Assembler
Rocking the life
You were correct in your memory of his words. "Spic" is an anti-Latino slur.
Mortality
- Thread starter frommerman
- Start date
- Location
- US
...really?
I don't want to say I should get up on my racial slurs, but...
- Location
- The Deep Blue Sea
Yeah really. Hispanic, is maybe what it's supposed to be going for?
Assembler
Rocking the life
Spic is older than Hispanic when used to refer to Latinos, and actually is used to mock their accent and the difficulty some have with English.
- Location
- The Deep Blue Sea
Huh. Weird.
6: Lieutenant McDougal
- Location
- US
Cold night. Fortunately I'm pretty used to it by now. Lived in the bay all my life, don't plan on ever stopping. No matter how bad the crime rate gets.
It's really a shame. I love this city. Love its people, mostly. It's my home, and always will be, no matter what.
Damn capes. When I was a kid, they'd only just started popping up. All I remember is being amazed at superpowers, praying every night I'd get some. Everyone...everyone had hope, for a better future. A future powered by unreal technology, by human gods. Perhaps even by the Golden Man himself, if anyone could ever get him to talk. It all seemed just around the corner, just out of reach and ready for the taking.
And then it turned out that most capes were assholes. Why we ever trusted humans with more power than other humans to be anything but, I'll never know, but that trust is gone now. This city used to be beautiful. Now? Now we're in the middle of our second gang war in ten years.
The comms snap me out of my brooding. "PRT squad five, we are receiving reports of a home invasion near your location. 4982 Eaglemont Drive."
Home invasion, huh? Bizarre.
We're currently posted near the center of one of the hot zones Watchdog gave us. we know there is likely to be a fight near here, but Eaglemont is pretty far off center. We don't know what the fight we're heading into will look like, so we've been waiting here for about an hour for anything that remotely sounds like an Empire operatio-
"Squad five, home invaders are confirmed to be members of the Empire. No parahuman powers used yet, but we believe they are attempting to kidnap the occupants of the house. I'm dispatching you there. No other parahuman support available at the moment, though Legend might wrap up shortly. Be safe."
Ah. Well that's it then. "Understood. Enroute."
I start giving orders. "All right folks, we've got a kidnapping in progress at 4982 Eaglemont. Lady Photon, get there as fast as you can and try to slow them down. We're following. Legend's gonna be late to the party. MOVE."
Everyone moves.
I turn onto Eaglemont and see a lightshow surrounding a freaking mansion at the end of the street. Two floors, I can't count how many windows, and a massive and maintained yard in front. The outside of the house appears to be made of ancient brick, in a european style, though given how relatively young Brockton Bay is it was probably just built to look like it's been here forever. Pearlescent shields cover some, but not all, of the windows and doors of the house, and though I can see in from the windows on the first floor, the second floor windows are totally dark. As I watch, some of the shields flicker out, to be replaced by new ones in different locations. If the size of that thing is any indication, whoever lives there can pay through the nose to get the target back.
"Lady Photon, what's your status?"
She replies immediately. "They're still inside. Three unfortunate facts, though."
She cuts off as a few more shields go up around windows and doors and another one drops. "First, this house is too big for me to shield all at once. I have to keep rotating them, and they might get out while my guard is down."
The shields rotate again. "Second. I know this house. I've been invited to it for philanthropic events more than once. Max Anders lives here."
Well fuck. If the Empire gets the CEO of the biggest company in town, that can't possibly go well for us. "What's the third piece of bad news?"
"Kaiser is here. Upper windows on the entire mansion have been iced over with spikes, I can't see inside or tell where he is. I'd punch through and try to knock him out, but I know from...experience...that he can create spikes on the other side of my shields, and my lasers are ironically slow enough that he can block them with a spike before they hit. All I'm useful for against him is area denial."
I nod to myself. Kaiser being here is...not good, in many ways. Max Anders is a very wealthy man, and it's obvious that the Empire wants that money to fight this war. I don't know how they'd go about getting their hands on it, but ultimately it doesn't matter. If they kidnap the CEO of Brockton Bay's biggest employer, they gain access to enough resources to do serious damage, on top of the image loss the PRT would suffer by failing to protect him.
On the other side of the coin, this likely means the Empire needs that money. We haven't figured out exactly how much liquid cash they have, but having a war declared upon them in the course of a single twelve-hour period is likely to have drained those funds. The fact that Kaiser himself came out to do it more-or-less confirms that. They chose a high risk, high reward line because they didn't have another choice.
Let's make them regret that.
"All right, people. Make a perimeter around the house and start foaming the windows and doors. Don't worry about property damage, I'm sure Mister Anders would far prefer that to being kidnapped. Kaiser's in there. If we get him, this whole war might end tonight!"
They all scurry to follow my commands, men and women fanning out around the house and dousing every possible exit point in their reach as I load up with my own foam sprayer.
Just as I turn around, all hell breaks loose.
Massive walls of spikes rise from the ground in waves, emanating from the house, cutting my men off from each other. Dirt from the formerly perfectly-manicured lawn flies, obscuring my vision from the back of the lines, and I reflexively and pointlessly shield my eyes as my visor blocks a rain of mulch from a flower bed. Panic comes in over the comms as several of my people are spiked, and I can't know from where I'm standing whether anyone is dead. I instantly decide that's for future me to worry about. Now, I need bearings on the situation.
"Kaiser's trying to create a smaller battlefield! Do we have men in every segment?" I ask everyone on the comms.
Lady Photon replies immediately. "It looks like one of the segments on the east side of the house is empty. I'm shielding every way out of the house in that area. Hopefully they try to make their escape through one of the segments occupied with foam sprayers."
I nod and continue rattling off orders. "Drag the wounded out of the way, Medics route yourselves to their segments. It looks like we should still be able to walk around the walls, he's just trying to slow us down. Everyone else, try to use these funnels to our advantage! Foam the entire opening to whatever segment you're in! He just decreased the surface area we need to cover!"
I redirect my focus on Lady Photon again. "Lady Photon, where are the spikes in greatest concentration?"
I see her fly around to the back of the house for a moment. "The walls appear to be entirely on the front of the house, though we have men on the back spraying everything."
That can only mean… "His power works by line of sight. He's standing somewhere at the front of the house!" I switch my comms again. "Folks, we think Kaiser is somewhere in the front of the house. I suspect he's going to escape from this side. No change in orders, just be aware."
Right now, nearly every window and door on the front of the mansion is foamed. Unless he has a Brute in there who can punch through walls, he isn't escaping from the first floor or most of the second floor. I start jogging to join the men in the closest segment to me in foaming the remaining windows…
And then one of the upper windows explodes outward, glass and pieces of masonry raining down as enormous spikes shear through the second level window and wall, perpendicular to the newly gaping hole. The blades keep growing, piling on length and seemingly reinforcing themselves from below with more spikes from lower on the wall. Lady Photon snaps a shield into place over the hole, but the blades keep elongating, and seconds after they started they've got to be at least 30 feet long! How can the wall hold thi-
Oh shit, it can't, "BACK UP, HE'S TAKING DOWN THE WHOLE FACADE!"
My warning came not a moment too soon. I scramble back as my men follow me, and the ground shudders as the bricks at the front of the house crumble away and the concrete and steel framing of the house cracks outward with a shriek audible even through my visor!
The ground stills, and the sound of protesting metal quiets. I fell to the ground in my headlong dive out from beneath what now looks like a bridge, or a ramp, and I carefully stand up. Gah, my chest is aching. Probably a cracked rib. I turn around, and see that Lady Photon is hovering about fifty feet above my group of officers, staring intently at the massive hole in the side of the mansion, maintaining one large shield over the entire opening.
Where once there were gardens and young trees, now there is a slowly sloping steel ramp up to the second floor. The whole edifice is covered in dust and debris, and supporting spikes from beneath the construct are jutting through in some places.
The only light on the mansion now is Lady Photon's shields, all of the ones we set up around the perimeter are knocked over, out, or covered with dust. On the other side of those shimmering barriers there's a faint flickering. Like some faceted, mirrored surface reflecting inconstant light back.
Kaiser steps forward out of the dark, his armor gleaming fitfully in the shield's light. None of us dare get any closer, with the power he's already thrown around there's no doubt how that would turn out. He strides slowly, purposefully, toward the shield, left hand raised. I can't tell from this far out, but it looks like he's gripping something. His hand touches the shield.
And Lady Photon begins screaming in agony. I jerk my head up, and see her falling to the ground barely controlled, holding her head and curled into a ball.
"CATCH HER!" I order. Several men point their foam sprayers at her, and she is rapidly covered in a cushion which protects her as she finishes her fall, at this point completely uncontrolled, to the ground. I glance back at the mansion and, unsurprisingly, the shield is down.
It's just us versus Kaiser, now.
"Dispatch, Lady Photon has been disabled by some kind of Tinker device. Now would be a good time for Legend to arrive."
"Understood." Silence on the other end of the line. "ETA two minutes."
I crack my neck. He can shred our entire force faster than that, if he wants to. I can't let that happen. Won't let that happen.
Only one thing for it. "Folks, stay back. Legend is on his way, but we need to stall. I am going to walk up and talk to him."
"Sir, he'll kill you!"
I frown and nod. "Maybe not. He does like the sound of his own voice, and I only need to stall for two minutes."
