Viktor had been in Thailand for 3 months and to say that his presence was felt was a major understatement. The first week in country he and Cortana had lost any and all tails from either The League or any other interested parties and scheemed in the comfort of one of his safehouses. They had collected the info on all the human trafficking and opium rings in country. They decided to prioritize human traffickers and designated opium operations as targets of opportunity.
The first strike had to make an example and to garner the right kind of attention. Cortana had discovered an auction house just outside of Bangkok. Viktor had slaughtered all of the participants in the auction and the syndicate running it. The display was especially brutal due to Viktor losing his temper when he saw that they were auctioning off 6-10 year olds as sex slaves.
He had knocked out all the guests in the building for the auction with a quick acting, colorless and odorless sedative gas he bought from the shop. No one noticed anything until it was too late. He proceeded to kill all the guards on the outside.
He gathered all the slaves into the back of a truck for easy transport. He then killed all the other people in the style used by this particular cartels main rivals. He made it seem like someone tried to cover up their trail but it looked somewhat sloppy. After staging his victims, he had Cortana give the Police an anonymous tip to pick up the children and other victims.
He had sparked an international gang war and was culling the worst of the scum in brutal and dramatic ways which reignited the war whenever it would start to go stale. The authorities and media had no clue what was going. The Justice League had dispatched a few of their members to investigate but had not succeeded in putting a stop to the war.
Viktor and Cortana were always a step a head, which was having the benefit of scaring the hell out of anyone that had anything to do with human trafficking and to a minor degree opium. The other side benefit was having the Justice League focusing at the furthest point from where Viktor needed to be. It all boiled down to deception and theatricality.
Viktor and Cortana had started an international gang war to muddy the waters. They did this by robbing, murder and blackmail. They stole the hard currency, weapons and ammo whenever they raided a base and destroyed any drugs found. They siphoned the electronic assets from one cartel and doctored the evidence to make it look like it had been done by another cartel. Lastly, was the blackmail, that was more Cortana than Viktor. She loved blackmailing some poor saps in the cartels to betray their bosses. She kept a photo album of the faces of the cartel bosses either getting great intel dumped in their lap or when they found out one of their men had betrayed them. Viktor was starting to grow concerned with the maniacal giggles he would hear every once in awhile.
How is it that Viktor is so successful in his current campaign, you ask? He had bought an ability and the corresponding skills for said ability. He had obtained the abilities of a shadow wraith from the Netherrealm. Specifically Noob Saibot. With the ability to blend into shadow and to travel through shadow portals was priceless to him. He also bought the skills of Noob Saibot because he didnt have the time to discover his abilities slowly and create skills that would work for his new abilities.
To give a very talented assasin an additional means of stealth and power, could be considered overkill. Viktor had practiced with his new skills after the initial raid and would only use some of the abilities when he could. After the gang war really took off he practiced his new abilities and skills non-stop until he was at the very least profecient with them.
One skill he quickly perfected was the shadow clone skill. He could make four - nine clones and using the confiscated weapons would raid their targets and cause all sorts of mayhem. He did this to throw the investigations off.
After 3 months of fanning the flames of the gang war, The Justice League started to send more of their competent members to patrol the area. Viktor was eager to use his newest ability of Shadow portals. He discovered he could teleport to places he had been previously. He chose to teleport to the cave he first arrived at and then snuck away from League territory and smuggled himself to the Unites States to start his hunt.
His first target was Ms. Clay. Cortana had been tracking her and she was currently in hiding in gotham. Viktor wanted her as his first target so he could absorb her and gain that shape-shifting ability. It would make his following hunts easier and would be an additional security measure against both Ras and the JLA.
After researching and stalking his prey for 2 weeks he was finally ready to make his move. He had even planned for the bat family if they decided to get involved. He used his new abilities to finally get close to her hideout which ironically enough was a normal, rundown apartment in the slums.
He silently infiltrated her apartment and waited in the shadows for her to return. He wondered how she got out of Task Force X, Amanda Waller would not just let an asset go free. After hours of waiting he heard the jingle of keys at the door. He stilled himself and waited for her to enter into her apartment completely.
