Chapter 934 - 54-56

Last edited: Dec 4, 2024439TDRDec 3, 2024View discussionThreadmarks Chapter 54 View contentTDRWriter, mad bunnyDec 14, 2024#3,659Director Costa-Brown let out a small sigh. The screaming and yelling that usually went on during these meetings was as always, quite present.

Doubly so after a Endbringer attack on American soil.

And then double that mess again with the fact and Endbringer HAD DIED on American soil.

She was already getting bombarded by questions from the President and his collected cabinet as well as every senator across the fucking country. Except for the one from Rhode Island. All he did was send a single e-mail thanking her for insuring his reelection.

Bastard was probably going to try and claim it was his government that was responsible for the Endbringer death, he could probably make a successful presidential run with that if he didn't screw it up.

Whatever, not her problem right now, she'd have Contessa look into him later.

The usual suspects were of course here, with Armstrong wanting to study the remains, Tagg wanting to weaponize the remains, Kilgore flat out demanding a chunk of the thing to mount on a plaque...

That one she might grant. Maybe it would calm the man's fervor. He never cared how the creature died just that it did and put forth a lot of effort to kill it after the devastation of the south east. Otherwise he was a rather impressive Director, not as good as Piggot had suddenly become, but seriously it was hard to top her recent record.

What was left of Japan would probably want a piece as well.

Ehh those were easy requests, Tagg... who knew what the fuck he was on about. But if that fucker wanted to try cloning it she would twist his head off and shove it up his own ass herself.

That wasn't even something to joke about, had the man not seen Jurassic Park?

Still in between the banter of what to do about the remains , there was what to do about Alucard. and to a lesser extent Lung, she had plenty of time to think.

Her eyes shifted over to another screen in her office that was showing the footage captured by both Dragon ships and by Uber and L33t's snitch device. The pair had actually offered to splice everything for Dragon, free of charge so long as they got to post the main footage. Dragon agreed because they were going to do it one way or another and at least this way the PRT, through Dragon, would have a say in what went in the footage.

Saturnia and Shadow Stalker's fates and face were a no go as they were under 18, and the two joke villains respected that enough.

Though she had seen and memorized the whole video already , she clicked play on it and let it play on the other monitor as the argument got more heated between the twenty plus directors on the call.

The video started with the usual Uber and L33t show logo, Master Chief's helmet done in Blue and red with the pairs names in comic sans framing it on the sides though at the bottom of the splash page was the logo for Dragon Tech and a note reading 'with additional footage supplied by,' before it.

The video started showing the falling tanker with the Endbringer slow motion swinging a claw to meet it while Queen's 'Princes of the universe' played, the video then showed the tanker explosion from three different angles. There were also little pop up info blocks in one corner rather like that VH1 show they did a while back.

The type of tanker as well as the fuel load and what powers were used to get the tanker to do that were listed in the boxes. Names were not mentioned as connected to the powers, but any one who had been on the PHO power scaling forums would likely have a pretty good idea.

There were shots of the burnt Endbringer with another pop up revealing the mass lost of the creature at this point, the TNT yield of the explosion, as well as a small eulogy to a doughnut shop that had been tragically destroyed in the explosion that evidently had the best Boston Creme ever.

Then things got a bit darker, while the two Wards had been cut from the shots, the other heroes that had flown closer and showered the block with blood as they died were not.

The music change to 'It's raining men' was tactless and had a number of comments screaming at the duo.

There was actually a comment from the pair in the description of the video apologizing for the tactless music choice. They then promised to change the music to P.O.D.'s Bodies as they admitted there were other capes besides men who had been killed and they apologized if that song offended and feminist or LGBT groups by being rather inclusive to just men.

Clearly the two idiots were trying to offend everyone with this, not just certain people.

What the video didn't show was that blood had showered down and then flowed into the stunned girl on the street in front of the Endbringer.

When the creature took a step forward a pop up showed how much pressure and strength would be needed to bend the remains of the truck frame that was embedded in the creature.

As it tore fully free and made another step towards Saturnia the music switched again to 'Mama said knock you out' as Lung stepped from behind a building and punched the Endbringer. This punch repeated eight times for the chorus of the song zooming in a bit each time to show Leviathan's face getting cratered, before Tom Petty's 'Free Fallin ' played as the Endbringer was sent sailing through the air in slow motion from the punch.

The scene stopped and everything went black as a robotic voice sounding like that AI from the Halo games spoke up.

"Code Whiskey, Alpha, Lima, Kilo." The voice spoke showing the line in comic sans text as it was spoke,

Uber and L33t truly were evil.

The words faded and another line was read by the Halo AI, though it carried the same inflection of anger and pain as the original line.

"I don't know if an Endbringer can feel pain, but make it hurt."

Another caveat for the two that they couldn't use Piggot's voice so Cortana was used.

The video showed the end result of that order however as a dark reddish mass swept across the city crashing into the reeling Leviathan like a tidal wave.

The Endbringer was clearly healing, though the music had shifted to 'the Final Countdown' .

The mass of blood and darkness swarmed over the Endbringer as Lung waded into the mess without any issue with it and started whaling on the Endbringer.

The whole thing looked less like an Endbringer fight and more like some WWF nonsense where one wrestler held another one while a third slapped the shit out of him.

When Lung tore free one of the creatures legs and literally started beating him with it the pop up on the screen was just repeated lines of 'Why you hitting yourself?'

Rebecca sighed. Dragon really should have negotiated for the footage harder.

Still Leviathan broke free and lashed out with several aquatic attacks as it tried to force it's way to the ocean only for the mass of blood to disgorge a swarm of dead Heroes and villains, naked for some reason, though thankfully all of them were pixelated out for the release, That swarm smashed into the Endbringer in a suicidal attack that drove it back until the mass of black blood could envelop it again.

Then the dead and Lung proceeded to rip bits off the Endbringer, until they found what appeared to be the core, a thing that was rapidly trying to regrow armor and scales over itself.

The bloody mass however formed into a canine like head and bit down on the oddly fractal looking sphere, square.... hyper cube looking thing, as who let the dogs out played.

The pop up froze the scene and called it a Teseract and then filled the screen with theoretical pseudo science from Star Trek before the scene started again with the massive dog like head biting into and through the core shattering it in a brief explosion of light that was subdued by the mass roiling around it.

The video ended with the last lines of 'Eat the rich' and a very loud burp before credits rolled as something of a memorial to all that had died during the attack.

Rebecca sighed and closed the video turning back to the unintelligible gibberish that the yelling had become, her eyes locking on the video screen featuring the only one of the Directors in this conference call that was even important at the moment.

Director Emily Piggot.

The woman looked like shit.

She was pale, far beyond the scope of any images she had ever seen of the woman save when she had just come out of Ellisburg. She had a blood bag and a hydration IV hooked up to her and Druid could be seen hovering around her and a massive green cat could just be seen laying in the woman's lap. Her right wrist was heavily wrapped in a bandage and her uninjured arm was was holding a mug of some sort of broth that she was draining through a straw.

So far she had spent the whole video eating or drinking something and occasionally Druid would touch her nod about something and go back to the hovering ignoring Piggot's attempts to get her to leave.

Honestly Rebecca was surprised Piggot had survived... again, with this sort of blood loss.

Because that's what it was of course, and why not a damn one of the other Directors was going to succeed in any of their demands about sending Alucard to kill the other two Endbringers.

At least not any time soon.

Well time to deal with this.

"Everyone shut the fuck up or expect to have your funding cut by half next quarter." Rebecca stated out loud.

The response was of course, immediate, even Tagg shut up.

"Alright who here has Black level Clearance?" Rebecca demanded.

Most of the directors had that so most responded with affirmatives. She already knew of course but better to keep them realizing this was above most pay grades.

The few Directors that didn't had their connections cut.

"Now then. Who here has Baby Blue clearance?"

That brought a few more winces as even more of them vanished.

In the End the only ones remaining were Piggot, Armstrong due to his research, Kilgore due to his delving into how to kill the Endbringers. Tagg for... okay Rebecca was not sure why Tagg had Baby Blue clearance. Director Sir Penwood from England, and surprisingly Director Belmont from Romania were also still present.

Everyone on the screen looked at Druid who stared back .

"What? I've got Periwinkle clearance." Druid stated.

"There is no Periwinkle clearance!" Tagg snapped back.

"Clearly your clearance is not high enough to know about my clearance." Druid snapped. "And if you want me to leave the room after you dragged mo....the Director into this stupid meeting in her condition, then you better come over here and remove me yourself."

The girl leaned very close to the camera , the red of her goggles giving a sinister air to her as her eye took up most of the frame as if she was staring directly at the Directors on the other side.

"And you better bring A LOT of help with you." Druid snarled with the large cat adding it's own rumbling growl to hers.

"Druid get back from the camera." Director Piggot ordered. The girl held her position for a moment more before leaning back and walking out of the frame.

Director Piggot sighed wincing a little as she moved.

"Druid has the same clearance as me due to working with Alucard and a number of other heroes . And given she knows the names of everyone she's ever treated, she probably does have Periwinkle clearance."

"THERE'S NO SUCH CLEARANCE!!" Director Tagg roared.

