Wander Over Yonder: The New Galaxy
Chapter 1: The Reputation
Disclaimer: I do not own Wander Over Yonder. I'm still just hoping for a third season. Until then, let's see what I can come up with.
Well, I've finally started my story based around season three of Wander Over Yonder. I hope you all enjoy it!
I am going to be using a mix of things I've heard about the third season, and my own ideas. I also may not use some of the things I've heard, if I'm not sure how to write them properly, or want to go in a different direction. All the ideas I've heard sound amazing, but I may not want to stick too close to some of them. This story is in cannon with my stories Traveling Companions and Never Hurts To Help, and some elements from them may show up in this story, particularly a certain villain.
Let me know how you like the first chapter!
Lord Hater looked out from the surface of the secret planet at the distant stars.
A new galaxy; green, wild and growing, all thanks, apparently, to Wander and the weird flower he'd been obsessed with protecting. Naturally.
And, of course, thanks to his own destruction of Dominator's ship, as well as all the…other stuff he'd done.
It was a perfect time for him to conquer it, according to Peepers, planets all laid out at his feet for the taking, and with most of the other villains still scattered and demoralized from Dominator's destruction, even with the villainess herself nowhere to be seen, there would be precious little competition, at least for a while.
There were a few hitches, most notably the skull-ship, which needed some specialized materials to repair, and a new core entirely. Apparently, Skullcrusher mode both ate up power at an incredible rate, and put a severe amount of strain on the internals. Materials on this tiny planet were severely limited, even with the wreckages of several other ships that had landed here, and most of the parts they needed wouldn't be available.
Plus, those materials were currently being utilized…elsewhere.
Some ways away, Hater could see the skeleton of a ship that was being constructed, though he could already tell it looked nothing like a traditional space-faring vessel. Small figures swarmed over the surface as Wander, Sylvia and the rest of the refuges worked on the construction. This was apparently going to be their way off planet, at least until Peepers could locate some appropriate parts and they could return to fix the skull-ship.
After the initial excitement of his victory, and the subsequent adrenaline-fueled chase across the planet, Hater had felt indescribably tired, drained of power and energy. He had lain down in his room in the ruins of the ship and slept for twelve hours or so, recovering his electricity. Since he'd woken, he'd mostly stayed inside, thinking and debating with himself, and keeping far away from the other 'inhabitants.'
And from Wander.
Actually, it had been a little difficult to even look at Wander after everything. He didn't know whether Wander knew, after all. He supposed that was partly why he'd tried to conquer the planet, and subsequently chased the little pest all across its circumference. He'd been trying to get things back to normal, back to a place that made sense.
A place where he hadn't saved Wander.
He wasn't sure he'd ever be able to, now.
The biggest problem was that he knew he'd have to face Wander eventually. The little nomad just couldn't stay away from him, and Hater's own attention was constantly drawn to the furry nuisance. And when they did inevitably have their next confrontation, Hater wasn't exactly sure what he'd say.
And, if they were going to be around each other for a while it would be impossible to avoid the frustrating ball of sunshine forever.
Thinking about it, Hater supposed he didn't want to stay moping over by the ruins of the skull-ship forever. Moping was for losers. He'd have to do this sooner or later. Probably better to get it over with. So, arms crossed in a show of disapproval, the overlord left the shelter of his lopsided ship, and headed over towards the group of aliens.
It was quite a mix. Some were species' he knew, some even from planets he'd conquered in the past, and there were even some who were former villains, something for which Hater was uncomfortably aware Wander must be responsible.
Hater tried to look in control as he approached, menacing and unapproachable. It wasn't easy, especially as he knew what his reception would be like. He'd already had a taste of that from right after he'd destroyed Dominator's ship.
Teeth gritted; he did his best to ignore the cheerful greetings of the aliens as he walked by.
"Ah, the noble and mighty Lord Hater! How kind you are to come and inspect our progress, my friend!"
Hater just barely managed to suppress a wince, not meeting the goat man's eye as he stomped past.
"Hater! Look buddies, it's Hater!"
"How you doing, Hater!"
"Good to see you!"
