Vegeta vanished in a snap. A crystal aura enveloped Goku as he took it to the air and dived backward like a cannonball. His evasive maneuver proved effective against Vegeta's rushing cross, but the Saiyan prince wasn't ready to surrender his offensive pressure and charged onward. Had it not been for a lifetime of focused martial arts training, this tension would have shattered Goku to bits.
The Earth-raised Saiyan grunted when blocking every strike and his breath raced to supply the vitality to sustain his wild switch in various defensive stances, but despite being a twig bent to the very edge of breaking, Goku fended off Vegeta's flurry of strikes. Feeling the weight behind Vegeta's fists weakening, Goku took in the momentum behind one of Vegeta's punches and carried it through into his spinning high kick that thrust straight into the prince's gut, robbing him of oxygen and numbing his entire body.
This was his chance! Goku spun his lower body, swiping with his right leg like a wild dragon swiping his tail. A vicious spinning high kick threw Vegeta's upper body back and opened him up. With Vegeta's ferocious, all-out offense blocked, with this counter Goku found himself a great opening for more power strikes he'd need to wail on his opponent. There was a gap between their raw power, and nothing short of Goku's strongest hits could help even that out. A busted rib or two might have been the equalizer Goku needed.
Goku wound his fist all the way back and threw it like he'd have swung a sledgehammer, smashing it right into recovering Vegeta's face before transitioning into a right elbow strike and digging his left into Vegeta's gut. His opponent had a breathing problem after going all-out with his offensive and skipping a blow to his gut, Goku planned on emphasizing on this opening he had created. A roaring uppercut drove the Saiyan prince into the air where Goku made his best spinner impression with his leg raised in a static angle, pummeling Vegeta on his way through.
A snap. The Saiyan martial artist had vanished down to meet Vegeta as he was going down from the skies and he did so with a vertical windmill kick, finishing his response to Vegeta's all-out attack with a one-leg missile kick that sent Vegeta flying backward into one building of the barracks complex. The resulting impact sufficed to send resonances through the building that shattered most of the windows in that building and nearly toppled the entire structure.
It was Vegeta's burst of Ki rising in a violet pillar that blasted the barracks building into a storm of falling debris while the risen Saiyan prince walked out of it.
"Damn, our Ki have somewhat evened up after that exchange, but I can't believe how tough he is. One mistake and I'm back to square one chasing him…" Goku grit his teeth. He didn't want to resort to King Kai's Fist after his application of the technique back on Earth, as now he fully knew the risks. If he missed his vital, amped up attack or if Vegeta fended it off–he'd break his body and end up in a far worse place than he started in.
"Unbelievable…" Vegeta hissed out, wiping a minor scrape off his lip. "I've faced no one that's able to put up such an even fight against me. Even your waste of space of a father and that Saiyan woman back on Earth were just mere punching bags to me. You've surprised me, Kakarot, I'll give you that."
"Thanks, you're really crazy yourself!" Goku smirked. "I had expected, after going all-out on you, that I'd end up leaving a dent, but our Ki are almost equal. Even if you're kind of a horrible guy, I'm having a blast!"
"I recall learning an entire array of interesting things from Earth. This way that you fight, it feels… Strange. Like you're in perfect control over your entire body. Like you're not wasting a single movement and not even a single breath is unnecessary." Vegeta noticed while clenching his arms by his side to prepare for his attack.
"You mean martial arts? Yeah… Back on Earth, we're studying ways of combat and how to do it more efficiently. Raw power and speed won't carry you too far against a skilled martial artist. Not unless the power difference is so massive that hits don't even register at all." Goku nodded. "If you weren't such a rotten guy, you could have learned it from us just like my father did."
"As if!" Vegeta yelled out, swiping his hand aside in dismissal of such a suggestion. "As if a proud Saiyan prince would ever ask a low-class trash like you for anything, let alone mere Earthlings! You presume too much thinking that I'm not capable of fighting the way you lumps fight and even better! I'll get power my own way and surpass your ways, I'll make a martial art of my very own and it'll blow all of you away. That's the talent of a prince of all Saiyans!"