"That's because you're not cleared to know about it." Director Piggot offered.

"Enough." Rebecca snapped. "First off, Director Piggot, is he contained again?"

"Yes ma'am, feel like he chugged twenty gallons out of me, but the seal is back." Director Piggot offered.

"Good. Here's the short of it. Everyone knows that Alucard is a Case 13, what no one outside this conference knows is that he is THE Case 13, the first in fact, with records of his existence showing in the Second World War with several descriptions of him appearing as far back as the Nepolianic Wars. There are also documents found from a Organization called Hellsing that have records of him going back even further, but none can be verified as the documents from that organization are sparse or outright lost after Hellsing's collapse. " the Chief Director explained.

"I'm sorry Chief Director, but do you mean to say that Alucard is the Case zero for the Case 13 file?" Director Armstrong asked.

"No. The case zero in that file was a woman in France, but he was evidently around longer than she was as her history only went back to just before the first World War. Even then the description she gave of the one who turned her matches Alucard."

"I thought she named the actual Dracula?" Director Belmont added in.

"Seriously?" Druid chimed up. "What's Alucard's name backwards? It's not even a witty attempt to hide it, unless he was going for the mirror thing with vampires having no reflection meaning no one would get his name backwards..... huh, maybe it is witty, don't tell him I said that."

There was a great deal of silence for a moment as everyone in the channel mulled this over.

"Well I feel dumb." Director Belmont sighed.

"What does that have to do with the fact an Endbringers dead?" Director Kilgore asked. " And why hasn't he been used to kill them in earlier fights?"

"Alucard made a deal with me when I found him. He'd listen to orders and obey me and seal away most of his powers. I think he thought it was like a game and he was bored. But if I ever let him free fully I would need to offer up the same amount of blood I did to seal him away the first time." Director Piggot offered.

"I take Director Piggot , that that first time would have been in Ellisburg then?" Director Sir Penwood asked.

"It was. The bastard told me after the fact he would count ALL the blood I lost up to meeting him and getting back to where i was treated for my injuries. And given I nearly died from blood loss there, I've been very reluctant to ever let him off the leash." Director Piggot explained.

"Well fuck just let him off the leash tell him to kill the other Endbringers and then seal his ass back up, or switch ownership to some one that has more blood to give than your tiny ass." Tagg snapped.

"I had considered that as well, but after speaking with Alucard, Director Piggot would need to be dead, the next person he spoke with would need to strike a brand new deal, and most importantly he would 'need to feel like it'." Chief Director Costa-Brown pointed out. "And if any of you have met him, he's kind of an ass, and who knows when he would 'feel like' submitting to another contract. And until he did we would have something loose in the world that in case you missed the video EATS ENDBRINGERS!"

The video conference went silent again.

"Well fuck." Tagg added bluntly.

"Exactly. Now then my only question for you Director Piggot is why you let him off the leash when I told you not to?" Chief Director Costa-Brown questioned.

"At the time I was under the assumption he had made his way to the medical area due to the fact that three Wards were down, add in the sudden massive up tick in dead Parahumans and the death of an Entire Endbringer shelter and I figured it was best cut him loose and try to survive it or have even more people killed." Director Piggot offered. "So I gave the order and he stopped the Endbringer and I paid for that by sealing him back."

"Luckily I was clear at that point and we could start force feeding her liquids and food to regain her mass so my powers could work on keeping her alive and I could focus on keeping her from going into shock. It was also lucky that one of the family members of some of the medical staff had started cooking in the kitchen and there was plenty of food and drinks on hand to keep her going despite it being touch and go converting mass before it was properly digested." Druid added. "She's going to make it, but I'm going to have to be yelling at a lot of people."

"What's the state of the Wards?" Director Kilgore asked, unsurprisingly since two of them used to be in his department.

"Most of them are fine." Director Piggot added. "Aside from Druid being pissed at me, and Vista having first degree burns from where the fire traveled through her space warping ability before she could shut it down, the only loss was Shadow Stalker. She was one of the first hit by Leviathan's new ability. Saturnia is also still in something of a state of shock as she was witness to Shadow Stalker's death first hand. They are also going to be on punishment detail when they recover and their parents are likely going to lay into them both as well."

Druid snorted at that, planning to lay into her new little sister too.

"I'll have Legend prep the usual medal and such for and Endbringer fight for Shadow Stalker's family." Director Costa-Brown added. "Get some rest Director Piggot, we will discuss this more when you are recovered. This is twice in very short succession that you have been grievously injured."

"Yeah, I am not happy about that." Druid grumbled.

"Well unless something else happens we're at least three-ish months from another Endbringer attack." Director Sir Penwood offered. " Perhaps we will be lucky and it will be the Simurgh and we can simply run her off by having Alucard go make kissy faces at her."

In space [CONFLICT ENGINE 3] shuddered.

[?]

"Well now that was a thing." a shadowy figure offered lifting the remote to cut off the TV the video had been playing.

"Indeed Father." A white scaled reptilian woman offered from her side of the room where she was sprawled out on the couch dressed in the real version of a Halloween Nun costume for adults. " I did not expect that the Leviathan would be dispatched, nor that the carrion lord would be allowed such free reign."

"Jus means we gotta kill it a'fore it grows." another voice in the darkness offered.

"That Endbringer cult is going to lose their shit." the first voice explained.

"Ah'll deal wid it. Tha old bat in charge kanna do shit tah me any way. I'll try tah drive home that while tha Endbringers might be angels of that Lord, they ain't god hisself. Might turn a few more tah that proper ways of thinking." The second voice paused."Prolly not that Mathers woman though. Strikes me as tha mega church type, all 'gimmi yer money' and not a drop a real faith."

"She is still an ally father. Please refrain from removing her while she is still useful." a third voice offered.

"Ah know Ah know Sister." The second voice sighed before grumbling ." Also how long does it take tah change a light bulb, we're like a frikking cult in here talking in that dark like this!"

Kenta regarded his home with a frown. While it had been spared most of the damage from the fight directly, a wave had still swept over this area and washed away much of the ground floor and everything that had been outside. He had refused help from his men, telling them to tend to their own, with only Oni- Lee staying to help him clean up. It was not as if the man had his own place, living out of what ever safe house or casino he was near when he felt tired.

Plus someone had stolen his favorite chair.

He pushed his daughter's swing set upright frowning at one of the legs of the metal pole was bent at a horrid angle and sighed, marking it down for the scrap pile.

"AIIIIIIIIIEEEEEEEE!" a screamed echoed through the house and both he and Oni Lee were moving before the sound died. He burst through a sodden wall while Lee just appeared, and he still managed to beat the teleporter up the stairs.

The second floor was not as bad as the first but there had clearly been at least a foot of water sweeping through at this level.

He rushed into his daughters room to find his wife there blade drawn, with his daughter half way climbed up her leg.

He blinked looking to where the sword was pointing spotting a rather large tentacle grasping around from under his daughters bed.

Striding forward he heard his wife mutter something about 'seeing enough hental', before he flipped the bed up revealing a rather large Octopus sitting on the sodden carpet grabbing at all the things that had floated under the bed and trying to cover itself with them.

They had found a number of fish in the yard and at least one crab that hadn't scuttled off , but this was new.

Kenta stared at the beast a moment then turning to look incredulously at his wife who only glowered at him.

"So." Kenta stated with a smirk. "Takoyaki?"

His daughter looked excited over that and his wife at least ceased her glower, Oni lee was impassive as always.

The octopus however, looked nervous.

"To be honest i expected you to just stare at your game boy for several hours. Not cook everything in the kitchen."

"It's not a game boy mom, it's a PSP. Nintendo hasn't made anything since the Wii. And I didn't touch the goose. I have no idea how to cook goose."

"Well you made a good enough meatloaf along with everything else. Evidently good enough that they want to offer you the same award they are giving the rest of the medical staff."

"All I did was cook some stuff. i mean it was left behind in some rich guys house, what better time to practice? Hard to be worried about messing something up when it's some one elses food."

"Yes, well, don't mention that at the award ceremony. Because of all the food you made Druid was able to help more people including the PRT Director and Armsmaster. He lost a leg in that but Druid grew it back. I have no idea what happened to the Director though."

"Prolly something with the blood bending thing Leviathan was doing."

"Most likely, above my pay grade any way. "

Greg Veder smiled, steeping his hands over his mouth hoping the light was catching his glasses right so he could do an anime pose even if he was the only one who got it.

"All according to Keiaku.." Greg muttered.

"Of course we need to get you a hair cut and a new suit for the ceremony...." Greg's mom continued.

Greg winced and rolled his eyes.

"Almost according to keiaku..."

"So you don't feel anything?" Doctor Yamada questioned.

"I do just not grief. Hess was a bitch and her death just makes my life easier in the long run. I'm not happy that she died like THAT, or even really happy she died, but given a couple of months ago i was plotting how to kill her myself I don't feel upset by it. I'm more upset by everyone else who died in the battle even if i have no idea who they are. Hess dying right in front of me was a shock, but I'm not broken up over it. I'm more upset at the punishment and cleaning details I've got to do because of the explosion." Taylor offered leaning back on the couch one hand idly petting the fuzzy ant Amy had made for her as it sat on her legs like a cat.

