Wanted

By C.M. Rich (Magnetman)

Epilogue - Forever Mindful

May 31st, 20XX, 9:51 PM

It took a few hours for Geminiman and SparkChan to find the near-dead Snakeman, hidden in the ruins. Using Victory’s own high-powered rifle, which he hastily discarded, Gemini was able to blast a massive hole through Requiem Mass’s chest, proving the horrific strength of the cannon.

After which, they sought out the other Mechs, gradually coming across Topman, and meeting up with NeedleGal, who reported that Hardman and Magnetman managed to survive the backlash of the magnetic force, though at a tremendous toll to their bodies.

Classi and Geminiman descended to find Shadowman in the darkness of the crater, alone. Silent.

Shadowman was gravely wounded, the whole day conspiring to rack up an impressive array of wounds.

Hardman was barely able to move under his own power, as his internal generators were almost completely wiped out. Magnetman himself was in arguably worse shape, as both of his arms had blown themselves apart when he used too much power. NeedleGal was still barely able to stand, and she had stayed with the wounded Kenta and Hadrian after their sacrifice.

Come to think of it, the entire team was much worse for the wear. Snakeman was full of bullet holes from his marathon battle with The Judge, as well as the near-mortal wound in his chest from Death. SparkChan was taxed to her limit after using her electrical power to protect her family, and couldn’t even manage to perform small repairs due to her level of exhaustion. Geminiman bore a vast array of scars, burns, tears, and gashes, as did Topman, who also had numerous crushed cybernetic organs within.

The entire team looked as though they had fought World War Three by themselves. Given the possible outcome, though, they may have prevented it.

Once they had collected themselves, Hardman slurred a rather important question:

“Boss…What about provin’ our innocence?”

Shadowman stopped for a second, his eye weary. Still, he managed a very slight smile after a moment’s pause.

“…Already taken care of.”

Geminiman looked at him quizzically with his one good eye, as did many of the others on the team. None of them seemed to think of any conceivable way Gauntlet could have cleared their name from this location, cut off from the rest of the world.

Then again, they were exhausted.

Instead of playing twenty questions, the group silently agreed to ask later. For now…All they wanted was to go home.

June 1st, 20XX, 1:01 AM, Eastern Standard Time

The Maniacs arrived home…Or what was left of it.

In the day’s events, they collectively forgot about the riot they left behind, which had invaded and damaged their old/new fortress on wheels, the Technodrome, to the point where it was nearly destroyed. The entire front portion of it was torn out and crushed, as if it were smashed in by a tank, or at least a few cars. That would explain the pair of burnt out Hummers still abandoned in front of their abode, which they had to climb past in order to gain entry.

Inside, the settings didn’t exactly look much better. Furniture, equipment…Everything. Anything and everything was crushed or missing. In their place was debris, hateful words painted or even carved into the walls, and remnants of large fires, the smell of which wafted into their noses as confirmation of the reality of this nightmare.

“…We don’t actually have to deal with this, do we?”, Topman groaned, his hands in his pockets as he nudged some smoldering wreckage with his foot.

“We’ll deal with it tomorrow…For now, let’s get some rest. I think we’ve earned that much at least.”, Gauntlet excused, Raijin draped over his shoulder.

“Hey, you don’t actually expect us to stay here, do you? Not only is this place a wreck, but as far as we know, that mob might come back, looking for us!”, Lennon argued, though at this point, he wasn’t even in much of a fighting mood. He simply didn’t want to wake up to a lynching.

Gauntlet placed his hand of Geminiman’s tattered shoulder.

“It’s been taken care of.”

“…If you say so…”

The group had no reason not to believe their rock-steady leader at this point, and after a few uncomfortable moments, they found themselves in their rooms, which were in as bad a condition as the rest of the base. Most of the Maniacs slept on the floor that night, but they were all so tired, it didn’t matter much.

Not a single sound woke them that night.

June 4th, 20XX, 9:51 AM

“Hello?”

The dark suited man cautiously stepped through the rubble of the Technodrome, one hand resting on his handgun…just in case.

“…Is anyone home?”

“Yes.”

The black suited man jumped a few inches off of the ground as Shadowman dropped from the ceiling from behind him in his usual fashion.

“Oh…I’m sorry. I always forget that my team is used to that, but most ‘normal’ people aren’t.”, the ninja robot apologized, still baring his battle wounds, albeit cleaned up a bit.

The dark-clothed man cleared his throat before continuing. “Ahem, yes, well…I assume you’re Shadowman?”

“You ‘presume’!”, shouted another voice from another room.

“Um, excuse me?”, the man questioned, somewhat insulted by the pretentious correction originating from parts unknown.

“Yes, Top…Please shut up for a few minutes, okay?” , Shadowman shot back to the wall.

“Sorry!”

“Right…Well…Mr. Shadowman, I’m Agent Evans here on behalf of the Oval Office.”

“I’ve been expecting you.”, Shadowman asserted.

“Expecting me?”, the agent echoed, taken aback again.

“Not you specifically. I assumed-“

Shadowman caught himself and waited a few seconds before going on, wondering if the inevitable interruption was really inevitable. Surprisingly, Topman kept quiet.

“…I assumed (I must have gotten it right) the White House would send someone over to meet with us. I’m guessing you enjoyed the video you guys received that late evening a few days ago?”

“Quite.”

“Good.”

The agent held out a discrete envelope to the battle-scarred shinobi, who was in a stage of repair, parts of his armor still missing.

“This…Consider this an official ‘thank you’ note from the President for your participation in the…spring cleaning. We’ve been meaning to get rid of a few old cobwebs for sometime now, but our vacuum was out of order.”

