"Well, Adalet, here we are. This place is truly the end of the world," Amy breathed, watching the landscape as Adalet drove the van beyond the entrance gate, "the others didn't exaggerate! I'm glad we have these suits to protect us!"

"How long has this place been so... Barren?" Adalet inquired, noticing a busted pipe spewing neon green goo up ahead.

"The region has been locked down for years. Between the extreme pollution and the vicious sandstorms, only madmen would come here," she replies, "and I guess that's why it's the perfect place for Frank and Karen to hide!"

Adalet slowed to a stop and parked the van beside The Wastes No Entry sign, "well, the beginning is a great place to start, so we should start looking here for clues."

Amy nods in agreement, "let's go!"

Adalet and Amy got out of the van and were immediately hit by the stifling heat of the Wastes. Walking to the front of the van they looked around the entrance of the district for any signs of Frank and Karen. There was no sign of the fugitives, but there was a dead body in their line of sight. Lying on the side of the road was a young man's body who looked to have dragged himself out of the neon green puddle Adalet had noticed earlier. A few yards up the road they spotted a weathered plastic trash can rolling from side to side in the wind.

"Oh no, Adalet! There's a dead man here!" Amy gasped, "it looks as if he tried to crawl away from that puddle of green liquid, seeping from that broken pipe..."

Adalet knelt to get a better look at the man's face, "we know this man! It's David Rosenberg, the tech genius from Innovation Valley!"

"But... the Wastes are a lawless, lifeless place... What was David doing here?!" she wondered, "Adalet, what's going on? First, Frank and Karen run away, and then we stumble upon an old acquaintance, dead... This can't be a coincidence, right?"

"Even if it is, it's certainly suspicious!" she agrees, going to grab the trash can she noticed, "but one things for sure, this is another murder! Whether Karen or Frank have something to do with it is yet to be determined..."

"You want to start by searching through that trash can? Alright, let's take shelter in the van an-"

"Hey, you two!" the women whipped around to see Andy Pascal running towards them, "what are you doing here? There's a sandstorm coming, you fools! Find shelter!"

"Hands up! Don't move!" Amy ordered, training her gun on the man, "who are you and what are you doing in the Wastes?"

"Whoa, cool down..." Andy cried, holding his hands up as Adalet hurried over carrying the trash can, "hey, I know you! You're Capt. Adalet! You solved the murder of my niece, Peggy, back in Jazz Town!"

"Andy Pascal," Adalet recalled the storm-chaser, "well, we'll need to have a word with you!"

"What brings you to the Wastes, Mr. Pascal?" Amy inquired, putting her gun away, "don't you know it's a forbidden area?"

"I'm here to film the nuclear sandstorm. You MUST seek shelter now!" Andy explained, repeating his original order with the utmost urgency.

"A nuclear sandstorm?! Is it as dangerous as it sounds?" Adalet asked.

"It is!" he confirmed, "the atmosphere here is full of radioactive particles! If the hurricane-force wind doesn't blow your head off, you'll die of exposure to radiation!"

"Even if what you say is true, I think we're more prepared for a storm than you are," she argued, eyeing the man's raincoat and camo bandana.

"Ha! If you're talking about the suits, they won't protect you forever!" he countered.

"We don't intend to stay long. We're chasing two fugitives and trying to solve a murder. Can you help?" Amy inquired.

"I haven't seen anyone. But..." Andy pondered for a moment, "there's an old nuclear testing site deeper in the desert. That's where I'd look for fugitives!"

"We'll check out this testing site. Storms have never stopped us before, no matter how dangerous!" she proclaimed.

While Andy left the area, Adalet and Amy dumped the trash can and began sifting through empty water bottles, Rocket Cow cans, candy wrappers, and wads of crumpled paper. Underneath the trash, they found a locked smartphone, its red screen displaying the locked symbol.

"We found a cell phone in this trash can!" Amy cheered, shovelling the trash back into the can, "let's unlock that phone, quick! The longer we take to solve this murder, the less chance we have of finding Frank and Karen!"

