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# Rebellion ballads

## Chapter 1: The Tower of Steel Men

The metal taste of blood persisted in Lia's mouth as she tested the boundaries of graphene handcuffs that held her wrists to the titanium chair. Three hours of interrogation, and the Watchtower of Steel Men seemed increasingly a dead end. Through the polarized glass window, the city shone under the moonlight, indifferent to what happened inside those walls.

"Do you really believe that you will get out of here, iron?" Deep Impact's voice echoed through the interrogation room, icy as the ocean depths he commanded. Its blue-okay armor shone under the fluorescent lights, water drops continuously running down its surface. "There is no place in this city where you can hide from us."

Lia looked up, her gray eyes like seasoned steel staring at the hero without fear.

"In fact, I believe you have created so many hiding places in this city that they can no longer count them anymore," he replied with a hoarse but firm voice. "Every person you have abandoned, every family who sacrificed for the 'bigger good' ... each of them became a place where their influence does not reach."

Deep Impact hit the fist on the table, sending a shock wave that made the water on his glass dancing.

"You don't understand anything about sacrifice," he growled.

"And you don't understand anything about the people who vowed to protect," read, ignoring the sealing pain in his broken ribs.

The door of the room opened with a sibilo, and two figures entered. Blight bug, with his greenish exoskeleton and vibrant antennas, approached crawling almost insane. Small fluorescent insects burst around them, some landing momentarily in the corners of the room before returning to their master.

"Is she still resisting?" Blight Bug asked, his voice a disturbing buzz. "I can make her speak. My little ones are very persuasive." A beetle of sharp jaws landed on his finger, as to emphasize the threat.

"Not yet," said the third figure, Edward Graham, known as Thunderstrike. Unlike the others, he did not wear an extravagant costume, just a black overcoat with silver details that occasionally emitted small electrical discharges. "Captain Virtue wants information, not a corpse."

Lia couldn't contain a bitter laugh. "Captain Virtue. The great symbol of justice. Where was he when the Hope neighborhood was flooded by his friend here?" She tilted her head toward Deep Impact. "Five hundred people lost everything. Twenty -three died, including my younger brother."

"COLLATE DAMAGE," replied Deep Impact coldly. "We were fighting a greater threat."

"You * are * the greatest threat," Lia spitting the words with the little energy left.

Edward Graham approached, static electricity making Lia's hair goose bumps.

"Where are the others?" He asked, his voice dangerously calm. "Where is Trickster hiding the files that have stolen?"

Lia looked beyond him, to the window, wondering where Arthur would be now. If the plan had worked, he and Sofia would already be at the meeting point with the documents. If Igor had managed to hack the Tower Security System in time ...

"Do you really believe we are alone in that?" Lia asked, changing tactics. "Every day, more people are seeing through the facade."

"You talk as if you had a chance," interrupted blight bug, leaning over to her face in inches from Lia's. An odor of decaying leaves emanated from it. "You are just a nuisance for us. A group of maladjusted with hero complex."

"We don't want to be heroes," Lia answered with a tired smile. "We just want you to stop pretending to be."

A sudden bang shook the tower, making the lights flasel. The three heroes exchanged concerned looks.

"What was that?" Deed Deep Impact, activating the communicator on his helmet.

Before someone could answer, the darkness swallowed the room completely. The tower's main energy system had just failed.

In the dim light, illuminated only by the emergency lights and the occasional lightning emanating from Edward, Lia felt more than she saw the presence that materialized behind her.

"Late as always, shadow," she murmured.

"I had some setbacks," a serious voice answered, while skilled hands broke their handcuffs. "Root and Trickster are waiting at the abandoned station. The documents are safe."

A genuine smile formed on Lia's lips for the first time that day. "So let's give these 'heroes' something to think."

When the emergency lights finally clarified the atmosphere, Deep Impact, Blight Bug and Edward Graham faced an empty room. In the place where Lia had been sitting, there was only a small metal gear with a recorded message:

*"The rebellion began. You are no longer untouchable."*

In the sky above the tower, the giant big screens that normally displayed advertisements of steel men now transmitted leaked images: Deep Impact deliberately flooding the Esperança neighborhood to cover up evidence; Blight bug testing their insects in homeless civilians; Edward Graham accepting corporation payments to "solve problems".

The whole city watched as the truth began to emerge.

And at an abandoned train station on the borders of the city, four rebels gathered to plan his next step against the Empire of Lies which, for the first time, began to collapse.