up, blood leaking into his eyes. This wasn't how it was supposed to go. The upstart saiyans were supposed to be easy pickings. The voices told him that it was supposed to be easy. They had been so comforting. It had all felt so right. He had killed his father, taken over as hegemon and organised the largest slave fleet in history, all because the voices had told him to. It had been working!

He staggered to his feet and stumbled to a window that, miraculously, had not shattered when the saiyans had attacked and stolen his slaves. Hypocrites! Claiming to be against slavery and yet stealing all the slaves for themselves! That's what the voices were telling him, and they had always been right before. His head throbbed and he put his hands on his temples to fight the ache.

A glowing light appeared in the sky. He looked up at the purple sun that seemed to be moving closer. When did the sun become purple?

Then everything went white.

…

It was a battle that only one side could win. In an explosion of unmitigated violence, the planet was torn apart, rendered to miniature chunks of rock where the planet had been. The power of the ki blast annihilated all life on the planet in moments and removed the final stain of the Hegemony.

Vegeta stared at this destruction, feeling completely satisfied. He had finished it. Now the whole galaxy knew of the might of the saiyans, the power to destroy planets. All he had to do now was hammer the message home. With that thought, he placed two fingers to his head and disappeared.

…

Prisa stared in horror at the glowing fragments of planet in the viewport, dimly aware that all of the other Council representatives and witnesses were doing the same. All that remained of what had once been the batarian home world of Khar'shan was enough rocks to be labelled as a small asteroid field. Never in her centuries had she witnessed such destruction.

How by the Goddess can we stand against such beings? she thought to herself.

In a blink, a glowing blue light appeared in the middle of the room. There were a few screams of shock and fear as it registered that the blue light was from the glowing saiyan king, Vegeta. A stray thought penetrated Prisa's terrified mind; I thought the saiyans had black hair, not blue. It almost looks like they could be related to asari.

"Representatives of the Citadel Council and their associated races," King Vegeta growled out. "I am here to tell you that with the annihilation of the planet Khar'shan, the war between the saiyan people and the Batarian Hegemony is over. The Hegemony is no more and now is the time for the division of spoils. For their aid, and in recognition of our alliance, the planet Camala will be given to the Human Systems Alliance. To help their people rebuild, the planets Lorek and Adek will be given to the Free Batarian movement for the formation of their new government. All of the freed slaves will remain on either Mindoir, Elysium, or Nova Prime until they can be properly processed, and arrangements can be made for them to return home, if they wish to do so.

"All other former Hegemony planets and outposts are now in the hands of the Saiyan Kingdom. They are ours by right of conquest and we will not be relinquishing them at this time. Any claim for them by any other party or government will not be recognised and we will defend our new possessions by force, if necessary. Focus your minds on your own people and those who were lost to you through abduction and slavery. Focus on how you will reacquaint them with your society, if they should choose to return to you. Bear in mind that they may not choose to do so. They may choose to stay with us, their liberators, and not return to those who abandoned them to desolation and despair, for the sake of taking the path of least resistance. They may choose to stay with those who are strong enough to defend them, and not with those who were far too cowardly to do so.

"Finally, if any further attack is made against the Saiyan Kingdom, or our human allies, know now that we will destroy you as thoroughly as we did the Hegemony. We did not seek this conflict out, but we are not afraid to fight those who seek to dominate us. That is the main difference between my people and yours."

With that, the glowing blue king vanished from sight. Prisa knew she was gawking at the empty space where had stood but she couldn't help it. Too much had happened and her mind was trying to catch up.

"By the Spirits," a turian said from somewhere behind her. "What do we do now?"

No one answered him. To be fair, Prisa didn't know either.

…

A/N Please Review/Follow/Favourite this as you please.

So yeah, that is the war in its entirety. You didn't really think it would take more than a chapter did you? This is SSGs versus the rest of the galaxy. There was no contest!

The artificial ki moon was first used by Vegeta in his initial attack on Earth in DBZ, so not an original idea. Hope you liked the brief appearance of the oozaru. I hadn't forgotten them but this seemed like the best time to put it in the story, even if it was barely there.

Until next time!