Chapter Text
Robert woke up before the sun.
The room was dark when he sat up, rubbing his face with one hand before he checked the time on his phone. It was five, too early for the amateurs of his profession. Robert was an early riser out of habit…even if it was a habit that he didn’t need to exercise out of necessity anymore. He had always been a light sleeper, but this was a little much even for him.
A small sound scrabbled at the foot of his bed, the familiar paws of the little dog that shared it. Beef clambered tiredly up to Robert’s face, his little tongue patting against his cheek in a gentle urge to go back to sleep. Robert scratched his soft ears.
Pushing up from the bed, he stretched, wondering what had woken him up. It definitely wasn’t Beef, who never had an issue sleeping until noon. But they weren’t in any danger; the security system in his house was too advanced for a break in to happen without warning. The red lights in every corner of the room blinked in passive overwatch, programmed to stun intruders. And it wasn’t the police, who had no reason to suspect Robert Robertson of ties to any criminal organization.
Robert had always known how to be careful of that.
Floor to ceiling glass walls, paired with an ocean view of Redondo Beach, too dark to be seen right now. Robert liked to keep his style minimalist, although it had less to do with taste than it did with his feelings over the house.
A pretty big step up from the suburbs that he’d grown up in.
Robert quickly attached his leg and arm augments, the motion sensing lights switching on as he stood. He left his bedroom, closing the door quietly behind himself, the other lights in the house emitting a soft, early hue. Beef didn’t follow; despite Robert’s best efforts, he wasn’t a morning dog.
The rest of the house was silent. His kitchen and living room were clean and almost empty…save for a single coffee mug, sitting alone on the clean counter. It steamed lightly.
Robert stared at it before lifting his foot to remove a slipper, throwing it over the corresponding chair.
“Wow, that is so fucking rude.” A woman appeared abruptly, dodging her head to the side as the slipper sailed by. She was lean and pretty, perched at his granite countertop with a mug of coffee between her hands. “I break into your house, quietly, I make you coffee, and this is how I’m treated. Nobody ever wants to throw a Bugatti at me…maybe throw some dick next time, mix shit up.”
Robert huffed a laugh, despite his irritation, and retrieved his slipper before pouring himself a cup from the fresh pot.
“First of all, it doesn’t count as breaking in if you have authorized access,” he muttered with a pointed stare, joining her at the counter. “Don’t give yourself that much credit. Second, you didn’t even pour a cup for me, so you’re not getting credit for the coffee either.” Robert switched on the flat screen, the morning news about to start. “And third, you know what they say about shitting and eating. Something, something, professionalism.”
“Yes, exactly, to being professional shit eaters,” Visi said, lifting her mug to toast. Robert sighed, but clinked her mug. “Or something-something.” Her dark eyes roamed his bare chest appreciatively, a mischievous smile curving her lips. Robert didn’t invest any attention in the look; he’d worked with Visi enough to be more than familiar with her particular brand of humor. She didn’t hold back, but she didn’t mean anything by it, either. He respected her straightforwardness.
“What do you want?” Robert asked, blowing the steam from his mug. Visi was the least concerning of Shroud’s agents, and the only one to know where he lived, but he was always skittish when Shroud sent agents. Eli had a tendency to hire for desperation over discretion, particularly when it came to supers, and Robert preferred not to meet them on his home turf. It wasn’t a good look for any too-curious feds skulking around.
“The big bad wants to see you,” Visi said, her voice low as she sipped her coffee. “He didn’t say why, so don’t ask. I’m supposed to tell you to come by the compound today.”
“Today? Did you remind him that I don’t work for him?” Robert grumbled, checking the schedule on his phone.
“Yeah, totally. Right after I told him to suck my left nut and give me a million dollars in cash.” The news started, and her eyes flickered towards the living room briefly. “He knows, dipshit, that’s why I’m here. If you worked for him, he would just text you. Hey, how come you never have anybody over?” She looked to the side again, her attention lingering this time.
