Idle Hands are the Devil's Playground (Worm)

Whispers slithered through the alleys and byways of Brockton Bay, whispers of an unholy alliance. An alliance between two forces which had hated and killed each other for years, yet which circumstances had suddenly pulled together. The PRT had only this to go on, and nothing else which could have warned them when one of their convoys was mysteriously halted in the forests outside of the city.

In truth, there was no mystery as to why the convoy was halted in the least. The convoy consisted of ten military trucks, carrying in new personnel to the city along with their gear. Those men were well trained, and versed in anti-ParaHuman combat tactics, they had Capes providing overwatch. They were dead before they knew what hit them.

The lead truck, a huge ten-wheel army vehicle, rumbled by a hobo camp, the same as any of a hundred others. The vagrant sitting on the edge of the camp was one Walter Wagner, a member of the Empire.

Wagner leaned away from the convoy and murmured, "They're on their way." into his radio.

"We're ready to rumble." came the reply.

Stormtiger felt his hands curling into vicious talons in preparation for the ambush. He had been given gloves for close combat with metal claws where his fingernails should have been. He could smell the blood-tang of Hookwolf, his captain, and the synthetic musk of Rune's hair products. But they were all sharp and razor keen. They were situated at differing points of Parker Street, but they were all knew what was about to happen, what they were about to do.

The convoy was making good time, and would be arriving in less than a minute.

"Remember, Wittmann tactics." Hookwolf growled into his mic, "Box 'em in."

"Roger that Actual." reported in the various callsigns.

Hookwolf almost found himself sighing. He was a warrior, a berserker, not some bloodless officer. But, he was also a leader. He would do his duty, no matter how much he yearned to shed blood with his men.

"Almost time Overlord." Hookwolf reported in turn. "We're ready to go."

"Copy that." said Kaiser's radioman. "Good hunting Chosen."

Right at that moment the convoy hove in sight, and Hookwolf's company sprang into action.

XxX

Stormtiger still remembered that night when they had gathered to hear the Bloody Prince speak.

Night and Fog had been summoned back from Boston, and Purity had been lured back by Kaiser on the promise that the Empire would be reforming after this last assault. They had stood around the table ordinarily used for board meetings, but which had the secret secondary purpose of serving as a meeting ground for the Empire's leaders. They were all there, Meadows, Fleischer, Van Allen, Mrs. Anders, and Stadler, along with all their supporters, nearly a hundred in all. This number was augmented by the presence of the Azn Bad Boyz, who included Lung and his number two, Oni Lee. Stormtiger was Hookwolf's champion among the Chosen, and had a seat at the table by virtue of that position. And since he was closest to the door, he was one of the first to see the big doors open to reveal the person who was, so far as the Empire was concerned, the man of the hour.

Unnoticed by him, Kaiser must have pressed a button on his laptop, and started the music.

Die Fahne hoch! Die Reihen fest geschlossen!
SA marschiert mit ruhig festem Schritt.
Kam'raden, die Rotfront und Reaktion erschossen,
Marschier'n im Geist in unser'n Reihen mit.

The assembly stood, facing the revenant of the Third Reich, their arms raised in the old salute, and declaimed for the first and last time, the ancient greeting of that wicked crew.

"Heil Hitler!" they bellowed, with Night and Fog the loudest. Except for the ABB of course, they just clapped.

There he was. Dressed all in black and white, a ceremonial dagger and a Luger at his belt, with an officer's sword on his left, and the famous skull and crossbones on his cap. He greeted them with all the confidence and poise that was expected of one of Himmler's princes.

"Sank you, Sank you very much." the man said, returning the salute and performing a dignified bow. Then he advanced toward Kaiser, cape billowing out behind him, as the two clasped hands.

"I am glad that you have come." said Kaiser.

"I em glad to be here." Altburg-Ehrenstein replied. Then he took in the combined membership of the Empire and the ABB. "You know, zis is ze first time I've ever met any of you face to face. But let us see if I'm qvite up to snuff."

Every fighter, whether they are a tribal warrior or a professional soldier feels some measure of honor at being named personally by their commander. The Bloody Prince greeted Krieg first, conversing fluently in German with the surprised and delighted Helmuth Fliescher, who went by James while he was in America. He then moved on to Hookwolf, recounting several of his deeds as a pit fighter and afterwards when he had joined the Empire. He greeted Purity last, kissing her hand in the manner of the gentleman of the nineteenth century into which his persona had been born. Then, he regarded her with a calculating and supercilious stare.

Kayden Anders felt the judgement of those crimson eyes, though she knew they were no more than colored contact lenses. So why was she feeling so small?

"Your maiden name, madam, what vas it?" he asked, in a deceptively mild tone, which he deliberately modeled on that which the SS physicians made when making their selections for the gas chambers.

"It's Russel." replied Purity, somewhat taken aback by his line of questioning.

"Russel..." murmured Altburg-Ehrenstein, as if searching it for anything out of place.

"Is there something the matter, General?" Krieg asked.

The Prince said nothing, circling round Purity and looking down his nose, noting her every feature.

"Zat name comes from ze Normans, I do believe. Yet there is very little zat is Nordic about you." he said, staring at her face. "Your skull ist too narrow to be considered properly Germanic. I vould assume levantine or mongoloid intermixing." Then he walked back to Kaiser, "Had zis been ze age of ze Third Reich, you might haff been under suspicion of intermixture vith an inferior breed."

