Wander Over Yonder: The New Galaxy

Chapter Eleven: The Protector

Our gang has made it through the dangerous part…or have they?

Enjoy!

Wander swung his legs back and forth in his seat at the round table, sipping his tea and smiling.

Today was shaping up to be a pretty super day. He was with several of his best buds, doing what he loved to do; seeing the galaxy, helping others and meeting new people. Their hosts were very glad to have visitors. Apparently, the inhabitants of Varta VII had been worried that Dominator was still out there and had been staying close to home, in fact, under the water of their home, ever since the attack, and so they were very interested in everything that had happened in the rest of the galaxy.

It was also nice to see that Hater seemed to be having a good time.

Wander had been noticing how happy his buddy been over the past few days on the ship. Hater had been getting to know all of his new friends and had enjoyed hanging out with them.

And it seemed like he'd enjoyed hanging out with Wander too. They had gotten to cook together and had several relatively friendly conversations. They'd even gotten to play some music together, which had felt amazing! Wander loved playing music, and he'd gotten to do it with two of his best friends.

Wander was really proud of his buddy. He knew it was tough for Hater to break out of his shell and have some fun, and that the overlord was still feeling a little uncomfortable about saving the galaxy, and the adulation he was receiving as a result. It was nice to see Hater getting more comfortable with everyone else and not feeling the need to put on his big bad villain persona to deal with them.

All of that was why he'd asked Hater to come with them today. He'd thought his buddy might enjoy having another adventure with them, even though he knew their last expedition had been rather stressful for the skeleton lord, and Hater must have wanted to, since he'd said 'yes.'Wander really wanted to help his friend have fun today. He knew Hater had said he was more down for the destination rather than the journey, so he wanted to help his buddy see that the journey could be fun as well.

Wander was so excited to show his buddy all the neat things on this planet, and he hoped Mr. Peepers would enjoy them as well. Wander had noticed the watchdog seemed a little stressed today. Peepers had taken to staring at him and Hater when he thought they weren't looking, eye narrowed and the lid twitching slightly, and Wander was pretty sure the commander was having a rough time, but didn't want anyone to know it.

It was probably difficult for Peepers to be away from the skull-ship and the other watchdogs for so long, especially as he normally liked planning and keeping it in order so much. Maybe he should check on him later and see if there was anything Wander could do to help Peepers enjoy the journey and unwind a little while he was here.

In the meantime, maybe the tea would help. It seemed like a nice, relaxing blend, and one thing Wander knew Mr. Peepers needed, was to relax.

"What happened to this place anyway?" Sylvia put down her teacup, looking expectantly over at their hosts. "Last time Wander and I came here, it looked way different. We were actually worried you would have lost your whole ocean from that drill. How is there so much of it left, and what's with the giant lily pads and everything?"

The two aquanists looked at each other, which was rather strange to see when they shared the same body.

Sylvia noticed that Peepers was leaning over his untouched tea, eye narrowed and expression analytical. Wander's legs had stopped kicking as he listened, and even Hater seemed interested. This was probably something they'd all been wondering about.

"Well, I reckon it was a pretty tumultuous time," Nabbit began after a moment. "When that drill drove down through the ocean, we could see it just outside the bubble, and we all thought it was the end of the world."

Sylvia nodded, and a shadow seemed to pass over Wander's face for a moment before it was gone.

"We didn't know what to do," Abbit continued. "There wasn't much we could do. That giant drill dug right into the core and we couldn't see the water starting to drain, but we knew it must be happening, especially once the core was hollowed out. The planet didn't quite get split in half, but once the drill was pulled back up and the ship left, we all knew it was just a matter of time. If the water level didn't go down far enough to pop our bubble and leave us without protection, we knew the cold would seep through the planet eventually without the molten core."

Nabbit nodded, reaching awkwardly over to put a hand on Abbit's shoulder.

"Sure was terrible," he muttered.

"Worse still, the water got real rough." Abbit took a gulp from his cup. "The draining water was causing some kind of suction an' it was pulling at the bubble as well as messing with the sea beasts. They were going crazy out there, bumping into us. There was a lot of upheaval, an' the bubble started fracturing. We thought it was going to pop, but instead it got bumped into smaller bubbles, though we did have an awful lot of damage to our infrastructure, an' that's a fact."

"We were still being jostled around somethin' fierce!" Nabbit took over again. "And the water was spinning all around us, an' then we started noticing something swirling in the water, like little seeds or something, thousands and thousands of them. They seemed to dig inta the bubbles and started growing like crazy, spreadin' roots all across and shooting long green stems up through the water, an' we thought at first we were done for, that they were gonna pop the bubbles, but instead, it was almost like they were sheltering them from all the hubbub out there."