“You actually just missed the orgy,” said Robert dryly, turning in his chair to see what she was looking at. The news anchors were gushing over a massive forest fire save by SDN, with an accompanying headshot of their featured super. Of course it was one of their top heroes, a smug grin plastered over his handsome face. “Twenty or thirty people, I think. Seriously? That guy? Isn’t he gay…and dumb as bricks?”
“Mmm, I don’t think so,” Visi hummed into her coffee. She stared unabashedly now. “I mean, yeah, I’m sure he’s a moron. He works for SDN, and also, just look at that face. Not one brain cell behind those gorgeous, gorgeous eyes, god bless him. I think the gay piece is, like, a company branding thing.”
Robert snorted, rolling his eyes and turning back from the television.
“Yeah, sure,” he chuckled. “That would go over great with the media, gay for pay supers at SDN. Are we done here, or are you supposed to escort me to the compound, Fabrizio?”
“Can you just let me have this?” Visi snapped, glaring at Robert. “Please let me have this. Sometimes I just want to think about climbing a hot, scruffy, six foot tall super. Let me fucking have this, Robert.”
“Well…you already have the chest for it,” Robert said, knowing that he should put the shovel down but unable. “Bring a good strap and he might not notice.”
Visi’s eyes slowly fixed him with a level stare, and Robert drained the last of his coffee, his deadpan nearly perfect. A tiny dimple pressed the side of one cheek as he fought back a smile.
“One more word about my tits and I’m gonna blow your other fucking leg off,” Visi hissed, eyes narrowing menacingly. “See you at the compound, Hopalong.”
She disappeared, leaving only an empty coffee cup.
Robert could track her way out if he wanted with the heat sensor in his augment, but Robert didn’t care. He waited until he heard the door close to get up. Collecting their mugs, he washed them in the sink and set them out to dry before turning to look at the ocean view through his back patio. After a few seconds, Robert walked out, the summer air light and salted in the morning.
He leaned back into a patio chair, watching the sun come up.
Morning jog on the pier, grab the mech, fly to the compound. See what Elliot wants…I could probably raid some accounts tonight.
Robert watched the first rays of light pierce the horizon, wondering if he should throw some rum in his next coffee. He didn’t want to hack bank accounts anymore; that was a convenient start up when he was just crawling out of the financial black hole that his dad had left to him, but there was no real thrill in it. And Robert didn’t need to do it anymore, not after fifteen years of rebuilding the family fortune.
He didn’t need to do very much of anything anymore.
Sighing, he watched for a few more minutes before eventually getting up. Robert headed towards his neat, sparsely furnished bedroom, opening the dresser to dig out his running shorts. He couldn’t afford not to care about his fitness, not in a world where he was constantly competing against supers. Even with augments, Robert knew that his physical limitations would define the difference between life and death for him, again and again, until the day they failed him.
Sitting on the bed, he stared down at the advanced prosthetic on his left leg, charcoal gray steel highlighted with dully glowing red light. Stronger and lighter than his real leg, it was seated flush to his body, more capable than any other of its kind. More tailored to its owner than any prosthetic on the planet.
Robert hit the release panel on its side, grabbing the ointment from his bedside table. His left thigh ended in a stump just above the knee, a long healed injury from his early start as Mecha Man. His right hand had been lost in the same accident. Robert carefully applied the abrasion ointment, even though his prosthetic augments were much more comfortable than anything he could get from a clinic. Applying a light, dry powder to it, he reattached the prosthetic before doing the same for his forearm.
His chest always felt a little numb doing this, although the deep-seated anger over his injuries had faded after some years. The augments had saved his ass more than enough times for Robert to fall into a begrudging respect for them…no matter how he might resent their origin, and the persistent whisper of reliance.
Robert slipped on the shirt, changing into his athletic clothes. He preferred the running prosthetic most of the time, but it was good to train in the equipment that he would take into a fight.
And if Elliot was pinging him, then it was probably safe to assume that Robert was about to get into a fight.
Robert didn’t bother to wonder what old uncle Elliot had in store for him. He would find out soon enough…and if he felt the need to send an agent to track Robert down in person, then it was not an appointment he could snub.
