Current Energy: 14
Friday, January 7th, 2011
The Docks, Brockton Bay
She approached cautiously. Her right hand clutched tightly against Lung where she was dragging him by his neck, and her left shifted unconsciously to grasp at a blade that had never existed. She did her best not to let her surprise at the movement show as she alighted on the beach, taking stock of her surroundings.
The Empire Eighty-Eight had a lot of capes. Easily twice as many as the local Protectorate if the idle whisperings of her classmates could be believed.
And Taylor recognized maybe three of them.
Kaiser, because he had the gall to not only be a Nazi, but to be the leader of the local Nazi's. He was the type of Cape that had a legend to them. A larger than life mythos that could never fail to make it into the ears of the common man, regardless of their interests. His power, as far as Taylor could tell, was to generate blades from any surface.
Hookwolf, because he made the news once a week every week. His fights always had tremendous costs in human life, and it was practically impossible to tell what would set him off. He wasn't exactly a member of the Slaughter House 9, but Taylor wouldn't be surprised if he was. Taylor didn't really know what his power was, but it amounted to turning into a giant metal wolf, so she supposed the name was simple enough to parse.
And finally Purity, because knowing when to run away and when to hide in place was a vitally important decision when she was in a fight. Purity didn't kill people, she killed buildings. The people were just an unfortunate side effect. Purity was more than just 'a' blaster. She was the blaster as far as Brockton Bay was concerned. She was often graced with nicknames like 'Nazi Legend', and it showed. Purity didn't start fights, she ended them.
Unfortunately of all the various costumes arrayed before her, Taylor recognized exactly two. Kaiser, and Hookwolf.
This was why, she thought numbly, she should have done her research before putting on a costume and going out to pick a fight with the gangs. She had no idea, who the other four people present were. There was a guy wearing old school knight armour, a woman wearing a cage on her head, a man wearing a tiger mask, and most importantly, the monochromatic man holding her father's hands tightly behind his back. And that wasn't even counting the handful of tatted-up goons holding the captured ABB members down.
"Ah, I knew you wouldn't disappoint. It was only a matter of time before that mongrel picked a fight with one of his betters." Kaiser comments idly as you approach, stopping as soon as you no longer need to use Spiritual Power to create footholds for yourself.
"...he didn't give me much choice." Taylor put forth in response, not bothering to comment on how none of the other members of the so-called 'superior' race present could have hoped to stand against Lung.
"Too true. We had heard that Lung had broken the unwritten rules against one of our own and decided to render assistance. I hope you don't mind." Kaiser answers her, carefully not spending more than a cursory moment examining the bedraggled Asian man she was holding. She does her best to keep his face hidden from view, keeping it angled downwards towards the sand.
"Unwritten rules?" Taylor queried, not daring to acquiesce or directly agree with anything Kaiser is saying. This scene was oddly familiar to her after all. She had seen it replayed, day in and day out, for over a year now. Wherein someone with power and influence has her cornered and at their mercy, turning her every word against, whispering sweet poison into her ears at every turn. It is why she finds it so easy to ignore Kaiser's conciliatory tone, instead, looking deeper at the intent within. He is simply too civil sounding. Too self-assured in his own righteousness.
"Ah, of course, you haven't been among us for long, so you would not know." Kaiser concedes smoothly, walking towards her casually, as if merely going to meet a friend.
"The Unwritten rules are thus; No unmasking, No attacking family, No rape, and No murder. These of course, only apply to other Capes." He explains, coming to a stop directly in front of her.
She wanted to comment on that last one, given Hookwolve's reputation, but again, she resisted. Antagonizing him at this point would help no one.
"They also," Kaiser continues solicitously, "don't apply to people who break them."
He waves a hand lazily towards Lung, the motion smooth enough that she was sure it would have become an offered hand, or a demanding grasp had she shown even the slightest inclination towards either. She was neither, however, and so Kaiser was able to disguise the gesture as just that, a flippant gesture of the hand.
"So what, I should kill Lung?" She bites out, allowing some of the duress she's been feeling these last few hours to colour her words.
Kaiser, for all he has been trying to come across as the better man, nods at her genially.
"You think I am a racist yes?" He asks her rhetorically, turning away from Taylor to look at the men arrayed behind him. She takes the opportunity to check on her Father and breathes a slight sigh of relief that he is both conscious and - aside from a bandage around his hand - well.
"I am not. Being better doesn't mean seeing no value in the lesser races, dear Taylor. It means being responsible for leading them. And so long as a few bad apples remain to rot the rest of the basket, they will never see better days. Not under a tyrant like Lung. You can see it can't you? The decay of the city as men like Lung and Skidmark tear it apart at the foundations seeking the barest scraps monetary gain?" Kaiser espouses, the rasp of his steel armour clinking against itself as he moves a poignant counterpoint to his deceptively calm voice, and the crashing of the waves.
He pauses to nod at the men holding the ABB gangsters down, and before Taylor could even think to react they had withdrawn firearms and summarily executed each one of them. Not a one of the thugs looked perturbed by their actions. Not a single one of the Capes even turned to look at the deaths.
Taylor found herself staring blankly at her first corpse, watching the life fade from its eyes with rising bile in the back of her throat that she had to fight back lest she vomit.
"I'm sure you believe that I am here with some ulterior motive. That I am here to demand or to take. I am not. I merely wished to make you aware of the safety my organization can bring to people such as you. It is a sad truth that the rules are unwritten for a reason, and that reason is, more often than not, that they are ignored. I hope you can understand. From one Hero of the people to another Taylor." Kaiser finishes, flourishing his Cape in a way that Taylor was sure Emmy would find moronic, and stalking away, into the night.
The man in white released her father, and along with the rest of the Empire, turned to leave.
They both remained where they were for several minutes afterwards, not daring to rush to each other for fear that the Empire was still here. That it was some kind of trap. When finally the damn broke, Daniel rushed towards his daughter with the frantic pace of a man who really didn't know what to say.
Taylor was caught halfway between a panicked giggle and a tortured sob, unable to get how stupid Kaiser's cape looked out of her head, even as she tried and failed to turn away from the corpses in the sand.
They held each other for several minutes more, when finally, finally, the roar of a motorcycle heralded the arrival of the Protectorate.
"Useless." Her father muttered under his breath, and Taylor couldn't help but agree.
A/N: It might interest you to know that I actually worked out what combination of bad things would happen depending on which choice you went with. The odds were so against you that there was no way nothing bad would happen. Pretty much every other option included me rolling to see if Danny survived the ensuing fight, followed by everyone finding out roughly how bulletproof Taylor is presently (Hint: Not completely against higher calibre rounds). Say what you want about the Empire, Kaiser isn't actually a moron. He's tactically pretty on top of things most days.
In other news, I apparently can't sleep so. Here. Take this chapter and let me taste sweet oblivion. I'm begging you.