BLUE WASTELAND

A Kim Possible Fan Fiction

By Psychedelic Leviathan

(KP is owned by Disney. Captain Freedom by me.)

a/n: So depressed. Hope you enjoy the chapter that my latest insanity has fueled.

The man who had been famed as Captain Freedom stood outside, awaiting the sunrise. As he had written in his own poetry: 'The Rising Sun will set me free.' He had grown terror drenched in the darkness over Hell, New Mexico.

He longed for senility and wondered why it could not come to such a creature of the ancient world. He was a walking fossil of a man born all the way back in the year 1916, why he wasn't dead yet was a mystery. He often wished for death to end his days, but didn't want to kill himself because of his pride. He'd think about it often, but wasn't quite able to cut open his wrists like he'd like too so very much.

The man who had once been the world's mightiest hero was now afraid of the dark sometimes, a trauma victim from cosmic horrors only he could understand. Freedom sighed and wished for the mental fog of senility to overtake him. All of those who had seen the sun bleed dry, they were all mercifully senile it seemed, all except for him. The man who had lead the greatest heroic stand in history, who had had to go aboard that nightmare world that was their starship. The images in his head could not be extinguished, happiness was now placed forever beyond his grasp from them.

The Justice Legion had invaded the ship fearlessly, attacking the aliens with mad abandon. But their zeal had been an attempt to cover over the fear that each one of those valiant psychopaths had felt in presence of the ultra human menace. It was a fear that had been well justified. One by one Captain Freedom had seen them die all around him, until only he was left.

He had to take that charge alone from then on ward, using his now defunct superhuman strength, flight and invulnerability to inflict massive damage on these abominations that had cut the wrist's of Earth's sun and slain all of his battle brothers and sisters in the Legion. He had fallen upon them with rage that could not be put into words, showing no mercy and expecting none. And in the end he proved victorious over the mightiest of alien war machines and brain matter, he had been the world's salvation in what had literally been human civilization's darkest hours.

The ship was destroyed, the energy process that had sucked dry the sun had been reversed and humanity had spawned another god to add to it's already extensive religious mythologies.

And the price he had borne to do all this, it was more then he could have afforded to pay. Captain Freedom was not a god like Zeus, he was a man even with all of his mighty abilities.

It was that day that he had understood human frailty. The teen superhero who had once put his hands on his hips and boasted "I am ten feet tall and bulletproof!" had been proven to be just a mortal smashed like an insect on the window of cosmic forces such as the Sun Drinkers. He knew what was going on, they had used their monstrous science to poison him as a last vengeful act for destroying their invading war fleet. His flight had been the first thing to go, accompanied by his sense of godhood that had accompanied flight. It had been wickedly symbolic, they had literally pulled him from the sky and nailed to his feet to the ground below.

His superhuman's strength vanished soon later, midway through a routinue attempt to lift a car off of somebody who was pinned below it. His invulnerability followed in less amazing fashion. He had never bled before in his life, but soon afterward he had found he could be pricked into bleeding by a paper cut.

Without his powers he had become another mortal man and for a little while was relieved, no more saving the world. He looked into other career options for a muscular and quick thinking young man. He decided he wanted to go back to his old life, to doing the things he had done before his powers had emerged at age nineteen. He picked up his long aside pigskin and after practicing his throwing he made some calls to the coaches of professional football teams, ready to return to the blazing dreams of big time athletic glory that super heroing had extinguished. He had been banned from playing college and pro ball after his powers had surfaced, but now that they were gone he was cleared to come back.

For a while everything looked fine, his skills had not rusted at all and had earned him a try out with the Los Angeles Rams. Soon he was headed out to California, full of revived dreams and ready to begin a new life for himself. All this made sense to him, a life as a full time pro quarterback rather then his teenage life as an athletic star who also saved the world from villains after school. He was almost 40 in 1955, but he had the body of a man in his early 20s and soon proved the doubts about his age wrong.

For about three weeks everything was wonderful. He dropped Captain Freedom and went back briefly to using his real name, he forgot about the horrors of interstellar war and soaked in the dreamy California sun. Everyday seemed better the one before, living his dream out on the West Coast and becoming more and more sure he would make the National Football League roster.

Captain Freedom store at the mountains in the distance. Where was the sun today? Had it vanished again? He deliberately paced his breathing, trying to calm himself down.

