The Silhouette and The Forge
Chapter 10

Steps echo out on the streets as we walk along it keeping our eyes peeled for whatever is out in Gotham killing anyone and everyone. Making sure my beer hat has the Jet in place in case I need a quick boost. We came around the corner to attack another smaller gang's territory, knowing where they had congregated after we pushed them further in.
 
Following behind the boys, they round a corner but stop in their tracks speechless. Rounding the corner about to ask them what the hold up is but stop, jaw hanging as my eyes widen in disbelief. Bodies. Or what was supposed to be bodies. Either sliced to ribbons, shredded into hamburger meat, or some other fucked up form.
 
“We need to leave.” One of the others says, all shaking our heads in agreement before we back up hightailing it out of there. Running back, I feel like we are being watched taking glances around. I don't see anything. Even with the night vision that drink gave me.
 
Becoming more and more unnerved, not wanting to be at the back of the group anymore, I ran faster overtaking two of the others. “Hey what the hell you are supposed to be at the re-”
 
He is silenced to my surprise and the groups, turning around and not seeing him. After a few seconds of us stopping and looking back, weapons raised, something falls from above. It was his gun, covered in blood. Without any prompting, we raise our weapons and open fire on the building next to us with the gargoyle statues getting shredded and torn to pieces.
 
Raining down parts of the building as we unload into it, a blurry form leaps from the building adjusting our aim and trying to hit it. As my head moves to see it, I see movement off to the side. Not taking any chances, bringing the straw to my mouth and biting down on a button, I get a lightheaded feeling and my body feels even lighter. That’s the feel-good juice I’ve grown to love.
 
Seeing the bullets and waves generated from their path in the air, the figure across the street is still a blur even when slowed. Eyes widened watching it cross the street-wide gap in a blink, before quickly changing direction and moving through Tony and the others who didn’t even notice it like a gust of wind, bending and moving at unnatural angles, they shoot a few more bullets before they stop altogether.
 
Their expressions slowly shift from focused to a blank look. And before my eyes, their bodies split apart faster than the blood has a chance to escape. Bringing up my ump and opening fire on the thing that killed them. It has stopped moving by the time I shoot, holding still, looking back at me. It looks like a ninja, covered in black with numerous blades across its body.
 
Circular soulless white glowing eyes stare back at me, just as the bullets are about to hit, the figure's upper body turns into a blur. I see afterimages with each bullet being dodged, but its legs haven’t even moved from the same spot it was standing in. Gritting my teeth clenching a grenade in one hand as my magazine runs out. About to pull the pin, the ninja doesn’t so much move as it floats across the ground, a curved blade in hand pointed at me.
 
A scream escapes me before it stops as the figure disappears. My body can’t move. I can’t do anything. What’s happening? Then I’m falling to the ground, rolling before it all stops. Looking up, a headless body falls apart in a jumbled mess. What.
 
Then a hand severed at the wrist falls in slow motion before my eyes. A grenade held in its grip, without the pin. Panic sets in but I can’t talk or do anything, I try to run but my legs don’t respond. The hand hit the ground, the grenade leaving its grip with it slowly bouncing back up and down before rolling to a stop in front of me.
 
With time still being slowed, I see it break apart, with metal fragments and fire blossoming forth. As the metal and fire are about to touch me, I see the figure drop the blade to the ground while it stares at my fallen form. Emotionless gaze, looking me in the eyes in my final moments on the other side of the forming explosion. A monster is my last thought before fire obscures everything…
 
…
 
Slowly at first, the gunfire and explosions petered off. The occasional shot would be fired intermixed with others all at once, only to be silenced all the same. The Hunter units are doing wonderfully. The unfortunate thing was that despite dealing with a majority of Anarky’s subordinates non-lethally, he had gone to ground alongside many of his henchmen. And I can’t find any trace of them.
 