Popping in his earbuds, Robert let the music drown out his reservations, falling into an easy jog out the front door.
It was a cool five miles to the bay where he kept the mech, just an early morning jog into the city. Robert didn’t think about the job, didn’t think about his future, or the dark house falling out of view behind him.
For five miles, he didn’t think about anything.
______
With or without his physical limitations, there was nothing that felt like flying in the mech.
Soaring over Los Angeles in the mech had to be one of the greatest feelings achievable in his life. Robert cruised just along the cloud line, the screens playing air traffic icons and police scanners, a wide screen visual of the mech’s front camera dominating his view. Daytime panels camouflaged the outside of the suit, making it almost impossible for even supers to spot it overhead on a clear day. And even if they did, Mecha Man was hardly somebody that any of them would pursue on just a sighting. No, even SDN’s strongest heroes would think twice…and the ambitious newbies would learn a hard, occasionally permanent, lesson.
But he wouldn’t be seen. In the vast California sky, Robert was as good as invisible.
Still, it was never a bad idea to check his six before landing in one of the most secretive bases on the planet. Robert did a quick 360 scan as he rocketed out over the Pacific Ocean, making sure that he wasn’t being tracked or followed before he started the dive down towards Shroud’s furthest compound…an underwater structure, marked only by a platform barely visible on the surface of the ocean.
There were no guards, no lights to hail him. Waves washed cold and high over steel, rendering it almost undiscoverable. Robert used only the provided grid coordinates, lowering the mech into salty, gray mist until he was standing on the narrow strip of titanium, ocean spray dusting his external cameras, the wind strong enough that he was forced to lean against it. Punching the correct frequency into the mech’s emitter, he blasted the code, and a door opened from the platform with a hiss.
Robert turned the thrusters over, carefully lowering the mech down the narrow corridor. His stabilization programming kept it from nicking any walls, although he was more than accustomed to buffing the machine back into fighting shape. Overhead, some seawater poured in, but the hatch closed as soon as Robert cleared it.
The entrance gave way to a massive maintenance bay, where Red Ring workers and mechanics paused for only a moment to identify him. The mech was easily distinguishable by its dark gray steel and red lighting, visible as the camouflage program shut off.
Mecha Man Zero.
They didn’t check twice. Robert landed the mech by his favorite engineer, an agent that Shroud targeted and then busted out of California correctional a few years back. He loved to run updates and maintenance for the mech whenever Robert came by the compound. His mechanical work was made easier by forearm-mounted augments, each holstering an array of deadly lasers and tools, but currently being used to remove the bolts on a dismounted weapon system.
“Eh, braddah! Good fo’ see you again!” Royd turned to offer a closed fist, and Robert bumped it as he climbed down from the mech. “Been a long time since you wen’ come by.” The massive Hawaiian was smudged with grease and engine oil, but his smile beamed brightly.
“Yeah, I’ve been busy,” Robert lied. Since his last hits, a digital raid of the state banking system and then robbing the steel factory for repair parts, he had mostly just been lying low. But the silence made him restless, and Robert didn’t want to admit that he’d been glad to see Visi again. “Can you take a look at the dampers? Mech’s been a little jerky on the landing, if you have replacement parts on hand I’ll take them.”
“No problem, brah. I know you can afford ‘em.” Royd chuckled, hitting the sensor to open the hatch. It authenticated Royd and hissed apart. “Say hi to the big man fo’ me.”
Robert left the bay on foot. He didn’t need to worry here; his costume concealed any identifying features, only his dark eyes and the lower half of his face visible. He was always masked on the compound, just like Elliot, even though a secret identity didn’t mean much to people like them…people without personal lives to sacrifice.
Just like the Red Ring was everything to Elliot, the mech was everything to Robert.
“Hey, you made it,” a disembodied voice floated next to him, and Visi appeared. She looked exactly the same as she had in his kitchen, down to the violet jacket and black pants; Robert knew that she’d never bothered to keep a secret identity. It just wasn’t useful for a loner like her, someone who specialized in moving unseen. “Done beating off to the competition?”
