Growing Pains

I hid my excitement behind a confident smile and crossed arms as Superman slowed to a stop and hovered in front of me. There was just something about having the chance to go all out that got my heart racing.

“I’m glad you got my message, I want a proper fight this time!” I declared.

Superman sighed and relaxed his stance a bit. “Are you sure about that? We could try resolving this another way.”

“Nope, has to be a fight.”

“Because of your mission? You said you were here to conquer the planet for your race, but you moved the fight all the way out here so no one gets hurt so I know you aren’t just going to mindlessly destroy everything.” Superman said, delaying the start of our fight even more…also oops, definitely giving people the wrong impression of Saiyans now. “Is there some way we could try negotiating with your leader to leave us alone?”

I mean, probably? If the Planet Trade Organization was a real thing here then there had to be someone they didn’t kill off or enslave right away. Since they needed, you know, people to actually buy and trade the planets they took over.

Not that I, as a disposable shock trooper, would know how to get ahold of them anyway, but I guess I needed to give him some kind reason to fight me without me attacking the city.

“Alright, if you can beat me then I’ll tell you everything I know about talking to our leader.” I declared, settling into a more offensive stance.

“...Okay, it’s a deal the–”

I didn’t wait for him to finish before I launched myself forward and attempted to bury my fist in his face.

Superman caught it before that could happen though.

One hand firmly captured, I could tell by the way he was bringing up his other hand he was expecting me to try punching him again like our last fight. He wasn’t expecting me to use my hand as a pivot point to kick him instead.

It was awkward, especially because in order to kick Superman I ended up twisting my whole body around and away from him, but I still hit hard enough to not only free myself but also send him flying.

He recovered quickly though.

“I’m glad you’re not hitting normal people that hard. You’d really hurt them.” Superman commented, rubbing his jaw.

I scoffed. “Humans are too weak for me to need to do that.” And they’d probably pop if I hit them that hard.

“They might surprise you. Humanity might not be the most physically strong race out there, but we are plenty strong in other ways.”

I was tempted to point out he wasn’t human though, but who was I to tell him what he could or could not consider himself? It’s not like he was saying he physically wasn’t kryptonian, just that he considered himself human. No different than if someone was born in Japan and grew up in America or something like that. Yeah they were born somewhere else but they likely didn’t think of their birth nation as home if they were only there as a baby.

Or maybe they did? I guess different people could have…

While I was distracted by my thoughts Superman blurred to the side. If this had been before my training with the Flash I wouldn’t have been able to keep up with him, but I was used to this level of speed now. I was easily able to see the open hand coming straight at me, confirming Superman was a jerk. He was still trying to spank me!

Not this time you blue jerk!

Ki gathered in my palms and with a loud shout I blasted him in the stomach with two beams of energy, swatting him out of the air and into a nearby cliffside.

“Ha, I’ve been training for our rematch Superman! You can’t cheat like last time!” I laughed as I floated closer to him. He was half buried in dirt and rocks, but he didn’t look particularly bothered by it either.

“Cheat? How did I cheat?” He asked, sounding a little incredulous.

“You didn’t fight properly!” I yelled, angry he was trying to sound innocent. “Spanking people when you are supposed to be fighting them isn’t fighting! It’s harassment!”

“H-harassment?!” Superman coughed. “Where did you hear that from?!”

“Internet!”

He sighed and pulled himself out of the cliffside. “I wasn’t trying to spank you,” he lied. “I was trying to restrain you so I could get some answers. I can tell you’re powerful, but running around causing trouble is going to get a lot of people hurt eventually. And I really don’t think I can seriously fight a child…”

“Hey, I’m a Saiyan warrior, not just some kid!” I protested. “And the only way you’re getting me to talk is to beat me in a proper fight! Now stop stalling!”

Superman sighed again. “Alright then…”

And then he was gone. Faster than Flash had moved during our training, but not quite as fast as I had seen him move, so I was already swinging a fist to hit him in the face. But to my surprise I hit nothing but air. How did he –

“Gah!”