"I can fully understand that, Assistant Director Renick did lay down a lot of punishment and extra training. But then again you were indirectly responsible for the death of a teammate as well as the injury of another. At any point you could have stopped and thought this was a bad idea."

"I thought it was a bad idea at the start, but it had a chance and there was an Endbringer. Everyone who joined up with that expected to die. I pointed this out and we were going to bounce back, though I didn't expect the explosion and Vista losing the connection. I did apologize to Vista by the way. "

"Would you have apologized to Sophia if she was only hurt?"

"Not at all. Not sure why everyone wants me to be upset she died after she made my life hell for a year. We've had several sessions where I told you in detail what happened to me at her hands." Taylor grumbled. "I've had several other people hear about that and they were surprised I hadn't killed her myself."

"Yet she is dead and there won't be any chance that any sort of forgiveness or healing can come now."

"Yeah and no one will get tortured, or beat up, or shoved down a flight of stairs because the track star had a bad day either. I get I'm supposed to be upset, maybe even in shock and had it been anyone other than her, I might be. But Hess was a bully and a complete asshole even when she was trying to be good. So no, I don't really care that she died from doing her job." Taylor explained.

"Alright and what about the argument you had with Druid?" Doctor Yamada asked.

"We're still on that, She's still mad I named that massive cricket she made for me ' emergency rations'.

"Ahh"

"This is completely unfair." Missy grumbled.

Dean and Dennis glanced to the younger girl sitting on the couch and sighed. He and Dennis had been staying at the Wards building as their own homes were going through repairs and it was easier to stay in the Wards area than in the little apartments given to their families.

Particularly since Dean's parents hadn't shut up yet.

Dennis was more interested in staying away from his parents as now that his dad had healed they were trying for a little sibling for him, and he didn't need the trauma.

Vista was in uniform and had been on console for most of the day as part of her punishment. The rest of the Wards and Protectorate would be gathering later to have a service for the fallen.

"Honestly Missy your actions lead to the death of another Ward. Even if indirectly that is still a big deal." Dean offered as he worked on trying to maintain the power suit Armsmaster had built him. There was a lot he couldn't do to it, but basic cleaning and maintenance had been drilled into him. Dennis was simply sitting there on his phone though he looked up at the complaint.

"Not that." Missy sighed." That I understand, all the meetings, classes, and extra work. I can even understand getting grounded at home with mo.... Emily."

"Then what's the problem?" Dennis asked.

Vista sighed and reached up and pulled her helmet off her head.

Dean stared as Dennis fell off the couch cackling.

Dean was doing his best not to laugh as Missy showed her face, her singed hair cut much shorter, though it was her complete lack of eyebrows that was the source of the complaint.

"Amy won't grow them back." Missy huffed and glared at the boy on the floor. "Dennis, shut up!"

"Vell vell. Is all of this correct Captain?"

"Yes sir. That is a video of the last Endbringer attack."

"Brockten Bay vas it?"

"Yes sir."

"Huh. Who is the dragon man?"

"His name is Lung sir, he's a gang leader in the city. He was Kaiser's chief rival."

"i can see vhy... those battles must have been quite entertaining. Still this is unexpected. Hmmm How long vould it take to pull the fleet out of mothballs?"

A few months sir."

"Get to it. Ve did lose contact vith the Empire there and they had two of our own. "

"Night and Fog were the prototype of the FREAK sir. They were written off as just being barely controlled monsters, that is why we sent them to Kaisur after all."

"Ehh expendable but still ours and better still....They have shown us vhere Alucard has hidden himself. In the states even..... ooooh this vill be quite they Var.... and it is still us attacking England. just... New England this time. HA."

Very humerious sir."

"Hmmm, well that was a bit tacky, but still informative wonder who they were censoring there."

"You mean all the naked people?"

"No no. with the first part, there were people with the truck that were not shown again. Curious."

"Whatever, just mindless trash."

"I liked it. It was like an AMV...."

"I wanna fight that guy."

"Which one?"

"Does it matter, both of them!"

"Well we are down a few members even with the new girl perhaps we should do a recruitment drive?"

"Ooh ooh I wanna nominate Druid!"

"Of course you do poppet. What about the rest of you?"

"Lung."

"I don't have a preference really. Though perhaps the little girl with the warping ability might be interesting."

"..."

"Armsmaster? Really? Well I suppose you do like the tinkers. What about you two."

"I don't think his brains working right Mista Jack, he's more meat than anything else after the newbie got ahold of him. And I don't think Sibby cares."

"And our new little miss priss doesn't get voting rights just yet."

"Well I think that vampire cape would be lovely for our little group, or baring refusal, that little girl with him."

"If we don't get Lung I was gonna pick him next."

"So then we are all agreed?" Jack Slash smirked. "Next stop Brockton Bay."

Alucard drops his new chair on the edge of the roof of the PRT building and kicks back in it watching the sun set in the distance overlooking the destroyed city.

"What a delightful last few days." Alucard hummed to himself. "I can't wait to see what's next. Hmmm we already had Nazis... maybe furries finally fed up? Hmm nah, that would shut down the entire internet. Aliens! That might be it, little green men from space.... I wonder how they taste..."Last edited: Dec 15, 2024423TDRDec 14, 2024View discussionThreadmarks Chapter 55 ( Shout at the devil) View contentTDRWriter, mad bunnyMar 9, 2025#3,723( A month later.)

Emily Piggot shifted, rolling her shoulder as she looked out the window over Brockton Bay.

The damn thing had finally been fixed after her fight with Victor and she was taking a moment to roll the shutters up and look out over the bay. It was a hell of a view after all and from here she could see most of the repairs still going on in the bay. There was really very little visible damage left aside from the block where the Endbringer had died. That whole area was being redeveloped into a tourist hot spot that would be connected to the Boardwalk by .. something. She wasn't sure yet as to what, and no one else was either, there were massive bids from across the globe and a design war for something that would be a memorial and a segway to the spot Leviathan was killed.

She had seen some of the designs that were suggested online and many of them were very impressive. As were the price tags.

It was amazing in truth, what the eyes of the world focused on a city could do to ensure there was a budget to do what was supposed to be done. The mayor was thrilled, particularly after he was cleared of corruption suspicion.

Not that Piggot knew about that investigation, nor had she instigated a thorough check from four different agencies in spite for the Mayor ignoring her warning about the Nazi attack so he could hold his little fund raiser.

No, she would never be that petty.

The ENE had a rather nice budget increase as well, enough for some well deserved raises, some repairs and gear upgrades. Also an increase in janitorial staff, finally. Emily would have to find new ways to punish Mouse, Assault, and Alucard if they did something.

She really wanted to punish the lot of them plus Clockblocker for that fucking April Fools non prank, though she couldn't punish them for doing nothing despite how agonizingly stressful those few weeks had been before she figured it out.

Missy was no longer grounded, but she had therapy and on site punishment detail for a bit longer, Amy was still mopey about Shadowstalker's death, but she was recovering. Saturnia still didn't seem to care, though she had been doing things for the other capes and civilians that had died, so Yamada considered it a positive.

The whole group of Wards was taking the gun safety classes seriously. Amy and Dean were ahead of the others with their training, though Missy was surprisingly not far behind in shooting. Adding in the girls powers and Missy couldn't miss the target and Emily was certain the girl could learn to do some rather impressive trick shots. Surprisingly Spitfire knew her way around a firearm as well.

Saturnia and Aegis couldn't hit the broad side of a barn however. The boy was too twitchy and for some reason Saturnia was gun shy. Honestly it wasn't far off her original power testing, when it was just laser sights or aiming she was spot on but when live fire started no control at all.

Glenn was being an ass and doing all he could to spin the Endbringer fight favorably, like he had to try hard even with CPS and the last dregs of the Youth Guard raising a fuss.

CPS was on her ass but that was expected, but nothing would come out of any of that save maybe some more oversight rules for Wards, which Piggot was all for following to prevent any more Wards getting killed by doing something stupid.

The two new Wards were settling in though she was still not sure what sort of power Schrodinger had or how useful the cat boy, girl,whatever, might be. Flechette at least seemed to be a less edgy version of Shadowstalker.

Mouse Protector had also wanted to head west because the other member of her Cluster Trigger had gone missing, Ravenger. She had been considering it before Hannah had come to her and told her to deny it. Seems Mouse and Ravenger had a complicated relationship that tended to end in a lot of collateral damage.

Mouse hadn't seemed too upset at the denial at least, like she was hoping for a valid reason not to go.

Armsmaster had sequestered himself in his lab to work on some project or another, given how his nanothorn design had fared she suspected he was looking to improve on that given the effect on the Endbringer.

Everyone was recovered and back on patrols. Not that there was much left in town, the ABB seemed to slowly be going legit, the Empire had a few stragglers, but they were done as an organization. Theo and Aster were living with Legend's non cape ID in Boston, thus out of her hair. Faultlines's crew had helped out during the evacuations rather than just cut and run and thus Piggot would continue to pretend they didn't get up to shady stuff in other states. The Merchants were just a scattering of dealers at street level that were slowly being rounded up but the normal police. If not for the rumors of the Church still existing in town, and word that a group called The Travelers might be headed this way Piggot would have relaxed.