She looked like an average run of the mill, middle aged woman coming home from grocery shopping. She locked her door and set her keys on the kitchen table along with her purse. She continued to the kitchen with her groceries. She started to put things away and was about to prepare herself a nice cup of tea, too bad she would never get the chance.
Viktor saw her posture relax and watched her start filling a kettle up with water and thats when he struck. One thing most people take for granted is that they live in a 3 dimensional world. Moral of the story, no one ever looks up. Viktor threw one the pens he found in the house towards the living room. She turned around and started to walk towards it and looked around warily. She never noticed the living shadow that had pooled above her head. Just when she started to berate herself for being foolish, Viktor dropped down and struck the pressure point on her neck with great force and knocked her out.
He then made two shadow clones and instructed the first to clean the apartment for any evidence he may have left and to dispell himself after using a portal to random places to throw off any sort of tracking. He wasn't sloppy but he always erred on the side of caution. He told the other to take the body through a portal. He then followed the clone carrying Ms. Clay.
He followed his clone to an abandoned warehouse in New York. He undid his head wrap, placed a hand on her shoulder, then proceeded to use his Devour ability. She became a grey mist which was quickly sucked up into his mouth. He inhaled the mist and after a few moments his body felt tingly.
He knew it was just his body gaining his new shapeshifting power. After 3 minutes the feeling went away. He made a portal and he and the clone walked through it and both portal hopped a few times to designated areas before they split and each jumped into different portals to repeat their hopping.
After an hour, He finally created a portal to the outskirts of a sleepy Montana town and he made his way into the safehouse located a few miles away unseen. "Cortana run a scan to verify we got her power." He heard her finally speak and say that his body now had the ability to shape-shift. She stated that his shadow wraith powers had cut down the learning curve on the shapeshifting since he could shape himself into any sort of shadow. He was grinning like a maniac, and then jumped into experimenting with his new ability.
Time dragged on but Viktor was more than happy with the results. He had been practicing his shape-shifting ability which pleased him greatly. He continued to practice in between hopping back to Southeast Asia for his semi-regular raids. The raids were becoming more difficult now since the cartels had hired a lot of extra muscle.
After 2 weeks he felt confident enough in his abilities to take out the next target, Killer Croc. According to intel he was able to push the explosive through his skin and dug it out and and jumped off a bridge into a river below to get away from Waller's team. He was now back in the Gotham sewers up to his old antics.
Viktor didnt understand this world's villains. He had been caught in the sewers of Gotham but he went right back to his old lair. Maybe he was just that stupid. He understood why Waller wouldnt go after him though, any normal people sent after him, in his territory, would be at a severe disadvantage and cost a lot of resources. Why waste resources when she can just wait for the dumbass to fuck up and get in a fight with the bat family and just snatch him up from a detention center with ease.
She was definitely an intelligent lady. He would enjoy absorbing her and possibly getting the knowledge of all her little misdeeds. He would play it by ear when the time came. He had mapped out the sewers in Gotham and it had paid off. He now knew more about the Gotham underground than the city planners and historians.
He finished his meditation and prepared his tools for the night. He would be using one of Mr. Freeze's bombs that he had found in an abandoned lair. Viktor had scoured the lair and found the hidden chamber with all Freeze's hidden arsenal.
He found out about Nora Fries after reading Mr. Freeze's memoir. He would see if he could help the couple some how. It was a truly tragic story. Viktor may now be an assasin but that didnt mean he was an asshole. He wouldnt go out of his way to cure Nora and Victor Fries but if he found the means, why not? One less 'villain' in the world.
He didnt find a freeze gun but he did find Freeze mines. He spray painted the mines black.(why does everyone want flashy gadgets?!) He packed them in his bag and used a portal to get to the ambush point at an intersection in some maintenance tunnels. He created a clone to lure the big dumb animal. He then stepped into the shadows away from the ambush point with his thumb on the trigger. He didnt have to wait long his clone came running through one of the tunnels followed by a howling beastman. He wondered what he did to piss him off?