Finally the summer of dreams came to an end, fall was approaching and he was informed that he had made the final roster for the 1955 season. He was issued his game uniforms, put in the program and was now ready to play. He began counting days until the opener at the Los Angeles Coliseum, ready to suit up on America's biggest stage. Though he would not start for the Rams he was told that he would be sent in at some point, that he would play in his first pro game as a rookie. Nothing but brilliant dreams lay in front of him, he collected his first paycheck in the week before the first game and immediately bought a house in the ever growing city. It was all like some crazy dream, a roller coaster ride to the moon.

Then in the first week of September all hell broke loose. Without warning the last phases of the alien DNA taint revealed themselves in a rapid assault. He awoke one morning to find much of his famed blonde mane of hair upon his pillow rather then his scalp. He knew what was happening, his family had not have a history of baldness so he knew immediately it was the poisoning. He shuddered fearfully and pulled his Rams hat over his head to disguise what was going on, but he knew deeply that he was doomed.

Within the next couple of days he witnessed his head go completely bald, trying weakly to refrain from sobbing in front of the mirror as the disease robbed him of his hair. Before this he been a 39 year old who looked 26, but now without the hair he was a 39 year old who looked almost 60.

As the days went by the coaches noticed him declining sharply, his joy on throwing the ball around on the Coliseum grass having become misery, the game having become a burden. But no one wanted to really interrogate Captain Freedom, not after all he had done for the world. No one commented on his disintegration, but everyone knew it was there.

Freedom then felt his arm strength beginning to drop day by day in a sort of reverse evolution. Spirals became wobbles, he was having trouble co coordinating his passes, his foot speed declined greatly. The coaches were now starting to notice that, his powers were blowing away like dust in the wind and he had no ability to do anything about it.

He took out his long forgotten Bible and every night would pray and plead to God to not let him fall apart. "Please God, just let me at least play in one game...please don't let me disappear..." But that seemed futile, regardless of how much he cried in prayer he still saw himself loosing weight, somehow he seemed to be getting shorter.

He could remember the last day, he had one of the receivers streaking towards the end zone and blowing past coverage. The man stood in the end zone and waved his arms, completely wide open. Freedom threw the ball and missed him by almost ten feet. He was pulled from the daily scrimmage and was told that the Coach wanted his playbook, just like that he was cut two days before the opener in Los Angeles and sent home.

Freedom sort of fell out of public view after that, no longer showing his face too anyone. He was unsurprised that no one looked for him, they were all too busy reveling in the fact that they were all still alive. He became a hermit, never leaving his home except to buy food. He contemplated suicide, but did not have enough will to go forward and actually do it. Eventually he had to return to the outside world in order to make money to eat, so worked in the graveyard shift at some warehouses in Long Beach under a made up name. He looked so different now anyways that no one recognized him ever, so he was left alone. Occasionally someone would show up at his house in search of the superhero but he simply told them that Captain Freedom was dead and he was a cousin who had inherited his small Hollywood home.

The world of the late 1950s was being actively threatened by giant radioactive monsters spawned by atomic bomb testing, so society at large was worried about other things then what had become of their champion. A 400 foot tall tyrannosaurus rex's terrible appearances in Tokyo bay were much more on the world's mind then anything else.

Captain Freedom saw the faintest glimmers of orange on the horizon, soon the sun would be eating up the night. He smiled, always feeling relieved when the sun would come up in the morning. It was why he set his alarm clock to 4 AM everyday without fail, he had to know for sure. It would seem and sound bizarre to those people in the present, but they could not understand what it had been like back in the day.

"Yo Freedom." Drakken said from behind the old man.

"Drakken." He said. "Why are you up so early?"

"I always get up this early, I work out."

"Oh right." Freedom said vaguely.

"Why are you up so early?"

"I can't stand the night."

"Oh." Drakken nodded. "Continuing your obsessive monitoring of the sun are we?"

"Yes."

"How long have you been doing this?"

"Forty nine years."

"Wow. That is crazy."

"Well, you youngins don't know how crazy my life has been. You can't count on nothing, not even the sun coming up the next morning."

"Oh right, I forgot all about that." Drakken said with a bit of concealed awe. "You were the man. You saved our sunlight."

"Yeah, but it cost me. I lost everything to save these ungrateful bastards. My health, my strength, my good looks, my sanity."