As Amy was cleaning up the trash, Adalet took the cell phone with her into the van to unlock it. Since she didn't have Loki with her, she connected the phone to the computer and ran the hacking program on it. After a few moments of the program doing its thing, the cell phone flashed green and changed to display the home screen.

"Cell phone is unlocked!" Adalet calls her partner.

Amy appeared in the doorway of the van, "Hannah's standing by in the lab, let's send it to her!"

Adalet hopped out of the van and handed Amy the cell phone. Grabbing a black body bag from a trunk in the back of the van she returned to where David's body lay and gently loaded his body into the bag, zipping it up once he was inside. Amy stood beside her as Adalet slowly opened a portal underneath David's body, and they watched as it sank into the portal and landed on top of an empty table in the body cooler. Amy leaned over and cautiously stuck her hand into the rainbow-coloured portal and placed the cell phone beside the body.

Adalet clapped her hands together and the portal on the ground sealed itself closed. Now that the body and cell phone were at the station, Adalet and Amy climbed into their van and began driving in search of the testing site Andy had told them about. After driving for about half an hour into The Wastes, they found the testing site featuring makeshift buildings and wooden test dummies set up around the area.

Getting out to look around, they could see in the distance what potentially could be the storm Andy had warned them about. It looked to be very far away, but with the flat landscape of The Wastes, it was hard to tell exactly how far away it was. Quickly searching the testing site, Adalet picked up some torn photo paper from under a fallen sign, and a yellow hazmat helmet half-buried in the sand.

"Adalet, I'm not sure I believe what Andy said about the radiation risk but... just in case, let's hurry, alright?" Amy says nervously, looking around the area, "everything here is motionless, covered in dust, and dead! The houses, those mannequins... What kind of "tests" could have done this?"

"I think I'll live not knowing," Adalet replies, coming over with her clues, "I'd rather focus on what these clues can tell us!"

"You've found some torn paper?" she remarked, seeing the torn paper, "quick, put it back together! Maybe it'll lead us to Frank, or help us solve David's murder! And you found a hazmat helmet? Hmm... the Wastes are clearly not as abandoned as we thought! Let's retrieve that faded text on the top!"

Once they were back inside the van, Adalet passed Amy the hazmat helmet to work on while she taped up the picture. Amy found a dusting kit and began recovering the faded writing along the forehead of the helmet. While she did that, Adalet repaired the torn photo and found it to be a surveillance image of David, but it was impossible to tell where he was however she could see that the man noticed the camera watching him.

"This is a photograph of the victim!" Adalet announced for Amy to hear, "it looks like a satellite image!"

"What's going on here, Adalet? Was David so important that somebody... spied on him?" Amy wondered, leaning over to see the photo better, "the corner of the photograph is stained with something... Let's collect a sample!"

The Captain began swabbing the stain while glancing over at the recovered text on the hazmat helmet, "so the helmet belongs to a certain "Jess Prakti"... We know a woman called Jess Prakti! We met her in Rhine Canyon, she's an environmental scientist! She was trying to grow corn in the desert."

"I wonder what Ms. Prakti's doing in the Wastes... but if she left her helmet here, she must be nearby!" she reasoned as Adalet finished collecting her sample, "well done, Adalet, you collected a sample from the satellite image! Let's send the sample to Yann! Between chasing fugitives and escaping radioactive storms, we don't have a minute to lose!"

With the sample ready for delivery, Adalet opened a small portal above her left hand. She could see that no one had retrieved David's body nor the cell phone from the cooler, so it must not be the hour mark yet. Using her other hand she placed the sealed micro slid on the table beside the phone and waved away the portal after removing her hand from it.

With that taken care of, Adalet and Amy climbed over to their seats and began driving in search of Jess Parkit, after marking the testing site on their GPS map. Amy had been right about the scientist being nearby, it only took them a few kilometres of driving to find her examining some cacti.

"Ms. Prakti," Adalet called after they'd gotten out of the van, "what brings a biologist to such a lifeless place as the Wastes?"

Jess looked away from her work excitedly, "I'm working on a new science project. The Wastes is the best place to try our radical new ideas, Capt. Adalet."

