Establish Dominance

Prelude: San Francisco Docks, midnight

The local crime boss of this part of San Francisco, Jeremy Steel, woke from his unconscious state to find himself tied up to a chair and facing three of his former goons and a five foot tall shrimp of a superhero, some kind of cross between a Jedi Temple Guard and a power ranger. Jeremy had his hobbies. One eye stung and was swollen shut, and his jaw ached terribly. There were a dozen more places all over his body that hurt, and he could move none of them being tied up.

“Good morning Jeremy.” The voice was distorted, concealing the fact that White Flame was a small Asian lady.

“You dumb piece of superhero shit. You have any idea what you’ve done? The cartel’s gonna come for you. And you three-” He looked at his former goons. Of course it was these three. What were their names? Tuco, Eduardo and Carlos. Yeah. These were the ones who messed up a deal in that neighborhood and got a verbal reaming from him just two days ago.

“Shut up Jeremy.” Tuco interrupted, his voice oozing with satisfaction as he then spit on this man in the suit that had been treating him like a doormat. He brandished his Assault rifle menacingly, threatening him with a rifle butt. But Jeremy was a hard man.

“So what now? You gonna arrest me, hero? You know my rivals are just going to take over the trade. You’ve achieved nothing. The rest of the gang is going to find you and do things to you that can only be described as... pornographic.” He threatened the hero wannabe, but his brains were only now just catching up and realizing he may be dealing with something else. Plus he picked up the scent of something awful. Something burnt from the outside.

“I doubt it. Most of your crew are in no position to help. I’m not arresting you Jeremy. In fact I want to know about your contacts in the cartel.” White Flame slowly got up and patted Jeremy on the face. Her hand was uncomfortably warm, causing Jeremy to flinch. “Like you said. I’m taking over your trade.” She finished.

Jeremy shot her a look of defiance. Some of his men were away on a shipment run and were due to come back. What he didn’t know was they were at his warehouse at his part of the docks, and outside the office the warehouse was littered with the two dozen or so charred bodies of guards, some still smoldering. A fire blast to the face left most of the body still intact, but the faces were quickly reduced to meaty skulls. The smell of burnt human flesh permeated the air, disturbingly like burnt pork.

Time was 11:23pm.

Coronel was as you can say laying back from his oh so previous excursion from space. Come to find out the vacuum of space does not really do anything to an already dead corpse that is shuttled around by its own ability. But that was currently of no importance as he scarfs down a ice cream cone like he never gets a brain freeze. He could hear sirens in the distance, but nothing coming his direction. As time rolled on he only increased in his boredom.

He jumped of the Dairy Queen sign and landed with no sound as if he landed on air. Popping his neck and sporting the dark baggy pants and dark t-shirt. He felt out of style. He needed maybe another layer. His converse he wore were also a bit destroyed. If he remained in space these things would be fine. He began walking down the light filled street and seeing a bunch of stores closed due to hours. "This wont do. 1, 2, 3, your it" Coronel pointed to the 4th clothing store on the current street while mumbling to himself. He began walking over to the building and placed his hand on the door. With a loud click the door slowly open. Walking into the once locked store he looked around at a few of the styles they had. He immediately took interest in a multi-clip style combat boot. His current footwear tore in half and shot off his feet and the boots floated over and slipped and clipped in place.

Next was the extra layer. He looked around then noticed the one thing he might have been missing the whole time. There in the window display was an all black trench coat. He pulled it over and slipped it on to his body but left it unbuttoned. He turned and floated towards the door and hovered out onto the street.

""WEEEWoooo WEEEWoooo" "Sirens? Guess the shop had an alarm system. What doesn't have an alarm system these days?" As the car got closer they screeched to a halt as they seen him floating. They jumped out of the vehicle and started yelling at him. They asked for him to land and to place his hands behind his back. He was interested to comply. Seems he never got to do this sort of thing because he was always run and gun, or maybe kill and kill. Listening to the officers he put his hands up and landed. He then backed up towards them. They grabbed his arm and shackled him. He smiled as they escorted him to the back of the car and put him in it. Good thing they are being careful, he would kill them if they tried being too forceful.

