The world had gone silent. Aira's vision tunneled, leaving only one image: Rhode's body, pierced and broken, suspended in the air like a grotesque painting.
Memories flooded her mind unbidden—fragments of a life she hadn't realized she was collecting.
Laina Star. His hands, gentle despite their power, tending her wounds while she slept. Kame Island. Their laughter mingling with Master Roshi's crude jokes as they trained under the brutal sun. The wasteland. His patient voice guiding her through the madness of the Great Ape, teaching her to harness the beast within. Namek. The quiet pride in his eyes as he helped her wish for Super Instant Transmission, then led her into the Time Chamber for a year of grueling, shared growth.
Yardrat. Even separated, his presence was a constant warmth at the edge of her senses. The challenge. His mercy when he could have killed her, carrying her broken body to rest in his own room.
The training grounds he built for her. The dragon ball hunts. The quiet mornings at the Martial Arts Hall.
When did he become this important? The question was a lightning strike of clarity. All those years, all those moments—they had woven him into the very fabric of her soul. The rituals she maintained after his disappearance weren't duty. They were love, masquerading as routine.
"AHHHHHHH!!!"
The scream was primal, a release of five years of suppressed grief and longing and fear. Her body ignited—not with the controlled flame of Great Ape Power, but with something raw, volcanic, divine. Her hair blazed gold and stood on end. Her eyes turned the cold jade of a Super Saiyan.
And her power... her power exploded.
*WHOOSH. *
She was beside Frieza in an instant. One punch—casual, almost dismissive—and the monster who had pierced Rhode was a meteor, crashing through the planet's crust.
Recovery Technique. Senzu Bean. Her hands moved on autopilot, healing the man in her arms. But as the light faded, her eyes narrowed.
This wasn't Rhode. This was a clone. A construct.
Her head snapped toward the distant crater where Frieza had landed. The figure rising from the dust was not the tyrant. It was Rhode. Her Rhode. Whole, unharmed, watching her with an expression that mixed pride, concern, and a hint of fear.
The truth crystallized in an instant. The entire charade—Frieza, the attack, the "death"—was a fabrication. A cruel, manipulative performance designed to trigger her transformation.
It worked.
And now she was going to make him pay.
She destroyed the clone with a blast of pure ki, then moved.
**BANG! **
Her fist connected with Rhode's stomach before he could finish his excuse. His eyes bulged, his body folding around the impact as he rocketed backward, carving a trench through mountain after mountain.
Rhode, even as he flew, activated Great Ape Power, his own Super Saiyan form flaring to life. His power climbed—eight billion, nine billion—but Aira's presence was a sun, a terrifying, beautiful sun of golden fury.
She's over ten billion, he realized, shock cutting through the pain. And she's still rising.
The multiplier technique. She was using it in her Super Saiyan state, stacking the power of her rage on top of the transformation itself. It shouldn't have been possible. And yet...
WHOOSH.
She was there again, her leg already arcing toward his head in a killing blow. Rhode barely got his arms up in time.
**BANG! **
The impact shattered the landscape around them. Rhode held, but barely, his arms screaming in protest. Through the crackling aura of their clash, he met her eyes.
Cold. Furious. And behind the fury, something else. Something that looked almost like... hurt.
"Aira, listen—"
Her next attack cut him off. She wasn't interested in explanations. Not yet.
Rhode held her easily, his power—eight hundred million base, forty billion in Super Saiyan—more than enough to weather her storm. Her attacks, for all their fury, carried no killing intent. No real desire to harm. This wasn't a battle; it was catharsis.
He understood now. The technique that multiplied her power with fighting spirit—it required genuine battle lust to function. And Aira, despite her berserk appearance, had none. Her power remained steady at just over ten billion, a testament to the truth: she was venting, not fighting.
Five years of waiting. Five years of maintaining his rituals, guarding his legacy, hoping for his return. And when he finally came back, his first act was to traumatize her with a staged death.
Yeah, he admitted to himself, I might have overdone it.
But in that moment of her eruption, when she thought he was dying, he had felt it—the raw, unfiltered truth of her feelings. The love she hadn't recognized herself until it was almost too late.
He let her exhaust herself, weathering the storm with patient endurance. When her strikes slowed, when the fury in her eyes began to fade, he moved.
His hand caught her wrist mid-swing.
"Rhode, you bastard, let go!"
She struggled, but it was half-hearted—a protest of embarrassment more than genuine resistance. Her face was flushed, her eyes darting away from his.
"Alright." His voice was soft, apologetic. "I was wrong. That was... extreme. I promise, never again."
He pulled her close, wrapping his arms around her. For a moment, she stiffened. Then, slowly, she relaxed against him, her struggles ceasing.
"Hmph."
The sound was small, petulant, utterly unlike the fierce warrior who had just achieved Super Saiyan. But Rhode heard the truth beneath it—the peace, the warmth, the unspoken acceptance.
Against his chest, Aira's face burned. Her mind drifted, unbidden, to the books Bulma hoarded so preciously. The ones she had mocked but secretly read when no one was watching.
Is this... what they call love?
For the first time, the word didn't feel ridiculous. It felt like coming home.