His clone pretended to be hurt and slowed down to allow Croc to catch up. Croc threw a chunk of concrete at his clone and the clone took the hit and ended up just outside of the trap. He tried crawling away which caused Crocs animal instincts to flare up and go berserk. Croc had just walked into the killzone when the clone started to laugh. Croc's eyes narrowed and he slowed down to observe his laughing prey.
"Why are you laughing? Are you one of the Joker's moronic henchmen?" he snarled.
The clone coninued to laugh then flipped Croc the bird and started to laugh again. Croc was even more angered and did the classic villain monlogue.
"I was gonna kill you quick and feed your carcass to my pets but now I'm gonna.."
Viktor didn't let him finish. he pressed the trigger and the Freeze bombs froze Croc mid rant.The 6 bombs were all positioned to create overlapping sectors to cut off any escape. After the cold mist cleared it showed Croc frozen mid rant. Viktor stepped out of the shadows and made his way to the Croc-cicle.
He sprinted and did a flying missile drop kick which shattered Croc to pieces. He absorbed his clone and then resummoned it to help him pick up the pieces. They piled them up and Viktor placed his hand on the pile which turned them all to a grey mist and were quickly sucked up. He and his clone then used a portal to leave.
---5 MINUTES LATER---
Two figures appeared in the now abandoned maintenance tunnels underneath the Gotham streets. One a tall man in a dark bat themed costume and the other a teenage boy in Red, black and yellow costume with a domino mask.
"What do you think happened here?" the teen asked the now kneeling figure. The figured looked at the scene and dug out pieces of shrapnel and was able to quickly deduce what may have happened.
Batman continued to look around until he saw something that caused his gut to drop. He found a fragment of a crocodilian toe. If it had not been frozen it would have been a messier piece of evidence. robin then looked at the item batman held.
"Is that a toe?" he asked in disgust.
"Yes, and from what I have gathered it used to be Killer Croc's toe. It seems he was ambushed and frozen then broken into pieces."
Robin's eyes widened at the revelation. "Wait! Are you saying, Mr. Freeze broke out of Arkham and froze Croc then killed him and then snuck back into Arkham?"
Batman shook his head, "No, it seems a group with access to Freeze's tech ambushed Croc and killed him. Whoever this group is, they are very dangerous. They killed Croc, collected most of his body and cleaned the crime scene in very little time. If we had not been in the area when we felt the tremor we would never have caught wind of this." He took more samples to analyze later in the Batcave. "You are not to patrol alone from now on. This group has no qualms to kill their victims. Is that clear?"
The boy wonder harumphed and crossed his arms in a pout. "I can take care of myself you know, and everyone we go after tries to kills us so why is this any different?" Batman stared his latest protege down until the boy began to squirm.
"Fine, no patrolling alone from now on." the boy replied in defeat.
"Good. Lets go back to the cave and analyze the samples." The dynamic duo then walked off to hopefully get some answers to whatever had caused this brutal group to set up shop in Gotham.
---
Viktor and his clone had portaled all over the world before they met up again in the safe house. Viktor felt that familiar tingle and some pain before he laid down on the bed in his make shift medical ward. After 5 minutes his body finally quit twitching he sat up. "Cortana run the scan, please."
Cortana scanned Viktor and gave him the results. "Your latest acquisition has increased bone and soft tissue density. You can now truly be considered superhuman or as the locals call it a Metahuman. Due to the body becoming more dense your body is now more durable the down side is that you may have some issues with balance and weight... You're not gonna get fat but you definitely weigh more. I show you now weigh close to 136 kgs also your metabolism has sped up considerably. I suggest we hold off on our future targets until you aclimate."
"Thank you, Cortana. I will stay here for a few weeks with my clones and train to get acclimated. Looks like we will have to closely monitor my metabolism to see how it affects me. It's good to know that our theory has been proven correct. Continue to track our next target and track the locations of Robin, kid Flash and Aqualad. We may have to change the order of our targets to take advantage of the distraction they will cause in Cadmus when they free Superboy."