No more protest is forthcoming. It's...surprising, now, how calm I am about possibly walking directly for my death. I walk slowly, deliberately. Wasting as much time as possible while making it look like I'm trying to be authoritative. Every second this takes is a second I'm not within grabbing distance of a serial murderer. Now that the shield is down, the entire area is dark, The hole in the mansion looks less like an architectural calamity than like the dark maw of an angry beast. That I am walking directly towards.
I don't want to die, not at all. And, somewhere, I guess I'm convinced I won't. I have a plan, after all, and it might even work. But still, it's something of a long shot.
A long shot, but it's simple, really. I've read Kaiser's psych profile, what we've managed to put together from all of our observations of him. He loves to grandstand, to gloat. And he most loves to do it with people used to being in control. He loves the feeling of crushing every hope his enemies have, before literally crushing them and messily slicing them apart. He enjoys feeling absolute power over others.
Well, right now he probably feels like he can't lose. We've lost our only parahuman, our carefully constructed battlefield is in shambles, and every single person arrayed against him is completely vulnerable to his power. All he needs to massacre us all is a wave of his hand.
And, therefore, it falls to me to prevent him from waving his hand. Simple.
Heh, yeah. Simple.
I reach the edge of the hole, the darkness swallowing all of my vision. By the faint starlight above, I can barely see the reflection off Kaiser's armor, ten feet in front of me. He's...not moving. Probably looking at my predicament with twisted satisfaction. It is odd, though. I can't see very far into the broken house, but there doesn't appear to be anyone else behind him. Kaiser certainly could have been the only person assaulting Mr. Anders' abode, but that seems unlikely. Kaiser has no particular affinity for working alone, and is smart enough to know the advantages of never doing so.
Most notably, there's no sign of Max Anders. That either means he wasn't home, or he's somewhere else in the house being roughed up by thugs. I highly doubt that first possibility.
No point analyzing the situation now, though. I can do that later if I survive. I switch my visor's speakers to external mode.
"You've won, Kaiser. None of us can stop you, and Legend is fighting Crusader and can't come to help us. I am prepared to surrender and allow you to walk out of here peacefully. Just spare my men."
The sound of knives sliding across each other echoes from the darkness, and the faint shine on his armor shivers as he walks towards me. Damn, he's tall. Maybe it's just the armor, but he has to be above seven feet. He doesn't speak a word as his mask slides out of absolute shadow into the dim starlight.
I look up into the pools of total darkness where his eyes should be, his silence more deafening than any sound I've heard tonight.
Maybe I should try to get him to talk again? He's supposed to like talking, I don't know why he isn't doing it now. "Make your decision. If you fight us, we resist you to the last man. Maybe one of us gets lucky, maybe not, but I'm good for my word. Safe passage through our ranks, in return for the survival of my men."
His eerie silence stretches on. I don't know if he's considering my offer, or considering how to dismember me. I don't want to find out.
"What's it going to be, Kaiser? How does this end? Give me something to-"
A flash of light, bright as the sun and blinding in the dark.
A thunderous crack, the shockwave throwing dust to the ground and rocking me back on my feet.
A minor deity of the skies manifests beside me, and Kaiser slams into the back wall of the room, completely visible now in Legend's luminescence.
"Was that all you needed me to do?"
I don't answer immediately, more important things to do. Deftly, I unsheathe my foam sprayer's tube and march forward, covering Kaiser's slumped form entirely.
Nice superpower you got there, Nazi scum. Try seeing anything through that.
I turn back towards the hero behind me. "Yes, sir. I believe it was."
He nods and vanishes into the distance, another thunderclap and my own totally ruined night vision in his wake. He has more important work tonight.
Time to clean up and roll out.
A quick search of the house proved what I was afraid of. No sign of Max Anders anywhere, and no sign of an obvious escape route. Kaiser was the only person in the house, in fact. The Empire either got a pile of cash in return for their leader, or they got nothing. Either way, I'm happy with the trade. It's long past time for that monster to be put in his proper place.
Several of our trucks are mostly unscathed from the battle, the ones parked further up the street. My men and I create large piles of containment foam similar to the pile Kaiser's in and load each of them into different vans, to confuse any possible watchers and make it hard for the Empire to catch us on the way to the PHQ.
We drive off, and I leave most of my men behind. They'll get picked up later, right now our priority is seeing Kaiser in secure containment as soon as possible.
None of my men died. Goddamn miracle, really. Several are in bad shape, and might not make it through the night without Panacea's help, but they'll at least make it to her. Lady Photon is still unconscious, we have no idea what that device did to her. But that ain't our job.
The streets are empty and wide. Nobody can be out because of the curfew, nobody wants to be out because that would be insane. I'm flooring it all the way back, and the decoy trucks following different routes are probably doing so as we-
SKREEEEEEEEEEEEEE
thefuckwastha-OOURFFFF! The truck tips completely over, metal screaming as it slides down the weakly-lit street. The airbag explodes, and I almost vomit in pain as my chest confirms that I definitely have at least one broken rib. Totally out of control, we slide into a storefront and bricks rain down on me for the second time tonight!
WHAT THE FUCK! THAT ROAD WAS EMPTY, THERE WAS NOTHING TO HIT!
We've stopped moving. But the back of the truck is still squealing in protest.
Ohgodohgodohgodhow'dKaisermakemorespikes? I climb out of the driver's window, adrenaline keeping the pain at bay, and I'm momentarily confused to see a gigantic hole in the side of the van being shredded ever wider by armor that seems to be...growing?
"A FEW FACTS FOR YOU." That isn't Kaiser's voice, wha-
I look up, and see a giant in crystalline steel armor.
One of the Twins.
Shit.
"DID YOU KNOW THAT MEDHALL PROVIDES A SECRET ESCAPE TUNNEL, COMPLETE WITH SEEMINGLY-LEGITIMATE FRONT BUSINESS FOR ITS EXIT POINT, FOR ALL OF ITS EXECUTIVES? WE FOUND OUT ONLY A FEW MONTHS AGO, WHEN WE DISCOVERED ONE SUCH BUSINESS."
If this is Fenja or Menja, How'd they use Kaiser's powe-oh. Duh. That mansion was at the end of a residential street. We probably passed by the house Kaiser was in, watching the whole battlefield, on our way in. He would have left after blowing open the hole in the house, and left us none the wiser.
"OF COURSE, THAT ISN'T VERY USEFUL INFORMATION WHEN YOU WANT TO STILL FOLLOW THE RULES. BUT WE DON'T HAVE MUCH USE FOR THAT NOW, DO WE?"
"Where's Kaiser!?" I scream uselessly up at the towering giant. Might as well try, right?
Booming laughter. "DON'T BOTHER TRYING TO FIND HIM. HE, AND MAX ANDERS, HAVE BEEN GONE FROM THAT HOUSE FOR OVER SIX HOURS. DIDN'T YOU WONDER WHY ALL THE LIGHTS IN THE HOUSE WERE OUT? WE CUT THE POWER AND EVERY OTHER LINE IN OR OUT OF THE HOUSE AND TOOK HIM IN SECRET. AMAZING HOW MANY OF OUR GROUND TROOPS CAN PULL OFF A CONVINCING ELECTRICAL COMPANY TECHNICIAN IMPRESSION IN A PINCH. HE'S ALREADY GIVEN US EVERYTHING WE NEED, THE LITTLE COWARD."
My heart locks up in my chest. This whole operation...we were played. Hard.
"SINCE HE COULDN'T GLOAT IN PERSON, KAISER WANTED ME TO DO IT IN HIS STEAD. THE CASH INFUSION FROM MEDHALL WILL SUSTAIN US FOR WEEKS. THAT LITTLE DEVICE WHICH LADY PHOTON LOVED SO MUCH? ONLY THE BEGINNING."
She raises her foot, and I scramble to jump off the truck and into the street as she stomps down, obliterating the entire vehicle and sending me stumbling at the shockwave. "RUN BACK TO YOUR LEADERS, LITTLE WHELP. TELL THEM TO BE AFRAID. WE WILL NOT BACK DOWN, NOT UNTIL THEY BOW BEFORE US AS THEIR RIGHTFUL MASTERS."
She raises her foot again, pieces of the truck dangling off protrusions in her armor, and sprints off into the distance.
Much as I don't want to follow her orders, I don't see much choice in the matter.
"Dispatch, this is Strike Team Five leader. Come pick me up at the corner of Elm and State streets. We didn't capture Kaiser. They put Fenja in his armor, and she woke up and caught me off guard. She is currently at large, running north."
I cut off communications and settle heavily to the ground, head in hands. I don't even care about the broken rib any more.
This war just got a lot longer. Poor Brockton Bay. Whatever happened to you?
Fucking capes.
It's really a shame. I love this city. Love its people, mostly. It's my home, and always will be, no matter what.
Damn capes. When I was a kid, they'd only just started popping up. All I remember is being amazed at superpowers, praying every night I'd get some. Everyone...everyone had hope, for a better future. A future powered by unreal technology, by human gods. Perhaps even by the Golden Man himself, if anyone could ever get him to talk. It all seemed just around the corner, just out of reach and ready for the taking.
And then it turned out that most capes were assholes. Why we ever trusted humans with more power than other humans to be anything but, I'll never know, but that trust is gone now. This city used to be beautiful. Now? Now we're in the middle of our second gang war in ten years.
The comms snap me out of my brooding. "PRT squad five, we are receiving reports of a home invasion near your location. 4982 Eaglemont Drive."
Home invasion, huh? Bizarre.
