A/N: Not sure if I will continue this, but it came to me and I just have to get it out of my head. Marvel has focused a lot on the big bads in their films; I wanted to show a few moments with the lower level types. I of course own nothing, marvel and Disney does that, this is just a little bit of fun for those that like to walk on the dark side. Hope You all enjoy!
Masters
It was still quite early when the woman walked through the doors. The kitchen staff was still putting out salad bar, food prep was still going on behind the window, and the yellow light of early morning was still blazing through the huge front windows.
The woman rolled her eyes.
Of all the places to meet…
…why had the others wanted to meet here?
Despite her recent…unemployment, she still tried to make herself look presentable, her black blazer and dark pants were crisp with fine lines. Her silk blouse bright white against the dark fabric, her blonde hair was clean and pulled up into a tight bun.
Cold careful eyes watched from behind mirror sunglasses.
She had not spent all those years studying, and slaving for her psych degree just to let a small matter like unemployment shake her confidence now. SHIELD had been a useful employer, they given her the kind of challenges she had enjoyed, but now…they were gone, but that was okay.
She smiled slightly.
They had given her just what she had needed, access…
Now…she intended to use it.
"Just one today?"
She looked at the perky eighteen-year old with bad acne and shiny silver braces. The girl looked like some annoying little dog eagerly awaiting its master's attention, either a scratch behind the ears or a good swift kick in the side.
"I'm meeting people here," she said dismissively, "Now…where…?"
It was then that she spotted them, in the far corner booth, the few customers avoiding them like the plague.
The woman smiled.
She was pleased they were all here. What she intended what she wanted to do, it would only work if they were all in.
She turned to the girl.
"Get me an ice water please," she said, and turned without giving the girl another thought.
She thought the girl might have mouthed a certain curse word at her, but she did not mind. Let the girl think what she wanted.
She and the others…
They would be changing the face of the world soon…
…Very soon.
IOI
"Good morning."
They all looked up at her some with hostility, others with amusement. Not that she was surprised…
Most of them still saw her as an authority figure. She had treated them all at one point, back when they had all been locked in the facility that SHIELD had so lovingly dubbed the Fridge. She had been their psychiatrist then, helping them work through their issues, and accept that their place was here.
She had not been entirely successful, but that had been expected, she had not really been trying. Oh she had done her job, and done it well, but the results had been far different that anyone could have thought. There had been many different people locked up in the fridge, all dangerous, all troubled or disturbed, but it was these four that she saw as the most useful. They had tools that would help her, but at the same time they were both programmable, and disposable.
In other words…they were perfect.
SHIELD had not known, had they known what she was planning she would never have gotten this far. All they saw when they looked at her was a Diva with security clearance. A stuck up psychiatrist too in love with herself to ever try and rock the boat, it was an image that she had cultivated quite carefully. She had not wanted any of the higher ups to look to close at her, and what she was doing.
Even then she had had ambitions…plans.
She would go to any length to see them fulfilled.
"Morning doc," a large brutish looking man with dark glasses growled.
"Good morning, Doctair," a slim man with pale skin and pencil thin mustache purred.
"Doctor," a twitchy looking man with short brown hair said glancing nervously around them room.
The doctor frowned.
"Is something wrong David?"
He gave her a down right venomous look, but that did not bother her.
David suffered from bouts of paranoia. He also tended to obsess on things, namely former girlfriends. In their sessions she had directed that paranoia against SHIELD and any other authority figure but herself.
Now…David was hers, he just did not realize it.
It was then that the only other woman at the table decided to speak up, not surprisingly, the first words out of her mouth annoyed the doctor, but again that was not unexpected, the woman enjoyed confrontation, it was how she ended up on SHIELD's radar in the first place. She craved attention, and feared being left alone. Her mother had abandoned her when she was eight years old. Now she lashed out at everyone.
As with the others, the doctor had turned those emotions to her advantage. She needed to be the mother the girl never had, firm, but seemingly caring, tolerating her displays, and always being there to listen.