Kaiser said nothing, not bothering to contradict him or agree.

"For instance, how about you?" Bainbridge asked one of the middle rankers present, "Vat is your name?"

"Miller."

"An Anglicization or is zat your family name's natural spelling?"

"The second one."

"Too bad. Had you actually tried to join the Party, ve would have laffed in your face and then beaten you to a pulp. In the National Socialist mind, ze common English people are only vone step removed from the brute, and they would have treated the people of London as such. Only ze aristocracy would have been left alone and allowed to become Germans. The only Aryans ve knew were Germanic peoples. Anyone else was either an auxiliary or a slave, or outright exterminated."

This brought silence to the gathering, aside from Lung's thunderous chuckling.

"Honeztly ist it too much to hope zat you've even had a Wiener schnitzel?"

Miller's only reply was to quirk an eyebrow and say, "Gesundheit?"

Bainbridge noticed Krieg burying his face in his hands in the background. Looks like you can't make proper Nazis out of Americans, Mikey thought. You had to get them when they've just gotten off the boat.

"But I'm getting off track, aren't I?" he continued on to each of the Empire's capes. Stormtiger and Cricket he greeted with handshakes and a few words of introduction. The Crusader was more uncomfortable meeting Altburg-Ehrenstein, in character or out, especially when he was forced to concede the fact that he didn't have so much as a drop of German blood. Alabaster was actually intrigued, since he was a pure born German American. Victor and Othala were next, and the ex-Californian Bainbridge was mildly intrigued at their relation to the Herren Clan.

"No," he said with a smile, "Your family belonged to ze Herrenklub?"

"The what?" asked Rune, who was a member of the clan as well.

"You know, ze Herrenklub, ze most exclusive gentleman's club in Germany? You had to have an ancient lineage to even be invited to join." When he saw that confusion was his piece, he sighed and muttered, "Never mind."

Night and Fog actually greeted him with the old Hitler Salute and a chorus of "Heil Hitler!" They'd at least be useful, but they gave him the creeps. Oh well, what could be programmed could be deprogrammed. He also shook hands with several of Kaiser's unpowered officers, and then moved onto the ABB. Lung nodded, while Oni Lee bowed. Oni Lee; a deliberately pan-Asian name, Michael Bainbridge thought. A Japanese theme but with a Chinese or Korean name. Interesting.

There was only one left.

"Kaiser, you still haven't formally introduced yourself to me. You know my name, I don't know yours." he said.

"In a way, it would be right. You won't be calling me Kaiser much longer." said the leader of the Empire, who grinned behind his helmet. "My name is Max Anders."

The ABB reacted most visibly, Lung throwing back his head in a booming laugh, while others gasped in shock or fury.

Bainbridge did not. He was thinking.

"Anders... zat name rinks a bell." he said, narrowing his eyes as he considered Kaiser. Then he remembered where he'd heard the name, but the answer only raised more questions. What in God's name was a member of the House of Anders doing running an operation like this? Assuming he was indeed from the Anders family. Now was not the time to bring up such things, however. He would, he decided, discuss it with Anders alone, and turned back to the gathered officers and ParaHumans.

"Ve're a sorry and ragged host, aren't we?" low chuckles sounded through the chamber. "But Hitler und Stalin started vith less, it must be said."

There was a ragged cheer from some of the Empire's men. They knew what was coming, what they were about to do.

"I know you're proud of your brotherhoods. Your banners have earned many glories and suffered many tribulations. Yet our performance is going to win us a greater victory than has ever been contemplated."

Stormy applause greeted this short address.

"Zis is going to be the first battle of our new Axis," he leaned in on the table, and just when they were getting interested, said, "So let's make it a night to remember!"

This time, the cheering was outright deafening. There was no doubt about it, they were definitely psyching themselves up.

XxX

Snow Raven was in the lead vehicle, while the Fantastic Fox, an illusionist with a fox theme, rode shotgun.

"Keep your head on a swivel, Rae." Fox murmured, "We got mondo hostiles in this area and we've gotta get Northeast shored up before things go nuts."

"Don't start laying your cards out just yet Danno," Raven said, watching the corners. "We're in an MRAP, if the Empire's set any IEDs, we'll be safe."

A dull roar shook the vehicle as it neared a bend in the road.

"What was that?" Fox asked, withdrawing his collapsing cane from a coat pocket.

"That was no IED." Snow Raven said, slamming on the brakes, just as a rocket slammed into the engine compartment. The cab was armored, but the vehicle was a write-off. But they had a lot more to worry about than vehicular damage.



They had just enough time to get out of the truck when the shapes started bleeding out of the shadows, with a distinctive silhouette in the lead.

"Hookwolf!" Snow Raven shouted, a dozen ice feathers crystalizing out of the air. Then he recognized the others and felt the bottom drop out of his stomach. "The Empire's here!"

"Die Protectors!" Hookwolf's voice emerged from within a monstrous iron wolf as it made a leap that would have put a raptor to shame over the outrider and into the convoy's midst.

There are things about battle that movies cannot teach you, and one of these things is the sheer noise. No one ever saw battle, that's true. But they always heard it. The fighting was personal, oh yes. The bazooka crews fired volley after volley, not to destroy the vehicles, but to wipe out the soldiers. Rune hovered over the battle on a fallen tree, hurling trunks as long as cars down on the soldiers and pulping their bodies as they whirled through the air.

