Darian explains his supervillain modus operandi to his most aspirational henchman, Ciel.
2.6k words | 2/18/24
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Setting: Late (or post?) plot, Mastermind's lair
Ciel and his henchmen returned from their latest mission, successful, though it had been a bit too close for comfort. They had been sent to "retrieve" an important item from an unethical museum in the next state over, and return it to its original owners. They welcomed their treasured item back with tears and smiles, but the henchmen were a bit uneasy at how close to danger they got during the actual heist. All of them but one, that is.
"I just can't believe you guys stopped me from drawing a knife on that guy. It's not like I was really gonna hurt him or anything," Ciel rolled his eyes, dropping his travel bag, and then himself, onto the couch. "You all know as well as I do that that guy was stupidly determined to 'protect' their stolen artifacts. We only got lucky that Bud's trick worked."
"I can't believe I actually distracted a guard by throwing a coin in the other direction... it was just like in that video game Emerald is always playing..." Bud mused, a subtle cheeky grin threatening to break through the 'c'mon man, really?' demeanor he wanted to be in right now. As Bud went in the direction of the kitchenette, Chaaya scoffed at Ciel from the doorway.
"Ciel, you can't just... threaten! Regular people! With knives!" Chaaya spoke up in a huff, bringing the subject matter back at hand. "We're not that kind of villains' henchmen! Mastermind is a [Saturday morning cartoon] level villain. The rules state that at our position, as [Saturday morning cartoon] level henchmen, we aren't allowed to do that without explicit permission from Mastermind first."
"My explicit permission for what?" The room hushed as they realized Darian, Mastermind himself, had walked in on their conversation. He wasn't wearing his villain costume, but was instead dressed even more casually than the returning henchmen. Ciel wondered vaguely if he was still wearing his sleeping clothes, even though it was mid afternoon.
"Ciel wanted to draw a knife on one of the guards and threaten him," Chaaya reported to her boss. She tried ignoring Ciel's not-so-subtle attempt to cough to hide a grumbled 'kiss-ass'; she lasted about 5 seconds before words exploded out before she could stop herself. "I am not a kiss-ass! I am doing my job! Which you are also supposed to be doing!"
"Cyril. Is this true?" Darian looked into Ciel's eyes with a serious glare, as an icy coldness crept up the henchman's spine. Instead of letting himself be intimidated, Ciel puffed himself back up to argue, quickly deflating again as Darian held up his hand to stop him. "Save it. I want a yes or no answer, and nothing else is to come out of that mouth until you answer the question I asked with one of the two choices I gave you. Now Ciel, tell me. Were you trying to threaten someone with physical violence?"
"Yeess-" he drew the word out, like a scolded child admits guilt to a parent. "But if you ask me, some people could do with a little threatening now and then. And you've had me draw knives on opponents before!" Ciel barked indignantly, before once again locking eyes with Darian.
"But never without my permission! Do you know how much planning goes into these missions? One rogue act from a henchman who thinks he knows better than me could fuck everything up, in an instant!" He snapped his fingers as he said 'instant', to accentuate his point.
"It was one guard!" Ciel crossed his arms. Behind them, the other henches' gazes all flew to Darian, expecting another equally explosive response.
"That's not--!" Darian fell into silence, closing his eyes as he took a deep calming breath. He opened his eyes and looked into Ciel's once more. "Come with me. I need to show you something." There was a veiled sadness that Ciel had never noticed in his eyes before.
Darian turned and left, not waiting to see if Ciel would follow him. At the simultaneous hand waving from the other henches telling him to go with Darian, Ciel finally did so.
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"Man, we're getting really deep in the lair, huh?" Ciel's eyes wandered, never having been this far before, especially not without his group. A part of him vaguely wondered if Darian was gonna kill him. Darian hadn't said a word since they started walking, and his eyes were always pointed dead ahead.
Ciel almost stumbled into Darian, who'd stopped walking as he finally reached whatever door he'd been bringing him to come see.
"Ciel," Darian started, "before you can go in this room, I need you to sign this NDA." He pulled an NDA out from... somewhere? Ciel hadn't noticed where he got it from, he was just suddenly being handed it.
"An NDA?" the henchman cocked his head.
"Non-disclosure agreement, so you'll be legally bound to not discuss the contents of-" Darian was cut off as Ciel piped up again.