"You got it Chief!"
---5.5 MONTHS SINCE VIKTOR LEFT NANDA PARBAT---
VIktor was currently disguised as a guard in a Cadmus facility in Missouri. He had spent a few weeks getting back in shape after he absorbed Croc. He went back to Southeast Asia and raided three cartel hideouts. He found intel on a few more in in Eastern Europe and traveled to the Czech Republic, where he proceeded to cause mayhem in the underworld.
He had come away with quite a lot of money, paintings, books, jewels, historical artifacts, weapons and intel. He of course pinned it on someone else. He traded a portion of the loot for SP in the shop for some goodies. He had bought a lot of untraceable poisons and two potions and a very awesome skill. He had also discovered Croc had healing factor which upgraded his a bit.
He had also taken down another target while taking a stroll through the streets in Gotham one night. It was a strange but not unwelcome opportunity.
---2 MONTHS AGO---
He was passing by a dark alley when he heard two men about to assault a woman. He was going to kill both men, but then a man with green hair and light green skin, unnaturally huge grin and a red cape jumped down and knocked both men out. Viktor stepped into the shadow of a boarded up doorway and observed. The green man told the young woman to run home and to not wander the streets at night. She quickly thanked him and ran off.
"I know you're there.~ Olly Olly Oxenfree.~ Wait? are we playing hide and seek? I love that game! Ok, I'm coming.~"
Viktor was perturbed by the green man's weird dress sense and creepy sing songy voice. He made sure his shape-shifted disguise was impeccable and stepped out of the shadows and calmly walked to the strange green man. Viktor had an idea of who the man was but he couldnt remember for sure so he decided to ask.
The green man saw a tall asian man walk out of the shadows. "You gave up already? Aww man, I thought we were gonna have a fun game of hide and seek." Then man didnt seem put off by his appearance or manner and just gave him an apathetic stare before he spoke.
"So who are you supposed to be? and why are you running around in your underwear with a red sheet wrapped around your neck?"
"Hmph, My name is Creeper and I'll have you know that my outfit is all the r..."
Once Viktor had verified his identity, one of his clones materialized out of Creeper's shadow and stabbed him in the back of the neck severing the spine quickly. Creeper could only widen his eyes in surprise before he died.
"Take his body back to the safe house." His clone nodded and grabbed the body and both sunk into the shadow portal underneath them. Viktor then walked out of the Alley and continued his stroll.
---
After absorbing Creeper, his senses and agility were enhanced, which in turn improved his already high agility and reaction times.
The skill he found that he could buy was Gun-fu from The John Wick Universe. Viktor was so giddy when he found that he could afford that skill that he laughed maniacally until Cortana asked who John Wick was. Viktor stopped his hysteria and immediately bought the movies from the shop and watched them. Cortana was amazed at the story and John's skills but was not sure why Viktor had been so giddy. Viktor just chalked it up to it being a human thing. He integrated the skill and practiced it to perfection.
He decided that he would shape-shift to look like Morpheus and would raid a Cartel hideout to throw another wrench into the now major international Human trafficking cartel wars. He mostly did it for the LULZ. He figured he might as well enjoy himsellf otherwise he may burn himself out. Cortana joked that maybe Devouring Creeper had made him nore playful. Viktor was not amused.
Viktor shook himself from taking that trip down memory lane. He thought that the boredom caused by this security job had made him daydream more than he used to. He walked his usual patrol route nonchalantly until his timed explosive took out the main generator to the facility at the same time the boys in Young Justice tripped the alarm at their Cadmus base.
Viktor still couldnt believe that this universe was a weird amalgamation of all the animated series and movies. When the lights went out he portaled himself inside the room that held the Supergirl clone in a stasis pod. she was currently being sedated under red sun lamps. He bypassed the security and took out one of the items he had Cortana acquire while he had been training with Ras.