Breathing in all of his own hype, Vegeta dashed across the entire distance between him and Goku, snapping away just within an elbow's reach. Clearly not having expected such a switcheroo, the Saiyan martial artist put up his arms in preparation to defend himself before Vegeta's vanishing. A sharp resonance of pain numbed Goku's entire body as, overjoyed with his own clever attack, Vegeta drove his elbow from Goku's backside instead.
As Goku shot out his palm to catch himself and vault over his shoulder in his frontal retreat so he could both gain some distance and reposition himself, Vegeta pursued his opponent, swiping his foot down under and tripping Goku up before sending one, solid right cross to slam his opponent away. Instead of pursuing him immediately, Vegeta vaulted back twice before taking in to the air and diving with a kick at where Goku would have been at that time. The Saiyan martial artist recovered with a roll and ducked from the dive kick, but received a flurry of jabs and elbow strikes from the Saiyan prince as he followed up his previous attack.
With a proud exclamation, Vegeta unleashed a flurry of Ki blasts from near point-blank range, blasting his opponent back as there was almost no way for the overwhelmed Goku to evade this quick and relentless barrage. It was only when they had pushed Goku a fair distance back that the circumstances permitted Goku to fall down on his back and for the never-ending Ki blast barrage to bombard the surrounding area continuously.
"What's the matter, Kakarot? Didn't you act all high and mighty with your martial arts before?" Vegeta taunted his opponent, crossing his arms over his chest as he beamed a confident smirk at his reeling and recovering opponent.
"Damn, what a guy… Every bit as wild as I had imagined…" Goku chuckled to himself in a dire tone of voice as he rose from his fall and rubbed the dirty bruise on his cheek. The merchandise that they had taken from the Gadget Super Lovers proved itself to be more resilient than Goku's ordinary gi as despite the Saiyan taking quite a walloping just now, he bounced back with only scratches and dirt on the armor.
"That is the fundamental truth that you're too thick to understand, Kakarot. All of you, you, your father and that other Saiyan woman… You are just low-class soldiers, mere grunts and everything that takes you a lifetime to achieve I can adopt and do better in just one go. That is why you would stand no chance against Frieza by yourselves, that's why you'd never defeat my father, as weak and complacent as he has become." Vegeta taunted his opponent.
"Frieza? We don't care about that guy. All we're here for is my mother!" Goku replied.
"You're full of shit, Kakarot!" Vegeta clenched his fists in an angered yell. "As a Saiyan prince, royalty that's been born to lead the likes of you around with the ability to control you even as Great Apes, I know what you're really thinking. Just like you asked that Namekian friend of yours to spare my life back on Earth because you were itching to fight me, you can't sit still until you fight Frieza because he's the strongest being in the entire universe!"
"Maybe I am a bit curious…" Goku smirked. "Chayote kept going on and on about how we must avoid him at all costs but Tenshinhan, Yamcha, Piccolo and the others all made me wonder if he's really all that… We've fought some crazy guys after the Saiyan invasion and got stronger than we could have ever imagined us becoming. Deep down I am wondering just how strong this Frieza guy is."
"The Earthlings?" Vegeta's eyes widened in shock. "The Earthlings convinced you to take a swing at Frieza?"
"Yeah… That thing you guys call the Saiyan spirit. The need to take on more powerful opponents and improve oneself until you can overcome them. We all have that. It's called being a martial artist. Improving ourselves all the time and finding new, more powerful opponents is all that we live for. That isn't just the Saiyan spirit, it's the spirit of a martial artist." Goku replied.
"Humph… Either way, you lot will be just throwing your lives away facing Frieza. It doesn't matter how much you want it or how important it is to you. You lack the talent, the ferocity! Drive alone means nothing! I am the one destined to end Frieza because I am on the verge of becoming a Super Saiyan!" Vegeta exclaimed, opening himself up by spreading his arms out.
"You can't say that," Goku muttered. "You've faced no one with the drive of a real martial artist yet!"
