A Snake in a Snake's den (Romulus, ask to join)

The grey clouds coiled and and burst, bathing the night smothered city with cold rain. The drops splashed onto the soaked concrete and splintered into the air. Commuters rushed, to-and-fro, some with their umbrellas and others with their coats pulled over their heads. A limosine, black as obsidian, swam through the wet streets like a shark. Amber eyes gazed through the tinted windows, which had spider webs of water sprawled down them. The car turned slowly another corner, sending fat, lethargic ripples through a deep puddle which had grown in the ditch along a curb. The car came to a halt outside a a restaurant. The front had stairs which led to double doors. Warm light stretched out from the windows with a reddish orange hue.

The front door of the limo opened and a man wearing a knee length leather coat, collar pulled up to shield his face from the rain, stepped out. He pulled his fedora hat down and walked to the furthest back door of the limo, which was directly opposite the stairs to the restaurant. He opened it, all the way and reached inside his coat removing a sleek, black umbrella. With a push of a button, the flesh of the umbrella sprawled upwards into a dome shape and he held it over the door. A slender foot extended, wearing a black heel with an ankle strap and it was quickly followed by another. A female's body stood up, and gently took the umbrella from the man. "Thank you, Mark." She nodded at the man, the dome of the umbrella blocking the upper half of her head. The man nodded back and got back into the Limosine. She walked towards the double doors with a furor that was akin to a march but with more elegance.

The doors swung open and she lowered the umbrella, revealing she was wearing a large hat with all her hair tucked up into it. She handed the sheathed umbrella to a member of staff, who knew exactly who she was. "In the back, Miss Hammers." He said, desperately trying to hold back his stammer - a cocktail of fear, respect and courage. She nodded to him and smiled, before walking on. The sounds of the more weathier members of Chicago filled her ears. Laughing, the scraping of forks on plate. A glass smashed in one of the back rooms. She blinked, peering forward, seeing the double doors which lead to the private party room; While usually reserved for birthday parties, she and 3 others had booked it for one very special reason.


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Inside the room, three older men sat around a table, each with a different starter; one at soup, the other a salad while the last had simply opted for fries. Don Michael Angelo, with his tanned skin and dark black hair spoke to the others. "They're late. Who would bring us here and not even arrive on time. It's outrageous." He spoke while munching on some of the home-made fries the restaurant offered. "And it gives me the creeps; maybe this is a pinch." He nodded aggressively, his two body guards behind him nodded with him. Father Steven Heeney, with a spoon full of soup nodded. "Late and I hear she's a broad; No idea how she got where she is." He slurped the soup gently, his reverent collar pressing against his throat, his tongue lapped his lips gently before he took another sip of his soup from the spoon. "A broad?! Ha! This aughta be good." More fries found their way to his fat mouth. The final person sat at their table, a Mr. Giovanni Jones stirred some lettuce leaves around with his fork. "She's not just any broad... have you not heard what they've been saying about her?" He was about to go on, but was intrupted by the mahogony doors being pushed open and all three turned to see who'd entered. A vision in black stood, hands near her hips.

"What have they been saying about her, Mr. Jones... nothing bad, I hope?"

She walked forward, a grin on her face and pulled a chair back and slid into it with a grace that felt almost supernatural. She still wore the hat, all of her hair tucked up into it, exposing her neck and fine collar bones. Her eyes remained unseeable as well, but you could make out strong cheek bones. At first the three were slightly taken aback, but it didn't take them long to regain their business like attitudes. "You're late, Miss. Hammers." She rolled her fur shawl off her shoulders and onto the back of the chair. "Fashionably, of course." A waiter walked in a presented her with her starter; rodered before she'd arrived - it was a small plate with 4 peices of sushi with some pink sauce trickled over it. "And please, call me Roxy."

While this all seemed extremely friendly, everbody in the room had maleficent intent feuled by ambition and selfishness. Roxy was no exception to this. She was new to this city, but she didn't intend on remaining unknown. She hadn't been able to bring much with her from New York for now, but what she had brought was more than enough.