They started chatting outside and thanking some god about not having this turn into a bigger problem.

After a while they were on the move back to one of the stations when all of a sudden his ability picked up something strange. They were close to the ports and what he was seeing was several dozen bodies laid out across the ground. A good many of them had head damage. "Stop the....." Of yeah he was not really in their custody. He snapped the hand cuffs into bits and they fell into the floor space. The top of the car blew off allowing him to exit. He immediately disappeared before they had time to stop. He flew over landing in the middle of the blood bath.

"How interesting. I wonder if the guy would not mind playing with me." He closed his eyes and scanned the whole port and found an interesting sight. In one of the office rooms of a warehouse he seen 3 humans and a meta all torturing some random man in a chair. He was tied up pretty well. Coronel slowly walked and made his way towards their position with the biggest grin on his face.

Carlos, the chubby one, was also the gang’s computer guy and had a laptop which allowed him to access the security cameras. When the silent alarm was triggered by Coronel’s arrival, he informed White Fire right away.

“Yo… Fire… We got company.”

“Is it Lupo and the crew?”

“Ain’t Lupo. This guy’s alone… I didn’t sign up for no superpowered showdown dawg.” Carlos voiced his worry. No good ever came from people walking into a warehouse full of dead people alone.

Stephanie stood up and viciously retorted their objection. “You signed up to do what I tell you to do! That’s the deal! Until I’m done here, none of you walk away with your shares!”

The trio were taken aback, they feared Fire. Stephanie composed herself. “Still. Let’s assume the worst. Eddy, Carlos, take the machine gun. Tuco, RPG. I’ll do the talking.”

With fearful faces they opened the weapon crates in the office to bring out the heavy weaponry. Once they were equipped, they went out the office’s rear door and took up positions. The machine gun team hid behind a large crate, Carlos almost gagging at the smell of a former gangmate lying at their feet. Tuco climbed up to the catwalk to get a clear shot. The lights were also dimmed to conceal the assistants, while White Fire walked out the office front door and confronted Coronel face to face.

Her costume was meant to draw attention after all. White and gold were deliberate to divert the eyes. She looked Coronel in the eye as she spoke. . “Hold it right there. Are you my friend or foe?” she asked, voice distorted.

As Coronel took his walk over the corpses he took notice to them not having skin burned all the way to the bone of the bodies. The work was sloppy and almost made him reconsider coming onto the scene. He sighed as he walked farther in because he felt they took notice of him and started amassing weapons. As they pulled the machine gun out he felt no threat. "Oh look they also have an RPG how boring." Coronel thought to himself, but the one person he took a little interest came out side unarmed.

"Well at least someone has a back bone"

They finally scrambled around back oblivious to his surveillance ability mapping them out like rats running under a rug. The main one came out the front door acting superior. They asked if i was a friend or foe... He looked around a bit and seen rubble on the ground. "I am the hero Rock-Shaker. What has been done here is a grave crime and i will be arresting you." Rock-Shaker sounded like a dumb hero name that would be in his start.

Coronel placed out both hands. Gripping real tight he acted to false shake and struggle to pick up a few small rocks as if he was going to use them as projectiles. "Giv...e it up... I am a ... Powerful! Metahuman that will DEFEAT you villain trash!" he shouted as he acted like he was out of breath. Coronel acting is sometimes good, but maybe this was over selling it.

In his mind he was sighing like crazy. "Yep sorry I cant play the hero. God that was terrible. " He said out loud knowing the others heard him. "Yeah i'm just a villain looking to have some fun. I like what you did with the yard the decorations are flawless." Again he was boasting his ass off.