Both aquanists turned, and Sylvia followed their collective gaze out the window to where the bubble with its cradling roots was just visible.

When they turned back to her, their faces were rueful.

"I suppose that must sound mighty crazy to y'all," Abbit said quietly.

Sylvia shook her head.

"Believe it or not, we've seen something like that before. Well, not like this, but with the plants protecting the planets they take root on."

She tapped her teacup thoughtfully. They had only been on two planets so far, but already she could see a pattern emerging with how the flower was acting, though she still had no idea why. She thought back to the fragile yellow bloom, and her and Wander's desperate efforts to protect it and help it flourish, even once Dominator decided to destroy it.

Both of them had thought they'd failed, only to learn later that the spores from the flower had spread across the galaxy, just in time to bring life back to the planets that had been devastated by her drill.

Was it as simple as that? Could the flower be responding to their efforts to protect it, even after the original plant had died, or was it more likely that this was just something this species of plant did? It wasn't a type of flower she'd seen before, although admittedly botany wasn't her strong suit.

She looked across the table, meeting Wander's eye and seeing a small smile on his face, and wondered whether he'd been having similar thoughts. It never hurts to help, the smile seemed to say.

Sylvia took another sip of her tea to cover up her own smile.

Yeah, yeah, buddy, I know.

She supposed that was one good thing that had come out of the end of the galaxy. She finally, really believed him.

Leaving the two aquanists behind, they headed off towards part of the city, which was encased in a larger bubble nearby. The roots of the water lilies seemed have really integrated with the bubbles, even creating passageways between them.

Hater glanced back at the two farmers. He couldn't imagine living here inside the fragile shells of the bubbles, even with Wander's weird plant helping to support them.

He also couldn't imagine being a scrubby little farmer and digging in the dirt every day though, so maybe the two of them were just weirdos.

He supposed it had been interesting to hear what Dominator's attack had been like from one who was actually there for it, as well as how the flower had started taking root and growing here, even if the inhabitants hadn't seen too much, living underwater in dumb bubbles the way they were.

They crossed through the root tunnel, the world temporarily dimming as the thick, wooden walls blocked out much of the strange, blue light that seemed to emanate from the bubbles themselves.

Then, they were through it, Hater looking across the much larger bubble they'd arrived in at a thriving, if heavily damaged, cityscape.

Many of the buildings were cracked or listing to the side, windows broken, with debris littering the streets between them.

Still, the citizens themselves seemed fairly happy, and there were even a few groups of them working on fixing up some of the more unstable areas of the city.

Dominator would probably have been disappointed at how little long-term damage she'd actually done to this planet, Hater scoffed to himself. Serves her right.

It was still unpleasant to think about her.

He'd really liked her, or at least what he'd thought she was, since he supposed he'd never really known anything about her. He'd wanted to get to know her, at least after Wander's advice had made him realize how he actually felt about her.

He glanced over at the little nomad, skipping along between him and the zbornak.

He remembered Wander trying to help him ask Dominator out, singing and dancing and helping him write a whole intricate musical number. You couldn't say the little weirdo didn't practice what he preached. Wander really had just always wanted to help.

Even if the person he was helping had wanted to kill him.

And Hater had known that. That was why he'd captured Wander to get his help in the first place. Wander was the one person he could go to because Wander was the one person who would genuinely want to help him. Peepers hadn't been interested in Hater's plans, and the watchdogs would go along with him, but only because they worked for him.

And there really hadn't been anyone else, so Hater had thought of Wander.

Plus, the little hippy was all about that lovey-dovey junk. It had just made sense.

It certainly hadn't turned out well, when Dominator had responded to his heartfelt song by stomping all over his feelings and threatening to destroy them both, but even after all of that, and after the pest had annoyed him into escaping Dominator's ship, Hater hadn't been able to pull himself back to his previous mindset, to go back to hating Wander and chasing after him the way he had before.

He still told himself he hated the nomad, and he still thought about him and got annoyed at his stupid games and everything, but he thought that was probably when his feelings had started changing.

He was over Dominator now, but he still didn't like to think about her; that condescending voice, the fake sympathy, the way he still couldn't help finding her attractive even when he knew he shouldn't. She'd almost undermined him in that final battle, almost gotten inside his head and caused him to lose control of his forcefield, though he wasn't planning on admitting that to anyone else.

