Dauntless looked at me a little funny a few times as we walked the final stretch to the appointed meeting place.

It wasn't until we were just across the street from the place that he actually spoke to me. His gaze firmly fixed upon the dinner slash bar, "Please remember to let me do the talking, and follow my lead."

I nodded, "Can do."

Dauntless huffed something under his breath. Looking both ways first he crossed the street. I followed soon after, not looking both ways.

Crossing the street I slowed just enough to take in building before me. In one word it looked gross. Gray and black paint that looked over twenty years old; just like every building. Rusty iron bars across the windows, with seedy-looking white curtains drawn on the inside. It made me wonder how such a place ended up neutral ground. They could have at least picked a nice place. If Dauntless hadn't told me to stay quiet I would've had words with the owner.

The hero pulled the door open with just a little too much force. The bell that announced our presence rung cheerily. Probably the only cheer thing in the entire place.

The inside resembled the outside in everything but color. The colors were different I think; I wasn't quite sure under all the stains.

Before us, directly in front of the door was a bar. Twins identical in everything except clothes stood behind it. They busied themselves with cleaning the bar top.

My scrutiny of the building would be ended when a strong clearly masculine voice cut through the silence that had befallen the place.

"Dauntless and the new brute." My head whipped around to face who had spoken. To the left in the sitting area of the pub, a couple of tables had been drawn together. This formed an impromptu meeting table. Disgusting green table clothes covered the table; I really needed to talk to whoever the owner was.

But I was getting off-topic, the man that had spoken wore the most elaborate armor I had ever seen. Granted I had not seen that much armor, but this guys armor was over the top. He even wore a crown, who did he think he was? A king or something. Even the way he was sitting conveyed his arrogance. He sat with good posture while still somehow reclining in the chair.

"Who's he?" I asked my companion. My head tilted just a little in his direction.

Dauntless answered quietly, "Kaiser, he's the leader of the Empire 88."

I nodded, the 88 was the other gang. With my question answered I finally looked at the other occupants of the room. It looked as though our entrance had interrupted the passing out of… DVDs or were they CDs? Judging by what the motorcycle helmet guy was holding out to one of the occupants, skinny ass man.

I mean the guy was super skinny. While wearing spandex.

Dauntless cleared his throat once again bringing me out of my thoughts. "We need two more chairs."

There was movement behind us, one of the bartenders fetching us chairs I guessed.

Once again my observation of the room started. Besides just Kaiser, a guy with a motorcycle helmet stylized like a skull and skinny ass man. There was also: Tophat man, he looked like he was trying too hard. Also, a girl wearing a cross between Asian laminar and riot gear. I really spare a glance at the other people in the booths, they seem unimportant at the time.

But the one occupant that really stood out was the miniature sun. the light that radiated from the figure behind Kaiser was blinding. Or it was until something just shifted, and the light dimmed into almost nothing for me. The person behind the light was a very bland looking woman of middle age. Wasn't ugly but they weren't pretty either.

The motorcycle guy turned to us, "Will you be needing a CD?"

"No, we won't Grue," Dauntless said the guy's name for my sake. "We already know enough about Bakuda."

Grue nodded, he looked very uncomfortable talking with us.

As soon as the handing out of CDs was done skinny ass man spoke up breaking the silence. "So," he began, cracking his knuckles one at a time. "We're in agreement? The ABB cannot be allowed to continue operating."

There were nods mummers of agreement from everyone. But I just whispered to myself, "No shit, you think."

Dauntless smirked beneath his helmet, he had heard me.

Skinny ass man continued unaware of my words. "Then I suggest we establish a truce. Not just everyone here, but between ourselves and the law. I would contact authorities and let them know that until this matter is cleared up, our groups will restrict our illegal activity to only what is absolutely essential to our business, and we will enforce the same for those doing business in our territories. That would let police forces and military focus entirely on the ABB. There would be no violence, infighting between our groups, grabs for territory, thefts or insults. We band together with those we can tolerate for guaranteed victory, and we ignore those we cannot cooperate with."

One of the bartenders, wearing a Hawaiian shirt set down to chairs for us. I looked down doubtfully at the chairs, they looked extremely poorly made and old. I recalled what happened to the cot in the PRT holding cell and whispered to Dauntless. "I think I'll stand."