I couldn’t help but gasp in pain as Superman’s palm dug itself deeper into my stomach. It hurt, but I also started smiling. He was finally taking me seriously!

I smacked his hand away and tried using that momentum to kick him, but once again I hit nothing but air. This time Superman grabbed my arm as I went sailing past and swung me around before throwing my high into the sky.

Which was really disorienting. I spent a few seconds just trying to figure out which way was which before finding Superman with my Ki sense and rushing back at him.

For a bit I thought I was overwhelming him. I still wasn’t landing any solid hits but he never managed to counterattack either. But as I paid attention to why they weren’t landing I started noticing something else.

Every kick landed short, every punch was being gently deflected or caught before it hit, and every ki blast was dodged.

He… he was toying with me wasn’t he? I was wrong, he still wasn’t taking me seriously at all!

Darn it, I was tiring out too. I was starting to overextend and Superman was taking advantage by throwing me around. Literally!

“WHY. CAN’T. I. HIT YOU!!!” I screamed, punching him with every word. None of them landed and I just got a slight smile in return that almost sent me back into a rage.

“Well, you just keep punching or kicking randomly.” The jerk said smugly. “It caught me off guard at first, but I just needed to watch carefully to figure you out.”

I froze.

Of course! Everything I knew about fighting was basically ‘hit it harder, hit it faster’ and while it worked for anything weaker than me, anyone stronger would be able to keep up. Okay, I knew what I needed to train next!

Superman looked a bit surprised when I smirked and drifted away from him instead of charging forward again.

Sorry, but I got what I wanted from this fight.

“Giving up?” He asked. “If you are, I hope you’re ready to answer my questions.”

My smile grew a bit sharper “Nope! But I definitely can’t beat you with my fists right now, so I’m going to end this with my ultimate technique!” (out of three, but he didn’t need to know that)

I spread my fingers out and placed them by my face while I readied the ki needed for the technique.

Superman started looking serious, watching for any sign of what I was planning.

Perfect.

“SOLAR FLARE!” I shouted the name of the technique as my ki flared out in a blinding flash of light. Superman was taken completely off guard and flinched while trying to shield his eyes, for all the good it did him right now. Leaving me to complete the last part of my master plan…

…running away as fast as I could! I knew I couldn’t win just yet, I just needed to not lose either.

-o-

“GAH?!” The sudden blast of light was unexpected and Superman was half expecting a child-sized missile to come crashing into him when he was blinded, so it was a bit embarrassing when nothing happened long enough for his eyes to recover and find Califa’s form flying off in the distance.

He was tempted to fly after her and wring the answers he needed out of her because if she was anything like some of the other children he knew growing up (and she certainly reminded him of some of them) she wouldn’t consider this a loss.

Before he could chase after her, there was a scream and the sound of rocks giving way.

Superman turned to see that some of the reporters that had stubbornly stayed in the area even though he tried to keep the fight far away from them had also been blinded by Califa’s last technique and staggered too close to the cliff edge where it collapsed.

He was already moving to catch the unfortunate reporter even as he realized the Saiyan girl would be long out of sight before he managed to calm the reporter down.

Hopefully she would keep to her pattern of relatively harmless actions until he could properly get her to sit down for a long discussion…and maybe figure out what to do with her afterwards.

If he was lucky she would stay out of trouble until then.

-o-

It was dark and stormy by the time I finally managed to get to my destination.

I hadn’t exactly wanted to come here looking for a martial arts teacher, but they were the best person I knew where to find and I knew they didn’t mind working with villains or kids from time to time.

“Why are you following me?” A stern voice growled from the shadows where I had finally found my target.

“You’re good at martial arts, right?” I asked instead.

Lightning flashed, revealing a dark cowled figure with a bat symbol displayed prominently on his chest.

“...”

“I want you to train me!”