Anarky isn’t necessarily wrong with what he preaches about the powers that be. I am a patriot to my country at the end of the day, I’m not a communist or anarchist but even I can’t turn a blind eye to the failings of the local government. Just look at the state of Gotham. So they saw a chance to fix their lives and get back at the ones who ruined them in the first place. I can’t hold that against them, I just don’t like that they were going to use my drugs to do it. Putting a bullseye on my alter ego in the process. Well, a bigger bullseye but my point remains.
 
The gang members were just killing and hurting each other over scraps or just for the fun of it. These people were at least doing so for a higher cause, depending on how one views all sides of this. That and the drug addiction kicking in may have had an impact on how much they listened to Anarky.
 
How annoying. Well if anything came of this, I need to make more drones and spying methods to get a tighter grip on things. If it wasn’t for the hunters being sent out, and using the Batcomputer temporarily to take out any cameras or other methods of getting images of my hunters out of commission temporarily, then this could have gone worse.
 
At least Operation Bait and Switch seemed to work out. The real test will be what the public and Batman think about it after this day is done. Having a local myth come out of the dark and start massacring all the criminals and sparing the homeless and downtrodden who didn't have any major crimes to their names will be useful for buying me time. Helps that the Batcomputer has been using facial recognition to quickly relay information to the hunters to know who to kill and spare.
 
Pacing back and forth watching the feeds as some information is relayed to me, such as the Bowery or Old Gotham becoming calm. Or how Penguins men and Black masks backed off for now after some of them were eliminated and both have hunkered down, fearful of the Court coming for them. Wouldn’t have expected them of all people to be scared of them.
 
One group in particular that I made sure to prioritize was Old Gotham. That of Amusement Mile. A gang that is controlled by Joker. I made sure to have every single one of those men that made up that monster's gang killed. No survivors. Unfortunately, Joker himself was still in Arkham during this fiasco.
 
I may have liked the Joker when I was a kid and he was just a fictional character. But when it’s not on a screen and can harm me, that changes. Like leaving a venomous snake around your home, and your family. A big risk, and one that should be taken care of by killing the snake. The deaths of all those snakes won’t bother me in the slightest with how far gone those men were alongside knowing what they all have done.
 
Everyone else however I will feel some regret at least. A hell of a thing to order the deaths of all these people. Sure, I had already killed some people. And even if not directly with all the deaths from the drug users going crazy, but never had the power to order someone’s death.
 
No wonder so many people who get a taste of some power no matter how small and insignificant, get corrupted by it. I feel the shaking in my hands, the excitement palpable of having so much control. I always lacked control of my previous life, resenting it so much. I felt like I was bound and shackled in chains that I could never hope to break free from.
 
Part of me feels sadness at the deaths of so many people. Like letting a bunch of zoo animals out of the zoo and then being forced to put them down because of how dangerous they have become. The excitement dulls at the images of the people I can never forget, even if they were nothing more than scum. Lesson learned: don't oversaturate super drugs in the market when the city is already volatile enough.
 
Especially when those drugs can cause mass chaos with how powerful they can make someone. When this has finished, I need to water them down to make sure it’s not as powerful as it is now while ensuring people still buy them.
 
Despite how that may sound like I'm taking this lightly, and not viewing all the lives lost as significant as they should be. I understand quite well how bad this is, but what’s the alternative? Let them kill each other until Batman manages to stop all of it? He is as overwhelmed as the cops, having to practically deal with all the gangs. Not just the big ones. From the biggest to the smallest. All of them. My drones managed to pick that much up as he went to town taking many of them down.
 
And the GCPD for all their efforts failed. Not like they could do anything, to begin with. Like how the hell is a regular street cop, even a Gotham one, going to deal with someone able to see bullets in slow motion and dodge them at mid-range? Or a drug that brings forth bloodthirsty tendencies and aggression that augments physical strength by a significant margin.
 
From what the engineers managed to gather many cops had died because of this incident. Thankfully the numbers were only big at the beginning, once they started figuring things out and getting better weapons and equipment from a generous donation from Wayne Tech those numbers started going down. They still lost far too many officers by that point.
 