He hadn't expected an intervention by the zbornak of all people, or how invigorating it was when she got everyone chanting for him. He'd been able to put Dominator's poisonous words out of his head and focus on being the most awesome and powerful villain in the galaxy, and he'd won.

His and Sylvia's relationship seemed to have changed, just as his relationship with Wander had. She was still vaguely and annoyingly disrespectful when she talked to him, but there didn't seem to be that mistrust and genuine dislike she used to have. He wasn't sure what he should do about that.

Wander was the only one who didn't seem to have changed from all of this, if only because he'd already liked all of them from the beginning.

Hater sighed, trying to put his jumbled thoughts out of his mind, at least for now. They were heading into the city, and he was kind of interested to see what it was like, even though he was not looking forward to being around all the weird people.

When they got back to the ship, maybe he'd talk to Sylvia again. There was a part of him that had started getting very curious as to how exactly she and the furry mop met and became friends, for no particular reason, of course.

The city was lots of fun to explore!

A lot of it was still damaged from the drill of course, but Wander could see that the people had already recovered, and were working to make sure their city did the same. It was wonderful to see everyone pulling together and helping each other.

They worked their way through the downtown area, going from bubble to bubble, and stopping to chat with the local residents and see a little of the sights as they did so.

Wander was even able to convince Hater to try some of the delicacies he remembered from his last visit, including some orbazane he bought from a street vendor. Hater had been hesitant, but when he tried a bite of the skewer, teeth crunching through the candy bubbles on the outside to the pieces of fresh fruit beneath, Wander could tell he was pleased. He even managed to surprise a smile out of the overlord before Hater concealed it with a cough and looked away.

Wander could tell his buddy was feeling uncomfortable around all the strangers, and he seemed to be leaning into his former attitude a little more, keeping slightly aloof and grumbling about more things than normal. Wander didn't mind. He figured Hater wasn't sure how to act around the aquanists, since he wasn't here to conquer them and he didn't really know anything about hadn't done a lot of visiting places without attacking them first. Being the mean villain was his safe space, and if he needed it for a while, Wander understood.

He also wanted to make sure his buddy was comfortable, so he tried to stick close to Hater's side as they explored, which Hater didn't seem to mind, although Mr. Peepers didn't seem too happy about it, and the watchdog kept giving Wander suspicious looks from Hater's other side.

"This is great!" Sylvia leaned against the back of the park bench she was sitting on. "This planet is in way better shape than we expected. I mean, I know their surface bases were totally destroyed and splitting up the city really messed with the architecture, but still! At this rate, we might even get some departures after all, huh, pal?"

"You bet, Sylvia! I reckon some of the folks on board ship'll opt ta stay, leas' fer a while. An' the aquanists will be happy ta have some help rebuildin'!"

That was something that had been discussed on board the Star Nomad, since at the moment they were a tad overloaded. Quite a few of the refugees were tourists or explorers by nature and had hoped to find a planet in decent shape they could make at least a temporary home on while the ship continued visiting other planets and bringing aliens back to their home worlds.

Wander could think of a few people who would be interested in staying here, and all the locals they'd talked to had been perfectly happy about the VII didn't really have a monarch or anyone leading it, but Sylvia had managed to find a few members of their sparse government to discuss the matter with and it had been very promising.

"So," Sylvia continued, glancing at Hater and Peepers to include them in the discussion. "You guys want to head back to the ship and let everyone know what we found?"

"Grop, yes," Peepers agreed emphatically. "This has been…educational, but we've done more than enough sightseeing for my taste. Let's get back and keep moving. Some of us have an empire to rebuild."

"Sure, whatever," Hater contributed, and Wander gave him a concerned look. The overlord seemed to have something on his mind.

He hopped to his feet as Sylvia stood. He took one step towards Hater, with the intention being close in case his buddy needed him, when all four of them froze.

It wasn't so much a noise that they heard, but rather something they felt. A deep, ominous tremor seemed to pass through the water and slam into the giant orbles, which trembled on their water lily stems like a bundle of grapes being shaken.

As for the insides of the bubbles, it felt like an earthquake was ripping through them. Wander and his companions were knocked off their feet and they heard screaming and crashing and other worrying noises.

Then the shaking stopped as quickly as it had started, leaving the bubbles intact, probably thanks to their root shelters, but the city in turmoil, alarms ringing in many of the bubbles, and smoke rising ominously from somewhere.

Wander found himself on his knees in the waving, seaweed-like grass of the park, staring upward through the bubble and its protective roots, although there was no way he could see all the way to the surface, but then, he didn't have to.