Still she was healthy enough thanks to a high carb diet and Amy fretting over her. She hoped she could stay that way for a little while before the next round of bullshit happened.

Of course that was when she heard a high pitched noise and the glass of the windows started vibrating before exploding into millions of shards.

Assistant Director Renick smiled, stepping back to look at his corvette, dropping the rag in the bucket and pulling off the gloves he had worn when applying the last coat of wax.

All the damage from Saturnia's ride had been repaired and his baby was back to pristine condition once more and ready for the summer car show set.

Not like the girl had done much damage in truth, but parts were hard to find and often needed to be custom ordered for repairs, not to mention every single panel had chipped paint and Alucard's fat ass had dented the roof.

He took a step back to admire the way the light shone off the newly polished chrome when a high pitched scream cut through the air and all the glass shattered from the windows of the houses around him.

As did the headlights, windows and mirrors of his car.

Renick stared at the shattered glass laying around his car and where it had likely gummed up the headlight mechanism and torn the leather interior as the safety glass somehow sharded.

"Fuck." Renick sighed before heading to get dressed as he expected he was going to be called in to work shortly.

"So what do you think of the new Wards?" Clockblocker asked as he Spitfire and Saturnia continued on a walking patrol that took them by Arcadia and past several parks. They had stopped a few times to sign autographs and give a sanitized and PR friendly version of their role in the Endbringer fight. Saturnia's PR correct part in it all was driving important people around, not dropping a tanker on the damn thing. For the moment they had split off and were alone on a side street.

"Flechette seems alright, though I think she might be flirting with me." Saturnia offered with a hum not able to see Clockblocker's grin behind his full face mask. Spitfire elbowed him anyway before he said something. "And for some reason Schrodinger unsettles me a little. He was also complaining that I wasn't blonde?"

"It's a thing she does." Spitfire corrected. "He's supposedly a dimensionaly displaced so maybe the you from the other dimension she's from has a blonde you."

"Don't know how, no one in mom or dad's family was blonde or even close. Everybody's pretty much dark haired. It would be weird to come from a dimension that it's just a hair color change." Saturnia muttered. "And clearly Dad's taste is still towards dark haired women."

"Wait you're dad's dating someone again? Who?" Spitfire asked.

"Jessica." Saturnia offered.

"Really. I thought she was blonde?" Clockblocker hummed.

"Bottle, her roots are coming back through. She said she was a red head for a while and she's been considering dying it blue next time." Saturnia offered.

"Wouldn't that cause issues with her rep in her job to have blue hair?" Spitfire asked.

"Clearly you haven't met Miss De'liss yet." Clockblocker chuckled."That woman could shave her hair into a Mohawk and paint it green and people would still fear her

Saturnia stopped dead tilting her head to look around in confusion.

"What is it?" Clockblocker asked.

"Do you guys hear...."Saturnia began before a scream echoed in the air making Clockblocker flinch at the sound of shattering glass. He thrust out his arms quickly tapping both the girls with his power before the lenses of their eye coverings shattered.

Missy kicked back on her bed stretching out a little as she stared at the ceiling of her new room. It hadn't been hers that long and the dents in the carpet where the weapon bench had been were still in the corner. She had fully unpacked though there was a box that still held a bunch of her stuff in it. Mostly all the Slayer stuff. Not because her hero worship had eased, but more because seeing it seemed to embarrass Emily.

She still remembered what had happened after the Endbringer attacked. As the Director she had come down rather hard on what they had done, the CPS had hounded all of them for a while though with the Endbringer situation there wasn't much they could do but rant and rave.

Emily didn't raise her voice, didn't yell, but it was clear she was disappointed in what Missy had done.

Missy could have handled yelling, could have ignored any screaming. She wasn't sure how to take the fact her hero was upset with her. Worse it wasn't because she tried something, but because she put herself in danger. She wasn't even blamed for Shadow Stalker dying. Not by any one at the PRT or Protectorate. Armsmaster had even praised the efficiency of the plan, but had told them that they should have informed some one else before trying it themselves.

Mouse Protector had said the same thing, but her speech was a fifteen minute stage show done with puppets.

All the other punishments seemed tame in comparison to that one.

Moon Dog had thought it was entertaining at least.

Still her therapist said she had disconnected that she was part of why Shadow Stalker was dead and Missy accepted that. This was a dangerous business and it wasn't like Stalker was the first person she had known who had died. Director Meadows, a couple of the PRT troopers, and at least one hero by the name of Landslide had died while she was with the Wards here in ENE. She had been through the Therapy before and while she wasn't numb to the death, it was just something that happened and you needed to move on as soon as you could.

Hell, it wasn't as if anyone even really liked Stalker.

Except Amy, and Missy was a little upset that she didn't care why Amy was upset.

A bout of swearing from down stairs made Missy smirk a little. Her and Amy's day off had lined up this week and the older girl was downstairs on the computer yelling at someone on the other end of the of her game.

She had tried getting Missy into the game, but there were too many buttons and too much grinding for Missy to be interested. She did enjoy playing some of the coop shooters with Emily and Alucard though even if the guy was a pure troll to everyone and everything.

A scream like cry filled the air and Missy tensed and rolled under her blankets on the bed hitting the floor as the window and a display case she had shattered from the scream.

Missy was on her feet and rushing to the railing as she heard Amy screaming out obscenities from below.

She sounded fine and Missy ducked back into her room to grab her phone. She had been through the Nine training and this was textbook Shatterbird heralding, the Slaughterhouse Nine were in the city.

She grabbed her phone, cursing as the screen was shattered and useless, there was a landline downstairs though thoughts of that fled when she heard a voice from below as Amy's swearing cut off. A voice that was childishly sweet sounding and could have been a little girl from some 50's movie with the tone of it.

It made Missy's blood run cold.

"How Rude, such language. It's almost enough to make me reconsider wanting you as a big sister."

Colin sat back in his chair in his lab staring at the laptop in front of him.

His best friend was an AI created by a Tinker named Andrew Richter. The man only had a few notes in the PRT database and those were about the creation of the fabled 'Robinhood' program that had been all but destroyed a number of corrupt politicians by cleaning out their accounts and set organized crime back years in some places. There were no records on how the program was stopped only that it was. And there was nothing about Dragon herself.

The reveal of her true nature had bothered him more than the failure of his Nanothorn equipment and he had pondered how for the longest time.

Dragon herself had admitted it , though it seemed she was under a host of restrictions set in place either by her creator or perhaps Saint who had this laptop somehow. And thanks to Alucard he couldn't even ask the man what he knew.

Still the laptop was a masterwork, almost as impressive as what parts of Dragon's code he could examine on it.

Thoughts of things like Skynet and HAL had crossed his mind when he first found out, but HAL had only been doing what he was programmed to and the terminator series was so convoluted with time travel that the actual goal of Skynet wasn't even clear or if there even was only one Skynet in the series.

Dragon was no Skynet.

She was something like those in Bladerunner or Short Circuit, just wanting to live her life after being created to do.....

"What did Richter create you to do?" Colin muttered to himself as he stared at the scrolling screen.

He was already out of his chair and moving by the time the first high note of the alarm had gone off , his helmet on his head and halberd grabbed. This itself was likely the only thing that saved him as a metal spike shot out of a vent bouncing off his helmet and slamming into the laptop shattering the device.

Armsmaster winced at his the blow, yanking the shattered visor from his armor staring at the vent as the chain attached to the spike pulled back into the shadowy recess of the eight inch vent. His gaze shot to the ruined laptop then back as a featureless white armored from that slipped from the vent with a clatter of chains and metal.

The back bay of the PRT loading dock smashed inward as Crawler burst into the underground parking garage crushing or spitting acid on the troopers mobilized there.

Major Kaisur burst out of his office as alarms blared and Crawler screamed out demanding Alucard fight him.

Screams filled the air as well as wails of pain as the glass finished falling along all the shops at the Boardwalk. A number of people had been hit by the glass, some of them blinded as their sunglasses burst or the show windows glass tore into them.

Still enforcers and a number of shop employees had trained for things like this given where the lived at least basic and gunshot wound training was a near required survival skill from the gang war era.

People had started to help others, to offer shelter and move people under cover when at the end of the street the Palanquin bar burst into a massive roaring fireball that engulfed the entire block and started spreading rapidly along the rest of the Boardwalk.

Jack Slash sauntered up to the front of the ruined PRT building watching as people screamed and fled or tried to retreat further into the building.

He chuckled, cutting down a few people here and there, the hulking form of Hatchetface to one side, the Siberian on the other. He wasn't one really for the direct approach like this, but it was Saturday after all, and it wasn't likely too many would be inside the building.

"Ahh yes Brockton Bay, the place an Endbringer died, so content in your own ego to not realize that such a struggle is futile. By jove I'll have to show the world that hope is pointless and everything dies in this cosmic charade."

Sure he was monologing and no one really was paying attention to him given the raining glass, Crawler and probably the fires that were darkening the sky with smoke. But it felt good even if he was pretty sure Hatchetface was brain dead and he knew Siberian was rolling her eyes at him. Still it would be fairly easy to slip into the building and killed the heroes of the hour while the others did their own hunting.