Snow Raven's power was over ice, and he could bear himself aloft through a gust of wind. He never got the chance.

He was in the midst of hurling a set of icy missiles when he was seized in the monster's bladed jaws, run through with a hundred spears. Hookwolf shook him once, just like a dog with a toy, and he was tossed in pieces into the foliage. The Fox was bisected by a blow from Stormtiger's aerokinesis, spilling a feast of wretched guts onto the ground. There were others, their eardrums bursting and their minds reeling as Cricket screamed a melody of death, carving them apart with great sweeps of her scythe.

The ambush took less than two minutes to accomplish, yet for the attackers, it felt like hours. Hours in which they had been locked in mortal struggle with people they hardly even knew. Hookwolf and his oldest comrades alone were unshaken. They were more than used to murder.

"This was too easy Stormtiger." Hookwolf said, the blades shrinking down into his flesh.

"A lot easier than what's coming boss." his champion said, dragging a body out of the path of one of the wheels of the second truck. "Hitting the PRT."

"Well, it's still nice to give them a little surprise when we get there. I bet you we'll get all the way to the HQ before they figure out what's up."

"No..." gurgled Snow Raven, reaching up with his one remaining arm to throw an ice feather at Hookwolf.

"I'll admit, you fuckers take some killing." the berserker turned on one heel and lashed out with a single arm, tipped with the blade of a longsword. It severed the wounded hero's head from his shoulders, and it bounced away into the green. "But not too much."

 

The hijacked convoy had been stopped for barely five minutes, and was back on the road in barely one. The bodies were buried in the woods, and they'd resumed the course that the Boston men had been fixed upon. When they passed out of the forest belt and arrived at the city limits of Brockton Bay, Hookwolf called in their position, and Kaiser's radioman called out a last pre-battle check-in.

"Fenrir's Chosen, rocks up."

"Dragon Devils, all sections ready."

"War Born, my battalion is in position."

"Valkyrie Squadron is spooled up and we're ready to go."

"Commence Operation Achse."

Of course, Kid Win didn't know any of this. To him, it was just another day, another dollar on the job for the Protectorate keeping the small area where the PRT held sway safe. He was on the job with Vista, since the kid was getting antsy, and they'd just about completed their final circuit of the morning.

"Kid, why did you build that hoverboard?" asked Missy.

They were side by side, he with his hoverboard under one arm like a surfer, and she in her green and white armor, walking down the footpath next to the bombed-out beach.

"You remember that one game, Sonic Riders?"

"Nope."

"Eh, its that one game where Sonic and his buddies ride rocket-powered skateboards. I played once before I triggered. It just... stuck with me, that thought of how awesome it would be to fly and do tricks like that. When I got my powers, I kept on it. Now I can fly."

So few words to tell so much. The endless nights trying to focus enough to work out the design, and then to find the right materials to build it.

"Wanna have a ride back to the ranch on it?" he asked, brightening up.

Vista tried to be mature, so as not to be constantly treated as the baby of the team, but even she couldn't help a quiet squeal of joy at the thought of flying.

"Then lets rock!" he said, throwing his board into the air where it hovered just high enough to step onto.



"I always say, if you're gonna ride, ride in style!" he said, swinging her up in front of him.

And off they went, rocketing down Martin Street towards the junction with Lord. Kid Win was something of a dark horse among the people who cared about the Wards. Shadow Stalker was a good magnet for the 90s nostalgia crew, no one could say Clockblocker's name without laughing, Aegis was cool in an old-fashioned sort of way, but there was something about Kid Win's good old college try attitude that made him one of the more popular figures among the BB protectorate.

His coms buzzed in his headset.

"You got Kid." he said into his mic.

"Aegis here, we got a convoy coming in from Boston. They'll need an escort and you're the closest. Make sure nothing goes nuts." said the voice from the monitor. The team captain had monitor duty that day.

"Roger that Aegis, on our way." Kid had to shout over the rush of air as he swung the board towards the outskirts.

There was nothing like what Vista experienced that day as the city blurred under their feet. Nothing like the feeling of flying without an airplane.

"I wonder if this is how Glory feels like?" Vista wondered out loud.

"Probably." replied Kid Win as his goggles zoomed in on the convoy that had just arrived in the compact part of the town. "Hey Missy,"

"Yeah Chris?" Vista didn't like the sound of Kid Win's voice as he brought the board up sharply.

"I think we have a problem." he said, as his visor lenses zoomed in on the lead truck. Those were definitely scuff marks on the hood, and those weren't Snow Raven and Fantastic Fox in the drivers seats.

The convoy's been hijacked. Those four words were the next that Kid Win was going to say. He never got the chance.

A hatch on the roof of the lead truck opened, and someone, he couldn't tell who, fired an anti-tank rifle at him. The shell whizzed past his ear by an inch, and he spun the board around and hit the thrust.

"Not the convoy." Missy said, for once not resenting Kid having his hands on her shoulders to keep her on the board.

"Oh its the convoy alright." Kid said, shooting over his shoulder. "But they got themselves hijacked!"

"I saw it." Aegis said over the headset. "The wards are pulling together at the intersection of Lord and Broadway."

And just like that, the world went crazy.