It was a green kryptonite knife they had bought off of Lex Luthor anonymously. He had Cortana open up the pod and he stabbed Galatea in the heart before she could even open her eyes. She woke and gasped in pain but that was ended quickly when he snapped her neck just for good measure.
He had set up an EMP and a few bottles of Wildfire he got from the shop before he grabbed the kryptonian corpse and slowly sank into his shadow portal. As soon as he had sunk about half way he triggered the EMP which caused a lot of the electronic devices to spark and sputter which then caused the Wildfire to ignite. He then quickly went through the portal.
He knew he didnt have long in DC world and before he left he would screw a lot of people over. He was currently in an underground lab probably last used in the early 1900's. He had found it when exploring the Gotham underground. He placed his hand on Galatea and used Devour. It took longer for her to form into mist but it succeeded and he sucked in the mist.
His body instantly began to tingle and then pain coursed through his body. He hadn't felt pain like that since The Creator had upgraded his abilities. Luckily, his pain tolerance was high enough that he could just grit his teeth and bear it. After what felt like an eternity, he found his body felt lighter and his vison was clearer. He thought the NZT had improved his vision. He was wrong, it was like going from an old tube t.v. to ultra high def. He could hear noises from people walking the streets in Gotham. He was overwhelmed by the new senses but GM sent out that old familiar calming wave through his head.
"Cortana, run a scan. I need you to do your most in depth scan possible. We need to know the limitations of my new abilities." He then nodded to the clone who had been quietly observing in the corner and passed out on the lab table. The Clone put Viktor's arm on his shoulder and they sunk into a portal.
--- 3 DAYS LATER---
Viktor woke up in his bed in the Montana hideout. He tried to sit up but his new abilities caused him to shatter the bed and caused him to bump into the ceiling.
"Chief! You need to take things slow. Pretend everything is made of glass and walk very, very slowly. Your body has gone through a drastic change."
Viktor followed her advise and walked over to a couch and gingerly sat down. "Cortana, what did you find out?"
"Good thing you are sitting down, Chief. The changes are beyond our estimates. Let's start out with physical changes. You now have super strength and I do mean Super. Your strength, speed, durability and senses are comparable to a kryptonian under the effects of a yellow sun. You have now officially stepped out of the realm of human ability. The downside is that you will not be able to fly, shoot eye lasers or have super breath. The upside is that your healing factor has gone up exponentially, still not close to Deadpool but definitely close to Wolverine levels. The really good news is that your body adapted to the new Kryptonian physiology so well that kryptonite will not weaken or kill you. It will sting like a bee sting but that's about it. To sum it all up, you are the perfect hybrid of Kryptonian and Human. All of there strengths and none of their weaknesses... well except flying, eye lasers and freezing breathe but we can fix that at a later date. The Creator has awarded you a good deal of SP for your accomplishment."
Viktor grinned happily, then shook his giddiness away before he broke into maniacal laughter He would spend some time training then move on to the next part of his plan.
---7.5 MONTHS SINCE VIKTOR LEFT NANDA PARBAT---
Viktor had just finished a spar with his clones, he got showered and was about to start reading one of this world's books on magic when Cortana notified him that The light was going to make a move on the Fog.
The Fog was a cloud of nanites that could eat through anything and if the consumed a computer they could gather the information stored in the hardware. Viktor wanted it for one of his future projects. He and Cortana quickly hashed out a plan and he prepared his kit.
---
It was a quiet night in the car park, all the could be heard was the buzzing of insects a few voices coming from a van. An unmarked van was parked and would occasionally rock. To the untrained eye it would seem someone was getting laid. Viktor stood in the shadows with a team of clones shape-shifted to look like a blacks ops alpha team. Viktor was currently shape-shifted to look like John Wick. He wore the black suit but underneath his jacket he wore a tactical vest with a lot of extra magazines loaded with armor piercing rounds. He had a shoulder holster which held a customized Glock 41.
He then nodded at his clones and they dispersed into two teams that would cover his flanks. He waited for the Fog to return from Star labs down the street. His enhanced eyes picked up the Fog rolling through the night sky. He watched as the van doors opened and saw 3 men step out while another two manning the computers.