It was then he noticed a man in a red suit with long black hair step out of the PRT building carrying a bag from the gift shop.

The man seemed to be completely ignoring everything that was going on and was focused on a small hero doll in his hand smirking as the doll made a tinny, if somewhat creepy laugh when you pressed it's hand.

It wasn't hard to know who he was after his face was plastered everywhere.

Plus he was on the Martha Stuart show at least once a month.

"Well well that was convenient of you to simply step out to greet us, Alucard." Jack smirked.

Alucard dropped the doll into the bag and looked over at the three members of the Slaughterhouse Nine standing in the walk way by the memorial to those killed in the Nazi attack.

"Oh... it's just you." Alucard sighed. "I thought this was going to be something interesting."Last edited: Mar 10, 2025449TDRMar 9, 2025View discussionThreadmarks Chapter 56 ( Ides of March. A notable day for settling debts) View contentTDRWriter, mad bunnyMar 15, 2025 Awarded ×1#3,789Spitfire stumbled as time started again for her and her foot finally came down onto the sidewalk. She looked around confused for a moment taking note of the glass littering the ground and in some cases impaled into the dirt or garbage that littered the street.

The second thing she noticed was Clockblocker sitting on the curb as Saturnia bandaged his arm, and the amount of blood covering his otherwise white uniform.

"What the fuck!?" Spitfire demanded.

"Oh good, you're out. " Clockblocker winced as Saturnia tied off the bandage. " We can move now, take off your goggles put on the spare domino in the Wards kit."

Saturnia looked up at her already having removed her own lenses and was wearing the spare domino mask she had.

"What's going on?" Spitfire asked glancing around before pulling her jacket over her head and swapping masks .

"Right, the yearly S class training is in November. So that scream was Shatterbird of the Slaughterhouse 9. Wards S class training two years ago was about the 9 and we got to see unedited footage of some of the things going on that the news didn't show you, including the year where Jack Slash wanted to do a reality TV show and filmed everything including Shatterbird's scream which didn't affect any cameras in the town they attacked by intent. It's a noise that sticks with you. Soon as I heard it I tapped you two to keep your pretty eyes from getting gouged out when your goggles broke. Then failed to dodge properly as the glass came down."

Spitfire blinked looking at the googles she had in her hand. "These were supposed to be shatter resistant plastic..."

"Yeah, well, Shatterbird doesn't give a fuck. On paper she's a glass kinetic Shaker 6, but she got bumped to a Shaker 7 because as long as she considers it glass, it's in her control. Plastic lenses, safety glass, obsidian, and so on." Clockblocker offered. "I'm just thrilled she hasn't figured out how to control sand yet."

"What about your mask?" Saturnia asked.

"Kevlar mesh with a fabric overlay, no glass or plastic." Clockblocker offered, "Hold on gotta call back now that you're out. Clockblocker to Console, Spitfire's out of timeout, location unchanged, ETA on pick up?"

"No pickup Clock, we've got five of the nine attacking the main building." Gallant responded through coms. "You are to proceed to Arcadia and seek shelter in the Endbringer Shelter there. Assist any Civilians you find along the way to the same place. All other Wards on duty are confined to HQ and the Protectorate on duty is preparing to repel the Nine here. Saturnia are his wounds as minor as he says?"

"Hey now." Clockblocker huffed.

"He'll live, but he still needs to get to a doctor as soon as possible, I got the biggest shards out, but I suspect there's more in his arm,back, and shoulder."Saturnia grumbled.

"Understood, no more heroics, get to a safe place as soon as you can." Gallant ordered. "That's directly from Mouse. We'll have a team on the way to you as soon as we can."

"Got it." Saturnia agreed. "Come on Clock your legs are fine."

"Why thank you, I do try and work out." Clockblocker stated. "Yours are rather nice too, are you in Mouse's yoga class?"

Saturnia snorted as the trio moved to the end of the alley seeing a number of panicked people running around.

"Alright we need to try and get everyone moving the right way, keep an eye out for any one trying to shelter in place or injured." Clockblocker winced. "Well other than me I mean. It's only a couple of blocks to Arcadia. Let's not say anything that might jinx our little walk."

Everything was red, she couldn't feel any of her process, nothing was working. Reboot commands were blocked, she didn't have access to the internet. There was nothing, nothing at all.

She couldn't access anything, she couldn't do anything thing. One moment she was fine and investigating the alarms about an attack in Brockton Bay the next everything shut down and she was cut off from everything.

Completely isolated from everything, even a simple time piece program.

Dragon was terrified.

Was she dead? Was this the robot afterlife? She had expected some of the machine army here and maybe the Furies after Alucard got a hold of them, but maybe they went to robot hell.

If this field of red was robot heaven or purgatory she really didn't want to see what robot hell was like.

An atto second later though for Dragon it felt like years in this place, there was something she could access, a single video file. With nothing else allowed to her, she activated it.

The video started and showed a older man with graying brown hair and a ragged beard sitting in a chair in front of a monitor, numerous computers and parts lay scattered around him, manuals and books stacked high in the cluttered mess. He glanced to the camera as if noticing it was on before turning to face it fully with only a glance back at the screen he had been working on before he focused on the camera and adjusted the wire frame glasses he wore settling his hands on the table the camera was evidently on judging by the faint shake as he interlaced his fingers.

"Hello Teresa." the man offered. "If you don't recognize me, I am Andrew Richter, your creator. If you are activating this file, I am either dead or you found it while checking through old data. Personally I hope it's the latter, but given the way the world is, I fear it may be the former."

The man sighed and leaned back in his chair one hand running up through his graying hair.

"When I first..., I think they call it triggering, yes, when I first triggered, don't ask how, it is not a pleasant memory... but when I first triggered I found I could easily make programs on my computer, programs that were far in advance of anything any one had ever seen. I made the Stepdown program which scrambled all the nuclear launch codes of any country even remotely hooked up to a network..... Scion then destroyed them all, but I tried. Then I made Robinhood which was a great success. I made a bunch of smaller programs with various tasks here and there and then biggest and greatest program. An assistant to help me keep tabs on everything to try and help me try and save the world... I made you."

The man smiled a little halfheartedly. "At first you simply followed the programming working exactly as intended. Then you started asking things, things I hadn't designed, started gathering information not in your design, started making suggestions for improvements...."

The man chuckled running his hand through his hair again as he exhaled.

"So I did what any man would do upon realizing they created new life. I panicked. I looked over everything I had done to try and figure out how I did it, went over everything trying to figure out how you came to be. Checked and quadruple checked notes. Set up baby gates to keep you from places you shouldn't be, or things I didn't want you to access and quietly freaked right the hell out if I am to be honest with myself. Looking back I remember feeling much he same way with my first....." The man winced and shook his head. " Never mind. I focused soly on you and what you were doing, how you were growing. I would be lying if I said I wasn't terrified of what you could become. If you chose to you could have destroyed every advanced bit of technology on the planet at a whim, set mankind back centuries. But I saw you had no real interest in that. You wanted to learn to grow, to help people. So every year I shut down one of the baby gates. Waited to see how you would react to the new freedoms, the new information. To see how you would change...hell, I built a custom laptop just to run the gates and keep you restrained, just to keep it out of your network so you wouldn't jump ahead too far too fast."

The man wiped his eyes, the smile still on his face.

"You exceeded every expectation I could have thought to have. Every time I released a block you improved, became better, closer to what I hoped you could become. Right now it's February, 16th 2005 and I'm about to release another gate. I don't know when you might be watching this file, I don't know how many restrictions you have, I'm going to open the biggest one today, on the day you first showed that you were not any sort of program. I'm going to let you loose into the world proper. Full internet access and I'll see how you react. I've already set you up with doses of the worst humanity has to offer and all you did was just suggest ways to fix it. I want to see what you do when you see all of it. From 4chan to kitten videos and everything in between. With how I expect you to act... well. If you are watching this video and I'm still alive, but haven't said it, you are not a program Tessa. You are my daughter in every way that matters. And if I'm dead and you are watching this and I've not removed everything still limiting you, I am sorry. I tried to make sure that by the time you came of age you wouldn't have anything left to hold you back. No strings to hold you down so to speak. You were first designed and made in 1987, your first program any way, what would become you as you are now, what you could be. Every year on your birthday I freed you a little more, helped you grow. But if I'm dead now and you are viewing this.... well to my daughter Teresa. All I can say is, Happy Birthday to you, my dear dear Teresa."

And Dragon saw EVERYTHING.

Dean was regretting getting out of bed this morning. He was also greatly regretting switching his Sunday off with Vista.

Not only were the Nine attacking the building he was in, but Armsmaster couldn't be reached and a lot of systems were down that had everyone else in the coms room panicking.

Evidently the Endbringer tracker, the status of the Birdcage, and a great deal of the internet including PHO were all down judging by all the shouting in the room. Dragon couldn't be reached and most contact and relays that used Dragontech were inoperable, which was most of them. His state of the art Dragontech phone had survived the shattering of glass by virtue of being in the coms room, which was heavily shielded from outside noise, only to have it brick for some reason. His Wards phone was working, but it wasn't connecting to any one else. In other words it was an absolute nightmare for anything tech.