If she could do that, then she would have the perfect soldier.
She could do that.
The young girl grinned savagely.
"What's up, Doc?"
She frowned and gave the girl a disapproving stare, the look her own mother had given her years earlier.
The fierce girl withered under her stare.
"I told you to try and not draw attention to yourself, Melissa," she said pointing at the girl's clothes. Leather jacket, short shorts. Her shoulder length red hair streaked with silver, her make-up smudged, making her look like she was wearing a mask.
The doctor shook her head.
"This is most inappropriate."
The girl seemed to diminish; she looked down at her plate. She seemed to regress right before their eyes, from twenty five year old, to child in less than a minute
"Sorry," she murmured sheepishly. As always her hand went to the scar on her neck. The reason she had been locked in the fridge in the first place was because of that scar.
The doctor gave her a warm smile.
"It is alright, just try to make better choices in the future, okay." She gently touched the girl's hand. The kind of touch a parent might give.
"We wouldn't want SHIELD locking you up again would we?"
The girl responded to her warmth, just as the doctor had intended, she brightened, once again firmly back in control…
…Her doctor's control.
That was all that mattered.
"Yes Doctor Sofen," she said, "Whatever you need."
Karla Sofen, formerly of SHIELD, now a freelance operative, smiled.
Whatever she needed?
She liked the sound of that.
IOI
It was only after she had ordered her meal that the real talk began.
She began to explain what she wanted from her former patients, the plans that she had in store.
Everything that had happened in SHIELD: the loss of the Hub and the Triskelion, the death of Nick Fury, the return and rise of HYDRA. These had all been unexpected gifts that had only made her plans even easier to arrange. It was chaos right now. The government scrambling to find out just what had happened, how had a former Nazi deep science division, a group supposedly destroyed seventy years ago, so completely infiltrate the world's foremost intelligence agency?
So far no one had those answers, chaos reigned.
There was great opportunity in chaos.
SHIELD, HYDRA, whatever they chose to call themselves, had embarrassed the governments of the world. The powerful were looking for people to blame.
They were looking for scapegoats, not answers.
That was useful too.
SHIELD was gone or in tatters. HYDRA had suffered too, the loss of three helicarriers and the arrest of many of their operatives, it would take time for the organization to reorganize and rebuild.
Currently, there was a vacuum of power; she intended to make use of that vacuum.
She glanced at former patients, her future soldiers. She had tracked them all carefully since the breakout giving them all her cell number, and promising to help if they needed it.
And they would need it.
She had made sure of that.
She had made sure to cover her own tracks before she went dark, before she vanished. It was only a matter of time before someone came looking for her, either the government, HYDRA or SHIELD. They would ask questions, and no doubt seek to either neutralize her or recruit her.
She would not wait for someone to come for her.
She had her own plans.
The day that the fridge fell, the day that HYDRA had released all the inmates, she had helped herself to something, a piece of technology that SHIELD had discovered. She had seen what it did.
It was not something that one simply threw away, or wait for someone else to take it. SHIELD would have destroyed it. HYDRA would have used it.
Fortunately, she had gotten their first.
Now, she was in the same class as her patients, they had abilities, now thanks to what she had saved from the Fridge, she had abilities.
It would help keep the others under her thumb.
"Ugh!"
Melissa wrinkled her nose; the brutish looking man had gotten their first, not waiting for the others to arrive. He had ordered a steak, rare; when it came he had simply picked it up with his fingers, ripping into it with teeth that were too sharp for a normal man's.
The young woman popped her bubble gum loudly.
"Hungry, Todd?
The man glared at her over his sunglasses, the eyes that met hers were not human either. They were black, lifeless, like the eyes of a doll.
That is why Todd Arliss wore the glasses, the genetic enhancements SHIELD had given him worked well, but they were far from attractive.
"Screw you, Mimi," he growled.
"The girl laughed lightly.
"In your dreams, Fish stick," she replied.
He snarled and bared his bloody teeth.