It may have been the city he had chosen to protect but that didn’t mean he had to like it. Things were always so bleak and it always seemed as if nothing he did made a difference. Hell, dropping his ego it seemed nothing anyone did ever changed anything in this damned city sense the New York Assault. Chicago was bad enough as it was before then but afterwards it seemed as if every bad thing that hid in the shadows of New York decided they would be better off in Chicago. Romulus had had enough. Sure, he wasn’t sure entirely what it was he was going to do to put a stop to this madness and bring Chicago back to the top and it all started tonight. Tonight was the first step towards actually making a difference.

Because after one year of just being a pest in the side of organized crime he had gotten some real dirt. Romulus’ methods were always effective and he always got the answers he wanted but sometimes the snitches that snitched to him returned the favor to their bosses. Well, those that he left with a tongue or working jaw. Tonight was different though, he had made sure the information he got from the first thug was true by getting it from three different thugs, each from the respective group of the top dawgs in Chicago. They were having a meeting in some fancy restaurant with what appeared to be a new player in the game. One who none of the men he ‘questioned’ really knew anything about. All they knew was the same damn things.

Things that honestly sounded more like superstitions than anything. No one knew where she was from, and there were rumors floating around that she was some kind of freak. Not in the physical appearance style or the ‘circus freak’ but in the sense that she was probably a metahuman. What her powers were exactly he didn’t know but one guy did mention something about snakes before he tried to throw himself off the building. Apparently she was that scary to these thugs. The only thing he did know about her was she liked big hats. That didn’t sit well with the man in black but it didn’t deter him. He had set out tonight with one goal and he was going to accomplish that goal. If he failed then he’d never get a chance to do this again, if he messed up they’d never be so sloppy again. The security would never be as simple as it was tonight. So, failure was not an option.

He was currently sitting on top of the building across from the restaurant and watching each and every person that entered and exited from it. He had already scoped the place out earlier in the day when he was dressed as a waiter. He had even helped set up the room the meeting was going to take place in. Luckily for him those little spy cameras that could record black and white video and sound weren’t as expensive as they had been twenty years ago. The restaurant was one of the high class types, one he could never get into not even back when he was still on active duty for the Marines. Suits and ties, dresses and diamonds were a must it appeared to even be allowed to get in. A dress code he was about to break as soon as he spotted the last member of the prestigious group of slum bags.

The first three men had been easy enough to spot and were already in the room by the time he saw who he thought was his mystery girl. His suspicion was only proven true when he heard a female voice speak in his ear. Or rather his ear piece he was currently waring as he listened in on the conversation going on in the room. Pulling his mask down over his face he let out a slow breath letting his body relax before he jumped. Sliding down the fire escape till the end of it before he jumped off the end and landed on the ground below in a barrel roll. He quickly made his way across the street ducking past cars and dodging people as he made his way into the alley and into the restaurant through a window into the bathroom. Here he waited, he needed more proof first. Something to go off of, well no that wasn’t entirely true. He didn’t but the cops would and what he had recorded so far was good for the three males but he had nothing on the female yet.

Impaling one of the small peices of fish with her fork, she placed it in her mouth and chewed. "Wow, the food here's actually really good." Placing the fork down, she leaned forward and scanned the people in the room. Just as she was about to speak, Don Angelo blurted some words from his mouth, impatiently - Paranoia had always been one of his traits. "Just tell us why you brought us here, this whole thing stinks!" He pointed at her and she muttered quietly, rolling her light brown eyes "Not the only thing that stinks." Angelo raised a brow "What did you say?" She looked at him and said, loud and clearly. "I said, why do you think." She raised both her eyebrows at him like he was stupid before leaning back in her chair once more.