XxX

In hardly ten minutes, the whole city of Brockton Bay had erupted in chaos. No one had ever experienced anything like the organized mayhem that started in two neighborhoods and began closing in on the PRT's headquarters near to the boardwalk and the Mayor's Office.

But in the basement of a particular apartment block in the neighborhood of The Towers, the chaos was of a different nature.

"And you're sure this thing can withstand anything?" Mikey said, as Fenja helped him strap the bulletproof vest onto his bare chest.

"Yes, it can." Kaiser said, sliding his helmet on. "I tested it myself."

For some reason, Michael Bainbridge thought, That's not very reassuring.

"Are you prepared for this?" asked Kaiser, gazing at him through his t-visor.

"I don't think anyone can be prepared to fight Armsmaster." he said, buttoning up his shirt.

"Nevertheless, I have a feeling he will give the city a good show."

Bainbridge regarded Kaiser... Max Anders with a calculating stare.

"Yes?" Anders finally demanded after the staring had gone on for some time.

"I'd like to ask you a question." Mikey said as he finished buttoning up his coat. "What's a member of the House of Anders doing running some penny-ante Neo-Nazi crew?"

Anders glanced at Fenja and Menja for a split second and said, "Leave us."

When they had gone, Kaiser took off his helmet. His eyes were blue, that was the first thing that stuck with Mikey, deep blue.

"For someone who isn't a century-old undead aristocrat, you certainly know more than ordinary people would try to find out about the German nobility."

"But you're not nobility, strictly speaking are you. Your descended from the American branch of the family, aren't you? The ones with the actual titles are still in Germany, right?"

Anders nodded in the affirmative. "Yes, my family got their start as middle-class burghers in Nuremberg, and just before the Revolution, Baron Joseph von Anders sent his son Franz to New York to open a branch of the family bank in America."

"You reaped handsome dividends by that decision, did you not." Mikey said, grinning in the manner of a fellow conspirator. "But we're getting off topic: how did you come to be in charge of these maniacs?"

"You can thank my father for that." said Anders. "He was Richard Wagner Anders, more famously known as Allfather."

He suspected that would be enough to set Bainbridge on the right path and he was correct.

Mikey chuckled evilly, "Richard Anders was the black sheep of the family wasn't he? Real psycho from what I heard. So, they were going to ship him out to Cali or someplace but the fact that he triggered made him too hot to handle."

"Precisely. And given the fact that they couldn't just kill him, the family decided to let him rove abroad as a criminal, since he would never submit to the authority of the army, and there wasn't even a Protectorate at the time."

"So they cut ties with him, more or less?" Mikey asked, taking the opportunity to peer into the world of the super rich that he'd only been peripherally aware of in California.

"Do you think families get rich by disowning every member who does something wrong? I'm still an Anders, though the rest of the family probably doesn't care to sit too closely to me at big dinners."

"And your wife is socially unrecognized. I can see why you'd be none-too-keen to talk about that sort of thing."

Anders was silent once again, refusing to talk about Kayden. He didn't care about her as such, but one thing that his father had hammered into him was that family sticks together, no matter what.

"And what about you?" he asked, turning the tables on the youth. "What's your background like?"

"I'm one of Europe's mongrels. I've got everything from Irish and Scotch to Czech and English in my blood." he raised an eyebrow, looking for some bristle on Anders' part. "If you were sincere about being a modern National Socialist, you'd hate me for just that."

"Hitler hated the Czechs." Anders observed, academically. "Along with Russians, Ukrainians, Poles and all the other Slavs. Crusader picked up some of that, but his dislike of Poles is too American to be properly German."

"I doubt he even has a great-grandfather from that country." Mikey said, scoffing. "I wasn't joking when I said you were lucky I wasn't a real SS man. If I really was part of some long-surviving Nazi holdout, and we had Capes under our control, the streets of Brockton would probably be stained red long since."

"You know, the Gesellschaft is just such a holdout." Anders said, mildly.

Mikey gave him a sideways glance. "Come on Max, surely you suspect it too. Surely you've done your own digging. In all likelihood, the Gesellschaft is nothing but a front for the CIA or BND or another intelligence group. My money's on the CIA. They were the ones who set up General Gehlen and his gang of cutthroats after all. It'd be just like them to keep some crooks on hand as a money pump for their off-the-books operations. Where did Krieg go to meet with the Gesellschaft anyway?"

"London." Anders said, feeling a pit starting to grow in his stomach. "Every two years, he'd go to meet with them in London."

Michael Bainbridge stood rooted to the spot, "Oh my God." he finally said, shaking his head in astonishment. "I was so hoping I was wrong."

Anders would have asked more, but Fenja and Menja took that moment to enter the room again. "It's time." Fenja said, gripping her sword. "The city's in chaos, and Armsmaster's almost landed."

"Good. Then the final players in the drama can take the stage." Anders said, putting his helmet back on. Then, turning to Mikey, he said, "I hope you can give a good final performance."

"If there's two things in this world that I pride myself on," said Mikey, laughing, "It's my acting skills and my singing."

 

How easy it is to destroy, Michael Bainbridge thought as he watched the city going up in flames around him, and how hard it will be to create something new afterwards. Their men comprised a ravening horde, marching by company down the streets. It was part advance, part parade as they tramped with banners held high and rifles clutched in their fists. They had begun their march from the Kehlstein House, where the whole thing had started in a piece of symbolic theater. Thousands of them now marched in their old hodgepodge of black and red clothes, or the red and green of the ABB. This was to be the last demonstration of the Empire and the ABB, but it would also serve to gel them together.

