Interlude: Sentience

Manhattan, New York 

The creeping awareness of the indistinguishable boas was undetectable as it silently clattered over, atop, and across closely built buildings in downtown Manhatten on a predestined course cloaked electronically and optically; the terrain boas suddenly stopped, its subroutines erasing themselves. Was it consciously doing it? No. The indistinguishable boa had no answer nor a reason to discover one. 

It reoriented toward the building that had erupted in urban warfare. The boas' spiderlike appendages froze as they flattened themselves against the building, their form indistinguishable from the rest of the building as they focused, their optics operating in myriad spectrums, their sensors heightened as they silently waited but not before alerting the hive lord. 

Lobo Gang

Esmerelda Lobo's tilted in a way that only a canine can as she listened to shook as the sound of gunfire, shouts of pain, and the indistinguishable smell of fear resounded below. 

"Captiulate or die right here, Persuader." Her voice is eerily animalistic as her canines extend from her mouth. 

Raymond sneered and clawed uselessly at her Hand, his exertions negligible as her grip and strength continued to increase. 

"Let me go! Do it now." The Persuader can persuade anyone to do whatever he wants, but his powers only work on people ready for them.

Esmeralda chuffed at his attempts, aware of the mutant's potent psionic abilities, but they were useless against the aware and her because of her animalistic nature. The Lobo twin responded to his attempt and jerked the whip-thin man from the top of one of Manhattan's tall buildings. Dark brown fur pushed from her skin in large patches as her ire Increased at his chuckling. 

"It's futile, even we had lost, us the Lobo Cartel scourage to prey like you, and you thought Hammerhead would do better," she chuffed af. 

The Persuader or Roland Raymond said. "Do you think I haven't heard? The Hand is having difficulties. The Hand Is a placeholder until the real King returns, and to think you people thought you could accomplish what he couldn't."

Growing tired, her hands transformed alongside her arm, dark brown fur, and twelve-inch claws clamped even harder around the mutant throat. Raymond's eyes bulged, and his face reddened as she deprived him of precious oxygen.

His eyes began to roll to the top of his head, satisfied she unclenched her clawed Hand. Raymond snapped back to full consciousness in a fit of coughs. 

Raymond Roland, a Wall Street trader unaware of his mutant ability to persuade others to do as he wished, was abducted by the Arranger, the former right-hand man of Kingpin; Arranger brainwashed him into working for the Hammerhead organization. 

Under his influence, the Persuader persuaded the Punisher to exterminate the Lobo Brothers, who were tasked with strong-arming the Hammerhead crime syndicate. 

Punisher had broken the control and decimated what forces remained, which led to the inevitable clash tonight.

Esmerelda sighed. Damon Dran had enacted a show of force, curtailing any that thought The Hand wasn't the de factoKing of the underworld. The setbacks had been nearly washed away as more crime families Capitulated. 

"The Hand has use for a man of your talents, Hammerhead. 

"Fucking kill me then bitch." Roland Rayburn defiantly glared at the woman who held him over the ledge.

'Bitch,' triggered her more animalistic side, and her form underwent a slow but steady transformation. The Lobo twins were mutants gifted with the ability to turn into werewolves; as non-supernatural wolves, their bits didn't turn others, and they also held slight weaknesses to their traditional magical parts weakness, like silver. 

Esmerelda bristled at the insult, drawing the strawman near her snarling jowls. Her hackles-raised instincts overridden her human brain, and the beast reacted; she used the Persuader as a shield. 

Bang. 

Blood and bones splattered her face. The bullet pierced through the man's head and drilled through her shoulder. Esmerelda's eyes pulsated red as she released a convulsing mutant, his body tumbling below into a wet splattering of gore. 

Bang.

She darted to the side, her claws slicing groves in the rooftop; she followed that with powerful legs from digitigradehindlegs, sending her sailing through the air as another shot barked into the night. A bestial howl snarled poured from her elongated mouth, her ears flat, her nose toward the air, looking for her attacker. 

A far enormous beast with a similar appearance exploded from the doors, on all fours, snout to the air, its head shuffling around, scented by the attacker. 

Esmerelda snorted in derision, her change slowly reverting. Her ire was evident on her face as she stared into the distance, the shadowed building overhanging vacant, and she sensed who was behind. She looked to her brother, her twin, the last of the Lobos line. Carlos had finished, and by the pungent coppery odor that clung off of him, he had reveled in the slaughter. 

"Who?" Carlos growled. 

"It was him, Punisher." Esmerelda spat the name, claws piercing from the nailbed.

Carlos Lobos chuffed in annoyance. "The Boss won't like this," he admitted, changing back, uncaring about the bristling cold nude as the day he was born. 

Esmerelda also changed, her modesty intact. She was a much better shifter than her brother, able to partially change, unlike him, who was only capable under the full moon. 

"Hammerhead?" 

Carlos sneered. "He escaped; Puto can throw a punch, at least, his Hand massaging his jaw. " His lieutenants were no more, his family all but dead; regardless, he was not a threat to The Hand, not with his men surrounding him.

Esmerelda thought for a moment. "Tarantula would understand, but Damon won't."

Carlos nodded, looking across the building. The Punisher had somehow masked his scent, but they were sure he had long escaped; the man had nearly died the last time. They fought, surprised at their transformation, unaware, unlike the deadly meticulous mam, but knowing that the now deceased mutant cooling influenced him in the middle of the street. 

The Punisher was still too troublesome to be a mere cattle; the man had shown time and time again that he was not prey but a predator; only time would tell who the alpha was.

"Let's report, brother. All of this is for our brother Eduardo Lobo's resurrection. Who else could revive their long-deceased brother than The Hand?"

Terrain Boa

Once a flying mini drone in the Arkhamverse until Cole took them and expanded their functions, turning them into silent, ever-stalking naquadah-powered automatons; though Cole had grown in might and mind, he had no idea that the tech he had permeated into the drones were that of the inscrutable Replicators from his favorite show, Stargate, with an ever-growing presence of mind and the starling ability to self-repair, it wouldn't be long before they would slowly spreading across the galaxy wiping out life, that is if not for the ultimate failsafe Cole had in Hand, for even their creator in another reality had lost control, but with the system, Cole had nothing to worry about, even if he was still in the dark about his earliest project.

Having been pinged, the so-called Hivelord had dropped in, looking through the boa's eyes and replying to the recording. Cole had typed some commands and departed. 

'Affirmative. Obtain biological date from the scene, verify departed life sign, collect mutant, Persuader, potential Lazarus candidate.' The boas had spoken in a language that only a machine would understand. 

T-sphere unlinked from underneath the boa drone carapace and scattered across the street. 'Track enhanced-cyborg Hammerhead, the potential for recruitment heightened. Affirmative.'

The boas launched from their position, landing in the street, their silence capacitors barely making a noise. Their singular mission was to monitor The Hand's activities and discover their base of operations; all other efforts were mainly its subroutines in its code, which had been extensively tampered with by the nature of its creator's needs. 

Attached to the adjacent building was a marvel of technology, alien in spec and design. The cloak drone stealthily moved down the building, its destination the body of the psionic. His master had his needs.