"Why do you think I, someone who has had extreme success in New York come here and arrange to meet with the three heads of Chicago?" She looked around. "Well?" The Reverent spoke up. "Too... know your competition?" She was surprised at how insecure he sounded. "Partially. I am expanding and I am here, not on hostile terms - I'm here to see if an alliance is possible. All out war is just so frustrating and so many people die pointlessly." She looked around the room once more; she knew the three of them were currently on non-hostile terms, especially since they were all sat around the same table, eating rather than fighting. "What if we refuse? Give us a reason to work with you." The Don opened his greasy lips again, and Roxy rose from her seat, prompting the Don's bodyguards to tense up. "Well... just look at New York; I basically run that place - hardly a thing gets done without my say so - I did all that single handedly, just imagine what my help could bring to your table.." She looked at Giovanni who had remained silent thus far. He noticed her looking and spoke. "With our current set up, we split all the money in an equal part, 33% each - with 1 of us getting the last 1% at the end of each year. We'd be losing out on an entire 8%. It's mathematically not worth it." The Reverent muttered in agreement and the Don slurped his wine before adding "Yeah!"


Roxy smiled a little and rolled her left shoulder. "Well, I suppose that is true... do you want to know something else that's true?" They looked at one another and all spoke at the same time.

"What?" "What?" "What?"

She reached up to her hat, and removed it slowly...

"The Rumours."

She was from New York, not only that but apparently she ran it. Information he could definitely use. When it came to finding out more about her and what it is she did exactly; despite the obvious that she like the other three men sitting in the room was connected to organized crime in some way shape or form. Her presence and ability to set up a meeting with the three most ‘powerful’ men in Chicago’s organized crime sense the Crime Syndicate was nothing to scoff at. He could only listen and watch as she attempted to weasel her way into ‘their group’ to gain some sort of foothold in the city without starting an all-out gang war. One she would not doubt lose. It didn’t matter how powerful she was back in New York they were in what they believed to be their city.

Weaseling her way in didn’t work though. The man in the suit with the salad, Giovani he believed, didn’t take so kindly to losing at least eight percent of his profit by including her in their little deal. What happened next however was not something he had anticipated; and it actually made him pay closer attention to the goings on of the room, specifically the woman now removing her hat. If that that was at all possible. With the hat now gone he was able to get a clear look at her face, meaning she was caught on camera finally. It also meant he was able to get a look at her hair, hair that was moving and apparently was not hair. No, where her hair should have been were snakes.

He was dealing with a modern day Medusa. If only he had been named Perseus. Despite that she obviously didn’t have all of the powers of her historical look alike as the men in the room were currently not stone figures and neither was he himself. Yet, she obviously could do something other than just having completely live snakes living in her scalp. This, he deduced, because there was no reason for people to have been as scared of her as the one he ‘questioned’ was unless she was some sort of metahuman or magician. Whatever the case was he still needed to see what would happen, he didn’t have enough on her to do anything quite yet. “Do something drastic…somebody slip up.” He quietly commanded, knowing no one was anywhere near to hear.

A fine chrous of hissings began to eminate from her head, and some fleshy coils began to descend. Snakes. Serpents. They had been curled around in such a fashion that no-one would be able to notice but finally they were allowed to sprawl. Their yellow scales, spiralled with unique white imprints glimmered like plastic in the room's lighting. She slowly shook her head from side to side and allowed them to stretch out. Some reached her lower back while others curled at her shoulders, somewhat resembling a normal hair style. One that occasionally moved. A frequently hissed. The men in the room all leaned backwards, the sizzling hisses sending shivers down their spines. She stroked one of the serpent's heads with the back of a finger before reaching into the fur shawl around the shoulders of the seat, removing a cigarette and a lighter. "I don't know about you Giovanni but I feel so much better." She stared him in directly in his grey eyes, doing everything she could to make them uneasy. Scared. While she couldn't turn people into statues with her gaze, she could certainly stop them in their tracks. She knew he didn't feel better but he was by far the least taken a back in the room. He'd obviously heard whispers.