“What can I say, I like ‘em with enough chest for both of us,” Robert sighed, even though it had been Visi to call attention to the newscaster first. “What do you want? Are you even a part of this?”
“No,” Visi said, hands dug into her pockets. “Just saw you come in, and I’m nosy. Sue me.”
They walked the cold, dark halls, side by side. This was Robert’s least favorite of Elliot’s compounds, but by far the safest in terms of location; nobody has ever uncovered his home base in the Pacific. Location aside, Elliot maintained total awareness with underwater sensors, diverting even submarines from stumbling across it.
Robert had only been by a few times, when the time called to meet up with the leader of the Red Ring in person. Robert didn’t mind; it helped to have an opportunity to get the mech professionally serviced, and special requests from Elliot erred on the heavy side of payouts.
The first mission he’d ever done, Elliot had given him the augmented prosthetics. And every mission since, an upgrade.
Robert walked into the planning floor, a large bay with a clear glass wall showcasing the dark, eerie water around them. It was unnerving. But everybody here was too busy to notice them, from agents arguing quietly over maps to security guards logging nearby activity. Shroud ran a tight inner circle of ambitious criminals, and they had only grown since his breakout from the California supermaximum security prison.
In the center, Elliot Connors stood watch over all as Shroud, disguised in his signature black cloak and mask.
The only indication that he’d seen Robert was a slight, subtle nod of his head.
“Well, escort mission complete,” Visi said quietly, backing off despite her jokes from before. “Fabrizio, out.” She vanished.
Robert rolled his eyes and stepped up onto the slightly raised platform, calm and collected. Elliot Connors turned towards him, his face concealed. Robert disliked the dehumanization of the mask, but in fairness, he wore one too.
“You rang?” Robert said lightly, leaning his hip against the workbench. “I thought you said we were done after the last job.”
The last one, about six months back, had been huge. Shroud had asked for Robert to build a back door into the city energy grid, an unexciting task that was enough work for him to upgrade Robert’s augmented eye; connected to the local cellular network, he could now pull most people’s open source information just by looking at them.
But Robert smiled now. He didn’t hate Elliot’s odd jobs; the guy had big, secret plans, but he paid big for them, too. And he wasn’t sure what kind of work the crime lord could want out of him, but Elliot always paid his dues.
“Well, we were on target to be done,” Elliot said, his voice low. He didn’t unmask, but it wasn’t because of Robert, who had already seen his face a hundred times or more. Elliot preferred to maintain his persona around the compound. “My engineers have made a little bit of a breakthrough, ahead of schedule even for me. The structural integrity for a new generation of astral pulse, but I need a fast, discreet, independent agent to find me the right materials to build it.”
“So, a scavenger hunt,” Robert clarified, crossing his arms. “What are we talking, plutonium? Why can’t your guys do this?”
“Tritium,” Elliot said quietly. He stared down at Robert. “Sapphires. Yes, plutonium-238. I need somebody who can do this without direction from me, someone who understands the purpose of the materials, and who knows how to transport them safely. I have a lot of agents; what I lack is professionals.”
“I’m flattered,” Robert said, wondering just what the carrot for this was going to be. “And you need a professional what, exactly?”
Elliot couldn’t make a face through the mask, but the dead silence was more than sufficient to communicate his mild irritation.
“Just…a professional. Smart enough to make decisions, and not get caught. Someone with as much to gain out of this as I have. Robert.” He said the name softly, though Robert’s eyes narrowed at it. And as much to lose, the unspoken message. “Bring me the materials, and you get to keep the astral pulse powering your mech. Permanently.”
Robert’s breath stopped a little, although he did a good job of hiding it. He’d been dreading the recall, the day that Shroud demanded his pulse to be returned. Knowing that he couldn’t give it up without ending the title of Mecha Man.
To be Mecha Man forever…his dead father’s dream, stolen right over the top of his grave.