The overlord tried to sidestep the group of his former prisoners from the pit of ultimate pain, but found himself surrounded and slapped on the back several times before he could manage to get away.
He got through the next few groups only having to endure brief greetings and cheerful waves, and successfully tiptoed past Major Threat, who was currently occupied using his psychic powers to hold a mast in place so it could be secured.
Even so, by the time he spotted Wander, Hater's power was boiling through his bones with fury.
He interrupted Wander's cheerful smile and "Hiya, Hater!", grabbing the nomad by one furry arm as he passed and pulling the pest along with him until they reached somewhere more secluded. The fact that not only did Wander go along with this happily, but none of the surrounding aliens seemed worried further soured his already grim mood, and once they were away from the crowds, he practically threw the nomad to the ground.
Wander bounced back to his feet with a smile.
"Good ta see you're feelin' better, buddy! I'm not surprised ya had ta lie down after all that stuff before. Didja want to talk to me about somethin'?"
"I'm not your…" Hater cut himself off with a growl. "Just what do you think you're doing here?" he snapped.
Wander cocked his head in confusion.
"Whatcha mean, Hater?"
"Acting like everything is normal and fine and all that junk!" The skeleton lord glared down at Wander, looming between him at the planet's sun to be as intimidating as possible, much as that had never worked on the freak.
Sure enough, Wander simply cocked his head the other way. He still looked a little confused, but not remotely frightened, much to Hater's displeasure.
"Well, everythin' is fine, isn't it, Hater?" he ventured.
"NO! It's not!" Hater snarled back. "Everything is weird and stupid now!"
"Huh." Wander stroked his chin thoughtfully. "I admit I was a little disappointed Dominator didn't wanna stay an' make some new friends, an' I still hope we'll see 'er again soon, an' o'course we're all stuck here until we can get tha Star Nomad up an' runnin', but…"
"That's not what I'm…" Hater paused, eyes narrowing. "What's a star nomad?"
"Oh, well, that's kind of a long story." Wander waved his hand in dismissal. "But it's also what everyone wanted ta call the ship we're buildin'. Kinda based on an old legend some of 'em have heard, I s'pose. What were ya talkin' about?"
Hater shook his head, trying to bring his anger back into focus after the usual way Wander insisted on derailing his thoughts.
"I'm not talking about that stupid Lord What's-her-face, or that lame ship out there. I'm talking about us!"
"Us?"
"Yes!" Hater felt like he was practically forcing the words out through gritted teeth. He took a deep breath, and looked the bemused nomad up and down. "You're acting like nothing's changed even when it totally has, and also, you're acting weird, even for you. You didn't sneak onto my ship even once after the battle to sing me a stupid song or start a stupid game…"
Hater trailed off, taking an uncomfortable step backward as Wander's smile grew slowly wider until it couldn't possibly fit on his face.
"Aw, Hater!" Wander clasped his hands to his furry chest, eyes wide and shining. "You should've said something if ya missed me that much. I just figured ya needed yer rest! But don't worry, I can take some time offa building if it's fer my best pal! I'm sure Sylvia an' the others can do without me for a few hours."
Wander was getting closer and Hater waved both hands frantically in an attempt to ward off the impending hug.
"No!" He denied, panicked voice squeaking, "That's not what I meant!"
Unfortunately, he hadn't reacted fast enough, and he found himself backed up against a tall rock, the nomad's gangly arms looped around him more times than should be possible. Hater growled audibly, pulling at Wander's arms until he could wriggle out of the furry embrace.
"Oh, this is gonna be great!" Wander bounced up and down in front of him, completely oblivious to Hater's glower. "We haven't gotten ta hang out t'gether properly in forever, 'cept for that game a' chase we had after Dominator's ship blew up o' course. Too much goin' on lately, I s'pose. What d'ya wanna do first?"
Hater growled, thoroughly fed up and at the end of his patience.
"What I want is for things to go back to the way they were, with you annoying me and me trying to destroy you!" Wander was smiling amiably again and Hater's eyes glowed in fury. "And stop that!"
"Stop what, Hater?" Wander blinked up at him innocently, only stoking the overlord's ire further.
