Bad Ending [digimon Apocalyptic Rogue-Lite

I'm practically down to a skeleton crew. I have three capes under my name and one of them is a psychopathic serial killer I can barely keep under control. The cars that Mechanic made are starting to fail without his maintenance, not to mention how most of his garage's have been getting raided by the PRT. And with the PRT's newest hero Overdrive on the streets, my boys are losing the one tactical advantage we had. Aside from numbers that is, and even that is dwindling as the attacks keep coming.

"Ugh... I fucked up." I groan.

I know Overdrive is Steve, The Mechanic. Overdrive's debut and the timing it had with the raids on the garage sites, not to mention the hero's preference for muscle cars.

I don't regret trying to put Steve out of commission. His alcoholism and recklessness were drawing too much heat. By the time he got arrested, having drunkenly drove into a police station, I knew he was becoming more than he was worth. But then I discover that he turned himself in. At that point it wasn't even a question, he was a liability and a loose end. I only regret my impatience in putting him down, I should have waited until we got back and slipped some trazadone in his beer.

'Your father never let his anger get the best of him.' I feel a wave of anger wash over me. 'You'll never make him proud, much less avenge him at this rate.'

It's not like I'm not trying! But even my attempts to defame Manpower only had middling results. What with all that happened in the following days, the former leader of the Brockton Bay Brigade's folly quickly became old news.

Now we have The Empire, in their desperate struggle to keep control, lashing out at the edges of my western territories. Made even worse by how the monster's wrecked my territory the most. And then there's the ABB, who've have been ruthless in their pushes at my southern borders. Along with Ginabog and Bakuda getting into explosive dick measuring contests along Winslow and the Industrial district to the further west.

"Should rename the ABB to the Kamikaze Crew." I mutter to myself.

I should be planning, making up new schemes to regain control or get back at the old guard of Brockton Bay Brigade. But... I'm just so fucking wiped. Dealing with everything has left me so tired... I just need a day. A day is all I ask.

"So this is what's become of the infamous, master of fear." I hear a man say from the door.

'I guess a day is too much to fucking ask for!' I snap around, turning to face the dead man who just barged into my office lab.

One hand on my revolver as I loosen the straps on my mask with the other hand. Getting ready to slide it on in a second in case I need a more... caustic solution.

"Wow, and I thought I was holding up well for my age." The curly brown haired, middle aged man chuckles. "You've barely aged a day, in fact I'd say you look even... younger?"

"You have ten seconds to explain yourself." I tell him, holding the gun up as he tilts his head in confusion.

The gun doesn't seem to phase him at all. So either he's insane, on drugs, or has a power that makes him confident the gun won't do anything. And judging by the focus in his eyes, and the steadiness of posture, he's not high. So insane, or powerful. Knowing my luck, it' probably both.

"... You're not Johnathan." He suddenly says, making my breath hitch.

Johnathan was my father's name. You'd think that'd offer me some comfort. But my father had a lot of enemies.

"Who are you?" I demand to know and cock the hammer back.

"... Little Joey?" He squints, and my heart nearly stops, finally recognizing the voice. "Is that you? My, I've been gone a long time."

'Only three people ever called me that.' I think, recalling the trio of individuals.

"... Mr. Lavere?" I whisper, almost not believing my own words.

"Mr. Lavere, feels weird hearing that from you after so long." He smiles warmly. "You always were such a polite child."

.

.

"Sorry, but whiskey is all I have on me." I tell him as I pour us some shots. "Most of my alcohol goes to my tinkering."

"Never thought I'd see the day you were running your own gang." He says, easily accepting the glass I offered. "You were always so mild mannered."

'He's too trusting.' I almost scoff. 'What if I poisoned the glass?'

"Life has its ways of forcing us to adapt." I sigh and sit down with him at my cleared off work table. "Times change, either we change too, or time leaves us behind."

"I'm realizing that more and more." He nods, idly turning the glass of brown in his hand. "it's not just the big things either, I mean, phones are so much smaller and do so much more now. To say nothing of the TV's I've seen on sale... gas prices are still outrageous. So that's comforting."

That one gets a chuckle out of me.

"Oh trust me, if running a gang has taught me anything, it's that overhead costs are no joke." I scoff and sip my shot.

