Two months ago.
The air was still. The ship that carried Android 18 was now just a glimmer against the endless sky, disappearing beyond the clouds. Razor stood motionless, the golden sparks around him slowly fading until only the faint hum of residual energy filled the clearing. His raised arm fell to his side, his fingers twitching once before curling into a fist.
The anger that had been burning in him moments ago dulled into something else — something quieter and heavier.
He exhaled sharply through his nose. "Tch. Fine. Go on then."
His voice was low, cold, but there was a brief hitch in it — almost imperceptible.
"I didn't need you anyway."
He picked up the supplies and flew away from the city, soon reaching an empty valley untouched by life. Walking toward the jagged cliff as the wind swept over the charred rocks, Razor's hair fluttered in the fading glow of the sunset.
The thought of her — the android with sharp eyes and sharper words — lingered longer than he liked.
He clenched his jaw. "She was just baggage. A mouth that wouldn't stop running."
But even as he said it, his mind betrayed him — flashing back to the way she used to smirk whenever she caught him scowling. The way she leaned back with her arms crossed, looking impossibly smug after every argument she won.
Razor clicked his tongue again and threw a punch at the air, the force creating a shockwave that cracked the nearby stone. "I don't care. I'll just get stronger. That's all that ever mattered."
With that thought, he let his ki rise. The world trembled as the ground beneath him split apart. His aura flared — golden light bursting outward like wildfire. His hair lengthened, his brows vanished, and his eyes sharpened to a fierce glare. The third transformation — Super Saiyan 3 — ripped through the silence, its roar shaking the valley.
The sheer energy output was monstrous, but so was the strain. His muscles screamed, and the air around him shimmered from heat and pressure. Razor grit his teeth, forcing the form to stabilize.
"Not enough," he growled. His voice had deepened, echoing with power. "I'll master this — even if it kills me."
For hours, he pushed his limits. Transforming, basic training, exhausting, eating and then repeat. Each second felt like a battle against his own body. The earth cracked beneath his feet, mountains in the distance trembled, and lightning carved scars into the ground.
When he finally powered down, steam rose from his shoulders, and his breath came out ragged.
"Still not enough…" he muttered, staring at his hands. "But… better."
Days turned into weeks. Razor's training routine became absolute — no distractions, no breaks, just raw, endless struggle. Each sunrise found him standing on the same ridge, hair whipping in the wind, eyes fixed on a horizon that never answered him.
But the longer he trained, the quieter everything felt. His punches started to feel heavier, not because he was weaker — but because something inside him was missing.
One night, as he sat near a dying campfire, the flames crackling softly, his eyes fell on a small, charred piece of metal lying among his gear — a fragment of the ship's paneling 18 used to fix. He'd picked it up without thinking before she left.
He turned it over in his hand, expression blank.
Her voice echoed faintly in his head: "You break it, you fix it. That's how this works."
A rare chuckle escaped him — dry and brief. "Annoying woman."
He stared into the fire again, but for once, it didn't calm him. Instead, the silence pressed against him harder.
Razor stood abruptly. "This is ridiculous. She left. That's it."
His tone was sharp, defensive, but it didn't sound convincing — not even to himself.
He walked to the edge of the ridge, looking up at the stars. There was an emptiness in the vastness of the sky, and for the first time, Razor felt it staring back.
"She probably crashed somewhere or found another planet to terrorize," he muttered. "Either way, not my problem."
But he didn't move. His gaze stayed locked on the stars, as though he was daring them to give him an answer.
After a long silence, he sighed and reached into his armor pocket, pulling out a compact device. It was circular, metallic, and faintly glowing blue — the tracker linked to his ship. He flipped it open, and the screen flickered to life, showing a blinking dot far away on the galactic map.
"There you are," he muttered, a faint smirk tugging at the corner of his mouth. "Guess you didn't crash after all."
He paused, staring at the blinking signal.
"I'm not going because I'm worried," he said aloud, as if trying to convince himself. "I just… need to know why she left like that. That's all."
The words hung in the air, hollow but defiant.
He shut the tracker, his eyes narrowing. "Yeah… I'll find her. Get my answers. Then we're done."
The decision seemed to lift something heavy from his chest, though he'd never admit it.
Razor made his way to a nearby city with an outpost. He stole one of the spaceships present there and entered the cockpit, the metallic floor echoing under his boots.
The ship's systems flickered to life as he set the coordinates from his tracker. The navigation panel displayed the planet's name — a world rich in natural energy, inhabited by a peaceful alien species.
"Figures she'd end up somewhere quiet," Razor muttered. "Probably to annoy the aliens there."
He sat back, the glow of the console lighting up his face. The silence of space stretched before him — vast, cold, endless.
As the engines roared to life, Razor gripped the controls tightly, his reflection caught in the glass.
His eyes, still sharp and proud, softened for just a moment.
"This isn't about missing her," he told himself. "I just… need to settle something."
But even as he said it, he felt a strange restlessness — an unease that wasn't born of battle.
He pushed the throttle forward. The ship trembled, then shot upward, tearing through the atmosphere in a streak of blue light. The planet below shrank rapidly, swallowed by the void.
As he sped through the stars, Razor leaned back in his seat.
His expression hardened again. "You better have a good reason for leaving like that, 18. Because I'm not going back until I hear it."
The engines howled as the ship vanished into the darkness between stars — a lone Saiyan warrior, chasing not strength, but something far more complicated.
And though he wouldn't admit it — not yet — for the first time in a long while, Razor wasn't just running toward a fight. He was running toward a truth he didn't understand.