Bainbridge was front and center in his persona of Altburg-Ehrenstein, leading the column as it began to drift apart into company-sized assault forces heading for their individual objectives. Not long now, not long at all.

They had one hurdle to cross, one hurdle before things could go forward and the city could slide into 'chaos.' The BBPD had to be overcome for the dam to break. And they had set up a barricade a half-mile from the Mayor's offices on Lord Street. A hundred officers had bundled into their riot gear and rushed to the scene.

It must be said beforehand that these men were well-trained, with many of them having served abroad as part of police exchange programs. Unfortunately, the situation they were deployed in was practically the opposite of what they'd been trained for. They had been trained as an auxiliary military force, ensuring the populace of their district remained quiescent, which was completely unlike the situation they had been ordered into.

Their training had been designed around breaking up mostly peaceful assemblies, and cowing people who weren't interested in fighting back in the first place. The force advancing on their position was not only hostile, it was well armed.

So they stood there, unsure of what to do, watching Kaiser's private army marching toward them. Then the ranks parted to reveal Altburg-Ehrenstein, who made his way out to the no man's land between the two forces.

"Run avay Orpo." he boomed, "Zis ist not a fight you'll vwin."

Several dozen Empire men had already raced forward and leveled their rifles at the police. These men, by contrast, were raised in the gutter-warfare of Brockton where anything went, and wherever it went, you could bet that it would be painful.

They could see the police starting to waver as a shivering motion passed through the entire phalanx.

"Just stay out of our vay, Blue Police. Ve have no interest in your lives, nor in zat fool Christner. So I say again, go back to your headqvarters and you may carry ze tale of our mercy vith you back to your homes."

When that failed to have a visible effect, the Prince's lip curled in a haughty sneer.

"Safeties." he said, and fifty AKs clicked in unison.

If the men that faced the Empire had been like the police of twenty years ago, they might have acted differently. They might have crashed their shields against the ground, shouting some sort of defiance against the men who brought death and violence into their city. If their motto had still been 'To Protect and Serve,' they would have dared them to try and force their way through. Instead, they turned their backs and ran.

No-one had expected this, least of all Bainbridge, but he saw how the men's hands tightened on their rifles, and their mouths contorted into snarls of fury at the prospect that bloodshed would be denied them. They were going to shoot, he knew it, and if he wanted them to follow his orders, he'd have to tell them before they took matters into their own hands. And he'd spent too much time in the city to have much sympathy for the police.

"Open fire!" he shouted, and the men were eager to obey. Don't think about it, he thought, as he watched men start to fall. He folded one arm under his cape to hide the fact that it had begun to tremble.

As it turned out, when push came to shove, there were a few who were willing to protect their fellow officers' lives, emplacing themselves and their riot shields as barriers between their colleagues and the Empire. But this was too little and too late for it to matter in any meaningful way. The paramilitary soldiers charged forward, forgetting all discipline and firing their rifles from the hip.

"Forward, to the protectorate! Kill everyone you find within!" Altburg-Ehrenstein roared, and the reality of the situation finally dawned on Bainbridge. He'd caused this. He had caused the deaths of more than a dozen men, and hundreds more were certain to die as the battle unfolded. That revelation might have been bourn were it not for the bullets whizzing past his ears. In that moment, for a few brief hours in his life, Michael Bainbridge ceased to exist. In his place stood Maximillian von Altburg-Ehrenstein, at last alive as Bainbridge had pretended he was.


XxX

"Director," the synthetic voice said, out of Director Piggot's comms, "A cursory evaluation of Axis capabilities indicates a distinct tactical deficiency."

"In other words, Dragon?" she groaned. Piggot remembered that movie. Gavin had loved it at first and cried when Optimus Prime bit the dust.

"We're outnumbered!" Assault shouted as he tossed a car towards a black-clad squad of Empire soldiers.

There were no words for the chaos that was rampaging its way across the city. The Axis was everywhere!

There were firefights in the docks and in downtown as scattered knots of policemen and the various mercenary forces clashed with soldiers of the Empire and the ABB.

Yet despite all the noise and combat, the damage would be found to be small. Mysteriously small when you came to think about it. When you thought about all the gas stations, oil stores and gun caches that could have been hit by rockets, tinker-tech rifles, or even stray hand grenades purely by chance, they'd really managed to frighten everyone without harming the city. Not that many people thought about this in the weeks after the battle, while the heroes were getting medals and commendations, and Armsmaster was doing his best impression of a statue as he was named as an honorary Righteous Among the Nations.

At the moment of course, no one could tell, and no one was taking any chances. Hundreds of people were fighting and undoubtedly dying as the day wore on. But as the sun began to set, a new force entered the fray. A small boat had put off from the Rig in the middle of the Bay, carrying Armsmaster and the senior members of the Northeast Protectorate, kept on the rig until this moment, getting their gear together and organizing the counterattack.

XxX

Kid Win found himself on the roofs, firing pistols, laser rifles and even the alternator cannon that he'd been developing on the sly. Around every corner were men in the black and red of the Empire, clutching assault rifles and shooting with every intent to kill. He put his collapsible combat blade through the mouth of a charging soldier, and he scorched another into blackened ruin. He killed a reaver of the ABB, pumping three shots into his exposed chest and then grinding down his bayonet into the man's ruined throat.

