E.R.A.O Danger Report:
Subject: Cassandra Cassidy(Alias: Bloom)
Location: Cassandra resides in the first ring of Venus City where she has set up an elaborate bio-lab deep under an empty warehouse, creating and selling biological weapons within the Federation's black markets.
Status: Alive
Temperament: Aggressive/defensive. A danger to others, but not unless provoked, with a seemingly darker view on morality and no real sense of responsibility for the havoc her weapons could wreak in the wrong hands. More interested in funding her own research than the overall betterment of mankind, not unlike many other single-minded prodigies. Overall, not an individual worth a lot of resources, but also not much of a threat on a City-level.
Power type: Cassandra’s official power has never been reviewed nor listed under E.R.A.O Exodus research but after reviewing imagery from her battles and analyzing evidence from her crime scenes, E.R.A.O specialists find it safe to guess that she possesses a symbiotic Minder/Prodigy ability which allows her to both produced highly weaponized flora and create a mental connection between herself and them. Her power is thus significantly reduced within the Globes due to a lack of ether-infected flora. To this point, all travel passes to the Rift, along with E.R.A.O assignments taking place outside the Globe, will be blocked for Cassandra.
Threat level: High Delta or low Zeta Level threat
“Well, well, well.” Cassandra mused, leaning close to her box's edge to get a good view of the paralysed Borg exporating into gold. “He might actually get close to winning.”
The supervillainess had demanded it mostly in jest to begin with. Maybe motivation as well? Because she hadn’t thought the scrawny but lanky cashier had a puncher's chance of even getting in the Pit’s newbie pool top five. But here he was, already having earned himself a hearty five thousand regardless of what the angsty teen he’d chosen to team with did to him.
She might’ve been more confident in his chances if she couldn’t read his facial expressions. Because the smile of confidence Luke was flashing now was the fake one. Not the insane one he occasionally showed ever since he’d showed up star-eyed at her apartment. Still, the odds could shift in his favour.
From what he showed, Cassandra was starting to believe he had a chance, regardless of how unlikely it seemed.
Especially after his performance against Aqua.
What even was that? She’d been steadily trying to get a read on his abilities, and after realising it wasn’t a revenge-type power, she had started to suspect it was a toolbox power with a quirky side to level him out. Toolbox powers, or jack of all trades type abilities, as non-E.R.A.O. affiliated liked to call them. Powers that allowed one to summon the right thing at all times, even if it wasn’t especially powerful.
Like having a counter to every move your opponent made. The only problem was that they were almost always weaker in exchange for their versatility.
But apparently, you don’t follow that trend, little star boy. Cassandra thought, feeling a sense of… was it pride? It certainly felt like something close to it as she imagined what Damian’s face would look like, seeing his sponsored new aspirant get trumped by some rando she’d pulled outta her apartment.
“Guess the favour was worth it after all, you little shit,” Cassandra said, cocking a grin. It was starting to feel like she was the one who’d rinsed him, and not the other way round. She went to take another victorious sip of her wine, but the door to her private box slammed open before she could, sending a vibration that shook the whole room.
“Speak of the devil,” Cassandra whispered to herself, turning to face the man who looked half annoyed and half infuriated which both equally made her day that much better. “Come back to lick your wounds.”
“You’re an idiot.” Damian spat, walking straight to her personal fridge and retrieving the most expensive whisky she had in there. “An absolute embarrassment to the rest of us proper supervillains.”
What a scathing remark. Normally, she would’ve bit back, but it was wrong to kick a man while he was down.
And it was also much funnier to watch the terrifying proper villain crime boss sulk over his loss. Considering his more… refined taste, the fact he was even willing to steal her whisky out of spite showed how truly at a loss he was. Good. a proper jackass like Damian deserved to get his feathers ruffled every now and then.
“You know that whisky wasn’t cheap,” Cassandra noted as he plopped himself on the edge of her box, probably keen to look down on the audience to make himself feel better. He was that type of person, after all.
“This?” Damian mocked, taking a swig from the bottle without even bothering for a cup. “It tastes like burnt oil.”
“It still cost me a pretty penny.” She refuted.
“Then that makes you even more of an idiot,” Damian muttered.
“Did you come just to insult me? Or did you want some of my burnt oil for the road?” Cassandra asked, smiling as he turned around to snarl at her.