"You're a god."

"Not for long. Soon I'll be dead. And of what use is a dead god."

"You still inspire people, even after your dead you will continue to do. No one's really dead until they are forgotten."

"I don't want to achieve immortality by history books or old black and white videos shown to very bored school kids, I want to achieve it by not dying."

"You could be frozen."

"I've considered that. Provided they can regenerate my body. Make me young again. There's no way I want physical immortality if it's going to be in this rotting bag of flesh."

"Yeah, that would be bad."

"Drakken? Why'd you become a hero?"

"Because Kim Possible failed. And someone has to stop that crazy Shego before she destroys us all."

"That's what I wanted to hear from you."

"Why's that?"

"Kim Possible will fail us in the clutch. That's why. Between you and me, you're the only real hope."

"That's not true. Kim Possible can do anything."

"Your wrong Drakken, your really wrong."

Captain Freedom picked up a rock and threw it as far as he could. "Because I'm hoping to pull out something that logically cannot be done. In my old age I am seeing a return of my old desire for a challenge."

"Why can't Kim Possible defeat Shego?"

"Because she is afraid of Shego, as she should be."

"She can do anything!"

"Could do anything. She's mortal now you understand that? Once you've been broken you can be put back together, but no where near as strong as before you were cracked. She never had doubt in her mind before and now she does."

"So? I have more doubts then her."

"Your tougher then she is. So am I. So is Shego."

"How?"

"All of three of us, me, you, Shego, we've been put to the torch. We've been tested by horror. Kim Possible never has up until now. She's always been winning in things before, look how hard she fell apart after she lost to Shego. We have the ability to slog through things because we were burnt by the world early and have been acquainted with the darkness."

"I'm not following you."

"She does not have the tolerance for despair that we do, because we've lived in it for so long. You, me, Shego we've lead terrible lives in the past and endured things that no decent human being ever should have too. Up until recently Kim Possible had never lost anything in her rich and preppy little life. She's not used to being hit hard and having her brain rattle around inside her head, just used to being the one doing it to others. And now she is in a position where she can't just mow everyone down anymore. I don't think there is enough time for her to develop that how do you put it...hard core."

Drakken seemed impressed. "Wow."

"What is so wow about it?"

"You mentioning me in the same sentence as yourself."

"You've got a hard head Drakken. A lot of people in your shoes would have killed themselves long before now. You've got the rock hard jaw that I have."

"Awww quit flattering me." Drakken laughed in embarrassment.

"I meant that. Now take some goddamned pride in yourself of get the hell out of the way."

"Um yes, wow, thank you for the endorsement sir." Drakken stammered with a nervous salute.

"Your tough Drakken and from what I saw from you earlier you're a real fighter. A real fighter can take that punch when the shit jumps off, that's the difference between that person and some brawling bully. That's what separates Kim Possible and Shego. Truthfully, I think your almost ready for Shego from the fight I had with you earlier."

"What do I need? More skills? More training?"

"Well yes, but your mentality isn't there yet. Its close, but not fully complete."

"Why isn't it?"

"In the fight you had with me, you had me beat at the end. But you did not beat me."

"You punched me in the throat."

"Sure I did. But that still doesn't change the fact that you had me on the ropes and couldn't deliverer the kill shot. There is no reason I should still be alive right now."

Drakken seemed shocked. "I should have killed you?"

"That was your goal wasn't it? You failed to do so."

"Now your just talking crazy."

"No I'm not. This is a glaring weakness in your way of fighting. You had Shego beat the first time you took her on, but you balked when she got cute with you. You have to put down the beast Drakken. You were very lucky to have come out alive. You are very lucky to have a second chance at her, so use it this time. Because I will guarantee you that if you fail to finish her this time, you will get no third chance because your throat will be cut out."

Drakken had never seen the old man look this grim or determined, his fists were clenched at his sides and he was livid.

"Drakken your problem is that you do not know how to be a killer. Even when you were a villain you lacked that vicious finishing instinct. I know it and you know it, you could have easily just stuck a gun in Kim Possible's mouth and pulled the trigger. But you feared victory and opted instead for cowardice, to put her in traps that supposedly would finish her off for you. Drakken, loose this shit immediately."

Drakken seemed somewhat lost from that. "I thought you said you were a fighter."