The hero looked at me before nodding, he understood. I could have turned into something lighter, but I didn't want to drop my durability at that moment.

The dialogue around the table had not ceased. Laminaria wearing lady was now talking about how she and her group were mercenaries and if someone didn't hire them they would be on the other side. I didn't care.

Skinny ass man apparently did, "Unfortunate, but you and I can talk after this meeting is done. I'd prefer to keep matters simple. You're okay with the other terms?"

The mercenary nodded, "Keeping on the down-low, not kicking up a fuss with other groups? That's status quo with my group anyways."

Skinny ass man turned to Kaiser, "Kaiser?"

The arrogant crown-wearing parahuman gave his words of agreement, "I think it is acceptable."

Motorcycle helmet guy Grue spoke next "I was talking to my group about doing something not too different from what Coil just proposed," he paused, "Yeah, we're cool with it."

So skinny ass man's name was Coil, what a dumb name. It held like zero meaning. I was going to have to ask Dauntless about him.

Next was Tophat Man who had stayed quiet throughout, now also pitched in his words of agreement, "Sure," He said, "Not a problem. We're in."

All heads turned to Dauntless and me, I shrugged letting Dauntless make the decision for the both of us.

The hero drummed his fingers against the wood table. "We agree to these terms, but we will stop you if we see anything illegal done."

Coil interrupted Dauntless, "What if we have to kill some of the ABB?"

"Best you try not to, only kill if they are a reasonable threat to your life," Dauntless smirked.

"Does this rule apply to your pet also?" Kaiser tilted his head at me. Did he just call me a pet?!

Dauntless didn't miss a beat, "Yes. there are no exceptions."

Kaiser didn't look happy but he didn't say anything else. He must have heard of my methods.

"Don't worry Usurper and I will be working separately from all of you. This is just for coordination so we don't have multiple groups hitting the same place." Dauntless stated, fingers still drumming the table.

Coil clapped his hands together, "Well then now that we are all in agreement we can conclude this meeting. Are there any offers, announcements, or grievances?"

"I've got a complaint." My head turned to the man that had spoken. He sat in the booth directly behind Kaiser. A large hairy man, that would have fit right in with Viking raiders. His face was covered by a snarling wolf mask.

If I had eyes they would have been rolling. Was everyone overdramatic in this world?

The man looked at the booth behind Grue. "My complaint's with her." the booth behind Grue was occupied with three females and a very feminine looking young male. Gonna have to be a more specific buddy.

The motorcycle guy Grue sated calmly, "What's the issue?" he seemed to also be leaking inky darkness from his body.

"The crazy one, Hellhound, she-" began the Viking like guy.

"Bitch." interrupted the ugly female from Grue's booth. "Only the panty-ass heroes call me Hellhound. It's Bitch."

"Don't fucking care," growled the burly man, "You attacked my business. Set your fucking dog on my customers. Lucky I wasn't there, whore."

Grue looked the newly name Bitch, "That's the kind of risk you run, doing business in Brockton Bay. Capes can and will get in your way, hero or villain."

Now everyone was watching the argument intently.

Angry the man glared at him, "It's a matter of respect. You want to fuck with my business, and we're not at war? You let me know if you've got an issue, first. Let me decide if I want to move shop."

I decided I had enough, my voice rang clear-cutting through the tension like a knife through hot butter. "Can we leave Dauntless? I tire of the bickering of these idiots."

Everyone head swiveled to look at me, my arms crossed, I could take them all.

Dauntless seemed the least surprise, "I also see no reason for the arguing. Not moments ago you all agreed to a truce. Now you want to break it. But such is the worth of the words of villains." he spat the last word.

Burly man looked absolutely angry. Guess he thought his issue was important.

Before any more words could be traded Dauntless dropped a card on the table. He had his hero name on it and a string of numbers. "Whoever is organizing this can contact me through this number."

He stood, slamming the butt of his spear into the ground he turned to me. "Let's go, Usurper."

With that Dauntless and I left the building.

We were a little ways away before anything was spoken, "Who was the big angry guy?" I asked as I glanced back at the pub. No one else had left yet.

