For a place bearing such an important standing in the Brockton Bay underworld, Somer's Rock was small. It was in a dark corner of an alleyway, the sort of place that, were it on Omega, would have a few vorcha as guards rather than a krogan or batarian. Standing at the entrance was a human woman, smoking a cigarette, her face partially covered by a domino mask. She leaned against the brick wall, her face illuminated by the glow of the cigarette and the light from within the bar. She examined them for a few seconds before speaking.
"You're the first big group to arrive," she said. "I don't think I know you."
"We're an independent team from out of state," Geth said. Hack. They would call it Hack now, Mar remembered. "Called Crucible."
"Wait... didn't you do some Uber and Leet videos?" she asked.
"Yes."
"Huh. You get all kinds, I guess." She took a drag on her cigarette, and continued watching them. They had stopped at the entrance. Then she laughed. "I'm not a bouncer, I'm also a guest. They've just got a no smoking policy."
Evan walked in first. Phoenix. His armor was in the hands of the gang that had tried to kill him, so he wore clothes that were overlarge on him and a mask Hack had fashioned for him. He looked like a fool.
Kara walked in after him. Salvo. She had activated her armor's full capacities, and looked like nothing more than an overpowered warning sign, traces of red lights glowing through the gaps between her armor's black plates. Her N7 logo contrasted with its background.
Geth followed her. Hack, now. Its orange plating polished, it looked brand new, as if it had not been in an explosion recently.
Mar stopped. He looked at the woman, and extended his hand to her. "Call me Comet," he said.
"Shark Week." She shook it. The name triggered the database Hack had uploaded onto their helmet, showing a video from a security camera in a diner in the corner of his vision.
Two monsters walk into the packed diner. Both large, humanoid in shape. The squat one has SHARK WEEK written above its head, the lean one is labeled PSYCHO GECKO. The security guard gets up, but collapses as the Psycho Gecko points at him, becoming a sobbing pile on the floor. Shark Week grabs a guest from a table and runs her hand over his face, flaying a part of his cheek. She gestures to the other guests. The footage is has no audio. Psycho Gecko walks around with a sack, motioning other guests to put jewelry and money inside. The two leave.
"You're smaller than I heard," he said.
"You match the news footage." She had a small smile on her face. "Not all of us need to stay monsters. Some of us are luckier than that."
He nodded. "How many people are in there?" he asked.
"Everyone," she said. "Except for the one who sent the invitation."
"Figures."
She took another drag of her cigarette, exhaling a narrow line of smoke. "Aren't you going to join the rest of your team?"
"I don't particularly want to," he said. "It's nicer outside."
"I get the feeling. All of that," she made a gesture in the air. "Testosterone."
He laughed.
The bar's door opened, and a man stepped out. Wearing a wide brimmed hat, with a scarf over his mouth and a poncho, he looked ridiculous. He approached the woman and Mar.
"An-Shark Week, what are you doing outside?" he asked.
"Cheating on you," she said. "Me and the big guy here. We're eloping."
"Fucking funny," he said. "Finish that cigarette and come inside before the big shots kill each other."
"Let me guess, you lost the seat at the table?" Her smile had turned into a smirk, her tone biting.
"I don't see you telling Kaiser to fuck off. Or should we try to take Coil's seat? I'm sure that'll go over well."
"Give me two minutes," she said. "The monster's more entertaining than you."
"Not my fight," Mar said, and pushed past him.
"Hey, fuckface." Psycho Gecko grabbed at his arm to no effect. Mar opened the door and walked into the bar.
It was as uninspiring inside as it was outside, but the company was more ridiculous. A large table was set in the middle of the room, made up of smaller tables pushed together, people in costumes seated all around it. Booths to the side of the room held other groups, whose costumes weren't as ostentatious or well made as the ones sitting at the table.
"I don't care what kind of power plays you're trying to pull here, but I am sitting down, and you don't want to try anything with my seat again," Evan said to a man in armor – KAISER, the HUD notified him, showing him a video of Kaiser's armor sprouting blades and killing a man in a black coat – before sitting in a chair. Pieces of another chair were near his feet.
Kaiser's seat, Mar noticed, was reinforced by metal, raising it up higher than others.
"My team has beaten yours, Kaiser, or is Othala sitting without her husband because they had a fight?" Mar asked. Othala's mask covered three quarters of her face, leaving an eye widened with rage, an ear, and her short hair exposed.
