"So, are you heading off to deal with the other Saiyans, then?" Lynn asked me as we finished shoveling the last of our breakfast into our mouths. Like usual, the kitchen table looked like a war zone, and Pepper hadn't even woken up yet.
"..." I didn't answer immediately. She noticed.
"What's wrong? You knew that you wouldn't get much stronger just from the Zenkai boost, Tarble." She reminded me.
I shook my head. "It's not that. I know where my effort's gotta go if I want to get stronger. I don't need to rely on parlor tricks and cheats." I assured her, "It's just… I keep replaying it in my head. He got stronger."
"When there's something on the line, you always push harder. You always say a fight's not real until someone hits their limit and skips right on by it." Lynn reminded me.
"No. That's not what I meant. Slug's power level… someone, or something, somehow artificially enhanced it. Made him stronger than me, mid-battle." I told her.
"Artificially? Like Zeck's generators?" Lynn asked, popping a lone grape that'd somehow escaped the war into her mouth.
I shook my head, "They're not gen-..." I gave up on explaining the distinction, knowing that she cared about as much as Pepper would. "Anyways, no. It was more like… an injection? Or a… unleashing…?"
"Talk me through it. Maybe that will help." Lynn offered.
So I did. I explained everything I'd seen and felt during that moment in as much detail as possible. "I didn't really sense him get stronger." Lynn admitted once I was done with my story, "I just sensed you get stronger, for your last attack."
"He got stronger. I felt it, close up." I told her, "I almost lost. I couldn't even react." I admitted.
"That strong and I didn't sense the difference?" She wondered.
"I guess it was probably harder to notice from far away. The evil aspect probably overpowered the higher power level… from a distance. Density over depth… Which means that the chaotic aspect of negative-aligned chi has a directly oppositional acting force when it comes to clearer-" I muttered, my brain instantly going on a long tangent, part of which found itself spewing out of my mouth before I even realized that I was still talking to Lynn.
"That means that it's gotta be… but why is it- depth and co- Then…" Lynn looked on in amusement as my brain just kept going, bits and pieces of my inner thoughts spewing out of my mouth as my brain theorized and assessed at a rapid rate.
"You're doing that thing again, Tarble." She finally told me, leaning against the counter, hand to her chin as she smiled, just listening to my brain systematically attack my very line of thinking.
"...Which means that it must've been… Of course! That's it! But how… and who… what…?" I finally came out of my thoughts. "Sorry. I think I figured it out."
"...And? For the rest of the class?"
"...Someone made him stronger. It was… basically an injection of raw life-force, pulled from the body of someone highly, fundamentally, malicious. That's why you didn't sense it… the chaotic… There's a big difference between slightly evil ki and ki energy that fundamentally corrupted. But the effect on me, right there, let me sense it perfectly." I explained my analysis to my wife.
"Wait, life energy? Like… that thing that combines with soul energy to make the ki we use?" Lynn wondered.
"Yeah. Someone… corrupted… his body with raw malice, at the most fundamental level possible. It was probably pretty simple, since he was already evil… But that means that someone tried to kill me… someone other than Slug." I explained. "I need to figure out who… Dang it."
"I'm guessing you have an idea, then?" She connected from my 'dang it'.
I shook my head. "I know of someone who couldtheoretically have done that… but it just doesn't quite line up. There's someone I need to talk to. They'll know exactly what happened." I said, then added after a moment, "But I really don't want to."
"Good thing you're going to go over and talk to your brother before you do any of that, Tarble."
"Oh, Pep, you're up." I noted, moving to give Pepper access to the seat closest to the door
"The baby smelled food." She paused for a moment, "When I get this thing out of me, I'm going to spike it like a football." Pepper decided, taking the offered seat.
"Please-" I thought about it for a moment. Normally, that'd be horrifying… but it would be a pure-blooded Saiyan baby with a power level that was likely in the hundred thousands. That changed the math considerably… the newborn would probably find it fun. "Do it somewhere where we won't have to fill in a crater. Throw it at the mountain or something."
"That really does sound like bad parenting." Lynn noted, pulling a packet out of the cupboards labeled 'Shrunken Breakfast Feast: 1 Saiyan'. Then, she frowned at it and pulled a second identical packet out.
"Blame him. He did this to me!" Pepper complained, pointing to me as a massive mountain of food appeared on the table.
"...Really…?" I rolled my eyes. Lynn did too. Pepper suddenly found herself hungrier than she'd ever been before, shoveling food into her mouth with a single-minded, not-at-all avoiding something else, level of fervor. It made me snort. "I'm not talking to Vegeta. He's not going anywhere. Figuring out why I almost died takes priority."
Pepper paused her eating. "He's not going anywhere because Novem is looking after his group. You survived. Now, you're wasting Novem's time. I don't care if someone tries to kill you, I need Novem. Did you see our bedroom? Who's going to make our bed without Novem?!" She complained.
I blinked, trying to figure out how to feel about that.
After a moment, I decided to chalk it up to the fact that it was Pepper and skip over processing any of that emotionally for the sake of my own sanity. "Have you been having Novem make our bed after your weirdly timed naps, Pep?" I asked.
"And clean the house, do the shopping, it works with the Fire Eaters, cleans the lava pool, waits on me hand and foot while Lynn's out,-" Pepper listed.
"Do you have any idea how many other responsibilities Novem has?! Pep, Novem's supposed to check in on you. It doesn't like to complain, sure, but its not a slave. That android goes to Capsule Corp twice a day, and has dozens of other little chores around the village." I told her, "You can't just have it do everything that you don't want to do. You can make the bed, Pep."
Pepper blinked. "So, we agree. Novem's way too busy to spend all of its time babysitting your brother just because you don't trust them unsupervised. You need to talk to your brother so that we can bring Novem back. It already set sensors all around their little island, and you've got their ki signatures on file. You just need to lay down the law." Pepper told me, ignoring my entire rant about Novem's many, many duties.
"I can't just go over and talk-"