Dauntless swung his spear lazily, it arced with electricity with every swing. "You mean Hookwolf? The guy that was mad at Hellhound?"

I decided not to say anything about the so-called Hellhound had said about people that called her that. "Yeah, that guy."

"He's part of the Empire Eighty-Eight. His power allows him to turn into a wolf made of hooks." He chuckled to himself, "Someone I know once called him a wolf blender." Dauntless expression turned dark. "He's a murderer, just runs at people, cuts 'em to ribbons."

I solemnly nodded, "So he is bad, really bad."

Dauntless looked me in the eyes or at least where my eyes would have been. "If you ever run into him, kill him. He is that dangerous." he paused, "He deserves it."

I did know what to say, so I was silent. I wondered what happened to the guy that got angry at me for killing someone? To the guy that told villains not kill?

"Were we the only heroes in there?"

"I would hesitate to call you a hero, more like a probationary hero. But yes we were the only heroes." A shrug, "The heroes in this city are outnumbered."

How bad was this city, on a scale of one to ten I think I would give it a zero? Maybe a negative one.

"So.. Grue, what's his story?" I asked as I thought back to the meeting. He seemed to be talking the most. Besides skinny ass man...

Dauntless pursed his lips, "Not much, he and his are recent. The biggest thing they did was rob a bank; they are a small-time team. Call themselves the Undersiders. All of the members are fairly new to the playing board." Dauntless turned down an alleyway. "By way of powers, he creates a cloud of light and sound." he looked at me, "If you end up in his cloud try to get out, don't wildly try to hit something."

"Can do, what about the other members?"

"There's Tattletale, an information-gathering thinker-"

"Thinker?" I asked confused.

Dauntless looked confused for a second also, "Powers related to perception, information gathering, enhanced skills." the hero stopped walking, "Take, for example, Über; he is a local villain. He becomes skilled at anything he tries his hand at."

"Powerful?" could do a lot with that...

"He's not too intelligent. But thinkers can also have post or pre-cognition, clairvoyance. Really anything related to the mind."

"Ok, I think I got it. Back to the Undersiders."

Dauntless nodded. "There is also, Regent, a low-level Master that causes muscle spasms."

Master was pretty straight forward I didn't need any clarification on that.

"Hellhound, or as she likes to be called Bitch," I remembered she was the one that Hookwolf was angry with. "She is also a master, empowers dogs, makes 'em really big and strong. Has slight control over them."

"Their newest member is Skitter, a bug controller, not much else to say."

Bug control? Why become a villain? Ever heard of the pest removal industry?

"I can see why they're a small-time team. But for a small-time team, they certainly did most of the talking."

"They had a run-in with Bakuda, think it makes them important. And remember they are all villains it was all posturing, showing who is the strongest."

"What about the other guy? Coil?" He was also one of the more prominent speakers.

"Another small-time villain, supposed only parahuman in his group. Not much is known about him. Not even his powers."

"Okay, and Kaiser?"

"Arguably the most powerful cape the city, with Lung dead. He is the leader of the Empire Eighty-Eight; Nazis. His gang has the most parahumans, they're the main threat to the Protectorate. His power is metal generation, he can create metal from almost any solid object." he added after a moment, "Hookwolf is part of his gang."

I remembered the figure that glowed brightly behind Kaiser. "What about the miniature sun?"

Dauntless looked thoughtful. "Purity, a former member of the Empire Eighty-Eight, I don't know how accurate the information is now. Her power is to release kinetically charged beams of light, this also allows her to fly."

"What about the glowing?"

The hero shrugged, "Side effect of her power? Never really thought about it."

I thought about the one other person at the table, "Tophat guy, who's he?"

Dauntless started walking again, "Trickster? He switches the places of two object of similar mass. He can use this on himself and others." The hero casually kicked a green dumpster, "He is the leader of a group of traveling villains, hence their name, The Travelers."

"So what else can you tell me of the Brockton Bay…" I paused, "Parahumans." I finished.

Dauntless laughed, "Lots I can tell you lots…" And thus began your very long conversation about the situation of the ever edgy city Brockton Bay. all the while Dauntless led me through it perilous streets and alleyways.