Having the ability to discern lies tossed her way, and being an actor herself, Fire shook her head in disapproval at the display of ineptitude. She presumed the opposite of the man, and treated him as exceedingly dangerous. "Terrible and Amateurish. But I can give you acting pointers." Fire took a few steps towards Corona.

"I will say you are not a foe then. Boys I will take it from here, you can go home. I will take it from here." she addressed her three goons.

The regular hired guns sighed with relief and retreat from the scene, leaving the two metahumans to the warehouse.

"I am White Fire. This was formerly a group with some capacity to import substances from out of the country, and I am taking control. You want a cut, you follow my lead. There will be stealing, killing, torture, but there will be a fair share of money. Otherwise you walk away now. How does that sound?”

"MY ACTING NEEDS WORK. Who does this little shit think she is." Coronel not really in an outrage was kind of loudly thought in his head. It played in his mind over and over. "She actually had the nerve to say that." He not only took slight insult from this but more so when she directed her little pets away as if she could take him.

Okay then Coronel would humor her. "How about a no to the whole thing, but instead ill give you an out to this whole mess. You apologize and beg for your life and ill only take your arms from you." It was a fitting offer. How much more generous could a man be in the presence of an insult. At least she would be able to walk around, but she would not be able to put her grimy hands on anything important anymore.

Popping his neck he was ready for that classic no i have class and don't dare to submit tone. "Also if you refuse you might want to tell the guys to shoot the guns first before the RPG. Makes for a better fight."



Besides all the commotion outside Coronel's power was busy at work inside releasing the restrained man. They would surely be surprised by the guy who can get up and walk. As he got a feel of the room he closed in on the ropes. As he focused in he created an ability like sword. With a single slash all the rope fell from the guy unbinding him from the chair.

Jeremy soon found himself free from his bindings by some invisible force. Not a man to waste time speculating, nor a man to be crossed, he picked up a spare RPG and kicked down the door.

“Metahuman pieces of shit! NOBODY CROSSES JEREMY STEEL!” He set the rocket launcher’s sights on the two freaks standing some distance away, planning to blow Coronel and White Fire away. The sound of the door being kicked down meant Fire’s attention was quickly diverted, and the nanosecond her brain registered the threat, she had already crouched down to duck and shot a blast of white flame towards the RPG round itself.

Jeremy had no time to feel anything, as the explosion blew him and his office to smithereens. Significant heat and pressure emanated from White Fire, countering the pressure from the blast as well.

She turns toward her guest once again, registering the kind of person she was dealing with. “Well if you’re easily offended that’s your problem not mine. I believe in constructive criticism.” She humored Coronel with her sass. But she also showed her open hand generate a small fire which she held aloft for him to see.

She saw he was a man prone to fighting, and made violent threats. That means he was both a telekinetic and ruthless. “…But you shouldn’t play with fire, if you don’t want to burn! Tell you what. If you want to spill blood so much, a werewolf is due to arrive in a few minutes. He's the one I want."

As they were in the middle of their discussion, given she was a ass sucking bitch who liked to flaunt what she had, the door from the room the guy was tied in flung open revealing a man hoisting an RPG. In a quick response he launched the missile head toward the two in the attempt to ensure a quick decisive blow. Coronel stood there completely unfazed and would let the projectile make its course, but the woman instead intervened and mid path blew the rocket up. It was a quick very weak explosion that was diffused in seconds.

She then turned back and went on to rambling about crap. It seems his image again was being denied as they did not even know whom they were speaking to.

"How about this I'll kill you now and then ill go upstairs and murder your goons. After that i will kill the werewolf; it only seems more fun that way."

IN a quick thought of her intercepting the missile, he looked to the right at the port. With a quick thought a 16 person boat come flying towards her. You could easily see it coming given the sound of dripping water pouring out of its hull. And the sound of metal scraping together as the boat was sent flying made it very non stealthy like.

