"Attention esteemed passengers, we have arrived at our destination: Earth. Please ensure your seatbelts are securely fastened for a safe landing."
"We're on Earth? That's incredible! Wow, everyone, look! Is that it? It's so beautiful!" Inside the spherical spacecraft, Anjēru stared at the vibrant blue planet growing in the viewport, her face alight with excitement.
"Is this the planet where the old boss lives? Why does it look like a big ball?" Strategist asked, scratching his head in confusion.
Brute casually cuffed him on the back of the skull. "Idiot! Don't tell anyone you know me when we get out there. Your IQ is too damn low! For your information, all planets are spheres! We live on a sphere!"
"Oh! So that's it! The boss is the boss, you know so much! Your IQ is off the charts!" Strategist looked at Brute with newfound adoration, stars practically twinkling in his eyes. Had this guy's entire intellect been shaped by Brute's 'teachings'?
Anjēru watched the two buffoons, utterly speechless. She turned to Two-Flower with a look that begged for sense. Two-Flower, however, remained placid, even sounding a touch proud. "See? Don't think Brute's just a muscle-head. Among us Minotaurs, he's actually quite clever!" Alright, clearly Two-Flower and Brute were two peas in a pod. Their intellectual standards were… not high. No wonder she'd married him.
"Alright, you two! Fasten your seatbelts, now! We're entering the atmosphere!" Anjēru was past the point of gentle reminders.
"What good is a piece of cloth? I'll have you know, I've mastered the Thousand-Pound Fall technique!" Brute scoffed, striking a wide, proud horse-stance right in the middle of the cabin, bracing himself against nothing.
Boom, crash, rattle, bang!
The spacecraft pierced the atmosphere and began shaking violently. Brute's heroic pose lasted all of three seconds before he was sent bouncing around the interior like a pinball.
"Wife! Save me! I can't hold on!" Brute shrieked, finally managing to grab onto the leg of a bolted-down chair.
"What can I do? You wouldn't listen! Serves you right! Anyway, you're thick-skinned, you'll survive. Just hold on tight and don't let go! And don't you dare break Anjēru's ship—we can't afford to pay for it!"
"Boss! Hold on, I'm coming to save you!" True to his role as Brute's most loyal subordinate, Strategist lunged forward without a second thought.
The ship bucked again. Strategist's trajectory was instantly altered, sending him flying headfirst into a wall with a sickening thud.
"Boss! Heeelp!" Strategist wailed.
Brute managed to snag Strategist's ankle. "Good kid, loyal to the bone! I knew I didn't spoil you for nothing! But next time you dive for a rescue, could you maybe aim a little better?" Seriously, was this really a rescue attempt?
"Boss, I was aiming perfectly! The ship moved on its own!" Strategist's voice was thick with grievance.
"Well… I suppose I can't entirely blame you for that," Brute conceded, nodding sagely as if it were a perfectly reasonable excuse.
Finally, the spacecraft cleared the turbulent atmosphere and stabilized. Brute immediately scrambled up and dove headfirst into Two-Flower's embrace, burying his face firmly between her two ample… assets. He grinned to himself. Now it won't matter how much we crash! Wahahaha! I'm a genius! A genius? Couldn't he have just sat back down and fastened his seatbelt like a normal person? What was this 'hiding in the cleavage' maneuver?
Strategist, showing a rare spark of sense, scuttled back to his seat, buckled in, and gripped the armrests with white knuckles.
"Everyone, brace yourselves! We're landing!" Anjēru called out.
The spacecraft skidded across a rocky plain for several hundred meters, plowing through boulders and kicking up a huge dust cloud before grinding to a halt.
"Whew! Didn't feel a thing on impact… but I almost suffocated!" Brute gasped, finally emerging for air.
"Is this Earth? It's really beautiful," Anjēru said softly as the hatch opened. The group stepped out, breathing in the unfamiliar air, their faces filled with awe.
Anjēru turned to Brute. "Brute, can you sense Goku-san's ki?"
Brute closed his eyes, concentrating. His brow furrowed in surprise. "The people on this planet… they're pitifully weak! Most are just trash with a battle power of five! How can this be the planet where the old boss lives? Are you sure we didn't take a wrong turn?"
"Absolutely not," Anjēru said firmly. "This is the return course programmed into the ship's navigation. It can't be wrong."
"But… I can't sense the boss's ki at all," Brute said, puzzled. "Can everyone here suppress their energy?"
"Then release your own ki! If Goku-san senses it, he'll definitely come to find us!"
"Now that's a good idea!" Brute immediately obliged, unleashing his full power. A torrent of ki, measuring in the tens of thousands, erupted from his location, rippling across the landscape like a shockwave.
---
"This ki… it's immense! Is it Son Goku? No… this isn't his energy signature… This ki is even stronger than Son Goku's! How is that possible? Is there someone in this world more powerful than him?" Piccolo, deep in secluded meditation, snapped his eyes open, a cold sweat breaking out on his forehead. He was still operating on the power scale from the last time he'd seen Goku. The thought of an even greater power existing was terrifying.
Without hesitation, Piccolo shot into the sky, flying at top speed toward the source of the overwhelming energy. At the same time, Kuririn, Tenshinhan, and others training across the globe also sensed the formidable presence and immediately began rushing toward the same location.
---
"Isn't that the idiot Brute's ki? When did he come to Earth?" Son Goku, who was currently enjoying a rather relaxing back massage from Yuriko, paused in surprise as he sensed the familiar, if dim-witted, energy signature. "And Anjēru is with him? Are they trying to get my attention? But… I'm kind of busy right now…"
---
Just as Kuririn and the others had converged on the landing site and were reeling from the shock of seeing Piccolo—and the even bigger shock of the three Minotaurs and a strange girl—an even more terrifying, malevolent ki began to bore into the atmosphere of Earth.
"This ki… it's monstrous! Who is this?! Can such a being truly exist?!" Kuririn trembled, his face pale. The others stood frozen, equally horrified by the approaching, planet-shaking power.
"He's here!" Piccolo growled, his gaze locked on the sky, his expression grim.
A figure encased in a crackling green energy shield tore through the atmosphere like a meteor and slammed into the flat ground not far from the group. The impact cratered the earth for dozens of meters, sending debris and dust billowing into the air.
"He followed us…" Anjēru whispered, her face draining of color. Brute and the others' expressions turned to sheer dread.
The dust cleared. The figure stood, his wild, grass-green hair writhing with power, his eyes burning with pure, unadulterated hatred. He scanned the assembled fighters, then his gaze snapped to a point in the sky behind them, his focus absolute.
"KAKAROT! I FINALLY FOUND YOU!" Broly's roar shook the very heavens, saturated with endless rage and a killing intent so thick it felt like a physical weight pressing down on the world.