A setting fusion of Dragon Ball and the DC universe. A world where there are Saiyans and Dragon Balls, but also Superman and Wonder Woman. A world where Bulma comes from Metropolis and Clark Kent was born with a tail. Being posted simultaneously on
Sufficient Velocity,
Spacebattles, and
Archive of our Own. Updates daily.
June 1990
"Come on!" the boy challenged, bracing himself and throwing his arms out wide.
His opponent glared down at him, dragging his leg backwards across the ground, before rearing back to charge.
"Come on! Give me everything you got!" he challenged again.
His opponent ran forwards at high speed, churning up the ground in its path. It tackled into the boy with all its might, only for it to amount to nothing as the boy refused to give an inch, absorbing the force of the blow, and remaining where he stood. His muscles shook from effort, but his face was marked by a wide, excited, smile.
"
Mooooo" bellowed his opponent, and the boy laughed, taking one heavy step forwards, pushing the bull backwards, even as the bovine struggled against him, waving his head back and forth and digging into the earth with his hooves. The boy shoved, and the bull stumbled back, before turning away and taking a few steps, circling the boy to charge from a different direction.
The boy shifted in place, always facing the bull, his hands flexing in anticipation.
"Come on!" he shouted again, "You can do it!"
The bull bellowed a second time, before charging again. But the moment before impact, a voice suddenly caught the boy's attention.
"You better not be riling up Babe again, Clark!"
The bull caught him dead-center, and with a swing of his head, launched the boy away. Clark groaned as he was sent rolling through the grass, before sitting up and looking back at the farmhouse, ashamed.
"Sorry, Ma," he shouted.
"
Moooo"
"Babe's sorry too," he added.
"Babe doesn't need to be sorry; you were the one pushing his buttons," his mother shouted, "You leave him alone, now."
Clark sighed, looking back at the cow, who stomped a hoof into the dirt, ready to go again if Clark was. "You heard Ma, we're done Babe," he said, sitting up and dusting himself off, before turning away from the bull. There was a shuffling of hooves behind him, and Clark grinned, and jumped forwards a few yards, escaping out of the bull's third charge. Looks like Babe was ready whether Clark was or not.
He eyed the bull a few moments longer, but it seemed done with him, turning, and facing away.
Clark Kent sighed and turned to face the sky.
What was he going to do with the rest of the day? He preferred summer vacation to school, of course, but it came with its own challenges. Clark preferred to keep himself busy when he could.
During most of the year, that meant waking up, running all the way down to Smallville Middle School, going to classes, eating his tiny lunch, hanging out with Pete and Lana for as long as any of their parents would let them, and then running back home to help on the farm until dinner. It was only
after dinner that he had free time to himself.
Summer vacation was a different beast. Being able to help on the farm first thing in the morning alongside Pa, then breakfast, then back to chores. Most days, most of the usual chores were done by lunchtime. That gave Clark the entire afternoon all to himself. He visited Pete and Lana as much as he could, but they still had their own schedules.
Which left him here, wrestling with Babe for as long as he could get away with it. Clark watched the bull trot around, still excited, and proud of his victory, and some part of Clark itched at that. Wanted to prove the animal wrong. Which was kind of stupid, all things considered. Babe was an animal, and Clark was a human. But stopping the tussle while both were still raring to go just felt unfair. Both to him, and to Babe.
He tried to describe the feeling to Ma once, but she just looked at him strangely, and that was that. He wondered if maybe it was just something about girls. Lana didn't like hearing about fighting, but Pete
did, and Pa thought it was hilarious, at least when Ma wasn't listening.
Deprived of a playmate, Clark instead wandered his way further and further from the farmhouse and barn, letting his feet carry him mindlessly, trying to think of something else to do. He had read all the books in his room already, and it would be another few days before Pete had any new comics to show him.
Abruptly, Clark stopped his wandering, confused and suddenly feeling on edge. Something was wrong. The boy leaned forwards, closer to the ground, and then slowly turned his head. There was something on the edge of his hearing, that set him off despite only barely recognizing it. He waited a few seconds, and then heard it again. It was a sound that came from far away. High pitched, but loud enough to carry over flat farmland.
"
Aaaahhh!"
That was a girl screaming.
Immediately, the boy launched into motion, taking off running. He began building up into giant leaps, closing in faster and faster on the sounds.
"
No, no, no! Get away from- Aaah!" The scream was followed by another loud noise, which at this distance, he could barely identify. Was that an explosion?
He plowed through a cornfield without a thought, smashing his way through the plant life and then erupting out of the field facing an open road. As he approached the fence that marked the edge of the Kent farmland, he skidded to a stop and listened again. But there were no more screams, no more muffled booms. No more…
He caught the sound of metal scraping against metal, and took off again, roughly in the same direction he had been running.