Sealing his words into stone, the Saiyan martial artist waved his arms out in front of him, forming two glistening, azure Ki spheres similar to a Kamehameha out in front of him and positioning them beside him from both sides. Vegeta clenched his fists in preparation to either dodge or deflect these attacks before Goku charged right at him and drove his fist into Vegeta's jaw with a triumphant roar.
"You've no right to say any of that until you defeat me!" Goku said as he threw a flurry of jabs from both sides, overwhelming Vegeta before one hefty thud from his wound-up right hand sent the Saiyan prince flying. Goku vanished and appeared behind his opponent with an upward-aimed double push kick that sent Vegeta over the rooftops of the tallest buildings on Planet Vegeta.
"You're strong because of your talent. You didn't need to train and work as hard as any martial artist challenging you so how can this Super Saiyan thing of yours be stronger than the drive we have to improve ourselves and face stronger and stronger opponents!" Goku yelled out, brimming with clear aura as he charged out in pursuit of Vegeta and began pummeling the Saiyan royalty with wild power strikes that seemed to rock Vegeta even through his attempts at defending himself. A radiant aura enveloped Goku as he delivered an uppercut that seemed to come from his heart and swatted Vegeta's block aside before a spinning barrage of kicks continued to pummel the Saiyan prince further.
As Goku finished his beat down with another windmill kick, sending Vegeta crashing down, he extended his arm and clenched it, sending the two Ki blasts positioned down on the ground bolting right at his plummeting opponent and creating a flashing nova of energy that cut down the surrounding skyscrapers and sent them crashing down as aliens and Saiyans continued to evacuate the area in swarms that made the evening skies of Planet Vegeta murky.
The proud Saiyan prince dragged his torn-up glove over his busted-up face, wiping the blood off of it as he looked up at Son Goku panting up in the skies. The left side of Vegeta's Saiyan armor had broken off as the bodysuit that covered Vegeta's body underneath the armor began tearing in more than a few places under the stress of this wild battle.
"I guess there is more than one similarity between you and your useless father!" Vegeta clenched his fist and looked down at his royal blood that soaked his glove with a dirty hue. "Just like him, you seem to find unexpected bottoms to draw incredible strength from. However, whereas your father seems to just growing stronger as he fears for his weakling comrades, you're growing stronger the deeper you wallow in your silly delusions about hard work being superior to your place in the pecking order."
Vegeta put up his fists and focused his body, forcing Goku to prepare for the eventuality of having to deal with this technique of Vegeta's. Electricity began circulating up and down the body of the Saiyan prince as his aura became more intense and began emitting a visible white glow around his body.
"If you can't survive this attack, you're useless to me, Kakarot!" Vegeta proclaimed and thrust his chest forward, raising up and spreading out his limbs as his aura became a huge energy wave emanating from his entire body and fired off toward Goku. As the beam hurried on to propel out into the atmosphere as a shining beacon of streaming energy, Vegeta relaxed his body to see nothing but smoke in front of him. "How dense do you think I am, Kakarot? Don't forget that I can sense your battle power just like you can sense mine."
"Heh, right, right…" Goku laughed out as he dashed into full view of his opponent from where he had moved to when avoiding Vegeta's attack. "I guess there's no use trying to fool someone like you that way. That was one crazy attack, but it doesn't seem to be very effective against someone that can move out of its way."
"Guess I should have broken your spine before trying to obliterate you with it. Sorry, I tend to jump the gun…" Vegeta smirked in response to Goku's joking observation. Both Saiyans chuckled while floating alongside one another while clouds shifted and rushed behind them, easing up their Ki control so they didn't burn through their stamina for no reason. When the opponents were this equal in power, every tiniest mistake such as missing a crucial attack might have cost one the entire clash.
"I was wondering about just what kind of a prince you are to the Saiyans," Goku said out of the blue, straightening out his body and stretching his wrists and neck out. "You didn't seem to care all that much when you killed those soldiers back then. There were Saiyans among them, you know."