We're currently posted near the center of one of the hot zones Watchdog gave us. we know there is likely to be a fight near here, but Eaglemont is pretty far off center. We don't know what the fight we're heading into will look like, so we've been waiting here for about an hour for anything that remotely sounds like an Empire operatio-
"Squad five, home invaders are confirmed to be members of the Empire. No parahuman powers used yet, but we believe they are attempting to kidnap the occupants of the house. I'm dispatching you there. No other parahuman support available at the moment, though Legend might wrap up shortly. Be safe."
Ah. Well that's it then. "Understood. Enroute."
I start giving orders. "All right folks, we've got a kidnapping in progress at 4982 Eaglemont. Lady Photon, get there as fast as you can and try to slow them down. We're following. Legend's gonna be late to the party. MOVE."
Everyone moves.
----
I turn onto Eaglemont and see a lightshow surrounding a freaking mansion at the end of the street. Two floors, I can't count how many windows, and a massive and maintained yard in front. The outside of the house appears to be made of ancient brick, in a european style, though given how relatively young Brockton Bay is it was probably just built to look like it's been here forever. Pearlescent shields cover some, but not all, of the windows and doors of the house, and though I can see in from the windows on the first floor, the second floor windows are totally dark. As I watch, some of the shields flicker out, to be replaced by new ones in different locations. If the size of that thing is any indication, whoever lives there can pay through the nose to get the target back.
"Lady Photon, what's your status?"
She replies immediately. "They're still inside. Three unfortunate facts, though."
She cuts off as a few more shields go up around windows and doors and another one drops. "First, this house is too big for me to shield all at once. I have to keep rotating them, and they might get out while my guard is down."
The shields rotate again. "Second. I know this house. I've been invited to it for philanthropic events more than once. Max Anders lives here."
Well fuck. If the Empire gets the CEO of the biggest company in town, that can't possibly go well for us. "What's the third piece of bad news?"
"Kaiser is here. Upper windows on the entire mansion have been iced over with spikes, I can't see inside or tell where he is. I'd punch through and try to knock him out, but I know from...experience...that he can create spikes on the other side of my shields, and my lasers are ironically slow enough that he can block them with a spike before they hit. All I'm useful for against him is area denial."
I nod to myself. Kaiser being here is...not good, in many ways. Max Anders is a very wealthy man, and it's obvious that the Empire wants that money to fight this war. I don't know how they'd go about getting their hands on it, but ultimately it doesn't matter. If they kidnap the CEO of Brockton Bay's biggest employer, they gain access to enough resources to do serious damage, on top of the image loss the PRT would suffer by failing to protect him.
On the other side of the coin, this likely means the Empire needs that money. We haven't figured out exactly how much liquid cash they have, but having a war declared upon them in the course of a single twelve-hour period is likely to have drained those funds. The fact that Kaiser himself came out to do it more-or-less confirms that. They chose a high risk, high reward line because they didn't have another choice.
Let's make them regret that.
"All right, people. Make a perimeter around the house and start foaming the windows and doors. Don't worry about property damage, I'm sure Mister Anders would far prefer that to being kidnapped. Kaiser's in there. If we get him, this whole war might end tonight!"
They all scurry to follow my commands, men and women fanning out around the house and dousing every possible exit point in their reach as I load up with my own foam sprayer.
Just as I turn around, all hell breaks loose.
Massive walls of spikes rise from the ground in waves, emanating from the house, cutting my men off from each other. Dirt from the formerly perfectly-manicured lawn flies, obscuring my vision from the back of the lines, and I reflexively and pointlessly shield my eyes as my visor blocks a rain of mulch from a flower bed. Panic comes in over the comms as several of my people are spiked, and I can't know from where I'm standing whether anyone is dead. I instantly decide that's for future me to worry about. Now, I need bearings on the situation.
"Kaiser's trying to create a smaller battlefield! Do we have men in every segment?" I ask everyone on the comms.
Lady Photon replies immediately. "It looks like one of the segments on the east side of the house is empty. I'm shielding every way out of the house in that area. Hopefully they try to make their escape through one of the segments occupied with foam sprayers."
I nod and continue rattling off orders. "Drag the wounded out of the way, Medics route yourselves to their segments. It looks like we should still be able to walk around the walls, he's just trying to slow us down. Everyone else, try to use these funnels to our advantage! Foam the entire opening to whatever segment you're in! He just decreased the surface area we need to cover!"
I redirect my focus on Lady Photon again. "Lady Photon, where are the spikes in greatest concentration?"
I see her fly around to the back of the house for a moment. "The walls appear to be entirely on the front of the house, though we have men on the back spraying everything."
That can only mean… "His power works by line of sight. He's standing somewhere at the front of the house!" I switch my comms again. "Folks, we think Kaiser is somewhere in the front of the house. I suspect he's going to escape from this side. No change in orders, just be aware."
Right now, nearly every window and door on the front of the mansion is foamed. Unless he has a Brute in there who can punch through walls, he isn't escaping from the first floor or most of the second floor. I start jogging to join the men in the closest segment to me in foaming the remaining windows…
And then one of the upper windows explodes outward, glass and pieces of masonry raining down as enormous spikes shear through the second level window and wall, perpendicular to the newly gaping hole. The blades keep growing, piling on length and seemingly reinforcing themselves from below with more spikes from lower on the wall. Lady Photon snaps a shield into place over the hole, but the blades keep elongating, and seconds after they started they've got to be at least 30 feet long! How can the wall hold thi-
Oh shit, it can't, "BACK UP, HE'S TAKING DOWN THE WHOLE FACADE!"
My warning came not a moment too soon. I scramble back as my men follow me, and the ground shudders as the bricks at the front of the house crumble away and the concrete and steel framing of the house cracks outward with a shriek audible even through my visor!
The ground stills, and the sound of protesting metal quiets. I fell to the ground in my headlong dive out from beneath what now looks like a bridge, or a ramp, and I carefully stand up. Gah, my chest is aching. Probably a cracked rib. I turn around, and see that Lady Photon is hovering about fifty feet above my group of officers, staring intently at the massive hole in the side of the mansion, maintaining one large shield over the entire opening.
Where once there were gardens and young trees, now there is a slowly sloping steel ramp up to the second floor. The whole edifice is covered in dust and debris, and supporting spikes from beneath the construct are jutting through in some places.
The only light on the mansion now is Lady Photon's shields, all of the ones we set up around the perimeter are knocked over, out, or covered with dust. On the other side of those shimmering barriers there's a faint flickering. Like some faceted, mirrored surface reflecting inconstant light back.
Kaiser steps forward out of the dark, his armor gleaming fitfully in the shield's light. None of us dare get any closer, with the power he's already thrown around there's no doubt how that would turn out. He strides slowly, purposefully, toward the shield, left hand raised. I can't tell from this far out, but it looks like he's gripping something. His hand touches the shield.
And Lady Photon begins screaming in agony. I jerk my head up, and see her falling to the ground barely controlled, holding her head and curled into a ball.
"CATCH HER!" I order. Several men point their foam sprayers at her, and she is rapidly covered in a cushion which protects her as she finishes her fall, at this point completely uncontrolled, to the ground. I glance back at the mansion and, unsurprisingly, the shield is down.
It's just us versus Kaiser, now.
"Dispatch, Lady Photon has been disabled by some kind of Tinker device. Now would be a good time for Legend to arrive."
"Understood." Silence on the other end of the line. "ETA two minutes."
I crack my neck. He can shred our entire force faster than that, if he wants to. I can't let that happen. Won't let that happen.
Only one thing for it. "Folks, stay back. Legend is on his way, but we need to stall. I am going to walk up and talk to him."
"Sir, he'll kill you!"
I frown and nod. "Maybe not. He does like the sound of his own voice, and I only need to stall for two minutes."
No more protest is forthcoming. It's...surprising, now, how calm I am about possibly walking directly for my death. I walk slowly, deliberately. Wasting as much time as possible while making it look like I'm trying to be authoritative. Every second this takes is a second I'm not within grabbing distance of a serial murderer. Now that the shield is down, the entire area is dark, The hole in the mansion looks less like an architectural calamity than like the dark maw of an angry beast. That I am walking directly towards.
I don't want to die, not at all. And, somewhere, I guess I'm convinced I won't. I have a plan, after all, and it might even work. But still, it's something of a long shot.
A long shot, but it's simple, really. I've read Kaiser's psych profile, what we've managed to put together from all of our observations of him. He loves to grandstand, to gloat. And he most loves to do it with people used to being in control. He loves the feeling of crushing every hope his enemies have, before literally crushing them and messily slicing them apart. He enjoys feeling absolute power over others.
Well, right now he probably feels like he can't lose. We've lost our only parahuman, our carefully constructed battlefield is in shambles, and every single person arrayed against him is completely vulnerable to his power. All he needs to massacre us all is a wave of his hand.
And, therefore, it falls to me to prevent him from waving his hand. Simple.
Heh, yeah. Simple.
I reach the edge of the hole, the darkness swallowing all of my vision. By the faint starlight above, I can barely see the reflection off Kaiser's armor, ten feet in front of me. He's...not moving. Probably looking at my predicament with twisted satisfaction. It is odd, though. I can't see very far into the broken house, but there doesn't appear to be anyone else behind him. Kaiser certainly could have been the only person assaulting Mr. Anders' abode, but that seems unlikely. Kaiser has no particular affinity for working alone, and is smart enough to know the advantages of never doing so.
Most notably, there's no sign of Max Anders. That either means he wasn't home, or he's somewhere else in the house being roughed up by thugs. I highly doubt that first possibility.