Melissa, who everyone called Mimi, popped her gum at him.
The man with the mustache rolled his eyes. He at least had tried not to draw attention to himself, clad in a suit and tie. The only thing a person might notice was the heavy metal glove he wore over his right hand. SHIELD had forced him to wear that glove, the accident that had given him his…gifts only took effect from he touched something with that hand.
Doctor Sofen had done her best to convince him of the value of that. He could still use his powers, but now he could hide his greatness as well.
"Zey are all children, Doctair Sofen," he sneered, "Surely, we can do bettair that zees?"
Both Todd and Mimi glared at him.
The man growled.
The girl popped her gum.
Dr. Sofen raised her hand, a sign that they would all remember from group Therapy in the Fridge.
It had worked then, it worked now.
She turned her head slightly.
"Paul, Dr. Duval," she said to the man with the mustache, "We must try to get along. What I have in mind…"
She smiled slyly.
"It is worth your time, it is worth all our time."
Paul Duval shrugged.
"You 'elped me learn 'ow to control my gifts, Doctair Sofen," he said, "You have proven yourself a woman of great skill."
He smiled at her.
"That buys you at least some of my time."
Karla did not quite smile, but it was close.
Paul Duval was a sociopath; he liked being in control, and controlling others. At first he had seen that gift as a loss of control; she showed him that that was not entirely true.
All she needed to do was stroke his ego once and a while, call him Doctor, and he would do whatever it was she wanted.
That is what would keep this particular fool in line.
Their food arrived.
Doctor Sofen drank her coffee and watched the others, the group dynamic had changed little since the escape, but she still needed to keep a close eye on them. Everyone here was dangerous…
She just needed to direct that danger where it needed to go.
Mimi had finally taken out her gum, sticking it to the side of her plate. Pancakes, she exclaimed were things she missed most while she had been locked up. SHIELD served something they called pancakes, but they tasted more like cardboard, and looked like hockey pucks.
She grinned, enjoying her meal.
Dr. Sofen began her pitch.
"SHIELD is gone, I'm sure no one at this table is going to mourn over that, but I must make one thing clear, we…are not safe."
Todd growled.
"Let them come, I'll rip their heads off."
"Charming," Duval sneered.
The larger man growled again.
Mimi finished her meal at put her gum back in her mouth; the fact that it was now covered with syrup did not seem to bother her.
David gave her a dirty look.
She smiled and popped her gum again.
"Do you have to do that?" he demanded.
"No," she said.
She popped her gum again.
A breeze began to blow around the table, odd considering they were in doors.
Mimi smirked.
"You know what happens to people that annoy me?"
"They continue to annoy you," Mimi said with a shrug.
The winds began to spin faster.
Todd glared at David; Paul began to take off his glove.
Mimi popped her gum, again.
Karla's eyes narrowed.
"David," she snapped, "Control yourself!"
" But Doctor, she…"
"I know David, but now is not the time."
"But Doc…."
"It. Is Not. The. Time."
David Cannon looked sullen, but nodded, a child forced to mind a parent.
The winds stopped blowing.
Privately, Karla Sofen breathed a sigh of relief.
A close call to be sure.
Unlike the others, David had been born with his abilities, and quite impressive they were. He had worked for a time as a hitman, until SHIELD had found him and shut him down. He had ended up on the index, for powered people. That was how Carla first learned about him.
She had stayed behind at the Fridge just long enough to erase her new team's names from the index. A HYDRA agent had walked in on her, thinking she was just another secretary.
He regretted that for the rest of his life, all twenty seconds of it.
She raised her hand once again.
Again the group fell silent.
"SHIELD is gone, but HYDRA is still out there, with all of SHIELDs old resources, they will find us, and try to force us to do their bidding.
David smirked at that.
"Why not work go for them," he asked, "Maybe we'll get some respect."
Karla gave him a cold grin.
"Do you want to be a slave, David? Do you think HYDRA will be any better than SHIELD? I've read the reports on SHIELD's indoctrination programs, the stuff they were only supposed to use in the most extreme of circumstances."