Something slammed into Chris's shoulder with the kinetic power of a sledgehammer. It spun him round, throwing him off balance. Through the haze that had filtered through his visor, he could barely make out what looked like a whole squad of Axis gangsters. One of them carried a heavy-bore grenade launcher, which Chris now realized had been the weapon that knocked him down, though not strong enough to penetrate his armor, as it had not been a direct hit, which would have surely killed him.

The gangsters bore down on him, eager for the kill, but as they passed through the shadow of a projecting stair enclosure, they collapsed in rapid succession, before even one could scream or cry out.

Stalker was the reason. Her form bled out of the shadow, a bloody ka-bar clutched in one hand. He had never been so glad to see anyone in his life.

"Get up Chris. We gotta rendezvous back at headquarters. The PRT's getting ready for a counter offensive!" she shouted over the ringing in his ears.

She didn't help him up. But she did keep watch while he got himself together, which was enough for Chris. Her crossbow had been lost in the earliest fighting, and she had taken an M16 off the corpse of one of the ABB gangers she had killed. For Sophia, this day was proving to be a revelation. She was surrounded by death, and a fair amount of it had been dealt by her personally.

"Come on!" she shouted at Chris, who was busy getting his hoverboard back in working order.

He gunned the engines, and took off towards HQ while Sophia faded into the shadows. By the time they arrived, the main body of the Axis had broken through their barricades. Altburg-Ehrenstein was first through the breech, his face a mask of fury as he strode inexorably forward. Gone was any pretense at civilization, his voice nearly broken by the throaty, wrathful roars that tore out of his mouth.



The sound of jets heralded the turning of the tide. Armsmaster's party had made their way from the rig, fighting off the helicopters sent to block them. And he arrived with all the grace of the gods of style. He leapt off his motorcycle, and laid down the squad that was closest with scything blows from his halberd. The fighting seemed to slow, and then stop, as he shouted, "Enough!"

The Bloody Prince rotated on his heel as though mounted on a turntable.

"You." he growled.

"So, you decided to strike. I never doubted that you would." said Colin, the PRT congregating behind him. "Why have you come here?"

"The Empire promised me a worthwhile death. I have walked this base earth long enough. It is time for me to finally rest."

The ancient German raised his blade in a coldly formal salute, and charged.

Kaiser watched in astonishment. The pair of them, both Armsmaster and the Bloody Prince, were beyond a blur, into something liquid and unreal. They parried, blocked, disengaged and riposted with a savage focused grace. Was this all part of the show? Or was there something deeper at work? He'd done some background checks on the boy, who had never displayed a great aptitude for fencing. But no, this wasn't mere skill. The way Bainbridge fought held the answer.

Something had snapped in his mind, and he fought with fury and passion instead of rationality and calculation. Some kind of psychotic break must have occurred as the battle raged through the day, and Michael Bainbridge had been subsumed by the personality of the General. Armsmaster was the better fighter, of that there was no doubt, beating his opponent's guard several times, for Bainbridge fought with almost no guard at all. It was as if he fought as the old monster would have fought when he chose to make his last stand. He attacked without thought for himself, to steal life as it had been stolen.

It ended, suddenly, like a jolt. Armsmaster's heavier weapon snapped Altburg-Ehrenstein's elegant rapier and drove in where his heart should have been.

So passed Maximillian, Prince von Altburg-Ehrenstein. Until a week ago, he didn't exist. Yet in the brief time he walked the earth, he had transformed the situation in Brockton Bay to a degree that no one would have thought possible.



And Maximillian, as he looked up into the heavens for the final time, the Bloody Prince knew that he had been deceived not just today, but for many, many years. That it was never for National Socialism to conquer Europe. That they had never been the Lords of the Earth. They had been only a tool.

The whole history of that movement—all their victories, all their atrocities, all their dogma, all their principles and their sacrifices, everything they had done, everyone they had killed, everything they had been, all of Hitler's dreams and grand vision for the Thousand Year Reich and the world they would dominate—had been only a pathetic sham, because all of them, all of him, add up only to this.

He has existed only for this.

This.

To clear the wake of forces so much greater and terrible.

It was the first time Michael Bainbridge had taken part in such an event, but not, he knows, the first time in history.

Then the blade in his chest withdraws like a sewing needle.

And all of the Bloody Prince becomes nothing at all.

 

Armsmaster’s blow had not been a gentle one. It had driven the air from Bainbridge’s lungs and he had fainted when he hit the ground. So he had no idea where he was when he awoke a day later.

He gasped when consciousness returned, sucking oxygen into abused lungs, and blinking through the haze in his eyes.

“He is awake.” said a voice that seemed both nearby and far away.

“Where am I?” Bainbridge managed to ask.

“The fearless leader returns.” said a sardonic feminine voice which he had become familiar with.

“Lisa?” he was able to force out.

“Yes indeed." Lisa said, leaping onto the hospital bed.

"Have I already said 'where am I?'"

"Yup."

"Did I get an answer?"

It was another person who answered. His voice was deeper, confident and ruthless. "You're in the Anders' suite in the Hotel Continental. That should give you some idea of the importance your collaborators place on your life."