No point analyzing the situation now, though. I can do that later if I survive. I switch my visor's speakers to external mode.
"You've won, Kaiser. None of us can stop you, and Legend is fighting Crusader and can't come to help us. I am prepared to surrender and allow you to walk out of here peacefully. Just spare my men."
The sound of knives sliding across each other echoes from the darkness, and the faint shine on his armor shivers as he walks towards me. Damn, he's tall. Maybe it's just the armor, but he has to be above seven feet. He doesn't speak a word as his mask slides out of absolute shadow into the dim starlight.
I look up into the pools of total darkness where his eyes should be, his silence more deafening than any sound I've heard tonight.
Maybe I should try to get him to talk again? He's supposed to like talking, I don't know why he isn't doing it now. "Make your decision. If you fight us, we resist you to the last man. Maybe one of us gets lucky, maybe not, but I'm good for my word. Safe passage through our ranks, in return for the survival of my men."
His eerie silence stretches on. I don't know if he's considering my offer, or considering how to dismember me. I don't want to find out.
"What's it going to be, Kaiser? How does this end? Give me something to-"
A flash of light, bright as the sun and blinding in the dark.
A thunderous crack, the shockwave throwing dust to the ground and rocking me back on my feet.
A minor deity of the skies manifests beside me, and Kaiser slams into the back wall of the room, completely visible now in Legend's luminescence.
"Was that all you needed me to do?"
I don't answer immediately, more important things to do. Deftly, I unsheathe my foam sprayer's tube and march forward, covering Kaiser's slumped form entirely.
Nice superpower you got there, Nazi scum. Try seeing anything through that.
I turn back towards the hero behind me. "Yes, sir. I believe it was."
He nods and vanishes into the distance, another thunderclap and my own totally ruined night vision in his wake. He has more important work tonight.
Time to clean up and roll out.
----
A quick search of the house proved what I was afraid of. No sign of Max Anders anywhere, and no sign of an obvious escape route. Kaiser was the only person in the house, in fact. The Empire either got a pile of cash in return for their leader, or they got nothing. Either way, I'm happy with the trade. It's long past time for that monster to be put in his proper place.
Several of our trucks are mostly unscathed from the battle, the ones parked further up the street. My men and I create large piles of containment foam similar to the pile Kaiser's in and load each of them into different vans, to confuse any possible watchers and make it hard for the Empire to catch us on the way to the PHQ.
We drive off, and I leave most of my men behind. They'll get picked up later, right now our priority is seeing Kaiser in secure containment as soon as possible.
None of my men died. Goddamn miracle, really. Several are in bad shape, and might not make it through the night without Panacea's help, but they'll at least make it to her. Lady Photon is still unconscious, we have no idea what that device did to her. But that ain't our job.
The streets are empty and wide. Nobody can be out because of the curfew, nobody wants to be out because that would be insane. I'm flooring it all the way back, and the decoy trucks following different routes are probably doing so as we-
SKREEEEEEEEEEEEEE
thefuckwastha-OOURFFFF! The truck tips completely over, metal screaming as it slides down the weakly-lit street. The airbag explodes, and I almost vomit in pain as my chest confirms that I definitely have at least one broken rib. Totally out of control, we slide into a storefront and bricks rain down on me for the second time tonight!
WHAT THE FUCK! THAT ROAD WAS EMPTY, THERE WAS NOTHING TO HIT!
We've stopped moving. But the back of the truck is still squealing in protest.
Ohgodohgodohgodhow'dKaisermakemorespikes? I climb out of the driver's window, adrenaline keeping the pain at bay, and I'm momentarily confused to see a gigantic hole in the side of the van being shredded ever wider by armor that seems to be...growing?
"A FEW FACTS FOR YOU." That isn't Kaiser's voice, wha-
I look up, and see a giant in crystalline steel armor.
One of the Twins.
Shit.
"DID YOU KNOW THAT MEDHALL PROVIDES A SECRET ESCAPE TUNNEL, COMPLETE WITH SEEMINGLY-LEGITIMATE FRONT BUSINESS FOR ITS EXIT POINT, FOR ALL OF ITS EXECUTIVES? WE FOUND OUT ONLY A FEW MONTHS AGO, WHEN WE DISCOVERED ONE SUCH BUSINESS."
If this is Fenja or Menja, How'd they use Kaiser's powe-oh. Duh. That mansion was at the end of a residential street. We probably passed by the house Kaiser was in, watching the whole battlefield, on our way in. He would have left after blowing open the hole in the house, and left us none the wiser.
"OF COURSE, THAT ISN'T VERY USEFUL INFORMATION WHEN YOU WANT TO STILL FOLLOW THE RULES. BUT WE DON'T HAVE MUCH USE FOR THAT NOW, DO WE?"
"Where's Kaiser!?" I scream uselessly up at the towering giant. Might as well try, right?
Booming laughter. "DON'T BOTHER TRYING TO FIND HIM. HE, AND MAX ANDERS, HAVE BEEN GONE FROM THAT HOUSE FOR OVER SIX HOURS. DIDN'T YOU WONDER WHY ALL THE LIGHTS IN THE HOUSE WERE OUT? WE CUT THE POWER AND EVERY OTHER LINE IN OR OUT OF THE HOUSE AND TOOK HIM IN SECRET. AMAZING HOW MANY OF OUR GROUND TROOPS CAN PULL OFF A CONVINCING ELECTRICAL COMPANY TECHNICIAN IMPRESSION IN A PINCH. HE'S ALREADY GIVEN US EVERYTHING WE NEED, THE LITTLE COWARD."
My heart locks up in my chest. This whole operation...we were played. Hard.
"SINCE HE COULDN'T GLOAT IN PERSON, KAISER WANTED ME TO DO IT IN HIS STEAD. THE CASH INFUSION FROM MEDHALL WILL SUSTAIN US FOR WEEKS. THAT LITTLE DEVICE WHICH LADY PHOTON LOVED SO MUCH? ONLY THE BEGINNING."
She raises her foot, and I scramble to jump off the truck and into the street as she stomps down, obliterating the entire vehicle and sending me stumbling at the shockwave. "RUN BACK TO YOUR LEADERS, LITTLE WHELP. TELL THEM TO BE AFRAID. WE WILL NOT BACK DOWN, NOT UNTIL THEY BOW BEFORE US AS THEIR RIGHTFUL MASTERS."
She raises her foot again, pieces of the truck dangling off protrusions in her armor, and sprints off into the distance.
Much as I don't want to follow her orders, I don't see much choice in the matter.
"Dispatch, this is Strike Team Five leader. Come pick me up at the corner of Elm and State streets. We didn't capture Kaiser. They put Fenja in his armor, and she woke up and caught me off guard. She is currently at large, running north."
I cut off communications and settle heavily to the ground, head in hands. I don't even care about the broken rib any more.
This war just got a lot longer. Poor Brockton Bay. Whatever happened to you?
Fucking capes.
- Location
- US
Sorry I didn't post there for a few weeks, folks. I kind of fell into a hole of depression for a little bit there.
Turns out it's hard to write while you can't feel positive emotions.
I've gotten meds now, feeling a lot better. Hopefully I can get this back on schedule. I posted this now because I'm visiting my parents this weekend and posting from my phone always has issues.
Turns out it's hard to write while you can't feel positive emotions.
I've gotten meds now, feeling a lot better. Hopefully I can get this back on schedule. I posted this now because I'm visiting my parents this weekend and posting from my phone always has issues.
Try as you might Anders, you can't escape your fate, those numbers, don't lie.
I wonder, would Taylor take the Eye deal? I can't help but feel she might, she did a lot of dangerous things in 'canon', some shardfuckery was responsible sure, but not for all of her actions, not even most, I feel.
I also wonder, even if the death note worked on entities, endbringers, and the like, could she even write down their names?
I wonder, would Taylor take the Eye deal? I can't help but feel she might, she did a lot of dangerous things in 'canon', some shardfuckery was responsible sure, but not for all of her actions, not even most, I feel.
I also wonder, even if the death note worked on entities, endbringers, and the like, could she even write down their names?
Last edited:
- Location
- US
Read chapter one again, that should clear up whether she took the Eyes for you.
gunghoun
The Hero of Man (v2.0)
- Location
- America
7: Switchboard
- Location
- US
"Tonight's top story is the ongoing violence between the PRT ENE and the white supremacist group the Empire Eighty-Eight, in Brockton Bay, Connecticut. Five days ago, the body of Shadow Stalker, a local Ward, was found tied up in a warehouse, surrounded with racially charged graffiti. Since that discovery, the PRT has declared open war upon the Empire, vowing to, quote, "End the group's existence and ability to perpetuate hatred and crime in Brockton Bay." Events are coming out of the city at a breakneck pace, and we are endeavoring to bring to you every detail we can."
Personally invested in the outcome of the conflict.
"Three nights ago, we reported upon the sudden death of Director Emily Piggot, of the PRT ENE. At the time, investigation into her death was incomplete, and the PRT requested that we withhold some of the details of her death pending completion. Due to the sensitive nature of events in the city, we agreed to do so. That investigation is still ongoing, and we at ATR News have decided, in the interests of journalistic integrity, to wait until more evidence is available before making any speculations."
Disagrees with that decision.
"The Empire, on the other hand, has denied responsibility for the death, releasing a video claiming to be of the execution of the men responsible, and an audio file purporting to be of a conversation between Emily Piggot and Kaiser, the leader of the Empire, just prior to her death. We will not repeat these releases on-air, as they are quite graphic, but they may be found on our website. Considering how difficult it is to ascertain the credibility of digital data in this day and age, we have not been able to verify whether these sources are real or-"
RINGRINGRING
I mute the news feed and switch over to my rather more special communicator
"You've reached Signus Information and Technology. This is Karen, how can I help you?"