Before Medusa could continue, the doors behind her opened and she heard a gasp. One of the waiters had come in and she looked over her shoulder. His eyes were fixed on the twisting flesh locks that composed her hair. Petrified. It wasn't until she spoke that the boy's ability to function was restored. "Can we help you?" She raised a brow, speaking in a montone, before the workman in his late teens stammered a reply. "P-plates?" She rolled her eyes. She forgot that common things still happen while the big boys play. "Go for it." He quickly and quietly scuttled around the room, and before he passed Medusa on his way out she spoke. "Do you mind if I smoke in here?" He looked at her and stitched together a response. "Well a-actuall-" Sensing a refusal she simply looked at him, right in the eye, before flicking the hood of her metal lighter off with a thumb. "I didn't think so." The flickering fire was brought to the end of a smoke, which curled with veins of vibrant orange. "Beat it." She motioned her head over her shoulder while the snakes hissed quietly. The kid nearly ran from the room.

Turning back to the room, she took a singular, large drag from the cigarette. "Where were we? Oh yes. You were going to give me 70% of your empire." Immediately the spell the snakes held over them was broken and they allpierced the uneasy quiet with an outraged burst. "70%?! Because you brought out some snakes? Absolutely ridiculous! NO WAY!" The reverand yelled, and he was soon followed by Giovannis much more polite reply. "No deal." She looked to Angelo, tilted her head forward, cigarette held between two fingers. He seemed the most flustered by the proposal. "ABSOLUTELY OUTRAGEOUS! WHO DO YOU THINK YOU ARE, COMING IN HERE WITH ALL THIS TALK! I DON'T EVEN KNOW WHO YOU ARE!" The three of them continued to yell, and Medusa brought her light brown orbs to her nails. Her dark red lips parted.

"I poisoned your food."

That shut them up.

‘I poisoned your food.’ That was all he needed. Her very own confession recorded and ready to be found by the cops when they arrived on the scene to clean up after Romulus made quick work of restraining the four individuals in the room and leaving them unconscious so that they would have no means of escape. Removing himself from the bathroom he was currently in, which apparently was the staff bathroom, Romulus made his way out of the back room of the restaurant through the kitchen and into the dining area where he walked towards the room that the four ‘gang’ leaders were currently occupying, ignoring the gaps and people taking pictures of him. So much for his mythological status. The Man in Black as of tonight was officially going to be a house hold name. Grunting he shoved a chair up against the door effectively locking them and keeping the occupants inside.

With that done he turned around walked up to the fire alarm and pulled it, activating the sprinklers and dousing everyone inside with water. “Get out!” Not enjoying being soaked while eating their meals or wanting to piss off the masked man in black the rich and upper-middle class families ran out screaming and complaining. Sure, he felt bad that he probably ruined some actual legitimate families’ meals but it was better that they had to work to save up money to eat a fancy meal another time than to be in the building when things got started. They’d thank him for that eventually, or at least the parents would once they saw on the news what had taken place the next day or whenever they saw it. Now that everyone was safely outside except the four locked inside he made his move.

“Lock it behind me.” He growled out at a young serving boy who had decided it was worth the risk to stay inside and try and take whatever money had been left behind. The kid had decided to stay, thus he would be made useful. “Su-sure. Anything.” The kid stuttered out following Romulus as he removed the chair from the door, placed it behind him and opened the door quickly closing it behind, the kid listened and locked it, him as he threw his escrima sticks at the reverend and Angelo, effectively knocking them both off their chairs and onto the ground where they hit their heads and were immediately knocked out. Slipping on his brass knuckles as he ducked underneath whatever projectile or punch was thrown his way he moved upwards in an uppercut aimed to bash ‘Medusa’ in the chin as she turned around to see what was going on.

