Interlude 3

The young boy was crying. He was alone, hungry, thirsty and stuck within a big scrapyard. Even worse, he was unable to remember anything from before yesterday. When he woke up in the scrapyard, he had been too busy making fancy stuff to actually think, but now he was done tinkering and had slept, it had all hit him at once. He didn't know where he was, he didn't know who he was and he didn't know what to do. All he had were a pair of roller skates with retractable wheels made during his tinker fugue yesterday, and a few memories that were likely no more than a dream.

The boy saw his big sister lying in front of him, likely unconscious. One of her arms went through a hole in the wall, the other was lying limply next to her body. From the other room, he heard a muffled voice saying: "Door to Fortress Constructions!". Then, a few seconds later, the same voice said: "Door to Toybox!".

When the boy moved to wake up his sister, a hand grabbed him from behind. When he turned around, he saw a women in a suit shaking her head. Somehow, the woman terrified the boy. The boy felt a puncture in his shoulder and started to feel dissy. As he slowly passed out, he still heard some voices from the other room.

"Thank you for accepting your offer, we .."

"Stop offering your empty platitudes, we all know you are immoral monsters and that the only reason we are doing this is to prevent you guys from selling out that young tinker girl to the gangs. Just get this over with and bring us the girl!"

"Very well. Please go forward one by one and touch the hand sticking out of the wall. When all of you have touched it, we will release the girl into your custody and …."

The boy didn't understand much from this dream, and didn't know whether it really happened. However, he was confident that the unconscious girl in the dream was his big sister, even though he had no other memories of her.

"Hey boy, are you all right? I can take you to your parents if you're lost."

A middle aged man was suddenly standing in front of him. In between his tears, the boy had not noticed him approach.

The voice of the man did not calm the boy, as mentioning his parents, which he had no memories of, hurt him. While tears were still coming out of his eyes, the boy tried to answer.

"I don't know my parents, I don't know anyone! Where am I?!"

Before the boy continued his ramblings, his power provided him with information. It showed him exactly what the man wanted and …

"AAAAAAAH!"

The boy screamed and tried to get away as fast as possible. After running for a few seconds, he remembered that he was wearing his roller skater shoes and activated them. Not only would he now get wheels under his feet, but there was also a small motor within the shoes that would allow him to skate at car speeds.

"Boy, wait, please come back! I'm just trying to help you!"

The young boy continued screaming as his power reminded him of what the man wanted to do to him. With the boosted roller skates, he quickly excited the scrapyard into the unknown city.

One problem he hadn't thought about was that he had no experience riding roller skates, especially boosted ones. So when he exited the scrapyard unto the main road, he was unable to make a turn. Instead he crossed the road, somehow not being hit by any of the honking cars, and face planted into the office building on the other side.

Now the boy's scream came not only from fear, but also from pain. He didn't seem to have broken anything, but had bruises on his face, arms and legs. The boy was lucky that he managed to turn off the boosters in time, as otherwise he would definitely have broken multiple bones.

Now people were walking toward him, most of them seemingly concerned but wary. However, before anyone reached his crying self, someone else screamed and those people who seemed eager to help started to run away.

The boy was in too much pain to join them in their escape, so he could only look around in despair and see what kind of monster was attacking him now.

Fortunately, it wasn't a monster. Unfortunately, it was a big scary man in a costume with upside-down mask. Even more scary was that he was walking down the building on its side.

"So, you are a young Tinker, huh? You know what? I think you can be useful to the Folk."

The young boy was suddenly lifted upwards. He kept rising until his bruised body was grabbed by the Villain. This caused the boy to scream and cry even harder. However, the villain didn't seem to care about that.

"Oh shut up kid! We have good doctors at the Folk, so just try to keep quiet for a few minutes!"

Of course, this did not relax the boy at all. However, before the villain could get even more angry and possibly hurt him, they were interrupted.

"Stand down Topsy! I didn't think you would stoop so low as to kidnap elementary school children, but apparently I was wrong. If you release the child and surrender now, you can probably still get leniency. You know that once this gets out, the protectorate will take off their kiddie gloves against the Folk. Your own team might even get to you before we do!"

The boy looked at the source of the voice. He then saw a man in bulky brown power armor right below them, as well as a teenage boy in what appeared to be a superhero outfit. The boy calmed down a little, and became a bit excited below the much stronger feelings of fear and pain. He manage to cry out a "Please, help me!" before a hand was placed on his mouth.

His captor, however, didn't seem to be as confident as before. Was he afraid of the heroes, or even of his own team? The boy didn't know and didn't have the clarity of mind to think about it.

Then, the villain managed to surprise the boy. "You know what, this shitty tinker is not worth the hassle!" and immediately let the boy go as he ran away. Unfortunately for the boy, he was not on the ground, but 30 feet in the air as he started to fall.

All the hope the boy had slowly acquired vanished. None of his powers would allow him to safe himself from a fall of this height. So the boy could only scream as he fell to his apparent death.

Long before he reached the ground, the boy was grabbed by two enormous brown metal arms. When he finally became cognizant again, the boy realized the superhero in brown armor had jumped up to safe him!

"Are you all right boy? Did that villain do anything to you?"

The boy felt all of his fears disappear, although the pain of the bruises remained. He was saved by actual superheroes from a dastardly supervillain! Maybe they could even help him to find his sister.

"He *snif* didn't do anything to me yet. These bruises are my own fault *snif*."

The boy again got an insight into the motivations of the person he was talking to. Unlike last time however, it was not something horrifying. The superhero genuinely wanted to be as good a hero as possible and wanted to keep crime in his city in check.

The other hero, who had been shooting actual beams of energy at the villain, came back once the villain ran away.

"Sorry, Tecton, he got away. I still have to practice my aiming a bit."

"No worries Raymancer. We managed to safe the kid without causing any property damage."

The brown armored hero then turned back to the young boy.

"So boy, could you tell us where your parents live? We'll bring you home."

The boy's good mood evaporated again, however he managed to hold his tears back this time.

"I … I don't know who my parents are. I don't remember anything from before yesterday! I only know that I have a big sister and that I have powers."

The heroes were shocked at that. Both of them looked with pity at the young boy.

"That sounds really terrible! We can bring you with us to the protectorate headquarters. Maybe they can help you find your family. Even if they can't find them immediately, you can still become a member of the Wards and live on our base until then."

"Really! I can become a hero too?! And you will help me find my sister?!"

"Yes, you can certainly become a hero like us, and we will do all we can to get you back to your family."

The boy squealed in joy after hearing this. He was going to become a hero and they would help him find his sister. Even though he was still in pain, he finally smiled.

AN: So here is an interlude that hopefully answers some of your questions (Although it might inspire new ones).