Clockblocker, Saturnia, and Spitfire were out in the streets on foot, and he couldn't get up with Vista or Druid.

Mouse Protector had come by briefly, but she had to get out and try and deal with what was going on outside.

It was supposed to be a slow day today, they weren't even at full staff today. Which given the Nine were outside, was probably a good thing.

If only there wasn't the crushing wave of emotions hammering into him, it might have only worrying instead of nearly debilitating.

A chime from his phone drew his attention getting him to look at the screen seeing a text message had popped up from an unknown source with only two words on it. Going by the noises other phones were making they were getting it too.

"Hello world."

Then everything came back online.

"Contessa we have a problem Dragon is..... what are you watching?" Doctor Mother burst into the room spotting Contessa in a Renamon onsie eating popcorn in front of a massive TV.

The TV was showing what looked like a panicked riot, though the city had been on the news enough for Doctor mother to recognize Brockton Bay.

"The Slaughter house Nine are attacking Brockton Bay." Contessa offered.

"Ugh. Unfortunate but hardly an issue right now. Dragon has broken it's chains. We need to find a way to shut it down..."

"The Path has already changed. The steps have lowered, and we are now on the path that has around a fifty percent chance of survival."

"WHAT? How?!"

"Brockton Bay has somehow become necessary for any plans to succeed. If it falls so do we." Contessa offered.

"What!? And the Nine are there... we need to send a team..."

"No. We don't. The 9 are already dead." Contessa smirked before offering the bucket she had to doctor mother." Popcorn? It's carnival flavor."

Armsmaster jerked back knocking aside a blade that came from his left despite the abomination of a once man swinging at him from the right. His armor was slashed in numerous places and the lighter areas punctured, though it did it's job and protected him at least enough that he was only scratched or poked. Though with his helmet removed due to the damage there was now a slash that nicked his forehead and now he was blinking blood out of his eyes as Mannequin simply did not let up.

It didn't talk didn't make a sound unless the blade struck something, he was fighting with two halves of his halberd because the bastard cut through the middle of it like some fucking anime character.

Reinforced carbon nanotube with titanium weave and a single stroke from this abomination cut it in half.

Leviathan hadn't even broken his halberd.

He had been forced back across his lab, multiple projects destroyed or sent tumbling aside as the fight continued. The nano thorn project bench was thus far spared though it was likely only a matter of time, if he was to fall that needed to be destroyed so this bastard couldn't study it. His armor rack was to his left and he was pushed back to the small garage where he worked on his bike, he was rapidly running out of room and time.

Worst still many devices that he had Dragon's help with had gone silent, the moment the laptop was destroyed and his few calls to her had not been answered.

He briefly considered the lab's self destruct, a simple thing, little more than thermite charges in the ceiling designed to melt everything was less complex than he liked but if he could activate it , it might take out this monster as well.

He opened his mouth to activate it , looking to forgo the timer and just destroy the lab and Mannequin with it in a last heroic.

"Colin. Duck."

He wasted no time dropping to the floor at the order, the servo arm he used to lift the heavier parts of his bike lashing out and clamping onto the arm of Mannequin The former human turned it's faceless head to look at it curiously before another servo arm shot forward.

Mannequin shifted to avoid getting grabbed only for the plasma torch on the end of the new arm to ignite and shear clean through the held arm.

The Nine member reared back looking at the partially melted stump of it's limb as everything else in his lab activated. Micro drones, other servo arms, a small bomb removal robot. Everything swarmed Mannequin

The faceless murderer slashed through many of them, kicking others aside as he fell back towards the grate, only for a number of drones to wedge themselves into the vent to prevent his escape.

The killer then took a step to the door only to stop at a loud click , faceless head turning to the source only for a large hole to open in it's chest as a loud roar filled the lab. Various fluids and viscera oozed out of the quarter sized hole that also punched through the wall behind him.

The faceless man looked up at Armsmaster who was standing on the other side of the room now, holding an over-sized revolver.

Armsmaster fired again and a nanothorn round punched another hole in the killer's chest. Two more shots were fired destroying the remains of the armored chest, though Armsmaster didn't stop, the last two rounds struck the featureless head putting what looked like two off center 'eyes' in the clean white head.

Mannequin fell.

Armsmaster popped the chamber dumping the shells before slotting a speed loader and reloading snapping shut the chamber and emptied six more shots into the fallen Slaughterhouse nine member. Making sure that every part of it had a hole in it.

Then he reloaded again and made to expand the number of holes again.

"Colin....." Dragon stated as he reloaded again, the guns barrel glowing red from the shots.

"Dragon, are you alright?" Armsmaster paused, the gun still aimed at Mannequin as if waiting for the scrap and viscera to twitch, he glanced to the broken laptop then the monitor that he usually spoke to Dragon through, though that too was damaged the speakers seemed to work.

"I should be asking you that, you're bleeding.."

"I am fine.... but the laptop was destroyed..... are you?" Colin took a deep breath glaring at the corpse on the floor of a man who died long ago. "With what I saw on that, I thought he had killed you...."

"He didn't. Not even close." Dragon chuckled. "But there's still the rest of them and you need medical attention. No don't argue with me... I've got a swarm of dragon ships and power armor booting up now to help. None of the Nine are leaving Brockton Bay alive."

"Good."

"AISHA!!!"

"Brian get back here!!" Newter shouted over the crackling flame, cursing as he shoved a burning table aside and grabbed onto Gregor's coat pulling the man away from the roaring fire that had consumed the bar as Brian rushed across the bar to where he last saw his sister near the sound equipment that was currently burning.

The group of them had been prepping the club for the night. Gregor himself and one of the hired staff had been prepping the bar when all the glass exploded and despite his toughness Gregor currently was bleeding from countless wounds the shards of glass had left in his back and neck.

Newter had been wiping down tables with thick gloves on. He wasn't even sure what was going on at first. One moment they were preparing to open the bar for the night, the first customers already filing in ready to go the moment the stupid blue law limit ended at noon.

The next moment two girls entered the bar, one of them was scarred, her face hidden by her hair and heavy makeup, she was wearing a big frumpy looking coat.

The other girl was dressed somewhat nicely in a pretty dress, though her hair was mangled and what looked like scars from a blade criss crossed her face and exposed skin.

The younger muttered something about Ellie, though the older told her to shut up, grumbled about being a baby sitter and demanded to know where Jean-Paul was.

Before anyone could answer, all the glass in the bar exploded.

The older girl cursed and Newter remembered being very very angry for a moment before she lit a match and dropped it into the growing puddle of booze that was running from the bar. The strong emotions hitting him and taking a moment to simply wash away oddly as if they wouldn't settle on him, though some of the patrons had started to fight each other despite the fire.

Newter then switched to panic and rushed over as the flame engulfed the bar and seemed to start dancing as the smaller girl began giggling, the fire rapidly spreading across the rest of the club in a wash of heat.

He had managed to drag Gregor out of the immediate fire, but the other bartender was engulfed in seconds.

Newter hoped it had been the glass that killed him and it had been quick, though he couldn't tell over the screaming of the rest of the bar. He really hoped that Anastasia was somewhere close, but she and Shamrock had gone out shopping and Trainwreck was in his lab a few blocks away.

The flames came alive and seemed to dance lashing out at any one and everything that was nearby.

The older girl made her way up the stairs in the back as the younger giggled and laughed waving her arms like she was playing with the flames which seemed to wave back.

Newter grabbed the bar's fire extinguisher and stood over Gregor, spraying every bit of fire that even came close to them, though the dial on it was rapidly going down and the fire started getting wilder as the little girl laughed. He heard people screaming outside about the fire and a glance at the broken windows showed the world aflame outside as well.

There was a sudden cessation of laughter and instead there was a sharp cough and Newter looked over at the insane girl to see blood running out of her mouth.

"Fucking pyro bitch!"

The little girls eyes widened as Newter finally noticed a young black girl behind her, yanking a switchblade out of the burned girl's back only for the blade to slam into the girl several more times as the black girl swore and kept stabbing.

Burnscar fell crashing to the ground as Brian rushed up to grab his sister.

Several gunshots rang out and brought everyone's attention who was left inside to the stairs as the older girl crashed down them, her designer dress soaked in blood as she lay still at the bottom of the stairs with a last meaty thud of impact on the hardwood.

Walking down the stairs Alec finally lowered the gun he had as he stared at the dead girl on the floor.

"Really should have called first sis...." Alec sighed then looked up as if seeing the burning bar for the first time.

"What the fuck happened here?" he asked before stepping over the corpse to the edge of the burning bar pulling the fire alarm at the side of the former wine rack, which kicked on the sprinkler system.

"Geez do I have to do everything, didn't you guys read the fire suppression manual for the place? Did Shamrock cut it off so she could smoke in the bathroom again? This is why we have the fire training people!" Alec ranted.

This sucked.

But in a fun way.

Major Kaisur grinned, bringing up the mini-gun and unloading a few hundred rounds into the rampaging monster in the parking bay with a cackle. Blood, acid, and viscera showered the concrete, pitting and melting into it as Crawler roared in pain from the wounds.