“I swear… sometimes I wish the Exodus Accords weren’t a thing so I could just put you in the ground already. But then I remember that the paranoid schizophrenic would just kill everyone stronger than a Swarm Tyrant if he weren’t bound by the same rules we are.” Damian said the last part more softly, because speaking badly of Oblivion wasn’t something you did loudly. He sighed, loudly enough for him to want her to hear it, before he continued. “How much?”
Ever the persistent little fucker.
But then again, the legend of Crypt wouldn’t have gotten nearly so over-bloated if the man took “no” for an answer. As strange as it sounded, the word simply wasn’t a part of his dictionary unless he was using it. Both his best and worst quality, depending on how you looked at it.
“As I told you, I don’t have V under contract,” Cassandra said, relishing in the way he spat at her when she did. “And personally, he doesn’t strike me as the type that would accept working for another.”
Well, any other besides Super-mart.
“Yeah, I got that,” Crypt mumbled. “What I meant was how much do I have to pay you to get the insider info on whatever the fuck his power is?”
“The great genius supervillain Crypt hasn’t been able to work that out yet?” Cassandra said, embedding as much sarcasm as she could. “How precious.”
“Please, we both know my field of expertise was always in logistics and infrastructure. I’m not so prideful as to not know when I’m out of my wheelhouse and you were always the one to handle power theorising when we worked with each other.” Damian said, honestly surprising Cassardra as he offered a rare compliment and admission that he wasn’t perfect. “That’s exactly why I run a highly successful criminal enterprise, and you think your plants are your friends.” Support the creativity of authors by visiting Royal Road for this novel and more.
Okay, that one hurt a bit.
“And now you’ve come crawling to the lady who befriends plants for advice…” Cassandra said with much more venom than before. “...So what does that make you?”
There was silence as those words settled over both of them.
“Touche," Damian finally spoke, relenting. “So, do you have at least a few ideas on what he might actually be capable of?”
She thought she did. At the start, it had seemed like a clear-cut revenge power, because why else would he want to kidnap and beat up a random lowlife Supe so badly? Then, as he’d shown his abilities off more in the Pit, she’d realised that instead of having a revenge-type power, he was just that tad bit off the rails. The kind of off the rails you needed if you wanted to last long in the supervillain business.
After his last fight, Cassandra had moved to thinking it was a toolbox power. Something that relied on transmutation, which allowed him to change the properties of something. Like the bullet he’d turned into a pie and ground he’d made bouncy. But then there was the way he’d blasted through Aqua’s defences easily and the fact that he hadn’t just done that again with Borg. That had to mean something.
All in all…
“Honesty, I’m not sure,” Cassandra admitted, earning a look of genuine surprise from Damian. He was right, this tended to be her area of expertise. “I’d need to see him out in real danger before I could make any sure guesses.”
Damian nodded at that, taking in the answer.
“Where do you think he’ll end up?”
Ah, the good old question every Supe asked themselves when they first got started. What threat level could they reach. What classification could they ascend to? Where would the wings of their Exodus finally settle them?
“At least Delta.” Cassandra assessed, comparing how well he’d done against others who would almost certainly reach that mark. The werewolf, Aqua and Borg were all at least capable of that, if not already there. If V took the three of them down just a couple of days after an Exodus…
“It’s too soon to think he’ll be on an even playing field with us.” Damian muttered, taking another swig of liquor that was beneath him. “Every star can burn out.”
That was true enough. Cassandra had seen too many up-and-coming Supes come up short, whether it was because of themselves or the doing of others. Potential didn’t mean power, and more often than not, those who burned the brightest got snuffed out early. If that happened, though, were they truly ever meant to reach so high? Nature had a way of taking its course.
The supervillainess moved her gaze back to the projected images in the sky, watching the aspirant who owed her do his usual.
The unusual.
“Are you sticking around just to mope?” Cassandra asked, watching Luke keenly. “Because that’s what the bar is for.”
**********
The Pit could be a nasty place. It was the nature of the thing. With money of the line, an adoring audience raging for blood, and the Guardian Bracelets as a safety net it could inspire people to do things they would never consider otherwise.
Things like betraying your potential team leader.
But even more than that, the sheer brutality of the Pit and as an unyielding machine of adrenaline and pain could bring back oh so terrible memories. Memories that were better left buried. Like Luke’s tenth-grade track and field day, which was the only time he’d ever run so hard he’d thrown up, puking all over the finish line and deeply embarrassing himself in front of his crush.
A very traumatic memory.
And one he was reliving through the Pit as he sprinted around the small arena space, avoiding being skewered by his own teammate, who chased after him in a huff. His body felt like it was on fire, and he was puffing like crazy, but still, he managed to run. Regardless of how he assumed his hyper-unfit body should’ve failed him at this point.
