The Wild Wastelands

Mayor Grove let out a quiet groan as he felt his eyes slowly open. "You okay?" Mr. Brenner asked.

Grove shot a glare at his bodyguard and shook his head. "No. I was tased and knocked out. Of course, I'm not okay." He hissed. He rubbed the back of his neck, slowly easing the tension that had started to build up in it. "So, you were able to activate the robot and get us out of here."

It had started off as his limo. A car that they had built using various supplies from other Mental-based Supers. His car was his ultimate weapon, loaded with powerful guns and able to fly and even transform into a large robot. It also used tech that had been created by one of the Pallet Boys. Those two fodder heroes had a way of doing the impossible. This tech allowed them to cause the cockpit of the robot to be much bigger than it should have been.

When the car transformed into its robot form, its interior nearly tripled in size, allowing for a wide-open space within the machine. It was a spacious room filled with dozens of chairs, a few beds, a bathroom, a fridge, and even a mini kitchen—like a small house that he could use in case he wasn't able to make it back to his base beneath the manor.

"Where are we heading?" He questioned his bodyguard. Mr. Brenner was seated in front of the wheel. Dozens of new buttons and levers had formed out of the car, which the man was using to steer his giant robot. "I was going to take us to the base-"

"No." The mayor shook his head. He looked around the large cockpit and frowned. The monitor showed the outside of the robot, and at the moment, they were quickly flying away from the stadium. They weren't very stealthy, and soon, it would be all over the news. "I don't want them finding my base."

"They already know who you are. Pretty sure they'll tear that place apart and find it sooner or later." The man grumbled. "Besides, the Supers are still there since you decided not to bring them along. We'll need them if we want to even stand a chance. I'm taking a great risk doing this. I might never be able to see my son again. The reason I worked for you was because you promised you could keep him safe from that monster. Don't forget."

"That's true, but..." He trailed off. He had a strange gut feeling. Something was telling him to not relax. Lady Luck was always on his side, so he often went with his gut feeling. His eyes roamed over the cockpit once more. "Something is off-"

The back of the room glowed with a bright blue light, and in a flash, two large glass-like boxes suddenly appeared. It caused their ride to shake and wobble. It didn't stop there either, as seconds later, Doc appeared along with two other people cloaked in red robes. Both glass boxes also contained two people. One of them was Kevin, whose eyes roamed around. The other was Wish. The girl didn't move an inch, and it was hard to tell if she was even alive; both her eyes squeezed tightly shut.

"How did you guys get here?!" Mr. Brenner asked with wide eyes. "Also, you're really fucking late!"

Doc brushed his coat off and walked forward, swinging his cane around. "We used a gate." The blind man explained. "Beneath the manor, inside of Grove's basement, we have our main base where I was restoring Kevin slowly." He trapped his cane on the glass box containing the boy. "That realm has two gates. One is the basement, and the other is here. It's so if the mayor is ever attacked, he can hop through the gate inside this machine I built and escape, then he has a door directly back to his manner."

"Why didn't I know about it?" Brenner asked, frowning.

"We didn't trust you with it." Doc chuckled. "Fear not, though you know now." The officer just sighed and shook his head. "So, Mr. Grove, or should I call you Sunshine? What do we do now."

"That's a good question." The mayor stood up and walked over to the glass container that held the body of Wish. "The Pod is still at our base?"

"Correct. I couldn't bring it with us." The Doc nodded.

The man sighed. "Very well. We got it from Avalon after we stole it away. It took me years to finally get the Lord of Life on my side. With her power my goal is actually in reach. A goal that had been created by someone before me once. I think it's time we meet someone." His fingers brushed the glass, and he felt his nails dig into it slightly.

"Are we going to go meet him, finally?"

"Meet who?" Brenner questioned.

"This machine. The thing that allowed us to break down people's bodies and turn them into monsters. They, in a way, mimic the Emperor's powers. We didn't just find them. I was gifted them by a man. That same man also happened to give me both Wish, and Doc here. All for the sake of my plan. However, he made me promise one thing. Should the day come that I am found out, he requested that I bring him his gift back."

"So instead of your base, we're going to go meet with this weird man, right?" The police officer nodded, putting it together. "I doubt this man is in Oleander, though. He'd have to be someone important to have all this stuff. He'd likely be a member of the Emperor's army, meaning he'd be an Organization member. That means he's in Rose City, right?"

Brenner shook his head. "No. The place we're going isn't in any city."

"Oh, you've got to be kidding me."

Brenner turned back and pointed at the monitor, watching as they passed over the ocean and began to head out of Oleander City. "We're heading to the Wastelands! If Lady Luck is truly on my side, then we'll win this battle, and my dream will come true!"