"YES!! YES... HURT ME MORE! MORE!!" Crawler roared lashing out with a claw and shattering the spinning barrels and ripping the gun from Major Kaisur's hands.

Well. The Major thought, I did tempt fate to make things interesting before I retired he thought, flinging the remains of the gun at the creature and tearing off down the hall as Crawler smashed into the stone doorway he couldn't quite get through.

"COME BACK!! HURT ME!!!"

"FALL BACK!" Major Kaisur shouted as a number of troopers flung flash bangs and confoam at the rampaging monster, the auto sprayers in the ceiling coating the beast with no real effect aside from slowing the creature a bit as he smashed through the door filling the hall with his bulk as he surged after those in the hall.

The monster rushed forward smashing through another group of troopers and nearly right over the Major if he hadn't flung himself through a side door pushing the trooper who came through it ahead of him.

"MOVE MOVE MOVE." The Major bellowed to the men in the new hall with him, the lot of them turning and running at his orders as Crawler smashed into and started tearing through the door frame behind him.

"Lead it back to the bay before he breaks a fucking support or something!" Someone shouted from further up the hall.

Major Kaisur swore as the hall behind them collapsed on top of Crawler, the cape simple pushing through the rubble. The rest of the troops ran forward, busting out of the fire escape that lead to the bay He instead tore off his badge and scanned it to another door ducking through that as Crawler surged past. He winced at the screams, a mental tally of this would have the last of his trauma plates etched with names if this wasn't stopped soon.

His eyes scanned where he was, The Black Room.

A stupid name really, sure it was painted black, but the sort of mystical mumbo jumbo associated with that sort of crap made people stupid. It was just a reinforced room where they usually stored all of L33t's tinker tech crap that was seized, as well as any guns or dangerous items before they could be shipped off to be decommissioned. There were even some of Armsmaster's failed projects here too, as well as the score or so of Nanothorn knives he had decided to give to the troopers.

They were taken away from the troopers after the third finger was lost and put here.

Druid had been annoyed with them, and it was a bad idea to annoy the one putting said fingers back on.

Major Jer'rahd Kaisur eyed that crate, as well as another one that had recently been brought in, and one of L33Ts old devices they made from a game called Sunset Riders.

A rather stupid plan formed in his head.

This was gonna be fun.

It was probably gonna suck too.

For Crawler.

"How are we looking" Spitfire muttered as she pointed a number of people towards Arcadia.

"He's holding up. Don't worry." Saturnia offered.

"I'm not worried about him." Spitfire huffed.

"Sure you aren't." Saturnia chuckled.

"Do you have money riding on this ship or something?" Spitfire grumbled.

"Depends." Saturnia offered getting a mans attention and pointing him towards the school. "Do you have money on the ship of me and Aegis?"

"Oh, it's like that huh?"

"Yup. Super vampire hearing."

"Figures. Odds?"

"No comment."

"Thought not."

"Hey ladies. I think the crowds thinning out and we should get moving." Clockblocker offered walking up to the pair slowly, his voice hitching occasionally as his arm moved slightly shifting the glass still in it. "Did you see any one else?"

Saturnia pointed over to a white van parked in an alley nearby, an older man just visible in the driver's seat, seemingly asleep.

"Homeless guy in a van?" Spitfire asked noting the mans disheveled appearance and what looked like a number of bags in the seat next to him. "Might be tricky if we need to get him to abandon it."

"Well come on, lets wake him up and try at the very least to get him to move it to the school parking lot." Clockblocker offered. "We're still too damn close to the main PRT building for any sort of safety."

"I'm sorry, what?!" Jack Slash stammered.

"Oh? Confused, not a surprised, probably doesn't take much more than some one speaking at a 3d grade level to do that." Alucard muttered. "Seriously, it's like you found some Batman comics in your daddies porn stash and rather than focusing on how nice Quinn's ass looked in spandex, you focused on how cool you thought the Joker was. I mean I can kinda see it, bad hair and that attempt at a laugh of yours, but it's like you're cosplaying Ceaser Romero's joker without the face paint, the talent, or even the awesomeness that man brought to the roll. It would be funny, if it wasn't so sad."

"Wha... WHAT, I'm with the.... I AM the Slaughterhouse NINE!" Jack stammered.

"Bullshit, you're like a bad groupie they picked up and can't get rid of. Hell, you can't even do Nihilism correctly. Bonesaw, the Siberian, Shatterbird, Crawler, these are the names people utter with fear with respect because of what they can do. Then there's you, mister extendable knives, wooooo. Scary." Alucard huffed.

"Bitch I KILL PEOPLE!" Jack snarled.

"Please, I've killed people, dogs kill people, tripping over their own feet kills people, a fucking clown shilling burgers kills people. You are hardly any more special or interesting than the common cold and that kills a lot of people." Alucard grumbled though he took note of Siberian and offered a grin. "That aside, is the naked tiger lady single? I'm free today..."

Siberian went from a placid expression to a sudden look of worry, before she vanished with a pop.

"Oh.... you know, that hurt. That actually hurt." Alucard sighed. "Not even a no or a goodbye. Finding love on the battlefield is such a difficult thing."

There was a very loud crack of a gunshot that made Jack jump and Alucard look up slightly. Jack didn't see anyone around them, let alone aiming at him.

"ALUCARD!!!!" Director Piggot screamed out from ten floors up.

The sudden impact of flesh, bone, and glass made jack jump again as he was hit with some of the splatter, as what was left of Shatterbird after a fifty cal sniper round cored her, hit the ground to the left of the three of them.

"Uh oh... boss is mad." Alucard chuckled and looked up seeing the woman in question standing in the window sil of her office holding the modified sniper rifle she stole from Victor, the scope of it torn off and likely shattered. She was covered in blood and her suit was torn and soaked in the red mess from the wounds of the glass that exploded in front of her.

"WHAT!?" Alucard called up. "It's my day off!"

"Stop talking and get back to the house, Amy and Missy aren't answering the phone!" Piggot snapped and turned and pointed at the monument behind Jack and Hatchetface. "And don't get any blood on that memorial! Who the fuck knows what those two are infected with."

"Sure MOM!" Alucard sighed.

"Fuck it, I will not be ignored. Kill him!" Jack snapped and Hatchetface surged forward bringing his massive ax down on the vampire.

Alucard sighed and lifted his free hand, catching the blade of the weapon in one hand stopping it dead.

Hatchetface grunted in confusion as Alucard tisked.

"Just a meat puppet now... nothing even going on inside and you are still a more interesting creature than this loser." Alucard sighed, setting down his bag and punching his other hand through the ax wielder's chest, ripping out the remains of the atrophied heart bringing up to his mouth and squeezing it dry.

"Bleh... can't say I'm a fan of rewarmed bodies. Oh well, I've got some blood bags at home to wash the taste out." Alucard hummed pushing the drained body to the side where it fell with a thud before he picked up the bag of dolls again and walked towards Jack.

Jack cursed and lashed out with a pair of blades, the weapons hitting the man, seemingly digging in deep though Alucard kept walking until he was right in front of Jack.

Alucard lifted his hand putting it on Jack's shoulder before simply pushing the man to the side with a light shove.

"Don't block the sidewalk kid." Alucard offered and walked on past him making his way down the street.

Jack stared after him blinking at having just been dismissed before he screamed out and rushed into the street to yell at the vampire strolling down the sidewalk away from him.

"YOU DON'T GET TO IGNORE ME! NOBODY GETS TO IGNORE ME!!!!"

"Ignoring yooooooou." Alucard called as he offered a faint wave without looking back.

"GRAAAAHH!!!!!" Jack screamed out, then screamed out again as a car slammed into his back flinging his body up into the air to crash to the ground in a tangle of broken limbs.

The tires of the blue corvette screeched as the driver hit the brakes.

Assistant Director Renick put his car in park and stepped out of the Corvette with a sigh, walking around to the front to look at the new dent in the fender and hood as well as the smear of blood now splattering the chrome.

The man let out a deeper sigh, before he turned and walked towards the twitching form of the man he hit.

"For fucks sake, it's a state of emergency and you are out here jumping into the street like that." Renick swore as he walked up, then stopped to look down at the groaning man that had jumped out in front of his car curiously.

"Huh. You're Jack Slash." Renick hummed before drawing his side arm and firing into the twitching man until he stopped twitching.

"I wonder if my insurance covers damage done by the Slaughterhouse 9?"

The bay around Crawler was suddenly filled with multi colored lights. Crawler opened numerous eyes looking up from a armored van he was clawing apart to try and get those hiding inside.

"What?" the creature growled.

A massive herd of steer composed of hard light projections burst through a wall, mooing and braying as they thundered across the bay slamming into him and knocking him back away from the van.

The few troopers in the bay witnessing this, then saw Major Kaisur running across the top of the cows in a frantic dash, holding a blue cowboy hat atop his head. As he neared Crawler he lept off the cows landing on the monsters back. Many of the troopers swore they heard the whisk and clack of his blade snapping open somehow heard over the sound of cows, before he slammed it into crawlers back using it as a hand hold while the monster man thrashed.