Of course, that isn't my name. That isn't who I work for. And while we do, arguably, help people, as many of our clients wind up dead or in prison as free.
I work for the Elite.
"I want some information."
As always, the subtext of the request appears, unbidden, in my mind.
Information he wants is illegal to have. Has done business with us before.
"Of course, sir! Please stay on the line while I direct your call!"
I blink out a code to redirect him to the proper line, then hang up.
My job is boring, but it pays well considering how good I am for it, and I never have to get in any fights. Besides, I enjoy listening to the news during downtime. I get so much more out of it than normal people, cutting through lies or misdirection to see fragments of the truth beneath.
And, I am irreplaceable to them. The Elite's business operations are, of course, all mostly separate from one another and only given temporary means of contacting each other when necessary. Having one department infiltrated can't take us all down, this way. Interdepartmental communication can be slow at times, but it works for us.
The problem, of course, comes with communicating with our other clients. Those outside the organization. They cannot gain access to us very easily, and it would be difficult to coordinate projects with them unless I existed. They call me Switchboard, because that is my job. By knowing the subtext of every conversation, no matter how short, I can direct callers who want our services to whoever they need to talk to without giving any context to anyone who might be snooping. In addition, my access to all of our departments is both unique to me and constantly encrypted. Any trails which might lead to me end with me.
And what do the people who call me want?
Practically anything you can ask for. People forget this, but the Elite is first and foremost composed of businessmen. All we ever wanted was to have fistfulls of cash. We don't want to hurt anyone, and while we might sell things to people who do want to hurt others, that is something most every government has done from time to time. We politely encourage people to get out of our way, and those who do not we chastise until they understand their place.
That particular caller? I directed him to our core operation: Marketing. Congress might have made it illegal for parahumans to run marketing firms, but all that did was force us underground. The subtle art of selling things to people who might not have wanted them in the first place cannot be silenced by mere mortal law. He was probably an employee of a perfectly legitimate company seeking access to one of our marketing databases. Having the names, addresses, and phone numbers of every person in a city, listed or not, is an extremely powerful advantage which happens to be difficult to detect from the outside.
Is that advantage unfair? Not at all! Their competitors could take advantage of our services as well. We exist only because we provide a service for which there is high demand. If it wasn't us, someone else would do it. That's the magic of the marketplace.
I unmute the news feed.
"-the first night of hostilities, a variety of major victories have been struck by both sides of the conflict. On the first night, Crusader, a powerful Master capable of creating shadowy minions and flight, was captured by Legend after a fifteen minute chase through the high-rises of downtown Brockton Bay. We have compiled a montage of amateur footage of that chase on our website. The PRT's only comment on that conflict was that Legend had a difficult time capturing Crusader non-lethally due to the nature of his flight, which works by having his projections carry him."
Believes the chase happened to distract Legend.
"In addition, the PRT successfully captured Cricket, a combat Thinker. Bastion, the former leader of the San Jose Protectorate who lost his commission a month ago when footage of a racist tirade flooded the airwaves, partially redeemed himself by capturing Alabaster, a regenerator, and killing Hookwolf, a powerful Brute, in defence of himself and Miss Militia, second-in-command of the Protectorate ENE. Hookwolf had already been sentenced to the Birdcage in absentia, and though there was no kill order out for him, local prosecutors are declining to press charges, citing the impossibility of assembling a jury who would even consider a conviction."
Frustrated with local prosecutors.
"However, the night was not without losses. The assembled forces of the PRT suffered a massive loss at the hands of-"
RINGRINGRING
Another call. "You've reached Munroe & Munroe Ltd. This is Joannah. How may I direct your call?"
"I need help."
Is lying. Is asking for parahuman support in order to trap whoever shows up.
I hang up.
The Elite's relationship with the PRT is...complex. They call us villains, of course, as we are an organization founded on the use of parahumans for illegal ends, but in many ways we are a special case. They rarely raid our establishments, even when they know where they are. Oh, of course I've been forced to uproot myself once or twice, but we all know it's a facade: they come after us only for the PR boost, and leave us alone otherwise.
They know well the reasons for our founding and how we operate. We cause little trouble, and we even send many of our parahumans with abilities valid on the battlefield to Endbringer fights all around the Western Hemisphere. That, of course, has many purposes. It encourages the PRT's leniency, showing them that many powerful men and women who might otherwise never step within a hundred miles of a living catastrophe can be convinced to do so under our banner. It occasionally provides us with a means to be rid of parahumans who have outlived their usefulness. And, most importantly, it is perhaps one of our strongest advertising campaigns. The public knows that at the direst of times the Elite will be there for them. The surge of outside contracts which are formed in the aftermath of each attack as shattered businesses try to find a rock to stand on is evidence of that.
And, of course, the PRT knows that the services we provide will be provided. The only questions are by whom, and with what cost to public peace. As long as the Elite exists, that cost is low. Warzones, like Brockton Bay for instance, are terrible for most of our businesses. As such we do not foster them in the areas we control. We value order and peace, in our own way.
That news feed is just getting juicy! I switch sources nearly constantly as I unravel the political slants and sometimes private lives of each broadcaster. The mysteries are fascinating, sometimes even profitable, for one in my position. I'm not above blackmail.
"-disabled by some kind of Tinker device at the hands of the Empire, and has not woken up from a deep coma since. Our thoughts go out to the heroes of New Wave. No successful captures were made in that engagement, and no word has been heard of Max Anders' fate since his kidnapping."
Smug about that outcome.
"This leads us right into our feature tonight. We have managed to invite Dwight Pewtersmith, a member of Medhall's board of directors, onto the show. Welcome to ATR, Dwight."
Truly curious about what Dwight has to say.
"Thank you, Alex. I'm happy to be here, if only to explain Medhall's side of this whole catastrophe to the world."
Honest.
"Now, Dwight, I was lead to believe that Medhall was still investigating their losses at the hands of the Empire and unwilling to talk about them. Has that changed since we invited you?"
Still curious.
"Indeed it has. We have completed our preliminary reports, and while the exact details are corporate secrets that we will only share with law-enforcement, I have been cleared to explain the broad details of what we found with the world at this interview."
"Do go on."
"It is worse than we hoped, but far better than we feared, in many ways. Of course, Medhall has protocols in place for removing the power of our board members to do anything important if they are compromised, but unfortunately those protocols can only be triggered if we know about the coercion. As Max Anders was kidnapped in secret, nobody knew he was missing until the Empire made it known by staging a second assault upon his home. I...shudder to think what horrific things they subjected him to, but in the hours between his kidnapping and our erasure of all of his connections to our systems, he must have broken."
Genuine personal worry.
"Broken, as in under torture?"
"I...Indeed. It is all we can think might have happened. Max is fiercely loyal to Medhall. Before his own personal life, before his own personal health at times, he has for years dedicated himself to this company and to Brockton Bay. He would not betray those loyalties for anything I can think of. Which means that something unthinkable has happened to him."
I don't even need my power to hear his concern for a man he considers a friend.
"I...am very sorry to hear that, Mr. Pewtersmith-"
"Please, call me Dwight."
"Indeed. Well, Dwight, what els-"
Ring ring ring, yes I'll answer. "You've reached Industrial Design Experts! How may I direct your call?"
"Uhhh, I need some equipment? Like…"
First-time caller. Wants illegal devices.
I interrupt him before he can give too much detail. "Let me help you with that sir!"
I blink out the request and hang up.
He's getting redirected to Requisitions. An organization such as ours has access to any number of devices of low to medium power and medium to high illegality. Lists of compromised credit card numbers, explosives, weapons. Police scanners which also hit PRT frequencies, Cell and radio jammers, programs for hacking and theft. A whole arsenal for those who want to take objects, information, or lives from others. We even sell some totally legal things: MREs, combat fatigues, flak vests. The kinds of things a street tough might want if they wanted to survive a little bit longer in the job. We don't deal in drugs, that business is far too dangerous for our tastes and would keep us tied to the streets, not to mention utterly destroying our reputation as an upstanding, honest dealer in illegal goods and services. No, we deal in the things drug dealers need.
Ultimately, that is why we are classed a criminal organization. Originally, of course, we dealt only in information and in things which had been legal before the Parahuman Exclusion Act, but if you're going to be arrested anyway why not make a bigger buck first? Requisitions is still not our top department, but it is growing rapidly as our reputation for prompt delivery spreads through the higher-class criminal organizations. Those large enough to have cash to throw around, but too small or lacking in outside connections to supply themselves with everything they need. That, ultimately, is our market niche on the dark side of the law: supply lines.
Outside of our core areas on the East Coast, we don't want to be seen as competition, but partners. We provide the services that aren't being provided by others, and nobody wants to shoot us because they all need us. We aren't the enemy. We're just the shopkeep. But what bustling city could exist without its shopkeeps? We are an integral part of the ecosystem, and everyone knows it. From that, we derive security. From that, we derive power.
This particular news feed has interesting implications for anyone with my perspective. I don't get the locations of the people who call me, of course. The less I know about them, the better for everyone. However, I would bet we've been getting countless calls from the Empire Eighty-Eight for the past week. They're one of our few clients on the East Coast, along with organizations like the Ambassadors, and right now they need our services more than at any point in my memory. Decisions to give out direct lines to departments are handled several levels above me, but they probably have a direct feed to Requisitions somewhere at this point.