Their yells turned to silence, and they all turned to look the woman in the eyes once more. She folded her arms and looked straight back at them, facial expression cold and serious. "You're lying." Giovanni spoke first, which was unlike him. "There's no way." She smiled, when she noticed the reverend nodding in agreement. "Maybe I was late because I paid a special trip to the kitchen." One of the snakes on her shoulder curled upwards before it's jaw unhinged and opened. Pink flesh could be seen within, but within a matter of seconds the pink darkened to black. "The venom of a Black Mamba in each of your meals. Maybe even in your wine." As she mentioned it, she extended her cigarette over to her own glass of red wine, which she had specifically left untouched. They noticed. She flicked the ash into the blood red liquid. The snake settled down once again and she scanned them all once more. Angelo was sweating more than usual it was repulsive. The Reverend's throat swallowed underneath the white square at his collar. Giovanni seemed particularly calm. "Say I believe you. Why are you telling us?" She smiled. "I'm glad someone's asking the smart questions. Well, Mr. Giovanni. I happen to have brought the antidote with me." She reached under her chair and removed a rather normal looking bottle of wine.
"Join me and I'll pour you a drink. Or you could just die."

She poured the dark liquid into another empty glass near her plate. Angelo sweat more, unsure what to do.

"I still don't believe you." The Reverend spoke up, and she stopped pouring, holding the bottle by her side once more. She reached down and held the glass and cigarette in one hand at the same time. "Go on then Reverend. Call my bluff." She face suddenly went sincere and she stared him down like a gorgon. "Do you have that much faith in your God. I don't think you do. God isn't in the room with you. Poison isn't just in the room with you. It's in you. In your system. I know which I'd have more faith in, Reverend. And I certainly know which one will kill you first." She raised her glass and took a sip. The Reverend seemed to have lost some courage. "I'll just go to the hospital then, I'l-" She interupted him. "The Black Mamba is native to Africa, do you really think some crummy hospital in Chicago of all places is going to carry the anti-venom? Because that's a miracle not even your God could pull off. Call. My. Bluff." He conceded and lowered his head. She could smell Angelo's sweat. Even the air was on the edge of it's seat.

In a typical outburst, Angelo raised his voice and his body from his seat. "ENOUGH OF THIS! I AM NOT GOING TO JUST SIT HERE AND BE THREATENED BY SOME BROAD - NEVERMIND A FREAK!" Medusa twitched, but retained her stone like composure. She simply looked at him. "You are stood there, trembling in your own sweat - scared senseless of the venom which is pulsating through your fat, pathetic little excuse of a body and instead of begging before the person who's offering to save you, you insult them? And I'M the freak?! Sit down, Micheal." She scoffed, and her scolding of the man, being brutally honest about what he was seemed to have been enough to shut him up and cause him to sink down in his seat. She walked over to her own, sat in it, and put both her feet up on the table one crossed over the other, wine glass in one hand, bottle in the other.

"Well, Gentlemen - I'd make your decision quickly if I were you."
"Roxy, I-"
She interupted him. "Yes or no. And please, call me Medusa."

She took another sip, but before any of them could answer the ceiling burst with water. The drops splashed in her glass and she left out a sharp gasp as the cold water hit her skin. The room became a small nest of chaos for a few more seconds, mostly people gasping after being hit with icy water before yelling with confusion. After a few seconds she gathered herself. "Isn't that awkward." She turned to the door, and went to push it open only to find it locked. "How strange."

She turned around again, and with the rushing water didn't hear the door open. However, as she took another sip from her now watery wine, in the glass's reflection she saw a figure enter and furrowed her brow. After the Reverend and Angelo were sent out of their chairs, Medusa turned to face the person. A fist swung for her, yet she calmly but swiftly swung her head to the side to avoid it. She span around the assailant and smashed her glass into the back of the man's head in an attempt to daze him before she moved towards the door and tried to open it once again. It didn't budge.