"It seems risky... Does the name Rosenberg ring a bell? We're investigating his murder," she inquired, changing the subject.

"Rosenberg? Hmm..." she hummed in thought, "not sure. I work too hard to socialize."

"What about two fugitives, a man and a woman?" Amy questioned, "they might be dangerous. Have you seen them?"

"Dangerous fugitives? The biggest danger here is the desert itself... the radiation, the storms... They'll probably be dead before you can catch them, Capt. Adalet," Jess declared, "and so will you, if you don't go back to the city soon!"

"Here's hoping the reception's not too bad..." Adalet prayed, turning on the radio equipment Hannah had programmed to communicate with the one back at the station.

After turning the knobs of the equipment to the right frequency, a static-like noise came out of the speakers. Adalet grabbed the handheld microphone and pressed the button on the side before talking into it.

"Hello? Can anyone hear me?" she asked.

After a few moments, a voice cut through the static.

"Guys!... You... Right?" It sounded like Hannah's voice, but she was cutting in and out.

"We're fine," Adalet answered, filling in the missing words of the question, "the reception is bad, but we hear you! Are Roxie and Yann with you?"

"Yes!"

Amy took the microphone, "Roxie? We need the autopsy results on David Rosenberg! Be quick, the radio only works intermittently!"

"Adalet... green substance that... David's body... toxic radioactive compound... killed your victim," Roxie explains, but some details got lost in the transmission, "David... high dose of radiation... organs... melted down... body glows... dark!"

"David was killed by a radioactive substance!" she inferred, "got it! But how did he end up in a puddle of radioactive waste, Roxie?"

"Found... bruises... head... blunt instrument... David was knocked out!" she says, "killer... exposure to toxic material... affected... radiation sickness! Nausea, dizziness... symptoms..."

"The killer is suffering from radiation sickness because of their exposure to the toxic material that killed David! I got it, Adalet!" she said, writing down the information, "Adalet, we're one step closer to catching this killer and getting back on Frank's trail... Let's just hope the radiation doesn't get us, too!"

"Yann?" Adalet asked the other lab expert, "have you identified the substance we found on the satellite image of the victim?"

"Adalet... substance... DNA... identified... General Freeman... recognize the name?" Yann inquired.

"General Freeman? Yes, we met him in Rhine Canyon..." she recalled, "an aggressive bully who thinks the Army can get away with anything. It's his DNA on the picture?"

"Photo... proof... Freeman... spy on... David Rosenberg..." he confirmed.

"This case is getting stranger by the minute..." Amy mutters from the side, "now General Freeman's mixed up in it, too! Let's find him, Adalet!"

"Before we got General hunting," Adalet clicked on the mic again, "Hannah? We need your results on the cell phone from the crime scene..."

Once again Hannah's voice came back out of the speakers, "Adalet! The phone received... message... send you... can see it!"

"What? Hannah, I can't hear half the stuff you're saying! The phone reception's terrible!" she complained.

"Adalet," Amy calls over from the computer monitor she sat in front of, "I think she said she'd send us the video message that was recorded on the phone! Let's have a look at it!"

Adalet noticed that there was a video displayed on the monitor. At least that part of their technology was working fine.

"We got it, Hannah! Good word, team!" Adalet addressed her teammates before turning off the transmission.

"That was Karen!" Amy gasped, "and she was clearly talking to the person who killed David! Karen knows who the killer is! The problem is, we have no way of interrogating her!"

"Even though we can't talk to her, she said the killer's "employers at Meteor Systems" could not help them... That means the killer works for Meteor Systems!" Adalet grins.

"So Karen was useful after all. Let's hope this piece of evidence can help us catch the killer and find out where Karen and Frank have gone!"

With the new information the lab experts provided them with, Adalet and Amy drove off in search of General Freeman to ask him about spying on the victim. They found the army man near the military testing site and he looked shocked when he saw them pull their van up beside him.

"Capt. Adalet?!" Freeman exclaimed, recognizing the woman behind the wheel, "you have to evacuate immediately! The Wastes are not safe!"

"Thank you for your concern, General Freeman, but we're here on official business. Tell us what you know about David Rosenberg!" Adalet ordered.