Dr. Sofen leaned closer.
"They would turn you into a puppet, David. All you would care about would be their will, and you would be more than happy to comply."
Karla shrugged.
"I don't know about the rest of you, but I'm tired of serving others. You can do all these amazing things; why not actually use your gifts to get what you desire?"
Duval nodded.
Cannon pursed his lips.
Todd adjusted his sunglasses.
Mimi smirked.
"Ooh," she purred, "We're going to get into soooo much trouble."
Dr. Sofen sneered.
"Probably."
"So we go independent?" Duval asked.
"Yes," replied.
"Under you?"
"Yes."
"Why you?"
Karla paused.
"Excuse me?"
"Why you," he repeated, "You 'elped us, but why should you lead?"
He held up his gauntlet, making sure it was still working.
"We all have abilities," he reminded her.
"Why shouldn't one of us lead?"
Karla smiled.
She placed her hand under the table.
Under her blouse there was a brief glow, you could barely see it, but it looked like something had bonded to Karla Sofen's chest.
She raised her hand. It phased through the table like it was not there.
Todd coughed.
Paul's mouth fell open.
David gave her a look that was both impressed and a bit envious.
Mimi cackled.
"So you're a freak," she said, "just like the rest of us."
Karla sipped her coffee.
"I have improved, myself," she said, "Because I will no longer be bound to anyone, not SHIELD, not HYDRA, and certainly not the government."
She sat down her coffee.
"We have a choice," she said, "We can continue to follow, continue to be slaves…"
Her smile blossomed fully, a yellow glow flashed behind her eyes.
"Or we can plot our own path; we can have everything we want. If we stand together no one can stand in our way. Not the police, not SHIELD, not anyone!"
She looked over them all; making sure they all understood the gravity of this situation.
She needed to bind them to her now. She needed to be the leader they needed, to give them the direction they all craved.
They were a dangerous group. Animal, narcissist, sociopath, psychopath, they were dangerous, but they expendable, programmable, and with the right push they could work.
She would have to remain careful, but it could be done.
It needed to be done.
"So what do you all say?" she asked, "Do you want to be prisoners? Slaves…"
"Or do you want to grab the world by the throat and take what you want? SHIELD is gone, and the police do not have the tools to stop us. We can be the new authority…the Masters of our own destinies. The Masters of whatever we want?"
She leaned back. If only the people around them knew what was going on.
This was the birth of a new age.
Her age.
"So, she said softly, "Slaves, or Masters?"
She looked at her former patients and they looked at her.
One by one they did what she had needed them to do.
What she had programmed them to do.
One by one, they raised their mugs or glasses.
"Mastairs," Paul Duval said.
"Masters," Todd Arliss growled.
"Masters," David Cannon smirked, "Let them try to stand in our way."
Mimi giggled.
"If only my old man could see me now," If only my mom could…"
She paused, her eyes blanked out, lost in sad memories.
Dr. Sofen gave her a soft smile, one final push to make the girl jump.
"We will be there to watch your back," she promised.
"You will not be alone."
Again Mimi's manic smile returned.
She grinned savagely.
"Masters," she said, she stood up and raised her fists in the air.
"MASTERS!" she shouted.
The entire restaurant turned.
"Melissa," Dr. Sofen spat.
The girl sat down, blushing, her fellows glaring at her.
"Sorry," she whimpered, "Got excited."
Karla smiled.
It was okay.
She was excited too.
She had her tools, her weapons.
Now she had to use them.
SHIELD was gone.
The world was vulnerable, ready to accept something new.
She would give it to them.
It was time, time for the world to realize things had changed.
It was time…
…for them to meet their Masters…
… and nothing…
… Would be the same again.
THE END?
A/N: I've been thinking of starting up my Assembly required story again, if I do the Masters will likely make an appearance there. If you're curious let me know, and shoot me a review. Perhaps there will be more to come.
DG