Once the boat was coming into view the gloves were off. One quick, deep inhale and a stream of concentrated white flame shot from her fingers towards the boat, slicing into its gas tank and igniting the fuel. With an agile leap she vaulted over a crate to shield herself from the blast, while a downward kick materializes a fireblast over Coronel's head, heading towards him in an arc.

As the superpowered duel was underway, Jeremy had come to from the explosion. No normal human could survive an rpg detonating at point blank range, but Jeremy was anything but normal. His head, arms and torso were blasted apart in the vicinity behind White Fire, and they had already begun... regenerating. Not into the original Jeremy, no, but rapidly growing into smaller Jeremy's of assorted size.

"Ah shit." They said in unison and began fleeing in different directions, rapidly growing into three Jeremys. Fire did not notice this, but Coronel had a nice view of it all.

With a nice howl through the wind the boat flew over head but was met with the same attack that hit the rpg. Cutting through the boat the fire made contact with the fuel supply making erupt and blow the ship apart. The fire from the boat collided with his telekinetic shield stopping immediately, but it was not done. The woman had also unleashed her own ability at him in the effort to catch him off guard. However the plan failed since He still had his shield up. Taking up the burning fuel from the boat he combined the fire and the burning bodies and hoisted them up as another shield only top watch the bodies have the meat incinerate until all that was left was bones.

Setting his new mad shield aside he caught a glimpse of the guy he helped trying to flee from the scene. Coronel knew he was a meta, but he didn't have to run without giving thanks first. "I will just take the thanks out of his ass" Coronel thought to himself as he held out a hand grasping the man with an almost invisible force. He stopped dead in his tracks. Not even the ability to struggle showed since his body was locked tight from all movement. "Now you are not running right? You fired an RPG at me after i untied you and that is how you show your hospitality?" Coronel waited no longer and squeezed his hand into a fist. The guy's three pieces were reduced to the size of a marble. Coronel chuckled "haha Meatbles" he blurted it out as an accidental joke.

The weird thing was the guy was still alive after getting crushed. It was like a cockroach that didn't want to die. He released his ability and the 3 marbles blew apart sending little bits every where. Soon they all started taking shaped back into Jeremy. Tens of thousands little Jeremy's scattered across the ground. Now he didn't care if Jeremy or the fire girl lived or died. He had a good chuckle and was read for the next thing to take his attention. "Didn't the girl say something about a werewolf and more fun? I might have to re-ask about that." He thought to himself as he kinda did test her. Screw it just ask "You said something about a werewolf showing up? When will that be?"

Stephanie just glimpsed from behind the crate to see the situation, if it called for more fireblasts or if something had changed. Well, the man was a powerhouse of telekinesis for sure, the environmental damage hardly bothering him as it did her. Shrapnel was a hazard for her squshy human butt.

His attention was diverted when Jeremy... a mini-Jeremy began fleeing. She locked eyes with one of them as he fled past her, but an unseen force started compressed Jeremy into a miniscule point, before he erupted into a viscous ooze. "UGH! HELL NO!" She cussed as she got some on her costume's skirt.

It became weird- really wierd- when a whole bunch of Jeremys rose from the ooze. They were all cussing out the situation. Deciding she didn't want to deal with a hundred Jeremys tomorrow, walls of fire began to rise all around and turning the all to dust. Where the fire wall went, only ash remained. Jeremy now, it seemed, was no more.

It seemed Coronel had found the amusement he sought with this clearly inhuman Jeremy thing. She was expecting the aforementioned werewolf "Any second now..."

And right on cue three large pick ups ladened with gangmembers began to arrive at the torched warehouse, mostly a bunch of dudes with guns wearing flannel and jeans. Said guns were aimed at Fire and Coronel.

One man, long haired and shirtless, wearing just jean shorts and sneakers, and very ripped, moved forward. "The hell happened here?" He then looked at Coronel and Fire. "The hell are you? Where's Jeremy?"