Whatever excitement was in me faded completely at the loss of not necessarily good people, but they weren’t all evil either. At least not entirely, when you have people like Jim Gordon and Harvey Bullock, to name a few.
 
Staying in a job like being an officer in Gotham had to take some resolve and conviction of some kind, even for the corrupt cops. After all, most criminals will try to kill you at any chance they get in a city like this. And just about everyone is a criminal in this place.
 
I brush past the intrusive thoughts to ensure that I do what needs to be done. I stare at the monitors in the computer room as Light keeps me company while the Sigmas correlate information with the hunters and vice versa. Currently, as things stand, after a couple of hours, most of the gangs have gone to ground that had a lot of members or the smaller ones who were lucky enough to realize what was happening and stop fighting and run and hide.
 
The video feeds don’t bother me as much as they would have before I got here, and I can at least say I have enough humanity still in me to feel regret. Steeling my resolve, I push onwards on what I must do.
 
The majority of the criminals who didn’t know until it was too late were executed with extreme prejudice. From what the drones and the information relayed from the hunters showed, they were extremely efficient and lethal. Ranging from criminals sliced to pieces so fast they didn’t even realize what happened, to being turned into ground beef or minced meat. Crushed skulls and bodies with limbs twisted at angles that they were never meant to be in. At every future crime scene, a blade of some kind with an owl motif is left behind.
 
I didn’t know if the Court of Owls existed in Young Justice, but if the myths are around in this city then they must exist here. So I might as well use them as a distraction by framing them. Helps buy me time to consolidate and figure out what I am going to do. That and if Anarky comes out of whatever hole he crawled into, he has a target to go after now instead of all of Gotham’s government.
 
Batman is too stubborn to let what I have done go. So when, not if he comes for me, I will have to deal with him. Once Batman noticed something was up, probably his Batcomputer seeing the cameras going dark and the criminals going into a fear-filled frenzy, he was on the prowl. Brave man, I would be going the other way after seeing what was left of those people. But I rather keep Batman in the dark for as long as I can while using someone else as bait to keep him occupied.
 
I don’t want to take any chances with his capability to prepare for most threats. And I don’t want him getting killed either. Both out of respect for him, and more importantly, not having the Justice League coming to Gotham for my head. If that ever becomes a reality, I am going to need some good deterrents to get them to back off. The ones like Superman, Wonder Woman, and the Lanterns? Together they may as well be unstoppable currently. So I would rather avoid a confrontation if I can.
 
A sigh escapes me, now having to think of a way to counter any consequences that will come because of this day. Speaking of the caped crusader, he has to my mild surprise attempted to go after my hunters again after his first fight with them. But they now have orders to flee when he gets close. Currently, he is taking down the remains of Anarky’s people who didn’t go into hiding and my hunters didn’t have enough numbers to scour all of Gotham for them. And I am forever thankful I was here to ensure the hunters didn’t kill him.
 
The Sigma’s had told them upon seeing him to go non-lethal. They didn’t follow that order initially, believing I, their father, would want him dead for my plans to work. Plans they didn’t even know, I simply gave them the simple order of hunting gang members we designated for them with the Batcomputer.
 
The instant I saw what was happening on the chat feed between Sigma-1 and Hunter unit 073, I ordered them to do as the Sigma’s ordered. With that, they obeyed and didn’t kill him. If they had, there is no telling how bad the fallout would be across Gotham when the Dark Knight is killed.
 
And in doing so, I got to see that Batman, despite being blindsided by my hunter and not knowing its full capabilities, managed a solid hit on its head. It did enough to screw with its visual receptors and make the feed go blurry for a second, which would take some force to do. The hunters are not the most durable thing in the world, designed more for speed and agility. A philosophy I adopted in the few fighting games I played in past years. A preference for speed over raw power and durability.
 
That same speed has proven to be rather useful since they don’t have enough numbers to outright swarm Gotham’s rowdy criminals. That speed let them attack promptly, ending this fiasco before it well and truly reached the point of no return. A morbid thought comes to mind of how much data we have collected on the hunter's capabilities and seeing any flaws that we will need to smooth over.
 