"I've got no use of Saiyans that are weak enough to die that easily!" Vegeta exclaimed, clenching his fist out in front of him as his face grew more serious. "Saiyans must be strong and grow stronger with each battle. Only that way can we crush Frieza and his goons and end that embarrassing travesty that is serving him! Weak Saiyans are an embarrassment to our entire race!"
"That's odd. Because you've always labeled me, my father and Chayote as being weak, and yet all three of us are easily your equals in strength." Goku replied calmly. "Even though I disagree with you and feel like you're in need of being knocked flat and straightened out, I think I kind of understand you. It's because of that understanding that I kind of feel sorry for you."
"Oh?" Vegeta made a malicious grimace. "Humor me, Kakarot. Maybe I'll let you live on as our new jester after I ascend to become a Super Saiyan and rid this universe of Frieza."
"You live up to your own principle, your own path as a Saiyan, but your father, your people don't. Even worse–you're a lousy ruler because you have no idea how to make the Saiyans more like you. Not even your father lives up to what you see as being the true Saiyan way of life and you love your father, but you can't help but feel angry deep down about it. You hate that he seems to accept Frieza and obey him, you hate even more than he forces your entire race to do the same and would love to see you buying into it too." Goku said with a strict expression, but in a calm tone. "The path of violence, threatening and bullying people into submission is all that you've ever known and yet this just doesn't work here, does it? You see in front of you a future where you defeat this Frieza alongside the other Saiyans but despite how hard you try to reach out and claim that future–you're more alone now than you've ever were."
"Shut up!" Vegeta yelled out, losing his cocky smirk as pure wrath dyed his face red and whited out his stare. "What can you possibly know about anything!? You! A low-class Saiyan trash that's never had to be an example for his entire race!?"
Goku stopped talking, but he kept on looking at Vegeta with a stare that irradiated pity for the Saiyan prince. This sadness and sorry that his inferior opponent sent his way seemed to drive Vegeta even wilder.
"The only path to power for a Saiyan is to fight and the only way I can do that is to do jobs for Frieza… The slimy, rotten worm that's burrowed into my home planet and won't leave us alone! I hate him more than anything, I loathe the idea of moving a finger for him but if I don't–I'll never become strong enough to blow him away and liberate the Saiyans from his menace!" Vegeta seemed to tense up so much that it almost crippled him. A vein popped out on his large forehead as his shaking face began leaking with tears. "No matter how many times I tell myself that I need to bend my back and act as his servant, I come no closer… It's… It's as if I know deep down that it'll never happen, that I'm just lying to myself… I'm the only one… The only one trying to do anything. The rest… Even my father. The King. They all just accept it and go on living as his lapdogs!"
"Okay, I'll help you beat up that Frieza guy and make him take a hike and leave you Saiyans alone." Goku smirked, giving Vegeta an enthusiastic thumb up. "You should have just said that all along. That mean guy routine really doesn't work, you know. Has it ever convinced anyone?"
"Shut up, Kakarot!" Vegeta dragged his glove over his eyes to wipe his tears as he seethed in rage at the low-class Saiyan that saw him break. Even now the Saiyan prince struggled with the idea of working alongside this oaf when the possibility to obliterate the only witness of his breakdown seemed so much more tempting. "How can my word as a prince ever mean anything when Frieza's disgusting mug is looming behind me all the time? You're right, I hate how complacent we Saiyans have become, but what I hate even more that my power and threat is meaningless against Frieza's. My people would rather act like slaves and fear him rather than serve as my subjects and fear me."
"Yeah, I think that last part is the only one I don't really understand…" Goku scratched the back of his head.
In a snap, Vegeta vanished and appeared right in front of Goku, thrusting his fist like a sawed-off shotgun into Goku's gut and punching all air and fighting spirit out of him. With a cruel smile, the Saiyan prince uppercut his opponent and extended two of his fingers, detonating the Ki that he had stored in that last punch. Observing the fallout from the explosion and wondering just how much of Goku remained intact, Vegeta lowered his hand.
"Those are some low-class fireworks…" Vegeta muttered to himself, ecstatic about his decision to attack Goku while his guard was down.