The Devil of Brockton Bay - Chapter 60

One thing that people didn’t think about a lot was that no matter the scale of a fight, there were always rules that people expected to be followed. And not even the immediately obvious codified ones surrounding sports and the like.

A boxing or MMA match? Generally the participants didn’t go into it expecting to kill their opponent. Or for them to suddenly pull out a weapon and attack them with it.

On the other end of the scale, with full on wars between countries… Well, the Geneva Convention was a thing for a reason. But at the same time, outright assassinating the other side’s leader was frowned on – even denounced, as hypocritical as it was to protect a few old men and women from violence while they ordered people half their age to die on their orders – for one very simple reason.

If targeting the people that had the power to call off any more violence was accepted, it created the risk of creating a war where sheer inertia kept the fighting going until one or both sides were annihilated completely.

The Unwritten Rules were a bit like that.

Yes, they were more like guidelines on how Capes acted against each other than strict rules. But they also set expectations. A code of conduct that everyone abides by without even realising it most of the time.

You wouldn’t go into a boxing match expecting someone to bring a bat.

A war expecting weapons of mass destruction from the get go.

Or a Cape fight only for the fight to be over before someone could even put on a costume.

The problem with breaking those unspoked expectations was that they were all or nothing gambles. Because if you didn’t win immediately, your opponent was likely not going to hold back from doing the same thing.

And no matter how much Kaiser and Coil dressed up their actions or talked about how they were justified, the fact remained they had broken the unspoken rules of engagement and now everything was on the table.

Something I bet Coil was actually counting on.

I had a feeling he wanted us to act out in a big way. To lash out against the other villains while he positioned things in the shadows to his advantage.

And normally that would have probably worked.

We had been attacked by the Empire, the Undersiders, and the Travelers. There was nothing directly connecting Coil to the attacks, so why would we focus on him when we had such convenient targets to be pointed at?

Unfortunately for him, I was an outside context problem that knew things I had no reason of knowing. And now I had no reason to hold back and pretend otherwise.

I heard a door open up below me and patiently shifted in my seat to a slightly more comfortable position as I waited for the group to walk up to the loft.

Even without seeing them, I could tell most of the group was not happy at the moment by the sound of stomping feet.

Good, I wasn’t happy at the moment either.

Grue stalked into the room and threw his helmet at the couch before whirling back to face his team. “Lisa, what the actual fuck?!”

“Gonna have to be a little more specific than that, Brian. I’m a little burned out at the moment.” The blonde said wearily, removing her own mask and rubbing at her eyes.

“How about how the ‘simple’ job you pushed for suddenly has us linked to a kidnapping and us in a corner either joining under Coil or being tossed to the wind?” He raged. “Things we might have needed to know before even thinking about getting involved.”

“Yeah, not gonna lie, a heads up might have been nice TT.” Regent added, not looking particularly bothered. “I dunno if a quarter-mil is enough to cover this kind of trouble.”

“And I told you at the meeting that I couldn’t. I wasn’t kidding when I said one of the contingencies for me being a part of the Undersiders and getting Coil’s funding was that I needed to keep certain things secret.”

“So what, are we supposed to just shrug and accept that now? After you lied about that girl being held hostage and we just helped deliver her to someone who wants to use her like a tool?” Skitter’s voice was glacial.

“Taylor, hun, it’s not that simple.”

“Seems that simple to me.” Regent commented. “He dropped the soft sell pretty quickly once the dork asked about the girl. Pretty sure we weren’t supposed to know about his little snatch an’ grab.”

“You’re not helping, Alec!”

“No, but he’s right.” Grue scowled. “Before that he was giving us incentives with the option to walk away if we wanted. As soon as Taylor brought up what Lucifer said, that changed to we either join up and take what he gives us or we get removed.”

“That’s not what he said.” Tattletale protested.

“It’s what the fucker meant though.” Bitch commented for the first time.

“Fine, maybe it was!” Tattletale threw up her hands. “Does it actually change anything though?”

“How would it not!?” Skitter demanded.

“Because yes we know a few things that could damage Coil’s operations if the right groups learned about them, but… who would we even tell?” Tattletale asked. “The Protectorate heard the same thing we did, the Empire helped Coil, the Merchants aren’t big enough to go up against him now that the Travelers joined him, and the Peerage just got hit by nearly everyone. They won’t be in a state to do anything for a while.

Well, there was my cue…

“I wouldn’t be so sure about that.” I said as I dropped the invisibility spell hiding me from the group.

The panicked reactions from the Undersiders were a bit amusing, but I was on a schedule.

A few small bolts of lightning to stop them from moving too much and some threatening magic circles surrounding them kept everyone in place long enough that I could talk.

“I didn’t come for a fight, so you can all calm down.”

Unsurprisingly, none of them did. But they were at least over the initial fight or flight reflex.

“Lucifer, what are you doing here?” Grue demanded, ink-like smoke wisping off his form.