"Most gangs leave the main overhead to the gang members." He tells me. "One of the benefits of running them."

"Most gangs fail to maintain control without a plethora of capes or at least a few powerhouses." I tell him. "I have a fifth of Brockton under my boot and with only three capes to my name."

"Another thing, just the sheer amount of capes in Brockton is staggering." He continues. "It was no surprise to find the Empire had taken a strong hold of Brockton after I was locked up. Even less of a surprise to see them collapsing as they have been." He rants off before taking a breath and quietly adding. "The AZN Bad Boyz, that was a bit of a surprise."

"Why's that?" I ask.

"Just never expected them." He shrugs. "And to say nothing of the sheer scale of some of these newer capes. I mean, turning into dragons, punching Endbringers, freezing the bay."

I carefully keep quiet about that last one. If he heard about Permafrost then he no doubt knows it was during a Merchant attack. But whether or not he knows I essentially killed her, well it's better I not leave any breadcrumbs.

"What happened to flying and super strength being all that was needed?" He mutters.

"You're starting to sound like an old man." I deflect his attention away from the topic.

"I feel more like a stranger in a strange land." He chuckles. "Everything is so different, yet oddly the same. Some places are the same, but run by different people. Some people are the same, but in different places."

"Just don't go off starting any sex cults." I scoff.

Seriously, that novel was a drug trip towards the end. Makes sense that it was written in the sixties.

"Oh you've actually read the book?" He asks. "Yeah... that book definitely didn't age well in some parts."

"Eh, I listened to the audiobook." I shrug.

"... What's an audiobook?" He asks.

"Okay I know for a fact that those were a thing during your time." I give the older man a pointed stare.

He just shrugs and shakes his head. Sighing, I briefly explain the concept to him, to which he said it sounds like reading for people who don't want to read. I told him it was for people with so much on their plates that they don't have time to sit down and read.

We agreed to disagree. And awkwardly settled into an uneasy silence.

"So... what happened to John... your father?" Mr. Lavere eventually asks.

"... New Wave happened." I say after downing another shot.

"Didn't know they were out for blood." He says cryptically. "Though some of them..."

"Not like that." I explain. "After you were put away, they went public with their identities. Started a whole movement based around public identities and accountability. Soon the press went into a frenzy uncovering the identities of every hero, villain, and vigilante." I say bitterly. "My father... he was one of those unlucky enough to get targeted."

"... So John, your father..."

"I walked in on him with a bottle of pills in one hand, and a note on the desk." I recount that dark day. "With his identity revealed, his doctorate was revoked and he was terminated from his job. Couldn't find another, no matter how much he tried. Add that with everything else, and the state was taking steps to take me away."

I stop talking as the memories start to come back. Leaving a bitter taste in my mouth that I can't quite place. I just know I don't like it.

"... Never figured him to... to be the type to... I'm so sorry." Mr. Lavere offers me his condolences. "... I... I know... no. I don't know how hard that must've been. No child deserves that, you certainly didn't."

"I don't need your pity." I tell him and down the rest of my shot. "Ah! It's been eight years, I've had time to accept it."

"Still, I haven't." He says solemnly, staring down into his drink. "I always figured that out of all of us, John would be most likely to get out of this life the cleanest. He was always so smart, so prepared... damn it." He leans back and rubs a hand over his face.

"He did." I let out a sarcastic laugh. "It was a year after you got locked up. He had gone straight, was working for some start up pharmaceuticals company."

"Yeah, that checks out." Mr. Lavere nods, then pauses. "Wait, you were ten when I got locked up. Are you even old enough to drink?"

"I'm twenty, but who cares?" I say and pour another shot of whiskey.

"... John would kill me to see me let you drink." Mr. Lavere gives a sad chuckle; shaking his head. "Damn... I'm getting sentimental in my old age. Never would have thought this is how things would have turned out."

He seems to have said that more to himself than to me. And I figure it's more personal than he's willing to divulge. So I leave it be.

"No one ever does." I sigh. "So, you're out." I look over to the former ruler of Brockton Bay. "How'd that happen?"

"Would you believe me if I said good behavior?" He jokes.