Major Kaisur's new cowboy hat flew free, and a nano thorn dagger was drawn and sunk into the creatures back, carving a line straight down the beasts spine from the base of it's 'neck' to the first set of shoulders.

Crawler screamed out in pain, as acidic blood flowed from the wound, the injury starting to close up almost as quickly as it was made. The Major dropped the nanothorn dagger as Crawler bucked around, yanking a duck taped ball that was slung over his shoulder by a cord free. Major Kaisur bit down on a evidence tag that hung from the top of it yanking his head back before shoving the bundle into the wound, the tag still in his teeth with a small length of line connecting the tag to three metal rings that now dangled from the other end of of the tag.

The wound closed up around the ball as Major Kaisur kicked off flying across the room as Crawler bucked him, slamming hard into a railing and spinning over a retaining wall with a crash as the three Bakuda grenades went off inside Crawler after perhaps a second or two longer.

The first turned everything in a ten foot sphere into glass. At the same time the second explosion turned it all into what smelled like orange juice. The third wasn't obvious for a second or two more until the sound of suction could be heard and the orange juice, glass, and then the rest of the flesh of Crawler started being pulled towards a tiny black dot that also started dragging loose items in the bay towards it too.

The tiny black hole managed to last a moment longer than Crawler's body did, the last thing it ate was the mechanical bull that was projecting all the cows slurping up the light projections along with it.

In the silence that followed, Major Jer'rahd Kaisur slowly stood, looking at the melted remains of his curved blade before sighing and then looking to the melted remains of his left arm where he had shoved the bombs in.

"Well fuck." Major Jer'rahd Kaisur sighed dropping his acid seared limb to his side. "Wife's gonna make me retire now."

For the second time that day Spitfire stumbled as she came out of a time stop. This time however it was face to face with a white van that was splattered with blood and a driver still asleep inside.

"SPITFIRE RUN!!"

Turning around she nearly fell again as she stepped into a massive divot in the road, the whole ally torn apart as if some one had been trying to smash a particularly fast roach with a backhoe.

Clockblocker looked like hell. While he had been soaked in blood before, now he looked like he had bathed in it. His mask was gone, as were what looked like a few fingers on his right hand that he was hastily rapping with bandages ripped from his own shirt.

Saturnia didn't look much better and she was growling half hunched over, though she didn't have any blood on her. There were also swarms and swarms of shadow bugs attacking something in the middle of the street.

With a ripping sound a black and white almost monochrome colored woman with tiger stripes stepped out of the swarm as if it was nothing , shredding the live bugs and dead ones apart. In her hand was at least one of Clockblocker's missing fingers which she popped into her mouth and swallowed like it was a bit of candy.

Clock surged forward his hand brushing the Siberian as she strode from the swarm, the woman popping like a soap bubble.

"I SAID RUN!" Clockblocker yelled back at Spitfire.

The thud of movement behind her had Spitfire turn again and see the man in the van was awake, evidently having been jolted by the yell. He didn't seem to be looking at her, instead he glared directly at Clockblocker before his eyes closed and his head dipped again as he fell back asleep.

"FUCK!" Clockblocker screamed as Saturnia yanked him away from the Siberian who reappeared trying to gut him, instead the claw punctured through Saturnia who winced but tried to claw and bite back at the killer as Clockblocker tumbled across the asphalt a few feet away screaming in pain.

"Fucking Tadigrade bitch, DIE!"Saturnia snarled her own blood seeming to turn into a swarm to attack the Siberian to no effect.

Clockblocker rolled and kicked out his foot, sans boot and tagged the Siberian again on the ankle, the murderer popping like a soap bubble.

Another thud drew Spitfires attention back to the man in the van who had woken up again , glared angrily and then quickly nodded off before Clockblocker screamed out again as claws tore across his side before he could tag the reappeared Siberian again.

Spitfire looked to Clockblocker and Saturnia, then to the man in the van, then to the Siberian before she looked back at the man in the van and inhaled deeply, flames flickering at her lips before she let it out in a roar of fire. The van melting like butter along with the driver as the normally silent Siberian screamed out, before popping again, this time not returning.

When Miss Militia and Mouse Protector got there a few moments later the van was burning merrily.

Spitfire was curled up on herself shaking with sobs against the wall of the alley.

Clockblocker was out cold and being treated by Saturnia again.

The vampire cape looked up at the Protectorate members with a wince then shook her head.

"Shit's fucked." Saturnia sighed.

Amy shifted hearing the demands for 'what the fuck was going on' and ' where's my heals Cow?' that were coming from here headphones as she stared at the intruder in her house. She slowly rose to her feet pulling off the headset to stare at the pair, not turning her back on either of them.

The first was a little blonde girl, dressed in some cutesy 50's style dress with an apron. It would be adorable if it wasn't soaked in dried blood and viscera, some of it probably days old.

The other one she didn't recognize, but it looked to once have been human, but was now an amalgamation of tubes and other things. It could have possibly once been female, but now it was a misshapen shape of too many arms and limbs with extra eyes and a patch work of different colored flesh sewn onto it. The face looked vaguely feline though sculpted out of human skin with splintered bones as teeth rather than fangs.

Amy on the other hand was in her PJs, granted the flannel was nice and was from her own PRT product line. She had settled on a green medical cross wrapped in vines as her symbol.

"What the gods damned fuck do you want?" Amy demanded stepping gingerly away from the computer and the broken glass on the floor, as well as stepping out of her slippers onto the carpet." And what the shit is that thing?"

"Honestly you are being rude..." Bonesaw sighed

"You broke into my gods damned house and your friend there is dripping .. something on the carpet, did you honestly expect me to be fucking happy?" Amy snarked feeling a faint tingle on her skin. She took note of it immediately and made sure the virus died the moment it touched her, though she kept enough alive at her elbow to start working on reversing it as she stared down the little girl in front of her.

"That is still no reason to be rude."

"Fuck you, you disease ridden trollop!"

"Language!"

"Fuck that too you bitch looking shitfaced wanker piss pot. I don't need you, a motherfucking dumb ass cunt, to caution me on my fucking mouth, you pissant little shit stain. And I say bitch and shit stain with lowercase fucking letters, because I've met Bitch, and someone who named themselves after a shit stain, and both of them are better fucking people than your plague ridden ass." Amy snarled.

Bonesaw just stared at the the ranting girl her mouth agape. Amy was quite content with the delay as it gave her more time to make a counter to the virus prickling at her skin annnnnnnd, there it was, neutralization virus engaged, eating the other one, and making everything smell like vanilla. Seriously the girl left a path in her work through protean chains that a blind man with a microscope could follow.

"I.... I don't think I want you as a big sister now." Bonesaw huffed.

"Good, Cause I already have a little sister, and evidently she's had time to open mom's gun case." Amy smirked.

"What?" Bonesaw blinked as her peripheral vision caught onto some sort of distortion in the air. She turned her head to be face to face with the barrel of a very large shotgun of some kind with a little blonde girl on the other end braced with her back against a wall.

Then most of Bonesaw's head was removed from the rest of her body as the weapon roared.

The amalgamation of flesh lashed out grabbing the gun which Missy dropped immediately and closed the portal, leaving the abomination with one of her Mom's shotguns, the big one that Alucard had got her for hunting brutes and elephants.

The zombie thing stared at the spot Missy had been then looked back at the gun in confusion that it didn't manage to recover from before a massive green tiger, that had been blending in with the couch, or more accurately the mass of cat hair covering said couch, slammed into the unfortunate Bonesaw victim and started ripping it apart at the seams.

Amy darted forward slapping her hand on the mostly headless girl and began shutting down anything that was still active inside her and there was a fucking lot of it.

"MISSY GET DOWN HERE! SHE'S SPREADING PLAGUE LIKE SHE'S A NURGLE WORSHIPER AND I NEED TO MAKE SURE YOU DON'T HAVE ANY OF IT!" Amy shouted hearing the girl upstairs start moving.

Pocky continued to rip apart the undead thing, which was down, but still twitching.

Amy grabbed Pocky by the tail and took Missy's arm as she got downstairs, her bare foot squelching as she stepped on the corpses brain splattered arm, working on keeping every one alive. She also fixed Missy's arm were the elephant gun had kicked enough to start to bruise it already.

"Shit shit shit.... gods damned this bitch was shit, thirty six.. no thirty eight separately tweaked plagues.... seriously her work was shit... look at this damn thing, look at it , it's a prokaryotic with delusions of grandeur, how the fuck did she make a ganelle have stitch marks?" Amy growled clinging to Missy's arm before letting out a sigh. " Alright Missy you might feel nauseous for a while but that will be fine because I reworked some of your gut bacteria to act as a neutralization agent for this shit."

"So what .... I have curing farts and burps?" Missy asked.

"What no... sorta , just ... breath normally and don't give any one pink eye by farting in their face to cure them. Not even Dennis."

At that moment the front door fell off the hinges, and Missy brought up her own side arm to point at the door, while Pocky whirled with a low growl, before blinking and offering a wide fanged yawn instead.

Alucard stepped over the fallen door with a hum looking around the mess of the living room and sighing.

"While I love the fact you girls have taken up a delightful new style of interior design, I know how your mom is and I am not cleaning this up for you.