Luke just attributed it to Brute. Come to think of it, the more he’d fought through the Pit, the closer entwined he’d felt with the stat. Originally, he’d assumed it was a flat strength bonus, then he’d come to realise it was more like an outsider force permanently attached to him and now… he’d begun to see how it affected more than just force. It affected his whole body. His entire biological system seemed to be boosted by Brute, gaining more endurance, strength, and even healing.
I think… I kind of get it. At least a little bit. Luke wondered, before red words popped into existence in front of his exhausted form.
[Congratulations, you have successfully uncovered the stat Brute. You may now read the full stat description.]
[Brute: It’s smashing time! For a supervillain, there’s no tool more reliable than good old physical violence, and for the more simple-minded, anger-prone individual, Brute is the stat to choose. Brute empowers all your physical attributes with Ether, increasing strength, speed, stamina, and healing factor along with a myriad of other bodily functions, allowing you to smash, dash and crash any party with overwhelming force. Brute is the archetype of the destroyer. Side effects may include anger, rage, an increased desire to destroy those weaker than you and an increased infatuation with steroids.]
Steroids? Honestly, considering the path he was going down, that didn’t sound like a bad idea-
“NO!” Luke shouted out, slapping himself out of it as he ran. “NO STEROIDS!”
“Will you stop running and just let me catch you!” Shrapnel shouted from behind, hot on his tail and looking a lot less puffed. There wasn’t even a drop of sweat dripping down the young man’s face. “I’m getting really sick of chasing people”
The teen did look quite fed up, but Luke didn’t really care. Luke had clawed his way through two fights which meant that most of the competition should’ve levelled out by now. There were probably only at most two or three fights going on besides theirs, so all Luke needed to do to get his hands on money was just wait those other fights out.
The cashier had already tried to explain this simple fact to Shrapnel, but Snapper had already put this strange idea in the teen’s head that Luke was not to be trusted. Since he’d basically ran himself out of super, Luke concluded his best option was just to run until he dropped.
Which, again, really really sucked.
My whole body’s on fire. Luke thought, ducking out of the way as Shrapnel chucked an exceptionally big chunk of tile at his head.
“Rude!” Luke shouted at his potential henchmen. “I thought we were teammates!”
“We will be after the Pit.” Shrapnel said, emphasising that their agreement would only go into effect after the dust had settled. “I need that hundred grand.”
“You’re a teenager, what could you possibly need a hundred grand for?!” Luke said, pitching a knife straight at his chest. It bounced off his skin as Shrapnel turned his whole chest into metal.
“My mum’s mortgage.” Shrapnel answered, immediately putting to bed the idea in Luke’s head that he was just gonna drop the whole hundred thousand on a bunch of black rag Sith-looking outfits. “It won’t pay off all of it, but it’ll help her out a lot. She might finally let me do the supervillain thing, instead of me just sneaking around behind her back.”
Oh yeah, I forgot he’s not actually allowed to be here. Not that he expected a place like the Pit to care for parental consent. Cesar was one of those rare few people who possessed enough power to bypass almost every law besides mass genocide and plotting the downfall of humanity.
“Listen, I’m proud you’d make such a mature choice with the money,” Luke admitted. “But you ain't getting it-”
Before he could finish, the living bedsheet charged him with a burst of speed, fully transforming into his metallic form just after he kicked off the ground. Luke could see him visibly slow down as the transformation took place, giving the cashier enough time to roll out of the way. What he didn’t expect was for the teen to trip on his own momentum, falling forward and losing focus on his transformation.
Giving Luke a perfect opportunity.
Gun in hand, Luke almost took a step forward to get the cleanest shot at his head. Then he realised something. Shrapnel could keep his whole body metal while being battered by a Swarm Hunter, there was no chance he’d just happen to leave his back exposed after he tripped over.
It’s a trap.
Luke took a step back, watching as the teenager almost immediately became fully metal again and dived at the spot he would’ve been had he taken the bait. He felt something bubble in his chest as he watched the dumbass who’d barely managed to rob him properly now set up traps midway through a fight.
Is this what it feels like to be… proud?
“Did you just try to trick me?” Luke asked, taking a few more steps back.
“Uhhhhhh…” Shrapnel mumbled, looking very suspicious. “....nooooo.”
“Lesson one of trickery, my young padawan,” Luke said, pulling out his trusty pistol. “You can’t bullshit a bullshit artist.”