The glass shattered against his head and he stumbled forward bracing himself against the table that was in front of him as the only female in the room ran to try and leave. “That won’t work.” He growled out flexing his hands before tightening them into a fist, wrapping around the brass knuckles once again. His eyes scanned the room as he picked up a bottle of wine and tossed it at the third and final man who had just removed a gun from his jacket effectively knocking it out of his hand and shattering the glass against his hand. Wouldn’t kill him, hell it probably wouldn’t even break his hand but it would leave cuts and scars as well as disarm him. “Let’s leave the guns out of this. You’ve all got enough charges without adding murder to your rap sheet.”

That done his attention turned back to ‘Medusa’ a smirk on his face as he rushed forwards. His stance and sudden forward movements making it seem as if he was some sort of unskilled boxer. Which is what he wanted. It worked in his favor if the person he was attacking thought less of him; if they thought that just because he was a human in a black mask and some normal ‘armor’ that he couldn’t hurt them. It lowered their guard and got them cocky. It also worked to his advantage as he knew every single pressure point in the human body and knew just where to strike to leave his foes practically immobile. His first punch from his right hand was aimed right at the snake lady’s thyroid. An attempt to cut off her air supply, and crush her larynx. As his fist was coming back his left fist flew forward intending to strike her right arm above the elbow but below the shoulder, effectively making it nothing more than a floppy limb.

When she saw the bottle fly through the air, she could see how Giovanni was seeing the world. Everything in slow motion. His hand, reaching up to try and save his life, but doing nothing but shattering the glass and sending the blood red liquid all over his hand. Shards of glass. Searing pain. He gasped and fell to the floor, dropping his gun. "No!" Medusa brought a hand to her face and gasped, before letting out a sharp, two sylable laugh. "You've no idea what you've just done." A fist flew for her throat, and she moved his head to the left eerily fast, however the man's other hand snapped upwards and hit her right in the right arm.  "Argh!" She grabbed it, and tried to will to to action. "What the fuck did you do?!" She paused.

"Besides murder three men." Medusa leaned to the right in order to better caress her wounded arm. Her face lowered it's aggressive stance, and she looked to the left. "I conceit, congratulations you beat a woman in a dress into submission." She held out her left arm, as a sign of surrender. Her dark lips cornered into a smirk. In truth she wanted him to ask more about how he'd killed the three men, but her being taken in would definitely not be the worst thing. People in her business... had their ways.

She dodged the punch that he had sent out in an attempt to cut off her air supply, stop her from talking. He hated it when these big bad mob bosses, or anyone for that matter, tried to talk their way out of the punishment they so desperately deserved. The one for her arm however that was intended to reduce her mobility worked however and that was almost good enough for him as he backed off preparing for any counter attack. None came, physically, as she leaned up against the wall seemingly nursing her wound. “Pressure point, your arm will not be of any use to you for a couple hours at the most.” She at least deserved to know what he did, not how though. Didn’t need her running around pulling that on anyone else if she ever got out of jail.

What she tried next though was to be expected, pin the blame on him. She had poisoned the three men, he had simply knocked them unconscious. Sure, the bottle of wine she had had in her hands when he burst into the room was probably the antidote and locating it now sitting on the floor, relatively unharmed next to where she had been moments before meant he could still save them. Although he didn’t have to. Could claim he wasn’t aware of the anti-toxin or how to administer it. The criminal underworld would be in chaos for a couple weeks and would allow him to take it down much easier as they rallied and fought trying to decide who was leading who. “No, you poisoned them, they were dead before I even walked in here.”

With that he threw a punch at the center of her face, one that was intended to knock her unconscious. If successful he’d rip apart the table cloth and use it as make shift binds. Tying the three mob bosses up, their hands locked together with Medusa also being bound in quite the same way. Her hat thrown into her lap so as to keep her snake filled head out and in the open. This all of course was not on Romulus recording as he had stopped it the moment he entered the room. The cops didn’t need to know what he looked like or sounded like. The rumors the scared people from the restaurant and the mob bosses would spread was enough spot light. All this done he notified the police using the silent alarm in the restaurant and left. If the punch didn’t connect, well then Medusa would have quite the fight on her hands.