Unknown to all, however, someone else watched them closely. Unseen, Whisper folded her arms and watched the Paths change and twist. They formed shapes she had never seen before. She had debated zapping the driver and crashing the car the moment they were all in. After all, the entire reason she had stowed away was so she could find their base, but now they weren't even heading in the right direction. She didn't do this, though.

It was all because of one simple reason.

The Paths began to turn blank.

The future for the first time since she could recall was going to be a mystery to her. And that really excited her...

***

A Few Moments Earlier...

"Did she actually let herself be taken?" Cinder sighed, folding her arms as she followed the others out of the stadium. Down below, Green Wolf and Demonica would be fighting the members of Watch Dogs.

"I doubt they know she is there." Myth hummed as he stared down at his phone. He was getting a string of numbers and locations from Whisper, the unseen hero constantly sending her location to them.

Kyle's father had gotten away and, in the commotion, picked the mayor up in that strange robot they had. Whisper had decided that she would take it upon herself to discover where the Wandering Coin's base was. Now, they were stuck going after her.

"Are we going to go after her?" Battery asked. They had made it outside, where the crowd of people were still being taken to safety by dozens of Hero Branch members. For a moment, Cinder wondered if her mom was among them. Whisper had gotten the woman out when trouble had gone down. She'd have to send a text or something later.

"Of course, we have to go after her." Snowdawn snorted. His ice armor had reformed, and he clapped Battery on the back. "She's part of our team, after all-"

"She's a dumbass." Battery's words caused them all to fall silent.

"Don't be like that." She said, wincing a bit.

"She shouldn't have just jumped onto their ride." Battery spat out, shaking his head. "If they find out she's there or decide to go through a gate to another world, then what happens? Sure, she might be able to handle herself if it's just those two, but what happens when they get to Wish?"

"Wish is dead." Myth grunted. "You and I killed her ourselves."

"Her type never stays dead for long." Battery shrugged. "Besides, if she really wanted to help us capture the mayor, she could have knocked those two out by now. Instead, she is trying to get to their base."

"It's so we could find the others. And if Wish is alive, we need to take her down-"

"Our job is to take down Fairy Queen, right now. That's what we told Boy Genius. Instead of doing that, though, we're leaving Green Wolf behind, as well as the place Fairy Queen should come to, so we can chase down the mayor and hope they take us to their base. This plan is stupid."

She awkwardly shifted on her feet as Battery and Myth stared each other down. It felt kind of like watching someone's parents fight. She had never seen her mom or dad yell at one another, but when she went to Armin's house as kids, sometimes his parents would argue. She always felt guilty about which side she should take or if she should say anything or not.

She cleared her throat, getting the attention back on her. She stood her ground and folded her arms. "I think Myth needs to do this. He seemed off when he saw the mayor. No offense, Myth. I get it, though. If Lucifer was here, I'd want to do the same—drop everything and go after him."

"You're supposed to be on my side." Battery grumbled.

"Sorry." She chuckled. "I get what you're saying. I even agree with it. We shouldn't just drop the Fairy Queen job, and Whisper could have gone about this in a better way. I also think Myth has a right to have us go after Sunshine." For a moment, her thoughts went back to Wish. "If 'she' really is at their base, I'd like to stop her for good this time. I'm running out of time." She needed someone else to have that vast power. Her father, and even Jack, both of them were nearing the end of the road.

Snowdawn rubbed the back of his neck. "How are we going to get to where Whisper is, anyway? That thing was flying, and besides you, Myth, none of us can do that."

Myth turned and stared out at the parking lot where Whisper's van rested. "Get in. I'll handle getting us there."

"Uh oh..." Snowdawn made a face and sighed. "This is going to be a rough flight, isn't it?"

Before they could get into the van, a quiet buzzing filled the air. Battery reached into his belt, pulled out his phone, and answered it. "Hello-"

"When you told us Harrison had the sword, you failed to mention the fact that Fairy Queen would also be here!" The sound of intense battle came out of his speakers along with the very pissed-off voice of Ocean Empress. "I'm not one of the Enforcers that can just casually fight a member of the Organization! Also, there are two of them! Golden God is here, too, and up where Paragon is-"

Battery hung up and placed his phone back on his belt. "Well. That's not good."

"Damn it!" Myth hissed. "I thought Fairy Queen would show up here. I never imagined she'd stay behind and back up Avalon."

"Well, at least we know for sure he's in on it." Snowdawn bit his lip.

"We have to help them." She said quickly. "Poseidon and Paragon are both in trouble if they're both there!"

"That would mean leaving Whisper behind. I don't like what she did, but we still have to help her," Battery said.

She felt her nails dig into her palm as she gritted her teeth. "I'll go myself, then-"

Battery reached out and flicked her on the helmet. "Don't be stupid." The speedster turned to Myth. "You think you can handle it without me?"