"It's confiden-"

"No time for your delaying tactics, General!" she held up the surveillance photo, "we know you used satellites to spy on David. We just don't know why!"

"My orders were to protect David! Unfortunately, my mission failed, as you must already know," he reluctantly told them, "I arrived in the Wastes too late to save Rosenberg's life. But I can still save yours, Capt. Adalet. Leave immediately, you're not safe here!"

"Adalet, what are we going to do? We'll never find Karen and Frank in this sandstorm! We'll be lucky to survive!" Amy rants, pacing beside their van, "and to make matters worse, we have a new murder to solve! So far, we know that David's killer works for Meteor Systems... And all our suspects are old acquaintances, all urging us to leave the Wastes! But can we trust any of them?"

"General Freeman claims to have had orders to protect David Rosenberg, but said he arrived too late..." Adalet mused as her phone began to ring, "and we have Jess Prakti, an environmental scientist who says she... Oh, the phone!"

"Who is it?" she inquired as Adalet answered the call and placed it on speaker.

"Adalet? Listen... only... minute... talk!" the voice of their old partner came through the speakers of the phone.

"Frank?! Oh my gosh, Adalet, it's Frank! Frank, where are you? You need to surrender, please!" Amy begged.

"No time... Adalet... coordinates... old laboratory... hurry... you'll understand... sorry..."

"Frank? Frank!" Adalet yelled, but the man had already ended the call, "he hung up!"

"I can't believe he called us! And... It seems he's trying to help us! He's given us the coordinates of a place... some old laboratory in the desert!" Amy says, pointing to the text message that had been sent just after Frank hung up, "or... could this be a trick? Could Frank be laying a trap for us, Adalet? Summoning us to a secluded place... Tell me he'd never do that!"

She sighed, "I don't think I can say what he would or wouldn't do now... But the only way to discover what lies in wait in that old laboratory is by going there..."

"And I won't let you go alone!" Amy declared.

Adalet smiled, "I know you won't."

After they had imputed the coordinates to the abandoned lab Frank had sent them, Adalet maneuvered the van through the Wastes to the run-down building. They had to kick down the heavy metal door and Adalet only slightly dented it from the force behind her kick. Entering the building they were surprised to see that it still had electricity flowing through it because of the strange electric rods and sparks of electricity climbing up them.

Staying clear of the electrical rods, they took a look around the lab. Around the outdated lab, they found a blue plastic crate filled with random, rusted technology. They also found a vintage, bulky computer on one of the desks that were still powered on but it was also locked.

"Well, I can't see anyone, can you, Adalet?" Amy asked, joining the Captain at the desk, "I guess it wasn't a trick, Frank really thought this place might help our investigation. I wonder what the deal is with that huge machine. All that electricity looks dangerous!"

"It's like Magnus when he's had too much to drink..." Adalet winced, "he's always shocking things for hours!"

"D'you thi-"

"Capt. Adalet! I didn't expect to see you here!"

The officers jumped at the sudden voice appearing behind them. Turning around they found themselves face-to-face with a tall, grizzly man with gray hair, a tattered plaid shirt, and leaves stuck in his hair.

"Eeeeek!" Amy shrieked.

"You... you're Allen Muir!" Adalet exclaimed, "the hermit who lives in the forests of White Peaks!"

"But... How did you end up in the Wastes, Mr. Muir?" Amy inquired, "we will need to talk to you! Strange things are happening and... out-of-town hermits are definitely suspicious!"

"So, Mr. Muir, what made you come to the Wastes, all the way from White Peaks?" Adalet questioned.

"Well, it's going to sound strange, Capt. Adalet, but... I'm here to meet someone. His name is David Rosenberg," Allen answers, way too happy for someone in the Wastes.

"What?!" Amy cried, "you know David Rosenberg? But... you're a hermit, you live in the woods! And David was an inventor in the city! How did you two ever meet?"

"Well... I've never actually met him," he confessed, "but he sent me a letter. He said he had something very important to tell me, and convinced me to come here. David even sent me money for the trip! But when I got here, I found no one. I wonder if he perished in that storm..."