Enough damage has been done for the time being. And there are some bright spots on this blood-soaked day. A decent amount of gangs, mostly smaller ones, have all but been wiped out. Across a broad portion of Gotham no less. So much so that most gangs wouldn’t have the manpower to keep all that land for themselves when they are busy licking their wounds.
 
Even amongst the bigger ones like Black Mask and Penguins gang. So that’s territory up for grabs like a big juicy piece of meat thrown between a bunch of hungry wolves. The clicking of shoes on the floor gets my attention, not glancing as the figure speaks, “Father, the streets are safer and many of the humans have been executed.”
 
“Well done, Smith.” Fully turning around I see the figure of Agent Smith. “Begin the next stage of the plans, setting up gangs with the hunters in either leading positions or a position to have some leverage or control over them. I don’t want another incident like this one happening again. And if the Sigma’s or Light gives you an order, follow it.”
 
At my praise, Smith smiles that oh-so-insidiously delightful smile Agent Smith would occasionally grace us with on the big screen. It took a lot of effort to not fanboy over that. “Thank you, father. And I will make sure they never cause a conflict in your city again, without your direct permission,” His head moves to look at Light and company with a frown replacing his smile, “Very well.”
 
Turning back around as he walks away with the engineers all giving pointed stares at his back, I hide the frown on my face at him and the others calling me that. I don’t like it. That and I need to correct whatever form of conflict is going on between them and the Engineers.
 
If allowed to go on, it could bring this all falling apart. To ensure the hunter’s loyalty, I had to be the one who had a hand in nearly all of their creation. Some time ago I had tested to see how much I had to do for anything sentient to be considered my creation to apply loyalty to me.
 
Nearly all of it. Even if I am not there personally and I made something to make them, it has to mostly be made by me. The engineers helped in the testing for this and to my annoyance, anything they mostly made wasn’t loyal to me if I only helped with minor things or small portions of their creation.
 
Now after I have made something and programmed it, so long as they don’t completely overwrite the core programming then it will remain loyal to me with varying degrees of severity. The issue is the software of my creations has to remain the same or mostly intact or it becomes wishy-washy on what will happen. Hardware they are fine with upgrading or doing as they please, at least what we have discovered. So, core programming must remain mostly untouched, and so long as I made most of it then everything is fine and they can upgrade it from there. Mostly.
 
At least I know the limitations of the ability I had gained. Such as whoever made the blueprints does not matter. What matters is who made it or made the machine that made it.
 
It’s why down by the warehouses next to the docks I had the engineers bring me the supplies necessary alongside the data necessary for the creation of the hunters. I put it into the conveyor assembly to begin manufacturing my guardians and executioners.
 
But after seeing the event with Batman, I see that their loyalty, as nice as it is, is not without flaws. They don’t take orders from the engineers unless I tell them to, and they are capable of thinking for themselves and may get an idea that something will help me and my plans. So they will act on it if they believe it benefits me. There is such a thing as being too good at your job. Which can go wrong, as it almost had in that moment Batman almost bit the bullet.
 
With most of my business concluded that I needed to handle personally, I trust Light and the Sigma’s to handle the rest. I left the workshop and began walking out of the apartment back to my clinic. Sirens can be heard across the area, showing the first responders are out and about now with a vast majority of the shooting being done. Seeing the burnt-out husks of cars or splattering of blood on the street or sides of buildings with almost every one of them having holes.
 
The smell of used bullet casings that litter the ground makes it smell like the Fourth of July. Some people are out on the streets, on edge and looking ready to run at the first sign of violence. I can't blame them for it. It would be hard to not run for cover at the first sign of trouble after what this city got put through.
 
Motioning with my lenses and sending a quick message to Jade for new training. Walking block to block, she meets me halfway to my destination wearing a white tank top with the smiling face of a green cat on the front. Black jean shorts with sneakers. Hair done up in a ponytail, with no sign of her wild black mane of hair she normally has.
 