"We'll manage, somehow." Myth nodded.

Battery nodded. "In that case, I'll head out."

"What?" She questioned.

"I'm going to go back up Ocean Empress and deal with Fairy Queen, myself." Battery explained. "Besides, I'd like to settle an old score with that winged bitch. As soon as I'm done, I'll run over and help you guys out. Even if you appear on the other side of the planet or in a pocket realm, I can grab Avalon's sword and make my way over."

"Should I come, too?" She asked.

Battery shook his head as sparks of gold began to seep through the lines on his costume. "It's faster if I go by myself."

"Stay safe." Snowdawn said.

"Now that's just asking too much." Battery smirked and then began to take off at a fast pace. He ran, getting quicker, and the gold got brighter until, in a flash, he zipped away at insane speeds.

She watched him leave before slowly turning away. "I don't like separating like this." She sighed. Despite that she got into the back of the van. Snowdawn took a seat up front. As for Myth he walked in front of the vehicle and his body began to change. "One day I really want the ability to fly. It would make things like this way easier."

Myth's body grew in size, claws forming out of his fingers and wings jutting out of his back. His body became that of a lion while his head shifted into an eagle. He took on the form of the griffin. He let out a loud cry, and his wings allowed him to take flight, and he landed on top of the roof of the van. Inside of the car, she cringed as she heard the metal rip and tear as his claws stabbed into it. Snowdawn made a face and quickly buckled up as the vehicle was raised off of the ground.

She reached up and grabbed onto anything she could, feeling her stomach go back and forth from the rocking of the now-flying car. "Somehow, this is much worse than Backup's boat."

"Please learn how to fly. Quickly." Snowdawn groaned.

"How would that help you?"

"You'd carry me!"

"Like hell I would."

"Hey, no fair! Didn't you carry Paragon when you and she did that combo move?"

"That definitely wasn't flying, and I can promise you she didn't enjoy it."

"How is it that you were able to pick up a girl before me?" Snowdawn pouted.

"I'm just cuter." She shrugged. "Deal with it."

Myth's voice pierced the air as he let out a loud cry. Just like when he was in his bull or lion form, his voice was louder and rougher, causing the metal of the van to shake as he took flight. "Not good. Whisper's texts have me worried." His tail held onto his phone, wrapped around it, and his bird head had twisted all the way around like some sort of owl, allowing him to still follow the instructions Whisper was sending him.

"How can this day get any worse?" Snowdawn called out, poking his head out of the window.

"They aren't heading to the mayor's manner." Myth explained. "Part of me thought the base would be there. Or maybe the base is there, but that isn't the direction in which they are heading."

She rolled her own window down and stared down at the city below, feeling her uneasy grow. She really wished Battery had stayed. They could have used his help. Myth had taken them above the bridge—the one that connected them to Lillian, the city Ocean Empress took care of. He wasn't heading towards the city, though. He flew over the bridge and began to head out towards the sea that rested down below.

She stared down at the water, her lips turning into a thin line. Her father had worked on boats. That was before she had been born. She never really liked the water, though.

They weren't heading to any city, and they weren't heading to Nightshade. In the distance, the land past the ocean looked small.

"The Wastelands." Myth's voice came out like a low growl. "They're heading deep into the Wasteland."

Across the sea the Wasteland stood. It was near Oleander, and Lillian. So close that they often had to deal with the threats that crossed the sea and reached them. The Wasteland was given its name because it was basically a hostile land where only death awaited. It was pretty much agreed that it was cursed. The Emperor, and Full Monarch, had started their clash in a city that used to stand there. That city was blown to bits. Later it was rebuilt but then the Beast came down and ruined it again and left the land scarred. After that a bunch of giant monsters moved in, Lucifer held a Murder Game there, and a bunch of other villains torched the place. Now the land was nothing more than a vast stretch of harsh sand that had no chance of recovering.

"Why would the mayor head this way?" She asked.

It didn't actually take them that long to reach the Wasteland. Oleander was a beach city, and the Wasteland was only a few miles away. Close enough you could get there by boat.

The Wasteland itself didn't actually look that bad. It was like an endless desert that went on in all directions, a few buildings poking out which still stood tall from the old world. The air smelled foul, and water started to drip down Snowdawn's body as the sky above the Wasteland had dozens of dark patches, places where the ozone had taken its share of damage, cranking the nearby heat to unbearable. Even she was having a hard time catching her breath.

"Well, if you're a bad guy, this would be a good spot to place your base, wouldn't it?" Snowdawn asked.