"Yes and that is more then most people. But Shego is a killer. And to defeat her you must also be a killer yourself. You need to harden your heart and be without remorse or care for this world. All that must matter is getting the job done, at whatever the price is to yourself. It's how I went into battle every time. It did not matter what happened to me, so long as I put down the threat."

"I need to be crazy?"

"Duh. All of the really elite are. The difference between me and some psycho off of the street is that I am in control of my inner darkness, I can turn it on and off like a water faucet."

"That's pretty confusing. You want me to be both controlled and insane?"

"Yes. A true warrior needs to know how to straddle both worlds. You must understand and master both cold thinking and violent insanity. And be able to switch modes at will. You have to be both the doughy fighter and the savage berserker and you have to know when to be what."

"I think your crazy."

"You think right. How else could I have thrown myself in front of an entire alien civilization? But I'm smart and logical too, otherwise I never could beaten them once I got there."

"I'm still confused."

"That's the nature of the beast. Cynic and fanatic, both you must be."

"So those are conflicting opposites. How can you live with both?"

"By being bigger then both all your traits combined and the master of your emotions, rather them the master of you."

"That's kind of making sense. Being to able to change yourself at will, sort of like different tracks on CD."

"Now you are understanding. Drakken you are not your emotions, you are your brain. In fact a lot of things that you probably think of you really aren't. You were never a blue mad genius, you were a blue man who choose to engage in the practice of being a mad genius. You are you, not your traits or your roles in the world."

"So, I need to be really cold? Like the Terminator?"

"In a way yes. But that does not mean your life is joyless. You can still enjoy things, but when you do remember that pleasure is just a game and that it exists to serve you, you are not to be a slave to it. The same is with anger. Rage and hatred, they are tools for you to use to embolden yourself for war. But you must be at the controls of the gun your firing."

"So, if I'm not all of these things? Then what am I?"

"You are your mind and to a good extent your body."

"And I'm not a mad genius?"

"That is a role that you occupied. Now you have been redefined as a hero. Nobody is really either a hero or villain, those are roles they choose in the world's struggles. But you are neither really, you are just Drakken."

"I understood everything you said for like all of three seconds. I saw it in my mind and then it was gone."

"Its okay. All this Zen type stuff about real identity takes time to comprehend."

"I'm sure if I want to be a killer."

"It's just another thing you'd know how to do, and need to do if you want to save us from Shego. It's not your real self, your Drakken."

"Thanks."

The dawn was rising, lighting up the sparse and parched landscape with a golden illumination that made all things pretty to the senses. For a few golden moments Hell was beautiful.

"Do you feel better now that the sun is up?" Drakken said.

"It never fails to relieve me."

"If you know so much about everything, why can't you fight with us?"

"Because I've been hit too many times. No one has faced death as many times as I have. As I've said, once your broken you can be glued back together. But not as strong as before. And I've been broken apart more then once."

"Don't talk like that, your scaring me."

"Yeah?"

"When the world's greatest hero is scared, then it means shit is about to jump off."

"Well...it is. And I can't fight with you, I no longer have the ability to detach myself from things. I've been kicked in the head too many times. And above all I'm too old physically."

"You fought me pretty well."

"Yeah, I know I did. But I had to survive."

"I know your not a scared old man. You just can't be, your Captain Freedom, the king of heroes. You were number one."

"Then you don't know me very well Drakken."

"What if you could be made young again? Like the green guy in Dragonball Z."

"Quit dreaming Drakken. Focus on your meat head training."

"Oh damn!" Drakken remembered. "Yeah I gotta go, I was supposed to meet Irv half an hour ago."

The blue man ran off on his great legs, leaving him alone with his thoughts again. He looked up in the direction the bright shining orb one last time before heading on an unplanned walk.

He knew Drakken was wrong of course. Some things could not be healed from, regardless of time's passing. Some wounds were just too deep. Drakken didn't know that yet, because though he had been hit hard in his time, he had never been smacked in the teeth like Freedom had.

But Drakken had made him ashamed of himself, though he had not shown it at all. He was a scared old man, despite what he stated. He wanted badly to be a part of this campaign against evil, but he knew far too much of his own mortality and fallibility.

Freedom sighed weakly, a tired and weary groan that was barely even audible, an admission of feebleness from a living ghost who once amongst all valiant heroes had been the very strongest.

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