Before she could respond, a tall skeletal man in black – COIL, with no accompanying video – at the extreme other side of the table spoke. "It seems this group has achieved a victory against you, Kaiser. They also seem to have made Uber and Leet succeed at something, which is admirable. They have earned a seat at the table."
"One seat," Kaiser said. "More would be unseemly."
"Fine," Evan said, and sat down. The seat was made of lacquered wood – too thin for Mar to sit on. Not an issue. He leaned over Evan, putting his hands on the back of Evan's chair.
"We will also demand the return of Phoenix's suit of armor. I'm sick of his attempts at making his own costume." Evan tried to give Mar an outraged look. With Evan looking straight up, it looked sycophantic. Nobody seemed to note Shark Week and Psycho Gecko walking back in.
"Who do you think you are?" Kaiser asked him. His voice was deepened, accompanying itself in an echo, coming out of his armor.
"I am the storm. I will sweep through this city and carve my name in it on my way to other places, and you can get out of the way or you can die raging at your weakness in the face of true power." Shark Week snickered from her booth. "You can call me Comet. We are Crucible. We will be in town for the next while, each of us with our own operation. And you will treat us with respect."
"Fine," Coil said. "I assume you are aware of truce rules?"
"Of course," Mar said.
"Where do you come from?" A woman in a welding helmet asked. FAULTLINE, with a video of her touching a building and it collapsing while she walked away, from a street view camera.
"It's a secret," he said. "Feel free to investigate. We're here now."
"Those are incredibly poor manners," Coil said.
"I do not take well to having my temporary location attacked by a madwoman." Mar put a hand on the table and leaned forward. "But that is not the issue. I do not take well to being duped. There is someone in this city who I did a job for, who hid their identity. I will tell that person to return the child to her parents – if you do not do this, I will come after you, and burn you and everything you ever achieved to the ground. Do not test me on this."
"A child?" A woman said. She'd been quiet this whole time. LADY PHOTON hovered above her head, with a video of her blocking a slash from a giant's sword. A hero. She wore no mask, unlike anyone else in the room. Her costume was white, with a purple starburst on it, her hair held back with a tiara. A family tree of hers opened in the corner of his vision – a family of heroes. And her niece…
"I owe you an apology, Lady Photon. I would like to speak with you alone later."
"After what you did to my niece? You should be happy I didn't come with reinforcements," she snapped. "My family is being held hostage by a madwoman. That's the only reason I'm here and not arresting every single one of you. Where is Bakuda?"
Almost on cue, the door slammed open, and Empress walked in, a metallic jangling accompanying her steps. She wore a red bodysuit under a red cape, holding a scepter topped by a sphere. On her face was an air filtration mask connected to a spiky crown. Her cape was weighted down, small objects on the inside of it.
"Oh. Not everyone arrived," she said. "Too bad for them."
Coil shuddered, then asked, "What did you just do?"
"Well, I told people to come. They didn't. They've been discorporated. Too bad for Uber, Leet, Circus, the Merchants… They were such contributors to the city spirit, too. I'd have gotten the Undersiders as well, but I'll forgive them seeing as they're currently in prison. I can collect them later. I'm glad to see heroes came, even though they weren't invited. Some of you haven't been properly introduced to me." She slammed her scepter onto the table and let go of it. It remained standing. "I am your new ruler. You can refer to me as Empress. It's going to be very simple, now, for the Brockton Bay underworld. You can join me, or you can be eliminated. I'm sick and tired of race wars, class wars, and whatever the hell happened with Uber and Leet starting a war with Skidmark. You may all join my Empire, or be crushed underfoot."
"How many speeches about our demise are we going to hear?" Faultline asked.
"Too many," said a large man in a black ski mask and loose fitting black clothes. A cheap costume, even by the standards of most people there. CHALLENGER appeared over his head. Mar ignored the video of a large hero in an ostentatious costume beating down a group of thugs his HUD supplied. "Too many by far."
"You're very glib," Empress said.
"You're overconfident, Bakuda," Faultline said, slamming her fist on the table. "I'm not afraid of you. I will say that setting off a bomb in my nightclub was a terrible mistake."
"I needed your attention somehow," Empress said. "Also? Don't call me Bakuda. It's Empress now. Bakuda never fit. A runaway from a Chinese army gave a Japanese name to a Singaporean. It was stupid. I'm Empress, and my empire will be Brockton Bay's underworld."
"There already is an Empire in Brockton Bay," Kaiser drawled, raising a hand. "Mine."