Because Requisitions doesn't deal only in physical objects. No, one of their lesser-known businesses is in connections. From those with things to sell, to those who wish to buy. Everyone knows about Toybox and their strained, but peaceful, relations with the PRT. Toybox doesn't sell weapons (or, at least, not things branded as such), the lawmen let them make money hand-over-fist and provide shelter to Tinkers who might otherwise fall into what they would term darkness.
We are the other side of that coin. Rather than slowly trawling the darknet for possibly-legitimate dealers of supernatural arms, those in the market for such things can simply contact us. For a small fee, we guarantee the efficacy of the devices our contractors sell. We put our reputation behind theirs.
Trust. It's a rare thing, in the criminal underground. But, it is perhaps one of our greatest products and assets. It is due to that trust that weapons' scams aren't rampant, that business between thieves is even possible. The reporter mentioned some kind of Tinkertech device putting Lady Photon into a coma? I almost guarantee it was supplied by us, because the Empire would have no way to test such a thing before using it. No way to trust the supplier's word.
Of course, such a device would be monumentally expensive, both for its power and for the secrecy required in making and selling it. The PRT cracks down hard on anyone known to be making custom devices for taking down heroes. That is probably why the Empire kidnapped Max Anders in the first place, to be able to continue affording our services and have a chance of staying in this fight.
I can't say I disagree with their conclusions on the matter.
More news.
"-timately, the compromise to our core systems was minor, all things considered. Max was our CEO, but that didn't mean he had access to everything. In some ways, the Empire would have been better served kidnapping most of our IT department, not that such a thing would have been possible considering how widely spread all of their homes are. Max had direct access to several expense accounts and his own stock options, and from those the Empire seems to have extracted approximately thirty million dollars. Quite a lot of liquid assets for an organization of their size, a drop in the bucket for us. Rest assured, stockholders, that Medhall's finances have been only marginally affected by this tragedy."
Honest.
"Thirty million dollars is, as you say, quite a lot. But I am glad to hear that Brockton Bay's biggest employer is not in existential danger."
Smug satisfaction at the situation.
"We all are, Alex. We all are."
"Well Dwight, I assume you have work to do in the wake of all of this, don't let me distract you from it."
"Heh. I do indeed. Thank you for inviting me."
"That was Dwight Pewtersmith, folks, assuring us that Medhall will soldier on in the face of the kidnapping of Max Anders, their CEO. But, the news from Brockton Bay continues.
Numerous additional parahuman engagements have occurred in the Bay in the past few days. Fenja and Menja, identical twins capable of growing into giants who take very little damage from attacks, caused millions of dollars of property damage in a commercial district near the city's downtown three days ago, while attempting to defend an Empire supply depot. During the fight, they were, accidentally, temporarily unmasked by Legend when he fired a laser into their faces and misjudged the force necessary to blind them, due to the damage reduction their Changer states induce. The PRT has requested that all footage of that fight be edited or taken down, to preserve the identities of all involved. This, of course, due to their longstanding policy of never revealing the identities of parahumans except in the courtroom. This might wind up being irrelevant in the long term, however, as the twins were over four stories tall at the time and visible for over a mile around.
However, that fight ended on a happy note, as Legend, in cooperation with Bastion, Miss Militia, and Glory Girl, successfully captured the duo and confiscated millions of dollars in weaponry, drugs, and cash."
Wishes that had gone differently.
"Not all is going well for the Protectorate, however. The Empire appears to have used their connections with Gesselschaft, the infamous German Neo-Nazi organization, to recruit two new members: Night and Fog. This ruthless duo has already made its mark, severely injuring Aegis, Kid Win, and Clockblocker, of the Wards ENE, and Velocity of the Protectorate, in a surprise attack upon the downtown PRT headquarters. According to the PRT, the only reason none of them died was luck, as Panacea of New Wave happened to be in the building to save their lives. Kid Win and Velocity are still disabled, though they are expected to make a full recovery."
Believes it serves them right.
"So far, every Empire cape has made their mark on the hostilities in one way or another, except one. Purity, the Empire's most powerful airborne attacker, has not been seen once in the entire conflict. We at ATR do not care to speculate as to her whereabouts, and neither the PRT nor the Empire have said anything about the discre-"
RINGRINGRING
"You have reached Amantic Software Solutions, how may I direct your call?"
"Um, h-hi. I'm Kayden Anders, an-"
First-time caller. In legal trouble. Just acquired money to pay for a lawyer.
I cut her off. "Allow me to redirect you, ma'am."
I redirect her and slam the phone down.
What a rank amateur! I have never understood how people like that survive in this business, but every few days I get a call just like that.
In a world where your civilian identity is only a weapon to be used against you, why would anyone ever reveal it? This business is rewarding, and for me the rewards outweigh the risks, but the sheer number of idiots who are involved boggles the mind. The only reason I redirected her instead of hanging up is because she needed legal help, hopefully they can set her straight.
If they fail, she probably dies. Not that I particularly care. Her fate is none of my concern.
Legal. Not much direct profit in it, but they are perhaps our most important department. As we are the rock which so, so many legitimate and illegitimate businessmen stand, so they are ours. Our uneasy truce with the PRT is pragmatic for both sides, but those idealistic fools might still come after it if not for the iron hand of the law. The Elite's segregation of information, the effort we put into obfuscation, and the bottomless well of shell corporations we run mean that very nearly zero actionable evidence of any so-called "wrongdoings." does, or will ever, exist. What little can get out, stamped out by our staunch protectors in Legal.
People make the mistake of thinking that we are first and foremost a Parahuman organization. Oh sure, that was the reason for our founding, but we are so, so much more than that now. We employ tens of thousands of people directly, and make possible the employment of millions. Only a few hundred of those are parahumans.
We don't make the mistake that every other superpowered gang in the world seems to make, of thinking that personal might is all that matters. All of the organizations we service have parahumans at the top directing their flunkies below, as if only superpowers make a man worthy of leadership. We, however, have recognized a simple, and obvious, fact:
A hundred regular people are stronger than all but the most powerful of capes. A hundred soldiers armed with containment foam can subdue most capes arrogant enough to charge forward. A hundred financial analysts are better than anyone but Number Man and Accord at fiduciary planning. And a hundred lawyers? There is no replacement for a hundred lawyers. No single power I can think of can match the might of a hundred men with the law at their back and rhetoric at their lips.
We are safe, I am safe, because the fine people in Legal protect me without any powers at all. The Elite can exist on the dark side of the law entirely because the law exists in the first place, and lawyers exist to enforce the wall between the light and the dark. Yes, I have a nearly limitless respect for the work they do. It is perhaps the most valuable service we provide.
By the time I flip back to the news feed, it has ended. They're a mostly online outlet, and their podcasts are more brief summaries with a short interview, but ATR has held my interest this week more than any other due to the truly fascinating dossier I've been putting together on Alex Porter, their anchor. My research has shown he lives in Boston with his wife and only son, though he was born in Brockton Bay. Casual poking around in the databases I have access to has shown nothing unusual about any of his activities. By all accounts, he is an average, boring man who lives an average, boring life.
Except, of course, that my power has made it obvious he's a Nazi sympathizer.
I have no particular care for politics, one way or another. It's a distraction from the real games of power, the behind-the-scenes wheeling, dealing, and stabbing that actually run the world. I think most people with strong beliefs are fools, wasting their time defending ideas when they could be defending or acquiring wealth and prestige, but if people want to do that with their lives, so much the better for the rest of us. Especially because it gives people like me leverage. If it got out that Alex Porter was cozy with the likes of the Empire, he would lose everything, and ATR would lose more. It's not too much of a bet that someone, somewhere, is willing to pay quite a lot to keep what I know silent.
Of course, I need proof first. I won't go public like a foolish activist, smearing a name all over the tabloids nobody takes seriously the moment a shred of evidence is found. My power is strong, but nobody needs to believe me, especially because I'm classed a "Villain."
Ugh, the PRT's labels are so imprecise. Putting me in the same category as blind idiots like Kaiser and raging lunatics like the Butcher just doesn't do it justice.
Oh well. My gripes with the PRT are political, and therefore unimportant. What I really need to do is get cracking on finding the solid, salient evidence which could bring down Alex Porter.
This is going to be a fun distraction.
Personally invested in the outcome of the conflict.
"Three nights ago, we reported upon the sudden death of Director Emily Piggot, of the PRT ENE. At the time, investigation into her death was incomplete, and the PRT requested that we withhold some of the details of her death pending completion. Due to the sensitive nature of events in the city, we agreed to do so. That investigation is still ongoing, and we at ATR News have decided, in the interests of journalistic integrity, to wait until more evidence is available before making any speculations."
Disagrees with that decision.
"The Empire, on the other hand, has denied responsibility for the death, releasing a video claiming to be of the execution of the men responsible, and an audio file purporting to be of a conversation between Emily Piggot and Kaiser, the leader of the Empire, just prior to her death. We will not repeat these releases on-air, as they are quite graphic, but they may be found on our website. Considering how difficult it is to ascertain the credibility of digital data in this day and age, we have not been able to verify whether these sources are real or-"
RINGRINGRING
I mute the news feed and switch over to my rather more special communicator
"You've reached Signus Information and Technology. This is Karen, how can I help you?"
Of course, that isn't my name. That isn't who I work for. And while we do, arguably, help people, as many of our clients wind up dead or in prison as free.