"Maybe in six more shots." I scoff. "So I'm guessing the Birdcage is empty?"

"Seems it's not just your old man's face you inherited." He grumbles, shaking his head. "What tipped you off?"

"I'll take that as a yes." I let out a sigh as I think about just how that's going to complicate things in the future. "As if things weren't complicated enough."

"Heh, that's life. If it's not one thing, it's another." He nods along with me. "But that's why we have friends to share the burdens it throws at us."

"... And there it is." I let out the breath I'd been holding in.

"Joey, you've done well so far." He turns his chair towards me. "But it's clear you're struggling."

"... And?" I scoff at the washed up villain. "You think you can do better? Time's have changed, there's more than a rag tag team of six teens with barely serviceable abilities and half a brain cell between them to contend with. And even then..." I let the rest go unsaid.

"Brockton Bay was my city, Joseph. And it will be again." He says, a hand firmly on my shoulder. "You can have your place, by my side, just as your father did. Keep your own slice of hell to rule without watching your back, waiting for the inevitable blade. You don't have to live in squalor like this. You can make your father proud and-"

"I did not live in the trainyard, on the run from my father's enemies for three years." I cut him off. "Build my reputation up and seize control of the merchants, turn the slums from a boulevard of drug dens to a system of half decent neighborhoods and functioning communities, just for you to come in and give me that half assed sales pitch." I turn a glare on my father's former boss. "I'll let you leave, out of respect for the friendship you and my father held. But don't think I don't know you turned yourself in, your surrender kickstarted the events that killed my father. I don't hold you as culpable in his demise as New Wave, but don't think for a second that I won't ruin you like I'll ruin them if you stand in my way."

We stare at each other for a long while. My hardened glare wearing down his softer, contemplating gaze. Eventually, he breaks, turning his gaze away in defeat.

"We could've left it there. But you had to keep talking." He sighs, then looks back up with a steely gaze. "But I can't have you targeting New Wave."

Before I can react, I gasp as a sharp burning pain spreads throughout my gut. Looking down, I see a white bone imbedded in my side. Leading from its target to where it originates in The Marquis' hand.

"I-I gave you a chance." I look up and grit out. "You ungrateful relic."

"I could say the same to you, kid." He says and stands up, pulling his hand back with a thick squelch. Revealing the bone to have been more than long enough to run me through and pierce my aorta, judging by the position and angle at least. "And I mean that, but I'm not willing to take chances with what I've already sacrificed so much to protect."

'What on earth is he protecting?' I think to myself. 'No, wrong thing to focus on!'

"It seems we have something we agree on then." I cough up some blood.

'It's spilling into my stomach.' I realize. 'Damn, he really means for that to kill me.'

"Fortunately, I like to consider myself prepared." I say and pull my hand back, revealing a small canister of gas that hisses as it releases a purple miasma. "I'd run if I were you." I give him what is no doubt a bloody smile. "Start now, and you might make it long enough to reach a clinic."

"You wouldn't risk yourself to-" He starts to say, before I cough up some more blood. "Shit!"

He takes off out the door. No doubt confusing the men I have stationed around the warehouse, assuming they're even alive still. I don't think he killed them to get in here. But I also didn't think he'd stab me.

"H-heh." I chuckle, holding a hand to my bloody wound and applying as much pressure as I can manage. "Can't believe that worked."

It was a muscle relaxer. Meant to target the heart. He'll think there's something wrong as he gets tired, but I just bought myself a few minutes as my pulse slows.

"Methylene, where's the damn methylene?" I huff out as I let myself fall into a tinker's fugue. Hoping that I come up with something to help me before I die as my vision starts to fail me.

"Always finish what you start, old man." I rasp out and inject myself with the serum I just made, and everything goes dark as I fall over.

.

.

-Meanwhile, The Rig-

.

.

Melody POV

.

"That's her? The resemblance is uncanny." I feel one of the researchers ask from behind the glass of the observation deck.

Yes, feel the sound they're making. I modified the bones and bottoms of my feet to be sensitive to infrasound. Much like an elephants'. Took me a while to learn how to use it right, but it's not like I had anything better to do in my spare time.

"Yeah, if I didn't know any better then I'd think this was another one of her pranks." Another researcher mutters.