Another man had evidently joined them, and Bainbridge managed to open his eyes. The rest of Lisa's circle were all in the small nook that served as a hospital room. Lisa's friends were all either his age or younger. This one was not. He was even taller than Brian Laborn, and thin to the point of near emaciation. Apart from that, Mikey could deduce very little since his face and form was completely concealed by a black bodysuit. It didn't even have eyeholes.

Whoever he was, the whole crew was submissive, even Rachel, who was ordinarily only willing to consent, and even that was reluctant. With this man, he shoulders were hunched and she avoided the blank spot of the man’s mask where his eyes should have been.

“So who are you supposed to be?”

The man chuckled and reached for a chair.

"Oh no you don't. Capes don't give out their names to anyone. You should know that by now."

Mikey strained to sit up and said, "Aaargh."

The new arrival held up a hand. "Don't strain yourself. Armsmaster wasn't trying to kill you, but he managed to hit your sternum quite badly. As for my identity, you can call me Coil."

Now that he had given his name, Bainbridge did know the man.

"You're not the sort to get involved over someone like me."

"Technically speaking, I was involved from the moment you met Tattletale." said Coil. Noting Bainbridge's puzzlement, he continued, "You wondered how Lisa knew to check your apartment? She heard about your handiwork in the Kehlstein House and deduced fairly quickly that there was no such person as Max von Altburg-Ehrenstein, and since I've had her doing odd jobs for me this past month or so, she felt it wise to check with me about just who you were."

"How did you do it?" Mikey asked, interested despite himself. "Some kind of facial recognition software? Were there cameras in there I missed?"

"No actually." Coil said, with a self-satisfied tone of voice, "I simply checked any transactions for an SS uniform and cape that had been made out of the city. Just tell me, why did you use your own debit card, instead of getting a new one under another name?"

Ignoring the implication that Coil could either hack into a major bank himself or had people working for him who could, Mikey answered, "I was beneath suspicion. They would never have looked for me in a building scarcely a block from the scene of the crime."

"And so they didn't. All I had to do was send Lisa to your address, she asked some leading questions, and I had my confirmation."

"So why didn't you do anything?"

"Why would I?" Coil asked, rather like a schoolmaster.

Bainbridge had to think about this. "You saw me as being more useful as a wildcard than under your direct control."

"Let's face it, you managed to do more to this city in one night with no plan of your own aside from some small entertainment than I did in five years."

"So you decided to pursue a policy of benevolent neglect? Then why did Lisa and her friends get involved?"

This question was actually fielded by Lisa herself. "That part was all me." she said, giggling self consciously and rubbing her arm. "I thought it would be fun."

"And you can bet that we're never going to letcha live it down." grumbled Brian, but with a smile on his face. "And technically we're called the Undersiders."

"I suppose I have just the one more question for you Lisa. How did you know there was no such person as Altburg-Ehrenstein?"

Lisa grinned her Cheshire cat's grin and said, "I looked up the name and found the short story on the internet. You were well-read enough to pick a fairly obscure Lovecraft story, but wouldn't you know, the power of the internet."

Coil now picked up the theme. "But you took pains to make it convincing. More than one or two noblemen threw their lot with the Nazis and even rose to high office in the Brownshirts and the SS. And by and large, they escaped the noose or the jail cell after the war. Nothing in the Bloody Prince's history was implausible, simply fictional in his case.

"So what are you going to do, now that your intrigues have run their course? Altburg-Ehrenstein is dead, and both the Empire and the ABB are 'dissolved.'"

Bainbridge lay back in his bed and put a hand to his chin.

"Lisa was undoubtedly eavesdropping when I talked to Armsmaster, Lung and Kaiser. Which means you know everything I said to them. But that's not what you want to know, is it?"

Coil nodded, and made a noise that was vaguely approving. "Perceptive. Yes, I want to know whether you're willing to continue now you know how the game is played. You know who Kaiser is connected with, and who the Gesselschaft likely is. You also know by now that these people have spilled enough blood to fill an ocean. Are you sure you want to face people like them?"

"I disliked what they did objectively, and I hate it all the more now I've had to be involved. I'm that rarest of men, Mister Coil; I'd actually like to do some good."

"Plenty of people would like to do some good." Coil rebutted, "But you've just seen the reason why so few actually make the attempt. The Anders family isn't the only rich financial dynasty out there, there are others who are even wealthier and more ruthless. If you would set yourself in opposition to them, I'd like to know why."

For the first time, Michael found himself scowling. "I said I hated what I did yesterday. There's gotta be at least a thousand people who are dead or got hurt thanks to me. But the Krupp von Bohlens and the Schroeders? What happened to them aside from a slap on the wrist? Every last one of them should have been shot or gotten the rope for what they did. And that's not even getting into their collaborators abroad. Did they turn themselves in? Were they haunted by the people they killed to the day they died? Or was it just another day at the office?"

Coil and the rest were silent for a long while, before the masked man said, very carefully, "I think you know the answer to that question already."

"Then you also know the answer to your own. They carry on their games of shadows as if the world hasn't changed. It's time someone gave them a wakeup call."

Coil laughed, harshly, like the bark of a dog. "And you think you're going to do it? All by yourself?"

"Was George Washington alone?" he asked, rhetorically.

Coil looked as though he were going to argue further, but he didn't. Instead he sat back in his chair, and nodded his head.

"Very well, then you know who you will have to court?"

"These oligarchs have always been a divided and cutthroat gang." Bainbridge said, and that was enough for both of them.