“The astral pulse and a hundred mil,” Robert challenged after only a moment. Elliot chuckled.
“Just the astral pulse,” Elliot said. “You don’t even need the money, you little shit.”
“Maybe I want to retire somewhere nice,” Robert argued with a half smile. “Plus, I can't exactly get plutonium on the internet; once they put together who’s stealing it, I’m going to have SDN breathing down my neck…which is exactly why you’re outsourcing this job. Eighty mil.”
“And you think you can’t handle them?” Elliot asked softly. His head tilted slightly. “Ten.”
“I can handle any of those dipshits,” Robert scoffed. “It’s an inconvenience fee, fifty and my augments get free service for life.”
“Twenty, and services on the house for the mech and augments.” Elliot humored him anyways, his posture relaxing as he understood that Robert was going to accept the job. This wasn’t their first negotiation; Elliot didn’t ask Robert for support often, so when he did, it came with a unique price tag. Robert tapped his chin, wondering if he had any other angles to consider.
“Thirty mil, free services, and if I get caught by the Feds, I won’t tell them it’s for the Ring.” Robert held out his hand, accompanied by a cocky smirk. “And a Red Ring hit team on call if I need it.”
“Not telling the Feds is fucking implied, asshole,” Elliot growled, but he grasped Robert’s hand nonetheless. “But fine.”
“Yeah, well, now it’s plied.” They shook on it, and Robert’s mind was already starting to race. “What’s the cut off? I assume some of this is going to leave your jurisdiction.” Even just the materials that were listed would take research and travel to find, and Robert didn’t know the quantities yet.
“Visi will take you to the lab for the full shopping list. You have until the end of the month.”
Robert nodded, turning to hop off of the platform. Visi was standing next to the exit, her arms crossed, a disinterested look over her pretty face.
She turned with him to walk Robert to the lab.
Robert was quiet. He didn’t need to discuss the deal with her, and she probably wasn’t going to ask. But Robert couldn’t deny being surprised by the deal; he hadn’t expected to be offered the astral pulse. Robert hadn’t decided if he was going to give it up willingly, knowing that the alternative was a normal, albeit luxurious, life.
Pampered, even.
“You’re not even in the Ring,” Visi muttered resentfully. She would never volunteer to run a solo job like this, but she didn’t mind complaining about it. “How are you his favorite?”
“My rugged good looks, probably,” Robert shrugged. “Charming personality. My really high brow jokes, you wouldn’t get them.”
Visi keyed them into the lab, a deep sea chamber where the Red Ring tested and experimented with every kind of chemical that could be synthesized. They used it for augments, for specialized attacks around the city, for chemical weapons to arm Shroud’s agents. It was just as dank as the rest of the compound, but better lit, at least for the benefit of his scientists.
The lead scientist recognized him when he walked in, grabbing a small, black notebook from the nearest table and double checking it before handing it to Robert. Inside, a list of items and quantities, no hints as to where he would get them. That piece would be on Robert.
Slipping the notebook into his pocket, Robert turned to make his way topside.
They headed back towards the bay, all kinds of options spinning out ahead of Robert as he walked. He’d floated retirement to Elliot, but neither of them really believed that. Robert hadn’t thought past the roadblock of keeping the astral pulse; now that it was being handed to him, a more daunting question stretched out ahead. Robert had already crushed his name into dust, rebuilt a legacy that would have his father spinning in the grave. Stolen enough to retire ten times over, not that it mattered.
How much was going to be enough?
“It’s a miracle that you somehow haven’t been cornered by SDN with that big, blinking compensation machine,” Visi said snidely, as they turned into the maintenance bay. Robert blinked and glanced up, pulled from wandering thoughts, and saw Royd waving to them. “You ever get worried about daddy sending you out on your lonesome, getting picked up by some dingus hero?”
“Nah, they know better by now.” Robert climbed into the cockpit, throwing a salute towards Royd as he turned the engine over. It growled to life, screens lighting around him as the hatch closed. “Any of those supers that tries to corner me in the mech would have to be a real fucking idiot.”