"Then you have a choice. Move it elsewhere, or be absorbed."
"And what if we decide you are too big a threat to walk away from this truce? We eliminate you right now?" Kaiser asked. A blade grew from his gauntlet, inching its way towards Empress.
Empress pulled her cape open. The inside was lined with round objects, of varying make. Her laugh was harsh and metallic. "Then we all go. As does most of the city. You want to beat me, Kaiser? Coil? Heroes? Hack? Whoever the fuck the rest of you are, in the booths?"
"You're telling the truth," Geth said.
"Of course I am." She extended her arms and curtsied. "There is a bomb in the city that will blow it sky fucking high. There may be survivors in the outskirts. Feel free to look for it once we're done here. But if you kill me now? It goes off."
"You're insane," Faultline said
"No, I'm audacious. That's what they call it if you win." She said. "I've got to ask a question, though. What are heroes doing here? Isn't this a neutral villain meet area or some shit?"
"You invited us," Challenger said, quirking his head.
"I don't even know who the fuck you are," Empress responded. She looked around, pointing people out as she mentioned them. "Photon Mom over there, sure, I know her, but I didn't invite her. The people in the booths? Cowboy, Hoodie Girl, Bangs Lady, Pilot Guy? Never heard of them."
"It's Zephyr," the man in the round helmet said. The HUD helpfully had ZEPHYR written over his head.
"I don't care. You're a hero, right?" Empress took a step towards the booth.
"Yes," he said, pulling away from her.
"I didn't invite you," she said. "I don't even know who you are. Your costume's shit, by the way."
"My home was hit by a super bomb," he said. "Who else could do it?"
"Let's look at tinkers," she said. "Kaiser's got none. Might be Coil, since his only power seems to be 'being freakishly tall.' Leet is currently spread over a number of blocks, as is Squealer. But there does seem to be a new team here, with their own tinker tech."
The table's attention seemed to all turn towards Mar. Kara's voice came in on their private channel, "Some of my grenades were missing this morning." She was standing completely still.
Evan began to push the chair away from the table, and stood up to look at Mar. He had no connection to the private channel. Kara put her hand on his shoulder.
"Some of mine, too," Mar responded. He'd thought nothing of it in the morning. Stupid. "Evan wasn't near our things until after I checked. Couldn't be him."
Geth twisted towards him. Too slow. He grabbed the machine by its head, pulling it down. He switched his coms back to the external speakers and asked, "What did you do?"
Empress laughed, a mocking metallic sound that filled the room.
Everything became pain, a screech emanating from the internal comms channel. Mar ripped his helmet off to see Kara doing the same. Evan had pushed out of his chair, his eyes glowing blue. Mar deactivated the internal channel on his comms, before putting his mask on.
"Fucker's gone," Kara spat, her eyes narrowed, her nostrils flaring. Geth had disappeared in the moment's confusion.
The reaction around the table was immediate. They had violated the norms of identity. Coil and Kaiser almost mimicked each other in their steepled hands. Challenger covered the bottom half of his mask with a hand.
And Empress's laugh filled the room. The harsh mechanical rasp took its time dying down.
"This is great," she said, before looking at Lady Photon. "This is amazing. Look, heroes, I'm not here to fuck with the status quo you guys have – under my rule, I expect crime in this city to become less violent. Kinder. Better. We'll still fight, but it won't be as wasteful. Black people won't be killed for being black and in the wrong place. The underworld will stick to the underworld. And I'm not going to go after you in your homes. If I face off against you, we'll go by the rules. Your patrol routes will be fair game. Your mall appearances, your charity fundraisers, your elementary school book readings. But as someone who knows what it's like, I'm not going to attack you in your homes. Whatever this guy did. That I'm reserving for the Nazis and whatever other groups these guys align with."
"We can't agree to a deal like this," Lady Photon said.
"Okay," Empress said. "I'll abide by it anyway. I'm not looking for… special treatment." She stopped for a second, almost as if lost in thought. "Isn't it great to work against someone sane, rather than someone who will bomb you in your home, or murder your family? I've got to go now. I've double booked."
She picked her scepter up, and pulled a plastic bag filled with small cubes out of her pocket. She put it on the table where her scepter stood. "These call me, to let me know you're in my empire. Everyone should take one. If you don't want to join, then I'd say 'see you later', but you won't have that chance."
Empress twirled her scepter on the way out of the room. She curtsied to the room as she opened the door, and left.
She left a stunned silence behind her.
