??? Interlude

He wished not for the first time to turn back time to his younger days, before he had chosen to become a policeman in Brockton Bay. This week had already been a killer before all of this started, but now there was even a new villainess making a nuisance of herself in the middle of the boardwalk and for some reason the enforcers hadn't acted at all. Something had happened down there, something other than an impromptu dance party, but the only videos online showed exactly that. A cape flooding the streets with small, nontoxic, gentle snakes that had as far as anyone knew only scared the people into running while stealing seemingly random things and vanishing in an alley. All the while the preteen cape, Dusa, possibly a short form of Medusa had forced people into doing something she called the slither, not that the people of Brockton Bay and the few tourist caught in the attack tried to resist all that much. People her were used to cape 'shows' by Über and L33t, which were a big tourist attraction for the people from outer states, but more of a nuisance to the locals.

The average Brocktonite knew what capes where there for some nonviolent fun and robbery by instinct and which type of capes to avoid at all costs. It wasn't by chance that this city had survived the Teeth, Marquis and even the Slaughterhouse 9 and despite the steady corrosion of the biggest Nazi-Gang in America and the arguably strongest villain in the country, the Dragon himself, the city endured and even managed to make a living from tourist visiting for the parahuman action. Not that Lung was all that active as a villain, he mostly kept to himself until provoked to do otherwise. He was more of a deterrence while Oni Lee was the true fighter fielded against threads against the ABB. People who didn't live in Brockton Bay and even those in the nicer districts of the city just didn't understand how close this city was to all out war. And that was before Lung recruited an insane Tinker, before getting himself captured and allowing her free reign. It was only a matter of time until the ABB would fight back against the E88 attacks against their territory.

He had spent the last three days running around, cleaning up behind the Protectorate and PRT forces after they had their showdowns with the E88. That they hadn't seen hide nor hair of Bakuda and Oni Lee would have been a relieve to lesser man, but he knew better, giving a tinker time to build was a catastrophe in the making and what the only samples of her technology revealed so far was far from reassuring, even if you excluded a mover like Oni Lee and he certainly wouldn't. Oni Lee had been observed to copy especially modified bombs during his teleports, his clones didn't last long, but if a grenades timer was reduced to a single second, the time a clone remained to turn him into a one man suicide bomb squad with unlimited numbers and that was before he got his hands on tinker made weapons.

Closing his eyes he leaned back in his chair and thought about getting himself a nice glass of single malt, he could almost taste it and feel the cold condensation of the glass on his tongue, but no he couldn't drink right now, he had only just escaped being caught with excessive amounts of alcohol, which was forbidden both in this house and in the Police charter he had signed when he had accepted his position of responsibility. He wanted to go back in time to brain his younger self for accepting that promotion. He had almost panicked outright when the chief had forced him to vacate his apartment a few days ago, luckily the other cops send to help him clean up hadn't been observant enough, trough he had had to leave behind his biggest stack of the good stuff. Hidden beneath the lowest cupboard in the seldom used cubby hole meant to store food stuff, it was well hidden but hard to move unobtrusively. He hadn't wanted to risk it and luckily the inspection had been done by equally inept troopers. Unluckily the new resident was a preteen with no social life, who moved in not even a day after he had moved out, which meant he spent most of his time in the apartment and he didn't get a chance to get his stuff back until this morning.

He had seen Rodriguez, the good natured fool that he was, accosting the young boy and forcing him to actually spend time outside his room and used the short window to intrude into the apartment. He had to disable the surveillance devices permanently and destroy their memory, because he couldn't risk exposing the time window if his intrusion was detected. He was one of the few people still there in the morning, because his late night shift had extended late into the morning. Removing the stuff had been easy, trough it had been moved since he touched it last time, in all probability the boy had been bored but not trusting enough to actually inform anyone of his find, it wasn't like he could do anything with it and him destroying the surveillance would be enough of an repayment for services unknowingly rendered. He didn't like the PRT anyway for placing cameras inside the boys room, even if there hadn't been a live feed and only audio devices directed towards the sleeping area. The PRT often thought themselves above the law and didn't care for anyone's rights.