“So what’s the training for today?” She asks me with excitement coloring her tone.
 
“Today you will be learning about the human body.” I say making her scrunch up her face like she just sucked on a lemon.
 
“You mean I’m helping you with that clinic you have? I’ll pass.” She says beginning to walk away without even looking back.
 
“Knowing about the body will help you more than you think. You can walk away and not get this training, I will still teach you, but you won’t reach your full potential without it.” I say turning my back on her and walking away, not bothering to look.
 
Her steps go silent before I hear her running to catch up with me. “How is knowing about the body and helping you with your patients going to help me get better at fighting and killing?” Of course, she would hear about my clinic, with the state of Gotham and its people, most medical practitioners legal or not will be getting a lot of patients for this mess.
 
“If you know how to put the body back together, you know how to take it apart. For example, the throat, heart, and back of the neck are prime targets to take someone down with a quick, decisive blow.” I point at each part of her body with her looking intrigued now.
 
“Those are some of the most obvious parts. The less known ones, like the inner thigh, are lined with a lot of nerves. If you manage to get a solid hit in that area the person will be in agonizing pain, making them more vulnerable to follow-up attacks with the pain hindering them.”
 
“Every hit or attack you make, doesn’t need to be an instant kill. Sometimes you will fight opponents that will see your methods as too obvious and predictable.” I say to her, making her take on a pondering look. We are nearing the clinic, just a block to go with a few turns.
 
“That’s why you never get hit by me when we spar?”
 
“That’s part of it, another reason is because of a difference in experience among numerous other reasons. Sometimes when you are fighting you need to go with whatever hits you can make. If it means slowing someone down in a fight, bleeding them out, or just hindering them however you can do it.” I say making punching motions at her solar plexus, a kick in the back of her knee, and a hit near her shoulder.
 
She hums at that information, pleased by it with her now side to side with me. Some of what I said was true, the other bits were just to get her to come and learn. After all, if she is to be an asset to me, I refuse to let her be an uneducated street thug. Those are a dime a dozen in this city, and I intend on her following along with me in future endeavors in my public persona.
 
One of said endeavors is to my annoyance not soon enough with the gang wars brought to an end, a lot of the schools are still shut down. This speaks volumes about how the schools usually stay open and only close during the worst events like Joker going on a killing spree, Scarecrow's fear gas threats, and so on. The fact that this is only one of a handful of the hundreds if not thousands of gangwars to make them shutdown is a testament to how much I had screwed the pooch.
 
“So did you check out the videos I recommended?” I ask her, curious if she did her ‘homework’.
 
“Yes I did, and I would have to say my favorite was Wing Chun. Do you think you could teach me?” She asks, fully turning to face me while walking down the grimy sidewalk. Give the girl this, she doesn’t bat an eye at all the blood from who knows how many died here on these streets.
 
“Sure, I have some knowledge of the style and can teach you the basics at least. You have improved enough that we can start going through the motions. For now, try and remember all the parts of the body I work with when helping these people.” I said to her glad she checked out the few videos I could find of good instructors showcasing different martial art forms Light put together and ran through me for verification. The perfect memory with the giant info dump in my head bleeds over a little into martial arts.
 
Rounding the street corner several people, be they civilians, or criminals, all moved out of their way in the packed street. Before I even got there it was dead silent, a few murmurs I could hear but most of everyone was silently staring at one another with others looking withdrawn.
 
Trying to not pay it any mind I unlock the door and enter into it with Jade, “Everyone move in single file lines, get lined up and I will help those who are in critical condition or close to it. If you have any weapons on you put them into the slot on the door to your left upon entering. Anyone who keeps them and keeps them in the open is getting knocked out and thrown out.” I say loud enough for all of them to start moving. Jade smirks at the suggestion of violence from me.
 