“…I see.”, Gauntlet stated, taking the envelope in hand.

“Plus…A gift of our utmost appreciation for your…vacuum repair. It works perfectly now, and is very, very quiet.”

“…So it is. It should stay quiet from now on. You needn’t worry about it anymore.”

“We’re very glad to hear that, Mr. Shadowman. Very glad.”

“Yes, well…Thank you.”

The two men shook hands at this point.

“I must be off, Mr. Shadowman. Before I go, would you like me to set up a demolitions crew to help you rebuild your base of operations?”

“No need. We’ll have this place back in shape by next week.”, Gauntlet claimed nonchalantly as he thumbed through the contents of the envelope.

“Next week? But…Ha ha, yes, I understand. Well…Good day, Mr. Shadowman.”

“Bye.”

As soon as Agent Evans had left the dilapidated interior of the Technodrome, Topman, as well as most of the other Maniacs, converged upon their leader from their respective hiding places.

“…I didn’t understand a word of that, hun.”, Classi whispered, not wanting to be embarrassed in case she overlooked something everyone else had noticed.

“Basically, the President says ‘thanks’.”, Gauntlet summarized.

“Well, that’s cool…What about all of that vacuum talk, though?”, Geminiman asked.

“The short of it is that the US government knew about the Horsemen, but couldn’t do much about it. We basically, inadvertently, did the Oval Office a huge solid by getting rid of them.”

“Great….Did we at least get paid for this favor this time?”, a groggy Hardman inquired.

Shadowman pulled out the contents of the envelope for the rest of the group to see.

Ten million dollars.

A collective gasp filled the room, followed by banter.

“Hey, hold it guys…It’s not as big a prize as we think it is.”, Geminiman asserted.

“He’s right…We’ll spend at least half of that just getting this place back into shape.”, Snakeman stepped forward.

“Well still, that’s almost a mil for each of us after we fix this joint up…Damn, really does seem pretty small considerin’ th’ hell we just went through out there.”, Hardman pondered.

“Say, Gauntlet…”, Topman asked. “What was that one line about? The ‘video’ line?”

Shadowman smirked slightly, then pointed to his still wounded-shut right eye.

“You know…I always forget you have that thing.”, Snakeman uttered, a small grin of his own adorning his face.

“Comes in handy.”

“…What exactly did you see that cleared our name, anyway?”, Magnetman came out of nowhere with, his shattered arms hidden beneath his poncho.

“…I’ll explain it later. For now, let’s just be happy with the reward money. We sure as hell earned it.”, Shadowman offered.

After some more bantering and postulating on what they’ll do with their newfound wealth, the Maniacs attempted to do some more clean-up around the ‘Drome, but decided to get some personal repairs done at Dr Light’s lab instead.

June 6th, 20XX, 2:51 AM, EST

Two nights later, Shadowman could be found sitting atop the Technodrome alone, seemingly lost in thought, a disturbed look etched on his face.

“Gaunts…You okay?”

NeedleGal joined her brother-in-robotic-arms and took a seat next to him to admire the half moon in the sky.

“…No.”

Needle peered at Shadowman. Usually, it was “okay” or “fine”, even if she knew something was wrong. Never “no”.

“Shadow…You’ve been feeling pretty down since we came back from LA. What was it…That you saw out there?”

“…Needle. The Horsemen were just puppets.”

The spiny android gave her brother a skewed look as he paused before continuing.

“There was someone else pulling the strings. Someone we’ve really got to be on the look-out for, but I have no idea what to look for now. He could be anywhere.”

“Who’s ‘he’?”

“Do you remember that incident the Sinister Six told us about? Their last big battle before Gary died?”

“How could I forget?”

“The guy responsible for that mess…The guy that had even the S6 by the throats…He’s still alive.”, Gauntlet muttered.

“That ‘General’ person? He was the one pulling the Horsemen’s strings?”

“Yeah.”

“Well…So?”, Needle said, innocently enough.

Gauntlet whirled his head around to look at her, almost horrified by her naiveté.

“’So’? I don’t think you understand what a problem this guy will be. He had such a perfect plot set up that if we weren’t framed by the Horsemen to begin with, he would have succeeded. I have no doubts about that.”

“Gauntlet…I think we’ve learned something today…”, Needle said, standing up and looking towards the city at large, sprawled out before them.

“There’s always going to be a big bad villain out there. Someone with some insane plan to take over the world, or take us down. But, that’s part of who we are. It’s part of our job, our duty. We can’t afford to get ourselves down, because doubt, in the end, will always be our main adversary. What can we do but accept and face every challenge with the same energy we had before? That’s all we can do…As Robot Cops, as superheroes, or even wanted criminals. We’re…the good guys. It's our job to win. People depend on us, and that’s all we need to know.”

Gauntlet sat in silence for a few moments, as if soaking it all in. Finally he stood up. He glanced at his new badge, clipped to his belt.

“Needle…How is it that you know exactly what to say at exactly the right time?”

NeedleGal smiled in response. “Because…That’s part of my job, too.”

“…You’re right. I suppose this is just another challenge thrown out before us. No matter what…We’ll find a way to overcome it. That’s…our job.”

NeedleGal put a reassuring hand on her brother’s shoulder. “C’mon…Snake and Top had a few new suggestions for the battle room. I think you’ll be surprised…”

“Alright.”

The two Maniacs slid back into the base through one of the many hidden escape hatches on the surface of their mobile fortress.

In the end, Gauntlet, and the others, would still have their doubts as to how much they really knew about what happened on that chaotic day in Los Angeles…But what mattered most was making sure it never happened again. Too many lives were lost for it to be vain.

Diligence. That was their job.

As Mechanical Maniacs.