He jumped the fence, crossed the road in an instant, jumped the next fence, and then kept up the pace on the other side, despite it not being Kent land any longer. Someone was in danger, that was the most important thing. Finally, he crested a small hill, and spotted a trail of smoke.
Following it, he finally saw the source of the noise. A
robot stood in the middle of the field. Clark could barely believe his eyes. The thing was at least fifteen feet tall, built in a vaguely human shape, with muscular, masculine proportions. Its body was made of metal, painted in shades of blue and silver. Its head was vaguely cone-shaped, and its face was hard and inexpressive, marked by triangular glowing red eyes.
The machine was standing over the wreck of a car, the source of the smoke. Sitting inside the cockpit of the vehicle was a young woman. The first thing that Clark noticed about her was that her hair was dyed a turquoise blue. The second thing was that blood was trailing down from her hairline, down her face. She wasn't moving.
Clark froze, his heart beating faster.
The robot bent over slowly. It was reaching for the unconscious, or possibly dead, girl.
"NO!"
Clark blinked, surprised at himself for shouting. The robot seemed surprised too, jerking backwards from the girl. Its cone-shaped head spun in place, orienting its vision directly on him.
"Witness identified."
"Uh oh."
And then, it turned back to the girl, and grabbed at a small bag that was attached to her belt. It lifted the bag up to its head, and the pointed tip opened up. The robot dropped the bag into the hole, and the tip flipped back down, sealing itself with a clang. Only then did its attention return to Clark.
"Eliminating witness." Its chest rotated to face him in the same way its head had, as if there was a swivel built into its waist. It clunkily raised one massive metal arm towards him and splayed its fingers. From the center of the robot's palm, a hole appeared. One that quickly filled with light.
Clark decided that he didn't want that pointed at him. He ran to the side, before kicking off the ground and diving for the car. He landed with a thud on the hood of the wreck and scrambled over the cracked windshield just before the robot's arm made a strange noise, followed by an explosion just behind him. He was sent tumbling into the seat next to the girl and realized with relief that he could hear her breathing.
"Why are you doing this?" Clark demanded, glaring up at the robot. Its hand had been aimed back at him, and the tunnel in its palm was once again beginning to glow, building up energy for the next blast. The front of the car was smoldering and melted from the previous shot, the edges of the metal still red-hot.
The red triangular eyes blinked, and the robot lowered its arm slightly.
"Computing answer," it said, before turning away from him to tap on its chin slowly and mechanically in thought.
Clark saw an opportunity and took it. Reaching down, he scooped the girl up in his arms, and hopped back out of the car, running back the way he came. She was taller than he was by a whole head, which made it a little awkward, but he managed. He cleared the hill, and then jumped the fence, before pushing back into Kent land.
He didn't know what he was going to do when he reached the barn, but he did know that Ma and Pa both knew better than him how to treat someone who was hurt.
As he ran, he caught a slight groan from the girl, and met her bright blue eyes.
"What the…" she muttered.
"Don't worry!" Clark assured, "I'm getting you somewhere safe."
"Safe? But…" her eyes shot wide open, and she began to struggle in his arms, "Agh! No, go back! I need to check!"
"Go back? To the killer robot?" he asked.
She groaned, more in disappointment than pain, before closing her eyes again. "All that work, all those days searching, all for nothing."
"Whatever it is you left in your car, your life is more important," Clark said, slowing down on his way back through the cornfield to avoid damaging any more crops, "Actually, now that I think about it, is that robot going to follow us?"
"It's certainly been following me," she muttered. Clark's heart started beating faster, and he found himself having to keep a smile out of his face. "Sorry to wrap you into this, kid."
"It's fine. I'm just glad I can help." The farmhouse came into sight, and he came to a stop. Slowly, he let the girl down, and she stumbled to her feet. She seemed uneasy, though, and he helpfully caught her arm just as she was about to unbalance again. "Ma!" he shouted, "Pa! Can you go get the bandages!?"
"Ow," the girl muttered, slapping a hand against the ear closest to him, "You've got a set of lungs on you, huh?"
"Right, sorry."
"Clark!" shouted his mother from the house, "What did you do to yourself now?" as Martha Kent stepped outside, however, she found herself blinking in surprise at the blue-haired teenager in front of her, "Oh my." She held the door open behind her, and motioned for them to come forwards, "You come on in, dearie. We'll see about that head wound."
Clark helped her inside, and onto the couch, before dashing back to the door.
"Clark, where are you going?"
"I've got to go take care of what attacked her!" he said, excitement was building inside him. The robot was following her. There wasn't really any choice, but to stop it. He didn't know whether he could. Somehow, he imagined that a robot was stronger than a bull.
The thought should have been scary. To Ma, it would be. But to Clark, it sounded like Christmas.
