Wretched Joy 12

Commissioned by Southmonk

Wretched Joy

Chapter 12

-VB-

Max hated this wait. 

It was obvious what the bastard was doing, but just because he knew what the enemy was planning didn’t mean that he could do something about it, especially an enemy that had no weakness to exploit. 

He knew from the bottom of his heart that if that bloodthirsty maggot had to go through twice - and even thrice - the their number of civilians to get to them and kill them all, then he would. He would make the same excuse every other bloodthirsty vigilantes make. 

‘When a murderer kills a murderer, there is one less murderer in this world.’

Max would know. He had killed more than a hundred murderer in his time as a cape. By that definition, Max was a hero unlike any other. 

Unfortunately for him, there was no hiding behind the mask now. No hiding behind the Unwritten Rules because the enemy didn’t care for them. Those kinds of enemy were the easiest and worst to fight against. Easiest in that there was no rules. If there are no rules, then there was only one objective: to kill the other side. However, it was also the worst for one very good reason. If the other side was much stronger and did not pull their punches, then so many of his own subordinates and footsoldiers would die before their numbers eventually took their enemy down. 

The Empire Eighty-Eight thrived now because everyone mostly followed rules. It was during the Bad Old Days that the E88 flagged so much.

After all, when their enemies were the white Butcher, a white Marquis, and the white PRT, their calls to arms for the “good white people” of America to rise up to drive out the foreign and unwanted didn’t really go well, did it? It wasn’t as if Brockton Bay had a thriving homosexual and other deviant community back then, either. 

Everyday Joe was not a mindless killer like the Butcher; he could not be goaded into taking a fight he would lose. 

Everyday Joe did not care about the rules; he already made that very clear with the deaths of his lieutenants and the threatening phone call. 

Everyday Joe didn’t care enough about the people to pull his punches. Hell, Max was half afraid that EJ might just start hunting down the families of the E88’s members just so he could make a statement. 

Association was a sin. It really was in the eyes of that remorseless murderer.

Max also believed it, too, though his was of a different philosophy. He believed that the world was a network and spectrum of those who were strong, average, and weak. A strong person could not do everything themselves. An average person could not do everything themselves. A weak person definitely couldn’t, even if they might be good at one particular thing. By networking and binding each other, they grew stronger. 

But that also meant that when a group fell, its consequences fell to everyone. 

After all, wasn’t it the capitalist ideology that when a business failed, it was the fault of all those involved, no matter how tiny their sliver of share in that fault was? It was the fault of the worker for working for a company that couldn’t make it in the market. It was the fault of the manager for not standardizing the output of the workers. It was the fault of the executives for failing to analyze the market and lead their company to a profitable future. 

Willing ignorance was a sin, and so association through willing ignorance was sin.

Because all sins were rooted in the axiom that has persisted through the ages. 

Being weak was the ultimate sin.

So if a worker was weak enough to willingly feign ignorance to work for a company, then they had a share in its output. 

If a manager was weak enough to not be able to change their environment from the point of failure, then they had a share in its output. 

If a executive failed… then they were weak and deserved the consequences. 

Americans … Americans lied to themselves a lot, and this idea about protecting the weak and the poor was one of them. 

They smiled and laughed. They would say “we must protect the weak and poor!”

But ask them to do so out of their own pocket? Most would turn away once they understood how much it would “disadvantage” them. 

Ideologies, politics, systems, environment, family… none of that mattered. The only thing that mattered was power. 

Without power, he was lost. Without power, he was weak. Without power, he would be a lamb to the slaughter.

And that motherfucker Everyday Joe chipped away at his power.

Max tapped on his expensive import wood desk. It was African blackwood or something like that. A very expensive wood, so he took care to not harm it. So he merely drummed his gloved fingers instead of clicking on it with an armored hand. 

Then he had an idea. It was an idea that could work.

He picked up the phone and made a call. 

“... This is Kaiser. I want to speak to Director Piggot.”

-VB-

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♦ Topic: A New Thread
In: Boards ► North America ► East Coast ► Brockton Bay
Everyday_Joe001 (Original Poster) (Original Poster) (Verified Cape)
Posted On Oct 28th 2010:
Good morning everyone.

This is your neighborhood villain-killing cape, Everyday Joe. It's nice to meet you. I come before you today for a very simple reason: I have been informed that my priority target, Empire Eighty-Eight called a Truce meeting at Somer's Rock with many villains to discuss my impact upon Brockton Bay. Because I killed his lieutenants Hookwolf and Krieg.