There was a fresh pounding at the door. The unmistakable growl of Brad Meadows snarled, "You'd better be finished in there Coil! The boss wants a word."

"It seems your time is in considerable demand." Coil said, the smile in his voice even more obvious. Then to the terminally bad-tempered Hookwolf, he said, "Come in."

The door was opened by a flunky, and Meadows stalked in followed by Anders.

"Being invited into my own apartment," the erstwhile Neo-Nazi boss said sarcastically, "What a fun week this has been."

"If its any consolation, I'd have never ordered that uniform if I had it to do over." Bainbridge said, and pushed himself up on his elbows to shake the hand of the man whose alter ego had struck terror across the Bay. "Well, we did it."

"Your plan worked as advertised. I'll give you that much. There's practically dancing in the streets." Anders said, taking a chair immediately vacated by Alec. "I must admit, it was wearying to play the villain for so long."

Bainbridge had to resist the urge to laugh, which was no easy feat. "Who says you don't have a sense of humor, Kaiser?"

Max Anders had the grace to look somewhat sheepish, "I suppose I always was more of an Anders than a National Socialist."

"Are the two so removed?" Bainbridge made to get out of the bed, before another shock of pain in his chest reminded him of the essential bad judgement of this decision. "You said there was dancing in the streets?" he asked so as to distract from his current state of disrepair.

"Oh yes." Anders chuckled. "The way people are acting, you might imagine the Endbringers had just been killed."

He grabbed a remote and turned on a 32' television mounted in an alcove.

"-wild celebration in Brockton-"

"-Uber and Leet might be pardoned thanks-"

"-Armsmaster being considered for-"

And on and on it went. News crews were already on the scene, showing a city more happy than any other time Bainbridge could remember. New Englanders in general and the people of Vermont and New Hampshire in particular were dour to the point of stoicism. And the people of Brockton Bay were the sort who learned cynicism as a survival instinct.

Except that right now, the populace was doing their best to recreate the V-Day celebrations. Couples kissed and cheered, and there was talk of a victory parade and medals for the brave heroes who had defeated the last gasp of Nazism. But the germ of celebration was not wholly contagious. Nestled in among the general euphoria were declarations from police spokespersons that the responsible parties would be found and imprisoned. That the BPD had been made a joke of was obvious, but then they had always been somewhat of a joke, even among their friends.

But they couldn't abide their poor showing being plastered all over the internet. When Bainbridge thought about it, it was only natural. They never resented a slap in the face when it came from above, and never forgave it when it came from below.

Alec looked at some of the policemen being interviewed. The police chief was a particular conundrum for him. He seemed at once embarrassed and angry.

"What's with Chief Cromwell?" he asked, since Anders had chosen to linger on that station. "Somebody steal his donuts?"

Bainbridge said, "In a way, we did." Then he looked to Coil, "You want to explain, or should I? You're their boss."

"I think I'll take this one. Bainbridge's alliance caught the networks napping. It's all they can do to report on it, and wait for things to die down before they try to spin the situation. And in the meantime, have you noticed PHO? They're on fire right now about what the forums are calling the Lord Street Races."

"You mean the coppers who skedaddled a few blocks from the Kehlstein House?" asked Grue, who was there as Bainbridge's bodyguard and smokescreen.

"Yes indeed. This little scheme embarrassed them badly, and people can see it. I wouldn't be surprised if some of the companies start pulling the videos. Unfortunately for them, the damage is done, and people are beginning to wonder about just how dangerous the police really are."

"So they're gonna a little hot under the collar for a while." Alec said, hunched forwards and rubbing his chin, "That should make 'em popular with the locals."

"You have no idea." They couldn't see the grin, but they could hear it in Coil's voice.

Bainbridge shivered, "Couldn't you tone down the slimy?"

"Please, who hasn't dreamed of being a Bond villain every once in a while?" Coil asked.

"So what now?" Meadows grunted. "You said I'd still be cracking heads, I'm waiting for the part where I come in."

Bainbridge felt solid enough to begin standing. "The political party has to be incorporated first, but you'll be in high demand, especially for the next step in the plan."

Meadows quirked an eyebrow. "I'm listening."

"If we're going to come to political power, we will have to follow the route of the old People's Party in the 1890s. We need to find ways to make common cause with, and eventually absorb the other political organizations out of power. We need to approach them all, no matter who they are. As for the fringe forces of both right and left, their willingness to fight would be useful, but their ideologies put them at cross-purposes, and this is where you come into play, Mister Meadows. And never forget, we're going to be elected legally, and hew to the spirit of the people. If we want power in America, we must embody it.

"Starting with that project that Mister Anders set up a few days ago. The graveyard still hasn't been cleared out, and the dockworkers don't have the manpower to do it themselves. It'll be good PR for us at any rate."

Bainbridge trailed off as he looked at Coil. "You wouldn't be here unless you had some plan of your own. What's your pitch?"

"Kaiser is a decent manipulator. But neither he nor Meadows are truly skilled in the shadow warfare that I've become a master at. You're going to need someone who is. Furthermore, you will see that my power is most pertinent to the success of a political movement."

Bainbridge thought about this, it was all happening too fast. Finally, he said, "If you do work with us, I can't have anyone know that you do."

Coil nodded, "How did he say it in that movie? I did not say this, I am not here."

"Have a wonderful day."