"I know what an NDA is, Mastermind, I just don't see what could possibly be in there that I wouldn't be able to tell anyone about. Is it like doomsday weapons or something? Illegal tech?" Ciel started getting a little excited, wondering what cool shit he was about to be privy to.
"I won't be answering any of those questions until you sign. You can walk away at any time, if you don't think you'd be able to keep a legally bound secret," Darian gestured loosely, using Ciel's pride against him. It worked.
"Fuck yeah I can keep a secret! Gimme that pen-" Ciel grinned like a cheshire cat, reaching for the pen that Darian was holding in his other hand. Unexpectedly, Darian pulled the pen out from his immediate reach before he could grab it.
"I want to make sure you understand the severity of this, Ciel. You cannot tell *anyone*. Not your friends, not the other henchmen, not your family members, nobody you know past, present, future, for the rest of your life. Or until I decide it stops being a secret. Whichever comes first." He ignored Ciel grumbling under his breath about how Darian's older than he is and would probably die before Ciel would. Darian held his gaze, trying desperately to get him to understand.
Ciel looked up at the ceiling, tilted his head, furrowed his brows, shook his head and looked down, tilted his head the other way and looked off to the side, all evidence of an epic emotional journey going through the henchman's mind as he weighed his options. It took several minutes of contemplating before Darian would receive his answer.
"Fine. I swear on my life that I will never tell another soul about this. Hand me that pen," Ciel ordered. Darian narrowed his eyes at Ciel for giving him a command, but complied nonetheless. Darian cocked his head and looked down at the paper, quietly observing as Ciel started signing the lengthy form. "Jeez, this is a lot of pencil pushing..." Ciel muttered.
"Being a responsible villain is as much about the paperwork as it is the daring escapades..." Darian smirked, obviously very proud of his life's work.
"Couldn't be me. I'm a man of *adventure*," Ciel clicked the pen closed for emphasis, and handed both items back to Darian. "Now show me the cool top secret villain stuff."
"...right." Darian quickly entered a long PIN code that even Ciel's well-trained eye couldn't keep up with. Before he knew it, the door in front of them was opening.
...
It was dark inside. Light streaked in through the doorframe behind them, but no lights were on as they entered. The door shut behind them, leaving them both in darkness for a moment. Darian flipped a regular looking light switch on the wall, turning on some lights on the other end of the room.
"Man, that's like. A normal ass light switch. I thought you would've at least had like.. an automatic light, or even one of those cool light switch plates that looks like an evil lever or something." Ciel mused out loud, though mostly to himself.
"Yeah, well, there's never enough time in the day to do all the cool villain DIY projects you hear about. It's on my list, okay?" Darian sighed, then gestured Ciel to approach the now-lit section of the room.
The lights were all pointed at one wall, which was the only decorated area of this otherwise empty room. Ciel internally bemoaned about the lack of cool villain gadgets, but maybe the stuff on the wall would be cool blueprints or-
"Hey, what the fuck?" Ciel murmured, "Are these... obituaries?"
On the wall in front of them was a dramatically large corkboard. Most of it was empty space, but pinned right around the center were an amount of various newspaper clippings, articles, and notarized letters.
"These are the people whose deaths I'm responsible for." Darian grimly stated. "I come in here before every single mission, no matter how minor or simple it feels."
"Wha- you- hang on, you've actually *killed* people? What happened to being a [Saturday morning cartoon] level villain? I thought you weren't allowed to kill anyone at that level. N-not that anyone's ever, like, *allowed* to kill people, but y'know...-" Ciel trailed off, not really sure what to think. "What... happened?"
"Don't get me wrong, they were all accidents. To this day I've never killed anyone directly nor deliberately. This is simply the reality of this profession, Ciel." Darian looked back up at the board. "Innocent lives are always at risk."
"Do people, like... know? Is that why you had me sign that NDA? To keep their deaths secret? Are you like... wanted, or anything?"
"No. All of their cases have long been settled already. When I make a mistake, I own up to it." Darian's eyes slowly trailed down the various pinned papers on the board, taking in each one. "The villainy institution knows, the heroes institution knows, the law knows, none of this is secret."
"Then what'd I sign that NDA for??" Ciel scoffed. "You made it out to be such a big deal..."
"That's not what the NDA was for. The NDA was so I could show you this." Darian pointed to a specific paper on the wall. Ciel took a moment to read it.
"I don't... understand?"