Or more specifically, he wanted to make a coalition to hunt me down by making me out to be some sort of an end for the entire underworld.

And who told me about this? Well, I'm not exactly going to name my partner, was I?! But they did take a photo of the meeting, so [HERE] it is. A bunch of villains meeting in a seedy bar. How classical. How quaint.

How... deluded.

You know what?

I'll make it very clear right here and now.

I will not hunt down any other villains. My target is the Empire Eighty-Eight and ONLY the E88. It has not changed since my first post here on PHO at March of this year.

Make of this what you will. Ciao~.

(Showing page 1 of 30)

►Brocktonite03 (Veteran Member)
Replied On Oct 28th 2010:
Uh... Uh huh.

First off, thanks for the photo? I'm sure someone will photoshop that into some kind of sick computer background or use it in the news or something.

Second, are you the guy that's killing all of the E88 capes?

►Bagrat (Veteran Member) (The Guy in the Know)
Replied On Oct 28th 2010:
He is. Everyday Joe is responsible for the deaths of Cricket, and Stormtiger, Hookwolf. And if the OP is to be believed, Krieg as well.

I was just about to write up about this, too. Who the hell is your inside source at the meeting that you managed to take a picture of this?

►Whitecollar (Cape Wife)
Replied On Oct 28th 2010:
Wait, someone has been going around breaking the Unwritten Rules? Shouldn't he be arrested as quickly as possible before a gang war breaks out?

►Brocktonite03 (Veteran Member)
Replied On Oct 28th 2010:
EJ is the one causing the nightmare circle in the Docks. If you aren't an innocent civilian, then you can't walk in there without getting your mindf'ed with your worst nightmares. I've seen people dropping and screaming.

►Realfat69
Replied On Oct 28th 2010:
Oh yeah, I've seen what it does to people. Videos aren't visceral so it gets posted on a lot of SFW sites, not that it stays up for long. Let me tell you, if you really didn't do anything, then you don't notice it. But if you so much as robbed a person, then you are going to have to crawl out of there. Worse, it's growing. There's a guy on MyTube who makes a video every time the field grows more than an inch.

I've seen Assault gasping and whimpering, sweaty as hell, as he dragged himself out. It did not look pretty man.

►Laotsunn (Kyushu Survivor)
Replied On Oct 28th 2010:
Fuck this city. I'm leaving. I didn't know damn field was growing.

►Realfat69
Replied On Oct 28th 2010:
O.o
Well, now we have a way to see if someones been naughty.
And Assault's been naughty?!

►Matara_Chit
Replied On Oct 28th 2010:
Let's not drift over to what Assault might have done. The guy's a chill man, but heroes are all involved in fighting. The nightmare circle thing might be indiscriminate.

►Acree
Replied On Oct 28th 2010:
Imagine if that's how the law actually worked lol

►JusticeDepartmentRep09
Replied On Oct 29th 2010:
The Justice Department of the United States of America does not blindly execute the law by giving out the worst punishment. The department may be filled with fallible humans, but each judge and justice takes the time to see the nuance of each case to see any mitigating circumstances that may be applied.

Example: a father from New Jersey who broke the speed limit by thrice the limit because he was taking his child to the emergency room is generally not punished with a month in prison and $500 fine. Past cases made such cases serve community service time but nothing more if there truly was an emergency.

►Realfat69
Replied On Oct 29th 2010:
@JDR09 you ALWAYS derail the thread, you know that?

►Robby
Replied On Oct 29th 2010:
But what if EJ doesn't stop at E88? That could just be a ruse!

►Brocktonite03 (Veteran Member)
Replied On Oct 29th 2010:
Imma be honest.
If Joe does go and actually end the local underworld and keep other would-be kingpin villains out, then I'm not going to complain.

►XxVoid_CowboyxX
Replied On Oct 29th 2010:
What if Everyday Joe is a government black op that is using Brockton Bay as a testing ground for destabilizing factors in a parahuman community? It would make so much sense!

End of Page.   1, 2, 3 ... 28, 29, 30

(Showing page 2 of 30)

►RegularJoeBB (Original Poster) (Verified Cape)
Replied On Oct 29th 2010:
@XxVoid_CowboyxX if I really was a black ops agent, would I tell you that or would political parties try to use my abilities as start a second Red Scare?

End of Page.   1, 2, 3, 4 ... 28, 29, 30

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