"That!" he snarled. "Stop looking at me like that! Like you know I saved you!"
Hater had been looming menacingly over the nomad, claws raised and beginning to spark as his fury grew. Now he froze, one gloved hand slapping over his mouth as he recoiled. One terrified glance at Wander was enough for Hater to see that, at the very least, he hadn't told the nomad anything he didn't already know.
Energy suddenly going out of him, Hater sank down on a conveniently placed rock, turning his back on Wander so he wouldn't have to see the gentle smile the other was giving him. After a moment, he sensed Wander sitting down beside him.
Neither of them spoke for a moment.
Wander was surprisingly quiet, which made it easier for Hater to fight off the muscle memory of leaping to his feet and trying to blast the pesky doo-gooder once and for all.
Not that that had ever worked out for him in the past.
Instead of attacking Wander, Hater found himself speaking instead, voice a quiet murmur as though he didn't really want to be heard.
"It's just…it used to be so easy; you know? I was the bad guy, trying to conquer planets and you'd show up to distract me, and then I'd chase you around or capture you and try to vaporize you or dip you in lava. Junk like that. Then that whole stupid mess with Dominator happened, and now everyone keeps acting like I'm some kind of lame hero."
He shot a glance at Wander over his shoulder, catching the fuzzy mop giving a small nod.
"Savin' the entire galaxy'll do that to ya, Hater," he offered.
Hater glowered at the reminder.
"I'm still a bad guy," he protested. "I still want to conquer the galaxy and plunge it into a hundred years of darkness and everything. I just didn't want stupid Dominator to destroy it all before I could take it over. Everyone else just happened to be here when it happened."
The excuse sounded weak, even to him. He remembered watching the drill shrieking down towards the restrained zbornak, Dominator's sick glee at the pain she was causing, and the horror on the helpless faces of the other aliens. He remembered the fear, the genuine fear on Wander's face and in his voice as the drill came down for the final time. Hater hadn't even thought about it; he'd just acted.
And afterward, when Dominator's ship had been coming apart, when Hater's power had been sizzling through the twisting metal, fingering its way through ruptures, fire and explosions, and he'd felt those two rapid, frightened heartbeats at its center, wrapping their fragile orble in a forcefield had been the only thing he could do. Once again, he hadn't decided to save them. It had just happened.
He didn't know whether that made it better or worse.
Wander's thoughts seemed to have been following a similar path to his own.
"Sylvia's really grateful, Hater. We all are." Hearing a tremble in his voice, Hater turned sharply to see the nomad's eyes noticeably wet. "I didn't know what we were gonna do, an' then you came in at the last minute an' protected her. Ya saved my best friend. Ya saved all of us. An' I didn't wanna bug you while you were restin', an' I know ya might not want me ta say it, but I wanna thank you, whatever happens later."
Hater looked away again, hunching his shoulders.
"Don't…do that," he said quietly.
He heard a sniffle from being him.
"Sorry buddy," Wander said, blowing his nose on a handkerchief from his hat and seeming to collect himself. "Jus' needed ta let you know how much it means to me."
Hater glowered into the distance. After a few moments, looking away became difficult, and he turned to find Wander giving him a somewhat watery smile that made his glare darken. He had to resist the urge to recoil again in case of another hug.
The problem was that Hater didn't know how to backtrack to the way things used to be, and he probably wouldn't have been able to even if Wander hadn't realized about that whole 'saving the life of his most hated enemy' thing. Because, when push came to shove, that was exactly what Hater had done, and the more he thought about it, the more he realized it wasn't as much of an outlier as he'd thought.
For quite a while now, his and Wander's relationship had been changing. There had been lots of times when Hater could have been chasing the nomad and trying to destroy him when he hadn't.
When Wander had his finger stuck in a hole in the fabric of space itself, Hater could have blasted the little nuisance out of existence. It was probably the only time Wander wouldn't have been able to dodge or get away, yet the thought hadn't even occurred to him. Yes, he'd teased and messed with the nomad relentlessly, at least until Wander had decided to find something positive in the situation and the tables had been turned on him, but how evil had his actions been really when he hadn't even tried to zap the little freak?