"This notarized letter was sent to the widow of the man from this obituary," Darian pointed at a nearby newspaper clipping. "He was killed in crossfire, during a battle between a hero and I. And this letter," he pointed again, "was sent to the parents of a teenager who was unaware of the bureaucracy of hero work, and got themself into a situation I wasn't able to help them get out of in time." Ciel found the corresponding obituary, uncharacteristically quiet as he took in the details. Darian continued to go on as he read.
"These letters to next of kin are the worst part of any villain or hero job, but they're also one of the most important parts. At the end of the day, you need to have compassion for the innocent people whose lives are unwillingly put at stake every time you go on any mission."
"Wait, hang on, do these papers say-"
"Yes. Every next of kin is personally compensated for their loss, to the best of my ability, for the rest of their lives. And I'm not just talking about the money part of it. When this person died," he pointed to another obituary, "he left behind three kids." Darian's expression turned to one of self-contempt.
"Don't the agencies pay out the next of kin? Why did you have to do it yourself?" Ciel questioned.
"I didn't *have* to do anything, beyond relaying the proper information to the proper people. Some villains leave it at that. But that's not enough for me. The way I see it: I fucked up these people's lives. I've stolen from them. It's the least I can do to make the rest of their lives as comfortable as I can," Darian grabbed his chin, starting to get lost in thought.
"You stole from them? What, adding insult to injury?" Ciel tried to joke to lighten the mood, but it didn't take.
"No. Due to my... frankly *unacceptable* incompetence, to say the least, I have not only stolen the years of the rest of that man's natural life. I've also stolen those children's father. I've stolen his wife's husband and best friend. I've robbed every single person whose life his had affected. All because I got a little too comfortable with an old partner of mine throwing threats of violence around like they were jokes.
"I could've stopped him. I should've stopped him. He started bringing unloaded guns to missions, until one day he actually brought a *loaded* gun with him... I should've checked to see it really was unloaded. I shouldn't have gotten complacent with his threats of violence. And I should've never let him start using them in the first place.
"Things can escalate so quickly, Ciel. You won't understand that until you really experience it yourself. And you will experience it. It's just a part of the job. But another part of your job is to always go to the ends of the earth in the pursuit of *not letting this happen*.
"Every detail needs to be planned out in advance. Contingencies and plan B's and recalculations are *vital* to this profession. On both sides, even." At some point, Darian had started to absentmindedly run his fingers through his own hair, obviously in distress. His gaze was kept fixed on the wall.
"The reason I had you sign that NDA is because the only people who know about my contributions are the victims' families and the proper authorities on the matter. I mean, think about it, if word got around that a villain was practically funding family retirements whenever someone died because of me, I'd probably see a lot more trouble than I already do."
"Don't want people knowing you got a heart?" Ciel quipped again, only slightly more successfully this time.
"Something to that effect," Darian smiled sadly in response. "Wildfire and Frostbite know I've been doing this, but not even they are privy to the extent of my aid. I'll most likely tell them whenever 3-way marriage is finally legalized and they get access to my accounts."
"Y'know, I think I heard that was actually being discussed in congress recently. Like, as of this week." Ciel cocked an eyebrow at him. "You have anything to do with that?"
"Cyril, my loyal henchman, you don't know the half of it." Darian firmly clapped his hand onto Ciel's shoulder, a friendly yet loudly unspoken reminder of their NDA.
"I won't say anything. So... am I the only person you've brought in here?" Ciel eyes glinted with mischievous pride at the thought of being one of the specialest boys in the whole world for getting to see all this top secret stuff.
"No. There's been a few over the years. Y'know, that boyfriend of yours has been in here too," Darian rubbed his chin in both thought and amusement.
"Scot's been here? He never told me..." Ciel glanced over and saw that Darian was staring directly at him. "Ah, right, because of the non-disclosure agreement... right." He looked back at the board and counted the obituaries out of curiosity. "Also, damn, you've only been responsible for like... 6 deaths over the span of, what, 13 years? That's like, one every two years..." Ciel tilted his head at the board. "It feels like it'd be way more than that."
"That's because I'm very good at what I do," Darian smirked. "Now, let's get you back upstairs. And at least *try* to remember that I can sue you if you let slip anything you've learned in this room. That's a legal battle you wouldn't be able to afford to lose." Darian unceremoniously herded Ciel out of the room, shutting the light off before closing the door once again.
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Written by Tony