No one got into a fight to my shock, and quite a few people put weapons down the mail slot. I doubt it was all of them, but nice to see people listening if halfhearted. I quickly assess who is in the worst shape and take them back with Jade following me to watch. I try to not look at the rest of the hall as it is flooded with patients. The patients didn’t even ask why Jade was there as I explained different injuries to her while helping them.
 
She was reluctant at first, not quite liking having to learn about this. As time went on, however, she seemed to get into it. For what reason I don’t know, but I chalk it up to her realizing this can actually help her get better at fighting and might as well find a way to enjoy it to pass the time.
 
Gunshot wounds, stabs, cuts of varying kinds, among numerous other injuries. There was a tension in the air that I could feel, and I know everyone else does as well. Similar to when you know something bad is going to happen and are just waiting for it to happen.
 
Something that Jade even picked up on when sitting on the counter or a chair in the room. I would occasionally joke to lighten the dark and oppressive atmosphere that hovers over all the people in here. Jade would get a knowing look on her face, seeming to understand what I was doing, and hide it with humor to get the patients to laugh. And even a few chuckles out of me.
 
“Well if you broke your arm in two places, maybe you should stop going to those places.” She says with the trademark Cheshire grin I have come to know her for, making the young man laugh before wincing cradling his arm with bandages wrapped around it.
 
“Alright Jade, I think you and I need to have a heart to heart.” I say out loud holding a heart model I got off the street up to her.
 
The man laughs walking out the door before the next patient comes in. Jade just smirks at me before rolling her eyes at my terrible joke. “You just don’t know real comedy. I give you comedy gold and you look down on it. Well, a couple of attempts at exposure therapy will get you to loosen up.”
 
She and the new patient just look at me with blank looks, not understanding the joke. “Why didn't you get that one? Come on now, it was a good joke you two just ruined.” I say checking over the man as he sits down.
 
He gives me a wide-eyed look and then looks over to Jade, “Did Joker get out of the looney bin early? Cause if he did I think I found him. Only he can come up with terrible jokes like that.” He says with a shit-eating grin plastered on his face with Jade cracking up at his joke.
 
I rise looking over his leg with his pants pulled up showing bandages covering a nasty stab wound, a deadpan look on my face at that craptastic joke of all things. Insult to injury, not only Jade is laughing at the joke, but a not-so-insignificant amount of laughter is coming from the hall. “You know you got some guts to upstage your Doctor.” I added emphasis by tugging on the ends of the sutures in my hands.
 
He looks back at me with that grin, as he opens his mouth to speak, someone beats him to it, “Well it takes guts to be an organ donor.” A woman's voice is heard making everyone crack up. Even I smile at that joke.
 
“Alright, I will admit that was a good one. The stitches are all done. If infection sets in or the stitches tear, come on back and I will hook you up.” I say to him as the man leaves while the patients are telling jokes out in the hall eliciting more laughter helping ease the tension. Even Jade laughs occasionally and pipes in here and there.
 
I could get used to this. As I think this I am to my surprise in a sea of stars. This hasn’t happened in some time, and it feels… different. Things have changed it would seem, I feel more energy in me, and numerous clusters of stars whirl around me. I grab one, a sizable one at that. Then to my shock a smaller one from another cluster. I could get used to this.
 
Perks Gained: Chop Shop (Ben 10) (400CP) 
Alright, you got the car. Now you need someplace to put it and fix it up when somebody inevitably wrecks it. You’ve got your own little garage full of everything you need to fix and maintain vehicles you own, as well as stuff like weapons and little gizmos. Even if you’ve got some advanced alien technology nobody else has, the tools you need to fix it up can be found here as long as it’s nothing super rare or unique. 

Car? Easy. Laser Rifle? Pick up that welder and get on it. No matter what it is, you can bring in just about anything to this chop shop and find the tools needed to fix it. Only downside is that it’s not really great for things like big battleships or stuff the size of a building… it’s just the size of a normal garage, after all.

Re’em Blood and Pill (Harry Potter/Make a Wish) (200CP) 
Re’em blood in a flask used by Mr. Black to increase his strength and the pill to make him scentless and help in controlling his strength