He was pretty sure he knew who it was.

Wander was acting weird.

Normally, that wasn't much to remark on; Wander was always weird. But at this point, Hater was very familiar with the nomad's normal weirdness. He had spent countless hours obsessing over it, after all.

No this was something else. This time, Wander was being…quiet.

Hater didn't usually see Wander quiet. In fact, he hadn't even been sure that state was something Wander was capable of. Even when he slept, Wander wasn't quiet; he would snore softly in that particular way he had, or talk in his sleep about all the stupid adventures he was dreaming about having.

And right now, he wasn't sleeping in any case. He was just standing there looking kind of shaken. And quiet, which Hater kept coming back to because it really did seem to catch his notice the most. Wander didn't do quiet.

Except for right now.

After the shaking had stopped, Hater had pulled himself to his feet from where he'd fallen, all set to start yelling. He hadn't been that comfortable being inside the dumb fragile bubble things already, and he didn't know what had caused that, and he didn't particularly care right now, but somebody was going to hear how upset he was about it.

He glanced over at the others, ignoring the smoking and the alarms from the city, and saw that they were all looking upward.

"That came from the surface," Sylvia sounded worried.

Peepers nodded.

"And it wasn't any kind of natural phenomenon I've heard of before. In my expert opinion, I'd say its some kind of weapon, which means there's another villain up there."

"Right, then we've got to get up there too, before it happens again," Sylvia decided. "A couple more tremors like that could knock the whole city down, even if the roots keep the bubble from popping. Let's go, buddy!" She turned to Wander, and that was when Hater noticed that Wander hadn't moved. He hadn't even stood up from where he had fallen on the weird grass stuff. He had pushed himself slightly up on his hands and was staring upwards as though he could see through the water to what lay beyond. He hadn't even reacted to the distress of the city, which was particularly odd, since he was, well, Wander.

When Sylvia put a hand on his shoulder, Wander seemed to come back to himself. He stood and pulled himself onto Sylvia's back. He even cast a concerned glance towards the distressed city, and Hater could hear him mentioning that they'd have to come back and help as soon as possible. Then they were off and running towards one of the stem tunnels that would bring them to the upper bubbles where they'd started.

At least, Hater started out running. He was surprised when Sylvia grabbed his and Peepers' arms, pulling them onto her back to join Wander before putting on more speed. It wasn't the first time they'd done this, although it usually seemed to be to escape from Dominator, and Hater found himself amazed at her strength, the fact that she could carry all of them and still move faster than all of them could running.

Hater had figured that the weirdness was over, but when he looked over at Wander again, beside him now on Sylvia's back, it was to find that the furball had gone quiet again, and his hands on Sylvia's reins looked like they were clenching too tightly. He wasn't holding on to Hater either, which Wander usually seemed to do when they were riding together. Hater actually had to reach around him and grab the reigns as well to help him stay on. And he might have incidentally had to put an arm around the nomad as well, simply because there wasn't much space to maneuver up here without falling off.

Even then, Wander didn't hold onto him in turn.

It was strange, and anything strange about Wander was worth noticing. He may not exactly be Hater's most hated enemy any more, but he still seemed to be someone Hater couldn't help thinking about and taking note of, someone Hater couldn't seem to get out of his head most of the time. That had always been the case with Wander though, and it was probably never going to change.

They reached the highest level of the bubbles and Wander fished the juice out of his hat, creating an orble around them, and pushing out through one of the bubble walls, in the space between some of the roots.

Hater held his breath in case the orble popped, but the next thing he knew, they were rising back through the dark water, more swiftly this time as Sylvia pumped her legs, and for the first time, Hater found his thoughts drifting to what awaited them above the water.

If Peepers was right, and that had been some kind of weapon, just who had been wielding it? What villain thought they could encroach on his galaxy?

And, still there, distantly in the back of his mind, floated that thought, what's wrong with Wander?

Thanks for reading!

Hope you all liked the explanation for how the planet got this way.

The orbazine Wander bought is similar to Tanghulu, except the sugar surrounding each piece of fruit is puffed up to be like a separate bubble surrounding it. It sounds tasty to me!

Some readers may have guessed what and who caused the commotion. Its someone I've teased before, so I hope you like it when they are revealed!

Not sure what will be posted next, or when exactly it will come out. I'll try to get another chapter out by next week, but I can't guarantee it, as I'm going to be very busy for a while. I'll keep writing when I can and we will see what happens.

Give me some feedback if you like. I love hearing from you all!

See you soon!