Just like that attempted murder at Winslow a few months ago, he had called his sister immediately after he heard about it from the grapevine and if even his dense nephew had known the people involved in that shit show he didn't believe for a second the PRT hadn't gotten the names of the perpetrators. That nothing had happened and Winslow remained as untouchable as usual only reaffirmed his decision to never send any of his children there. Immaculata was to expensive, even for a senior officer like himself, not that they were paid well, after their budget got cut time and time again in favor of the PRT, but Arcadia or Clarendon were just as well protected. He didn't care much as long as his kids got out of the city alive and if they had to become catholic or join some kind of work study program at Medhall, then so be it. Never would he allow his kids to be like the boy living inside his old apartment right now, alone and forced to seek solace in acting out in villainous ways.

He hated the way they weren't allowed to interact with him and how they were forced to just watch as the Youth Guard and the PRT fought over his parahuman sister, like anyone in this building still thought they could keep that little tidbit a secret was beyond him, it wasn't everyday your local saint was attacked and the PRT cordoned an entire hospital wing for themselves. Poor Panacea was another victim, but they, as in the entire police force in Brockton Bay couldn't risk alienating the PRT. They were the ones with the actual money to provide for this Building and they payed for the programs which allowed for the children of booth PRT and Police officers to go to the safer schools and subsidized the rent in the safer areas of the Bay. Not that they were doing so out of their bleeding hearts, their kids and families were used as distractions for the families of the real PRT troopers and potential even hero families. It was unfair, but the PRT where the only ones with the money and political cloud in the city to pull this off, which meant the police force had to carefully choose their own battles.

Today this meant to ignore everything to do with his old apartment and not looking into why certain things weren't in their jurisdiction. Brockton Bay had it bad, but they weren't even the worst city and during the last Slaughterhouse 9 attack it had saved the lives of dozens of officers and their families. He didn't even have a family which was why he was the longest serving captain in the Bay, he and the chief who had already lost his entire family were seen as the most incorruptible servants of the law in Brockton Bay, not that this was a great achievement. Half the police force had to pander to the PRT and those that didn't had lost friends of family before. Enforcing the law here was a death sentence for anyone career.

If only more parahuman kids would go out and cause chaos by flooding the entire boardwalk with snakes, instead of risking their lives and those of others by fighting in the streets. He knew the laws preventing parahumans from profiting of their powers where a big motivator for capes to seek combat centered roles on both sides of the law, but if everyone just limited themselves to getting by with small and nonviolent crimes and shows there would be a lot more acceptance for their behavior and they could use the funds saved to offer psychological treatments. He had yet to meet a single cape who was sane by any stretch of the imagination. Trough he had to admit the kid had been smart to hide his gender and the way he handled the boardwalk also had been semi well thought out. The worst injuries had been caused by people tripping and being trampled in their panic, which while not great was the lowest amount of damage one could hope when villains engaged an audience. His costume had also been perfect to hide his identity, he wouldn't even have suspected anything if he hadn't taken a short look at the footage when he destroyed the surveillance devices and seen the kid create those snakes. He hadn't been able to actually see a lot, because in his haste he had already deleted most of the footage and had only gotten a glimpse by accident. Du to time constraints and the lack of storage medium, he had destroyed all evidence so at least now the kid had gotten a little more time. Maybe he could use this to his advantage. He would have to observe more closely and prepare for the worst case scenario. Using protocols designed to combat gang members and serial killers as a hypothetical on a preteen didn't sit right with him at all, but he owed it his men to be prepared. He would do something nice for the kid in return, maybe leave some advice.

Admittedly he had had a great laugh watching videos of the slither being spread in Brockton Bay and as long as he didn't go to far he would have a hidden ally in him. For the first time in months the thought of the next day, brought a smile to his face. So he stooped resisting and took the tiniest sip of the open bottle which had let to the discovery of this newest player in the Bay. In his head he toasted the future, the Empress of snakes Desu and the small kid down the hall who had taken his first step into a wider world full of adventure and danger.

"May you have a long and fulfilling career young Benjamin, may the Nightcastle name be passed on to further generations and made the Snake Empress bring the fresh storm into the old and decrepit underbelly of the Bay."