“Well, I figured you all would have heard Coil’s recruitment pitch by now so I figured I’d swing by and explain why you should be working for me instead.” I explained, enjoying the shock on everyone’s faces.

“You seem… very confident about that.” Tattletale said cautiously.

I smiled at her. “I can be pretty convincing when I want to.”

“You’re not doing a good job so far.” Grue growled angrily. “Following us back to our hideout, waiting until we unmasked… I thought the rules meant a lot to you? Compared to the boss we had a pretty good relationship with even if we didn’t know who he was but kept his word… I’m not seeing much of a reason to trust you, let alone work for you.”

“The rules do mean a lot to me, Brian Laborn. Do you want to know why?” I said, ignoring the sharp intake of breath from him and most of his team at the mention of his full name. “Because I’ve been trying very hard to not get sucked into the politics that powerful capes seem to attract.

“Unlike Coil or Kaiser, I have no interest in ruling part of the city. I don’t want some criminal empire bowing to my wishes. And I don’t have some philosophy or agenda to push on the people around me. All I wanted was to have fun with my friends and maybe set up some battles with the heroes from time to time. I even had the beginnings of an agreement with New Wave before things started to fall to pieces!” I smirked a bit before letting it fall away from my face.

“But I knew from the start that was unrealistic. The gangs wouldn’t let someone as powerful as me just do whatever I wanted, let alone the PRT. And that was before the Godzilla incident, the Cult, the ABB bombings… So I decided to build a reputation for sticking to certain rules. Simple things that everyone already claimed to follow and a policy of ‘don’t mess with me and I won’t mess with you’.”

“How does this help then? You’re breaking your own rules.” Skitter asked. I could practically see her mind moving a mile a minute trying to figure how to get out of this situation.

“Holding yourself to rules everyone else ignores is either misplaced pride or masochism. And I’m a big believer in what goes around, comes around.” I replied. “You attacked me out of costume, Taylor Hebert, your allies attacked my home and kidnapped a girl that had no interest in being a cape. You don’t get to complain if I decide to do the same.”

“Why us though?” Tattletale leaned forward. “If this was just about getting back at everyone who attacked you, you could have just ambushed us but you’re trying to recruit us instead. Why not start with the Empire or Coil?”

“Uh, hey Tats? Maybe don’t encourage the devil lady to kick our ass when she has us by the balls?” Regent complained.

I ignored him. “Not going to ask about the Travelers?”

“You already know they’ve been working with Coil before tonight, somehow. We were the only group involved that was semi-independant, but we’re too small-time to put this much effort into when the Empire is a bigger threat and Coil was the mastermind behind the plan.” She looked harder at me, “But… you aren’t worried about either of them for some reason. Care to explain?”

“You mean monologue until one of you thinks of a way to escape?” I laughed at how none of them bothered to deny it. “But fine, the simple reason is that I’m pretty sure the Empire is going to have their own problems soon. And Coil won’t be a problem for much longer.”

“What does that mean?” Skitter asked.

“It means she’s already made moves against them.” Tattletale spoke up. “No, you made a move against one of them. The Empire? No, Coil. What? How?!”

“Just because I did my best to avoid participating in cape politics doesn’t mean I didn’t plan for people that wanted to keep poking the dragon, Sarah.”

Tattletale paled.

“I thought you were supposed to be the devil?” Regent commented, getting a small smile from me.

“Call it double branding then.”

“What am I not good enough to get a name drop?”

I shrugged. “I was mostly doing it to make a point and to avoid a fight right now because I’m busy. Rachel’s name is public record so I wasn’t going to bother, but if you’re feeling left out, I’d be happy to include you, Jean-Paul.”

“...well, fuck me then.”

“No, thank you. I have standards.” I said, rising to my feet and giving the group one more look.

“Now, like I said, I’m a little busy at the moment. So think my offer over before making any decisions but just know that right now the Peerage is not pulling many punches. If you decide to be our enemies anyway? Well, you were warned. Otherwise, I’ll send someone over to get your answer in a few days.”

My final message delivered, all my spell circles winked out and I teleported away.

“Just one more thing to do tonight.”

-o-

One thing I appreciated about living by the ocean and being able to teleport was that if I had someone I needed to keep around for a bit and didn’t want anyone else stumbling across them or them being able to escape on their own, it was really easy to stick them on a disabled boat for a few hours by themselves until I popped back in to talk with them.

Not something I would have thought myself actually doing just a few months ago. But I guess Brockton Bay had a habit about bringing out the worst in people.

My target was the Ocean Wave, a small fishing boat that floated fine, but if anyone was paying attention they would have realised it was missing both its engines and that half of the cabin’s windows had been replaced with plywood.

If they got even closer, they would have realised that the cabin had been stripped completely bare and the only person on board was a singular man tied to a chair.

It was such a shame that not many people would consider night fishing in the Bay, or be willing to approach another boat even if they saw one.

As soon as the flash from my teleportation faded away, my captive stared angrily at me. But being bound and gagged didn’t really make him all that intimidating.

“Hello, Thomas. Let’s have a chat, shall we?”