Four of the men were dressed in typical League of Assasins garb but one man stuck out due to his unusual choice in head gear. It had a giant red lense. That was Professor Ojo. He looked like a weirdo due to his stupid helmet and molest-stache. Once the Fog was put back into its container Cortana hacked the computers and nanites. One of the assassin's yelped and called out. "We're being hacked somehow and just lost control of the fog."
Ojo quickly turned to face the man but that was when 'John' struck, he put a round through the back of Ojo's head. The other four men quickly jumped behind cover one tried to get to the wheel but the lone man in the suit shot out the tires.
The assassin's tried to rally and take out the lone gunman but were quickly taken out in a coordinated cross fire. The tac team quickly moved in on their prey and double tapped the corpses and raided the van. They grabbed the Fog's recepticle and and moved out John brought up the rear when he suddenly stopped and looked directly into a security camera and mouthed out a phrase. "Compliments of the High Table." and then shot the camera.
Viktor walked into a darkened corner and used a portal to go back to his safe house and plan
--- MEANWHILE IN A CYBER CAFE IN MIAMI---
"WHAT JUST HAPPENED?!" The team was startled by Dr. Roquette's outburt.
Kaldur looked around warily, "Is something the matter, Doctor?"
"IS SOMETHING THE MATTER?! IS SOMETHING THE MATTER?! I'LL TELL YOU WHAT IS THE MATTER, THE FOG WAS JUST HACKED AND THEN IT WENT DARK. THAT'S WHAT'S THE MATTER!" Dr. Roquette exclaimed.
Kaldur frowned, "Wasn't the Fog created with security measures in place to protect it from something like this?"
"YES! IT WAS BUILT SPECIFICALLY SO IT WAS UNHACKABLE, THIS IS IMPOSSIBLE!" Dr. Roquette took a breathe to continue her rant but she noticed that the computer she was using was now displaying a message being typed. She jumped out of her seat.
"T-there is a message here for all of you." She gasped out. She took a shaky breathe and started to read the message.
"Good Evening Dr. Roquette, We apologize for contacting you so suddenly but we would appreciate, if you could relay a message to the sidekicks. To Whom it may concern, You have our sincerest thanks for the wonderful toy. We will put it to better use than either of the Leagues. With our compliments, The High Table."
--- 3 HOURS LATER WATCHTOWER---
The inner circle of the Justice League sat around a table while Batman debriefed them on the results of the Team's mission earlier that day.
After Batman's recounting a tall man man in a blue and red Costume spoke, "So there is another player in the game? Do we have any intel on this High Table?" He asked.
Batman grit his teeth in frustration, "No Clark, there is absolutely nothing on any group calling themselves the High Table. They are either a new group or the more terrifying thought is that they have been operating in secret this whole time."
"What did they mean both Leagues?" asked a slim man in a red costume with a yellow lightning bolt on his chest.
"Maybe they were referring to us and the Team?" suggested a beautiful raven haired woman in golden armor.
"That's not it, the message referred to them as the sidekicks." Answered a machine like man.
"Victor is right, I believe they were referring to the League of Assasins. They were the ones who had kidnapped Dr. Roquette. The mesage Dr. Roquette received was not the actual message that was meant to be received. They wanted us to know they had intel on all of us." answered Batman.
The room became silent as the true horror of the message was finally understood.
--- SAME TIME UNDISCLOSED LOCATION---
"Who is this High Table?! They dare mock me?!" roared the image of Ras Al Ghul.
The other members of The Light remained silent as they contemplated their next move. They stopped us from gaining the information we needed, We will have to rethink our strategies." Spoke the image of Lex Luthor.
"We must all go back to our respective organizations and eridacate any possible spies. We shall meet again when we have culled our forces." adviced the image of Deathstroke. The members of The Light then cut communications.
One lone member remained at the table, he balled his fist in annoyance. "No one will interfere in my plans. High Table you have made a grave mistake this day." Vandal Savage declared to the now empty room.