And when Wander had showed up during his concert for Dominator, Hater had needed very minimal convincing to allow Wander to share the stage with him. As soon as he'd noticed the nomad's sweet guitar skills, he'd been perfectly willing to accept Wander's help. That didn't exactly sound like an enemy he lay awake at night thinking about torturing into submission.
Even after the whole disaster with their music number for Dominator, when they'd barely escaped with their lives and fled their separate ways, he hadn't really gone back to chasing after Wander. At most, the little weirdo had annoyed him when he'd shown up, but he'd still, well, worked with him and the zbornak, if grudgingly.
He'd tried to tell himself it was because Dominator was a huge threat right now, and he could always get back to destroying Wander once she was defeated once and for all. Now, she had been, but that fire of rage that used to burn in Hater's ribcage when he saw Wander, or heard him, or even thought about him, still seemed to be missing.
"Look," he managed after taking a deep breath. "This is really weird for me. I should want to destroy you, and I kind of do, but…" He dithered for a moment. "I'm not going to, for now," he finished lamely. He bit his lower jaw, continuing gruffly. "I mean, we're all stuck on this stupid rock together right now, so after we leave and I get the parts to repair my ship, I'm going right back to conquering the galaxy, and the next time I see you, I'll destroy you, for real this time. That whole…saving thing was one time only."
He peered at Wander critically, but was met with that soft, affectionate smile again like he'd half expected he would be. Wander wasn't buying it.
At least he'd confronted the pest, even if he'd totally flarped up his attempt to get things back to normal. Hater stood, brushing off his cloak distractedly to give himself something to do. He could feel Wander's smile warm against his back.
"I know what ya mean, Hater." Wander's voice was far too chummy for the overlord's liking. "It'll be nice ta get out in this brand-new galaxy an' see what's what. This little planet's been real accomodatin' while we needed it, but I could use a stretch of the ol' legs m'self. Jes' hard fer me ta stay in one place for too long, tell ya the truth."
"Yeah, I bet." Hater rolled his eyes, trying to put as much vitriol into the words as he could. "I'm going back to my ship. Don't wanna spend any more time with you losers." He muttered the words, but made sure they were loud enough that Wander heard them, not that he seemed bothered.
"You go get yer rest, Hater," he said instead. "An' don't worry. The Star Nomad will be finished b'fore ya know it!"
Hater was already walking, trying to put the cheerful voice and wide smile out of his mind. Unfortunately, while his all-consuming hatred for Wander refused to show itself, he still couldn't get the fuzzy mop out of his thoughts. He knew he'd be thinking about Wander's smile, as well as his tearful gratitude, for a long time to come. It was probably going to keep him awake tonight.
He wasn't looking forward to when they were able to finally leave this dumb planet either. If Wander somehow found a way to hang around and bother him when there was a whole galaxy between them, he hated to think how frequently the same would happen when they were forced to be on the same ship for an extended period of time.
Well, he supposed with a grim set of his jaw at his unpleasant future, if that didn't get the evil juices flowing again, nothing would.
Thanks for reading!
Hater had a rather confrontational heart to heart with Wander and we saw the Star Nomad beginning to take shape. Next chapter, let's see if we can get these characters out in space and see where they end up.
I share the head cannon that Wander is a Star Nomad, but I figure no one knows that, and they came up with the name for the ship based on fragments of remembered legends and such, and Wander just didn't bother to fill them in. I heard the ship was going to be called the Star Nomad, so I wanted to include it.
I also had to reference Hater saving Wander and Dominator by putting a forcefield around their orble. When I heard he'd done that I was over the moon! Made a lot of sense also, as you can see the green glow through the smoke and the crackles of electricity across the orble when it clears. That fact gives me so much delight.
This series is probably going to be fairly episodic, with likely a few chapters per adventure, and maybe some longer stretches. We will see how it works as I write. We should see a lot of familiar faces, and I plan to bring in some new ones, and especially some new villains.
Hope you all enjoy the ride!
Next update is probably for Learning To Swim.
See you soon!