"No." She shook her head. "It wouldn't. All the giant monsters of the Emperor's army live out here, and there's got to be dozens of bandits or something if video games taught me anything. The base would have to be deep into the Wastelands, and they'd have to constantly go back and forth. It would be hard to constantly sneak in and out of the city. Besides, they have those mini pocket universes, don't they?" She frowned. "They had a bunch of them all over the place, or at least that's the feeling I got. They know we have a way of getting into one, so maybe that's why they're doing this, but if that's the case, this can't be their main base. All their stations are in Oleander city, and as far as we know, they never bothered messing with any other city. It doesn't make sense that they'd just leave and head out to this danger zone."

The ground below constantly belched smoke, and small fires were always crawling along the ground as beams of sunlight burned from above. She prayed Myth could hold out, but he seemed fine, shrugging off the heat beams and keeping his form over the van as he kept flying.

They were moving fast, and already up ahead, she saw the robot, or at least what was left of the machine. It was torn in two from her earlier attack, and the metal on it still had small plumes of fire that rose off of it. The thing was still far away, just a tiny, small dot in the distance, but they were moving faster than it and would soon catch up. Myth slowed down and went lower to the ground to avoid being seen. They had done this to find out where the Wandering Coin's main base was, but now they were likely going to discover something else.

"What are they going after?" She folded her arms and moved up to the front seat, getting in the passenger seat next to Snowdawn, who sat behind the wheel. She felt her enhanced senses build up. Even with how good they were, there was no way she could hear what was being said in the machine, but her eyes did improve, allowing her to see further than she normally would be able to. She always loved using this power to stare up at the sky at night. Sometimes, it allowed her to see cracks in the moon, the spots where Full Monarch had fought the Emperor; other times, she would catch rare glimpses of the Victorian up in space. Right now, though, it allowed her to see past the tiny dot that was the machine and see further past the lands of the Wasteland. "That doesn't look good."

"What?" Snowdawn asked, turning to look at her.

The Wasteland stretched on every way she looked. Just an endless wave of sand that was slowly twisting into shards of hot glass from the sun beams. Every now and then she would watch the ground break and twist as something beneath it moved or twitched, likely one of the giant monsters created by the Emperor. She even spotted a few large, armored trucks made out of junk metal that drove through the desert. Basically, sand bandits. It was something past the robot that was up ahead, though, that had her nervous.

A large metal structure was stabbing out of the ground. It was circular and came out like a large tower. Half of it was buried into the sand, and it was covered in thick rust. A large vault door hung in the center of it, though it had been torn away. It looked like the place where a Super would keep a bunch of their tech and was clearly unnatural. It was nearly three miles away from the flying robot, and they were almost two miles behind the robot.

If she were to make a bet, she'd say that's where they were heading. That tower was most likely something used by heroes or villains in the war with the Emperor. Either that or it was made before the Emperor and was something to stop the Beast. "Big ass tower ahead of us. Might be a vault filled with Super tech."

"Bandits would take all of it though, wouldn't they?" Snowdawn asked, cocking his head to the side. "Also, if they really had such amazing tech wouldn't they just bring that into Oleander and beat us? What could they have that would be so big of a trump card they'd run out here like this and leave Oleander behind?"

"Maybe it's a gate to another pocket realm that they have." Myth grunted out from above. "If they controlled it, no Bandits would be able to mess with it since the gate wouldn't let them in, and if it's on the building itself or massive, they wouldn't be able to move it, so they'd have to come out this way."

"That still wouldn't explain how no one ever saw them coming out before," she said, shaking her head. Their base has to be somewhere in Oleander. Whatever this thing is that they're heading to, it has to be something else. I don't know what, but it must be something they felt they either didn't need until this point or was so dangerous they didn't want to risk it."

"Ah, this makes my head hurt!" Snowdawn groaned. "I wish things would just be simple! Why don't we just speed up and take them out? From this distance, you could snipe them and down them. If they aren't heading to a secret base, we have no reason to follow them."

"That's true." She nodded. "We could just knock that box out of the sky and then come back to this place later and check it out-" Her enhanced senses allowed her to hear it. A familiar 'popping' sound. The same Green Wolf always made. Someone was using the sword and teleporting towards them. Only there was no way Battery would have gotten his hands on it this quickly. "Guys! I think we have trouble! Someone is about to-"

In a flash, she saw red hair, and her head turned just in time as a sword almost stabbed into her, going through the seat she was in. "Shit! Sorry, Cinder!" A familiar voice said, followed closely by a bird cry.

She didn't have time to speak as she felt someone simply appear in her lap and she suddenly became aware how cramped it was to have three people sitting up front.

The girl in her lap wore a white lab coat and a familiar goofy mask. On her shoulder, Destiny rested.

"Paragon! What are you doing here?" Hope asked, baffled.

The blind girl winced a bit, trying to move away from the flame-based hero, only to quickly find out she had picked the worst spot to teleport in: she was enclosed in a cramped car. "It's kind of a long story..."