As the little Jeremy's scattered about they were met with a cold, or should say crispy end of a hot rod. They were burned in clusters unable to live after full incineration. The smell of charred bodies filled the air. It was Enjoyable to Coronel and made him crave more fun. The lady said they would be here any minute, and right on cue trucks started cutting of there exits. Coronel grabbed a drop gun from the other bodies on the floor and pointed at them.

The guy came stepping out acting all high and mighty. I'm a big dick I want to know where my friend is or everyone dies; sort of thing.

Coronel with another brilliant idea. "That Lady is Jeremy's friend and i came in and gunned and burned everyone here. I was about to kill here but then everyone showed up for the party." The plan to get his full attention worked a bit too well. They guy with anger in his face had everyone line up and point weapons at Coronel. With a smirk He jerked the gun in position and acted like he was going to shoot, but before he could all the men unleashed fury. Bullets ripped through the flesh of Coronel's vessel. There were enough bullets to disarm both his arms and blow his torso and head apart.

As the firing calmed down they were more than sure they killed Coronel. They began reloading and dropping their guard. A few set their weapons back in the truck. But in all the rush a good group of them seen Coronel regaining his stance. His Torso reconfigured itself and his head remolded. Both his arms reattached as if it was a disconnected robot. They were horrified in the sight and a few could not hold their lunch. In a minute or two Coronel was back together.

"You know i'm going to have to kill you now. You ruined my new clothes. Good thing my shoes are fine."

The raggedly Twilight reject looked at Coronel then at Fire, the former claiming the latter was Jeremy's friend. Then the goons started wasting Coronel, only for him to come right back to life.

Fire took note of Coronel's abilities. She wondered if he could withstand her fireblasts. He was useful on her side.

"All of you back off, you're all dead men to this one." Then he turned to Coronel. "Jeremy's dead you say?" Then he started to laugh. That awkward villain laugh that went on for a bit too long.

Fire shook her head and looked at Coronel. "Does he expect us to laugh maniacally with him? That's a terrible cliche." Then he looked at the supposed wolfman. "I take you are not upset at your associate's death?"

The wolfman started explaining, his head starting to break out in sweat. "Jeremy was just a small piece of a much bigger threat. Bigger than the drug trade, bigger than psycho metahumans killing each other in the streets. By killing him, you sent it a message, and "IT"... will be coming for us. ALL of us! Killing me here, now, would be doing me a favor."

"Okay. I was not expecting that." Fire said to Coronel, genuinely surprised.

Looking around he seen the faces of the disgusted men. Have they not seen someone who can regenerate? Was limbs and parts reconnecting on a cellular level too much. He was in his right mind to start killing them all when the were thingy started talking. It was as if he was in distress. It this, it that. What ever this It thing is is sounding like a better way to waste his day on.

He was itching for a stronger opponent. The girl and the wolf guy would not due. If he was going to kill weaklings he'd go to a children's hospital.

"So you are less afraid of me then you are of them? What an idiot. I allow you all to destroy my clothing for a half baked plead. If you want to die then so be it, but you werewolf i will personally make you regret fearing someone weaker than I." Coronel through up his hand reaching for a loaded truck of iron rods. They were used for securing concrete to the shore. They Would float several feet above Coronel's head pointed at all the weak men.

With a quick hand gesture the signal was given. The rods spun then launched themselves at all the new comers except the werewolf.

The rods were sent flying and skewered cars and gangsters. Screams of pain filled the air as the normal humans were turned into sish kebab. Some died instantly. Others agonized as the rods immobilized them but missed vital organs.

"If you want to meet your death. You'll find it on our distribution island off the coast of Mexico. In the Wolf Mountain on the Galapagos Islands." The man transformed fully into a giant wolf, pouncing on the duo. Fire responded with a fireblast to its face, and while he tried to power through, this caused his jaws to miss Coronel by many inches. He landed roughly and unsteadily, and was open to attack.