I work for the Elite.
"I want some information."
As always, the subtext of the request appears, unbidden, in my mind.
Information he wants is illegal to have. Has done business with us before.
"Of course, sir! Please stay on the line while I direct your call!"
I blink out a code to redirect him to the proper line, then hang up.
My job is boring, but it pays well considering how good I am for it, and I never have to get in any fights. Besides, I enjoy listening to the news during downtime. I get so much more out of it than normal people, cutting through lies or misdirection to see fragments of the truth beneath.
And, I am irreplaceable to them. The Elite's business operations are, of course, all mostly separate from one another and only given temporary means of contacting each other when necessary. Having one department infiltrated can't take us all down, this way. Interdepartmental communication can be slow at times, but it works for us.
The problem, of course, comes with communicating with our other clients. Those outside the organization. They cannot gain access to us very easily, and it would be difficult to coordinate projects with them unless I existed. They call me Switchboard, because that is my job. By knowing the subtext of every conversation, no matter how short, I can direct callers who want our services to whoever they need to talk to without giving any context to anyone who might be snooping. In addition, my access to all of our departments is both unique to me and constantly encrypted. Any trails which might lead to me end with me.
And what do the people who call me want?
Practically anything you can ask for. People forget this, but the Elite is first and foremost composed of businessmen. All we ever wanted was to have fistfulls of cash. We don't want to hurt anyone, and while we might sell things to people who do want to hurt others, that is something most every government has done from time to time. We politely encourage people to get out of our way, and those who do not we chastise until they understand their place.
That particular caller? I directed him to our core operation: Marketing. Congress might have made it illegal for parahumans to run marketing firms, but all that did was force us underground. The subtle art of selling things to people who might not have wanted them in the first place cannot be silenced by mere mortal law. He was probably an employee of a perfectly legitimate company seeking access to one of our marketing databases. Having the names, addresses, and phone numbers of every person in a city, listed or not, is an extremely powerful advantage which happens to be difficult to detect from the outside.
Is that advantage unfair? Not at all! Their competitors could take advantage of our services as well. We exist only because we provide a service for which there is high demand. If it wasn't us, someone else would do it. That's the magic of the marketplace.
I unmute the news feed.
"-the first night of hostilities, a variety of major victories have been struck by both sides of the conflict. On the first night, Crusader, a powerful Master capable of creating shadowy minions and flight, was captured by Legend after a fifteen minute chase through the high-rises of downtown Brockton Bay. We have compiled a montage of amateur footage of that chase on our website. The PRT's only comment on that conflict was that Legend had a difficult time capturing Crusader non-lethally due to the nature of his flight, which works by having his projections carry him."
Believes the chase happened to distract Legend.
"In addition, the PRT successfully captured Cricket, a combat Thinker. Bastion, the former leader of the San Jose Protectorate who lost his commission a month ago when footage of a racist tirade flooded the airwaves, partially redeemed himself by capturing Alabaster, a regenerator, and killing Hookwolf, a powerful Brute, in defence of himself and Miss Militia, second-in-command of the Protectorate ENE. Hookwolf had already been sentenced to the Birdcage in absentia, and though there was no kill order out for him, local prosecutors are declining to press charges, citing the impossibility of assembling a jury who would even consider a conviction."
Frustrated with local prosecutors.
"However, the night was not without losses. The assembled forces of the PRT suffered a massive loss at the hands of-"
RINGRINGRING
Another call. "You've reached Munroe & Munroe Ltd. This is Joannah. How may I direct your call?"
"I need help."
Is lying. Is asking for parahuman support in order to trap whoever shows up.
I hang up.
The Elite's relationship with the PRT is...complex. They call us villains, of course, as we are an organization founded on the use of parahumans for illegal ends, but in many ways we are a special case. They rarely raid our establishments, even when they know where they are. Oh, of course I've been forced to uproot myself once or twice, but we all know it's a facade: they come after us only for the PR boost, and leave us alone otherwise.
They know well the reasons for our founding and how we operate. We cause little trouble, and we even send many of our parahumans with abilities valid on the battlefield to Endbringer fights all around the Western Hemisphere. That, of course, has many purposes. It encourages the PRT's leniency, showing them that many powerful men and women who might otherwise never step within a hundred miles of a living catastrophe can be convinced to do so under our banner. It occasionally provides us with a means to be rid of parahumans who have outlived their usefulness. And, most importantly, it is perhaps one of our strongest advertising campaigns. The public knows that at the direst of times the Elite will be there for them. The surge of outside contracts which are formed in the aftermath of each attack as shattered businesses try to find a rock to stand on is evidence of that.
And, of course, the PRT knows that the services we provide will be provided. The only questions are by whom, and with what cost to public peace. As long as the Elite exists, that cost is low. Warzones, like Brockton Bay for instance, are terrible for most of our businesses. As such we do not foster them in the areas we control. We value order and peace, in our own way.
That news feed is just getting juicy! I switch sources nearly constantly as I unravel the political slants and sometimes private lives of each broadcaster. The mysteries are fascinating, sometimes even profitable, for one in my position. I'm not above blackmail.
"-disabled by some kind of Tinker device at the hands of the Empire, and has not woken up from a deep coma since. Our thoughts go out to the heroes of New Wave. No successful captures were made in that engagement, and no word has been heard of Max Anders' fate since his kidnapping."
Smug about that outcome.
"This leads us right into our feature tonight. We have managed to invite Dwight Pewtersmith, a member of Medhall's board of directors, onto the show. Welcome to ATR, Dwight."
Truly curious about what Dwight has to say.
"Thank you, Alex. I'm happy to be here, if only to explain Medhall's side of this whole catastrophe to the world."
Honest.
"Now, Dwight, I was lead to believe that Medhall was still investigating their losses at the hands of the Empire and unwilling to talk about them. Has that changed since we invited you?"
Still curious.
"Indeed it has. We have completed our preliminary reports, and while the exact details are corporate secrets that we will only share with law-enforcement, I have been cleared to explain the broad details of what we found with the world at this interview."
"Do go on."
"It is worse than we hoped, but far better than we feared, in many ways. Of course, Medhall has protocols in place for removing the power of our board members to do anything important if they are compromised, but unfortunately those protocols can only be triggered if we know about the coercion. As Max Anders was kidnapped in secret, nobody knew he was missing until the Empire made it known by staging a second assault upon his home. I...shudder to think what horrific things they subjected him to, but in the hours between his kidnapping and our erasure of all of his connections to our systems, he must have broken."
Genuine personal worry.
"Broken, as in under torture?"
"I...Indeed. It is all we can think might have happened. Max is fiercely loyal to Medhall. Before his own personal life, before his own personal health at times, he has for years dedicated himself to this company and to Brockton Bay. He would not betray those loyalties for anything I can think of. Which means that something unthinkable has happened to him."
I don't even need my power to hear his concern for a man he considers a friend.
"I...am very sorry to hear that, Mr. Pewtersmith-"
"Please, call me Dwight."
"Indeed. Well, Dwight, what els-"
Ring ring ring, yes I'll answer. "You've reached Industrial Design Experts! How may I direct your call?"
"Uhhh, I need some equipment? Like…"
First-time caller. Wants illegal devices.
I interrupt him before he can give too much detail. "Let me help you with that sir!"
I blink out the request and hang up.
He's getting redirected to Requisitions. An organization such as ours has access to any number of devices of low to medium power and medium to high illegality. Lists of compromised credit card numbers, explosives, weapons. Police scanners which also hit PRT frequencies, Cell and radio jammers, programs for hacking and theft. A whole arsenal for those who want to take objects, information, or lives from others. We even sell some totally legal things: MREs, combat fatigues, flak vests. The kinds of things a street tough might want if they wanted to survive a little bit longer in the job. We don't deal in drugs, that business is far too dangerous for our tastes and would keep us tied to the streets, not to mention utterly destroying our reputation as an upstanding, honest dealer in illegal goods and services. No, we deal in the things drug dealers need.
Ultimately, that is why we are classed a criminal organization. Originally, of course, we dealt only in information and in things which had been legal before the Parahuman Exclusion Act, but if you're going to be arrested anyway why not make a bigger buck first? Requisitions is still not our top department, but it is growing rapidly as our reputation for prompt delivery spreads through the higher-class criminal organizations. Those large enough to have cash to throw around, but too small or lacking in outside connections to supply themselves with everything they need. That, ultimately, is our market niche on the dark side of the law: supply lines.
Outside of our core areas on the East Coast, we don't want to be seen as competition, but partners. We provide the services that aren't being provided by others, and nobody wants to shoot us because they all need us. We aren't the enemy. We're just the shopkeep. But what bustling city could exist without its shopkeeps? We are an integral part of the ecosystem, and everyone knows it. From that, we derive security. From that, we derive power.
This particular news feed has interesting implications for anyone with my perspective. I don't get the locations of the people who call me, of course. The less I know about them, the better for everyone. However, I would bet we've been getting countless calls from the Empire Eighty-Eight for the past week. They're one of our few clients on the East Coast, along with organizations like the Ambassadors, and right now they need our services more than at any point in my memory. Decisions to give out direct lines to departments are handled several levels above me, but they probably have a direct feed to Requisitions somewhere at this point.
Because Requisitions doesn't deal only in physical objects. No, one of their lesser-known businesses is in connections. From those with things to sell, to those who wish to buy. Everyone knows about Toybox and their strained, but peaceful, relations with the PRT. Toybox doesn't sell weapons (or, at least, not things branded as such), the lawmen let them make money hand-over-fist and provide shelter to Tinkers who might otherwise fall into what they would term darkness.
