La Belle Dame sans Merci

The young man is shunted to an opulent office the size of a small house. Red is the dominant color and the Metropolis skyline is nothing short of breathtaking.

"It will be 10 minutes Merci and get the forms for section 57." He smiles coolly at his shapely assistant as she leaves. There's nothing here but an immaculately clean desk with tasteful gold implements. "Now, you're wondering why I had you directed here..."

"Directed," was a nice word for had happened.

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"Directed, yes..." The KGBeast felt rather naked without his mask on. It wasn't too many times he was ushered through the front door of an office complex, either. His cybernetic arm didn't make it easy to interact in polite company, let alone in public. Yet here he was, in an expensive office with expensive furniture, looking at the most powerful man - correction, the second most powerful man in Metropolis.

"I can only presume Cobblepot had contact you," he tried to drop his Slavic accent as much as he could, but it still sounded like broken English. "But how did you find my 'flat' in Gotham? Your men broke door down. Barely allowed me chance to break one of their arms."

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"Hmm, I could design something more effective then that. For all the cold War talk..." He clucked a little. "Cobblepolt, oh no. Gotham leaves a taste in my mouth. I have other connections. No, the reason you're here is because I think a man of your talents is someone I might find to be useful to me."

He smiles like a shark.

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The KGBeast forced himself to form a small smile in return. The Cold War might have been over, but that didn't mean he'd developed a sense of humour about it. And Luthor was the biggest Capitalist there was. Saying that, most of his employers were Capitalists these days.

"The Penguin is below the both of us. I am pleased you hear of my skills though. It is long time since I used them to very good effect. Too long." For a second he looked wistful, but then his gaze snapped back to Luthor. "My enemies call my the K.G.Beast. You may call me Anatoli Knyazev. Who do you want dead?"

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A black market economy as thriving as Russia's was very easy to convert and exploit by the Luthor's of the world.

his eyebrow twitch, but do not raise at the man's forthcoming nature. "I was considering starting entry level and allowing you to work as high as your talents allow. Sound appealing?" The man knows the answer already, of course. Luthor forced contracts away from Knyazev in order to assure desperation.

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The KGBeast paused for a few minutes of uncomfortable silence. He was eager to take any job - anything was better than having to mug teenagers. But getting into bed with Lex Luthor was signing a contract that would be very very difficult to break. He always considered that if Oswald Cobblepot had got to forceful he would have just killed him. With Luthor that wasn't so easy.

"Yes, it does sound appealing. Consider the KGBeast your agent, Mr Luthor." He extended his good arm over the desk towards the devil he was dealing with. He only hoped it wouldn't be a mistake.

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Difficult? No. Impossible.

Luthor looks at the hand. A trained person, one with more etiquette to his would never put out his hand before his superior did. "Let's hope," he says, looking at the hand like a bug before steepling his own fingers. "You prove to be a gem in the rough. "Merci will take you downstairs."

To his new Kyptonite arm.

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He didn't know the exact way to part from someone as powerful as Lex Luthor, so the KGBeast delivered a curt bow, and left the office and met the attractive P.A.

And let out an audible sigh of relief. He hadn't felt this tense in a long time. "I believe you will be taking me downstairs?" He hadn't interacted with a woman this attractive in some time, so he didn't make eye contact with her. In fact, the KGBeast had spent most of his time alone for the past couple of decades. When your profession involved killing people, it often murdered the romantic side of a man.

"What am I being taken to?" He felt a sense of anticipation about whatever Luthor had in store. He played with the joint of his cybernetic arm out of habit as he walked.

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Mercy is a towering amazon of a woman who moves much the way a cougar would. The smile and minuscule nod she favors him with is small and polite as they head to the elevator.

"You're being taken down." The tone should be one he recognizes from his KGB grunt days.

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He couldn't help but be transfixed by her muscular frame. He suddenly became aware of his maskless face. He was glad he'd made an effort to gel hir hair, but nothing could get rid of the scars... What was he thinking? This wasn't a blind date...

"I got this arm-" he tapped his cybernetic gun arm "-after a fight with the Batman. I was tied to a gargoyle up on one of the cathedrals and he left me there for the Gotham cops to find. Didn't count on me sawing my own arm off to escape..." He smiled, a sick smile. "The pain was immense."

He wasn't sure why he was telling the big lady this. It was a cross between flirting and trying to scare. He wasn't sure of the difference.

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As if scars and war stories would scare this woman. "We'll have to add escape training to your program," is her only cool comment.

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For the first time all day the KGBeast laughed. It was a roar that filled the elevator. "Very good. Da. Very good."

The elevator ground to a halt and he politely gestured for Mercy to leave first. "After you." As he stepped out after her, he looked in amazement at the large lab complex around him. This was some place.

"Luthor is what we Soviets would call, 'a man of some means.' We didn't even have this level of technology in Leningrad labs when they were going strong, and we had government backing. Amazing."

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"Luthor made this from nothing - and made me from nothing," she remarks and then for the first time, stops and regards him fully. "From what I understand, you have nothing."

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"I have... fallen upon hard times." He runs his good hand over his hair. "There was a time when I was something important. A patriot, willing to serve Mother Russia to the bitter end."

He smiles grimly. "Does it seem ridiculous to you that I've lived here, in America, for twenty five years? I lived in the Soviet Union for only twenty one. For all intents and purposes, I am an American citizen. An irony that never fails to sicken me."

"Still, something can come from nothing." His eyes rest on the kryptonite arm.

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"Everything," she amends. "Comes from nothing that's worth anything."

"Have a seat." There's a leather covered seat looking not unlike a high tech dentist's chair on more sinister. The comment is not a request.

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The KGBeast sat down on the chair. It was surprisingly comfortable. "I get the impression this won't be much fun..."

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The chair molds around him, at first comfortably, then the pressure and some sort of strange suction pulls and holds him, even his arms and legs.

"No."

((OOC: I think that works for a scene. There is no Luthor in the current game and so the arm upgrade might be a plot device later if you want one, but I don't know if you can walk into the game with it. That would be up to Sean, the supes player, and the mods. Just FYI.))

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OOC: So how do you think it went? I think he's slightly more villainous than heroic... ;)

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ivy-lady.livejournal.com

((OOC, the writing style is great. Spelling, punctuation and queue reading seem to be "on." (Queue reading is more of an art then skill.) I'd call him about on par with Parasite as a threat. More brains then the villain, but less raw power. Impression seems to be he's a guy who needs a mastermind or commander giving him orders otherwise he gets lost pretty easily. Is that what you were going for?))

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