We are the other side of that coin. Rather than slowly trawling the darknet for possibly-legitimate dealers of supernatural arms, those in the market for such things can simply contact us. For a small fee, we guarantee the efficacy of the devices our contractors sell. We put our reputation behind theirs.
Trust. It's a rare thing, in the criminal underground. But, it is perhaps one of our greatest products and assets. It is due to that trust that weapons' scams aren't rampant, that business between thieves is even possible. The reporter mentioned some kind of Tinkertech device putting Lady Photon into a coma? I almost guarantee it was supplied by us, because the Empire would have no way to test such a thing before using it. No way to trust the supplier's word.
Of course, such a device would be monumentally expensive, both for its power and for the secrecy required in making and selling it. The PRT cracks down hard on anyone known to be making custom devices for taking down heroes. That is probably why the Empire kidnapped Max Anders in the first place, to be able to continue affording our services and have a chance of staying in this fight.
I can't say I disagree with their conclusions on the matter.
More news.
"-timately, the compromise to our core systems was minor, all things considered. Max was our CEO, but that didn't mean he had access to everything. In some ways, the Empire would have been better served kidnapping most of our IT department, not that such a thing would have been possible considering how widely spread all of their homes are. Max had direct access to several expense accounts and his own stock options, and from those the Empire seems to have extracted approximately thirty million dollars. Quite a lot of liquid assets for an organization of their size, a drop in the bucket for us. Rest assured, stockholders, that Medhall's finances have been only marginally affected by this tragedy."
Honest.
"Thirty million dollars is, as you say, quite a lot. But I am glad to hear that Brockton Bay's biggest employer is not in existential danger."
Smug satisfaction at the situation.
"We all are, Alex. We all are."
"Well Dwight, I assume you have work to do in the wake of all of this, don't let me distract you from it."
"Heh. I do indeed. Thank you for inviting me."
"That was Dwight Pewtersmith, folks, assuring us that Medhall will soldier on in the face of the kidnapping of Max Anders, their CEO. But, the news from Brockton Bay continues.
Numerous additional parahuman engagements have occurred in the Bay in the past few days. Fenja and Menja, identical twins capable of growing into giants who take very little damage from attacks, caused millions of dollars of property damage in a commercial district near the city's downtown three days ago, while attempting to defend an Empire supply depot. During the fight, they were, accidentally, temporarily unmasked by Legend when he fired a laser into their faces and misjudged the force necessary to blind them, due to the damage reduction their Changer states induce. The PRT has requested that all footage of that fight be edited or taken down, to preserve the identities of all involved. This, of course, due to their longstanding policy of never revealing the identities of parahumans except in the courtroom. This might wind up being irrelevant in the long term, however, as the twins were over four stories tall at the time and visible for over a mile around.
However, that fight ended on a happy note, as Legend, in cooperation with Bastion, Miss Militia, and Glory Girl, successfully captured the duo and confiscated millions of dollars in weaponry, drugs, and cash."
Wishes that had gone differently.
"Not all is going well for the Protectorate, however. The Empire appears to have used their connections with Gesselschaft, the infamous German Neo-Nazi organization, to recruit two new members: Night and Fog. This ruthless duo has already made its mark, severely injuring Aegis, Kid Win, and Clockblocker, of the Wards ENE, and Velocity of the Protectorate, in a surprise attack upon the downtown PRT headquarters. According to the PRT, the only reason none of them died was luck, as Panacea of New Wave happened to be in the building to save their lives. Kid Win and Velocity are still disabled, though they are expected to make a full recovery."
Believes it serves them right.
"So far, every Empire cape has made their mark on the hostilities in one way or another, except one. Purity, the Empire's most powerful airborne attacker, has not been seen once in the entire conflict. We at ATR do not care to speculate as to her whereabouts, and neither the PRT nor the Empire have said anything about the discre-"
RINGRINGRING
"You have reached Amantic Software Solutions, how may I direct your call?"
"Um, h-hi. I'm Kayden Anders, an-"
First-time caller. In legal trouble. Just acquired money to pay for a lawyer.
I cut her off. "Allow me to redirect you, ma'am."
I redirect her and slam the phone down.
What a rank amateur! I have never understood how people like that survive in this business, but every few days I get a call just like that.
In a world where your civilian identity is only a weapon to be used against you, why would anyone ever reveal it? This business is rewarding, and for me the rewards outweigh the risks, but the sheer number of idiots who are involved boggles the mind. The only reason I redirected her instead of hanging up is because she needed legal help, hopefully they can set her straight.
If they fail, she probably dies. Not that I particularly care. Her fate is none of my concern.
Legal. Not much direct profit in it, but they are perhaps our most important department. As we are the rock which so, so many legitimate and illegitimate businessmen stand, so they are ours. Our uneasy truce with the PRT is pragmatic for both sides, but those idealistic fools might still come after it if not for the iron hand of the law. The Elite's segregation of information, the effort we put into obfuscation, and the bottomless well of shell corporations we run mean that very nearly zero actionable evidence of any so-called "wrongdoings." does, or will ever, exist. What little can get out, stamped out by our staunch protectors in Legal.
People make the mistake of thinking that we are first and foremost a Parahuman organization. Oh sure, that was the reason for our founding, but we are so, so much more than that now. We employ tens of thousands of people directly, and make possible the employment of millions. Only a few hundred of those are parahumans.
We don't make the mistake that every other superpowered gang in the world seems to make, of thinking that personal might is all that matters. All of the organizations we service have parahumans at the top directing their flunkies below, as if only superpowers make a man worthy of leadership. We, however, have recognized a simple, and obvious, fact:
A hundred regular people are stronger than all but the most powerful of capes. A hundred soldiers armed with containment foam can subdue most capes arrogant enough to charge forward. A hundred financial analysts are better than anyone but Number Man and Accord at fiduciary planning. And a hundred lawyers? There is no replacement for a hundred lawyers. No single power I can think of can match the might of a hundred men with the law at their back and rhetoric at their lips.
We are safe, I am safe, because the fine people in Legal protect me without any powers at all. The Elite can exist on the dark side of the law entirely because the law exists in the first place, and lawyers exist to enforce the wall between the light and the dark. Yes, I have a nearly limitless respect for the work they do. It is perhaps the most valuable service we provide.
By the time I flip back to the news feed, it has ended. They're a mostly online outlet, and their podcasts are more brief summaries with a short interview, but ATR has held my interest this week more than any other due to the truly fascinating dossier I've been putting together on Alex Porter, their anchor. My research has shown he lives in Boston with his wife and only son, though he was born in Brockton Bay. Casual poking around in the databases I have access to has shown nothing unusual about any of his activities. By all accounts, he is an average, boring man who lives an average, boring life.
Except, of course, that my power has made it obvious he's a Nazi sympathizer.
I have no particular care for politics, one way or another. It's a distraction from the real games of power, the behind-the-scenes wheeling, dealing, and stabbing that actually run the world. I think most people with strong beliefs are fools, wasting their time defending ideas when they could be defending or acquiring wealth and prestige, but if people want to do that with their lives, so much the better for the rest of us. Especially because it gives people like me leverage. If it got out that Alex Porter was cozy with the likes of the Empire, he would lose everything, and ATR would lose more. It's not too much of a bet that someone, somewhere, is willing to pay quite a lot to keep what I know silent.
Of course, I need proof first. I won't go public like a foolish activist, smearing a name all over the tabloids nobody takes seriously the moment a shred of evidence is found. My power is strong, but nobody needs to believe me, especially because I'm classed a "Villain."
Ugh, the PRT's labels are so imprecise. Putting me in the same category as blind idiots like Kaiser and raging lunatics like the Butcher just doesn't do it justice.
Oh well. My gripes with the PRT are political, and therefore unimportant. What I really need to do is get cracking on finding the solid, salient evidence which could bring down Alex Porter.
This is going to be a fun distraction.
- Location
- US
Pridakarbiter
Unseelie
- Location
- Arctis Tor
Switchboard kind of reminds me of Tattletale.
Tin_Mother
(Verified Cape) (Omnissah be Praised!)
- Location
- Mars
Was that Lisa? Nice to see a fix where she isn't a Coil flunkie right of the bat.
- Location
- US
Nope, OC.
Everyone is in their canon starting positions in this fic.
Switchboard's power is only useful for verbal communication, unlike Lisa's which works on just about everything. However, where Lisa seems to get a ton of her efficacy from seeing things directly, drawing information from visual clues, Switchboard can work over recordings. She also doesn't get Thinker headaches nearly as badly.
Switchboard can't really do the psychological teardown thing Lisa can do because she doesn't get that much information. She basically has a constant sense motive check running.
Last edited:
CV12Hornet
Riter.
- Location
- Tacoma, Washington
Why do I get the feeling that that person redirected to Marketing is Taylor, or affiliated with her?
- Location
- United States
Sarah has a nice job.
- Location
- Hungary
I have to agree withthis man.
This was exposition: THE CHAPTER
with nothing much advancing the plot.
Dr. Mercurious
Strangest Person You Know
- Location
- New England
Except it did.
I was kinda hoping that this would be Lisa as 'Switchboard'; I would love to see a fic where she's a member of the Elite. Still and all, nice setting up for future chaos and mayhem.
You should make that clearer. The only reason I didn't straight up assume she was Lisa is that Lisa is not normally portrayed as that much of a self-righteous asshole.