Super Man Sized problems part 2

Turk Barrett was a criminal, there was no argument there. It wasn't something he used to brag about or something he felt particularly guilty about, it was just the statement of a fact. Crime was his way of life, ever since he was a kid, and he wasn't about to change that. He wasn't one of those psychos that went around murdering people for no good reason or even a high-class mobster, the kinds that ruled the underworld, but he was a criminal and – unless he was talking to the cops – he wouldn't deny it.

So he could say, with authority and absolute certainty, that Superman's appearance on Earth had thrown the criminal world into chaos.

Things were spiraling out of control ever since Superman decided to start flying over New York, answering cries for help. The laws that ruled the streets couldn't be applied anymore. Criminals like him, who spent their whole lives doing what they did, were being caught like rookies because everything changed overnight. Nothing was guaranteed anymore and professionals such as himself had to learn new things as they went along, hoping everything would work out.

Turk had lost count of how many people Superman and the police had arrested since Black Zero Event. Buddies of his, old crooks that had persevered for years and years doing their trade, were being thrown in jail because there was a freaking alien god flying faster than a bullet, stopping crime everywhere.

He had been a victim too, of this abusive system, before Black Zero Event; before Superman was even Superman. Of course, Turk didn't know what the fuck he was back then, with his speed, strength and red eyes; he actually thought he was a demon of some kind. Or worse, a mutant. It was only after Zod's invasion, when the Big Blue Boy Scout appeared for the first time, that he made the connection.

Luckily for him, things had worked out; and differently from others, Turk was known to be adaptable. He made a mistake, yes, but he learned from it. That was the important thing, right? And like any good learner, Turk decided to pass on his knowledge, to improve the minds of tomorrow.

That was why he was waiting for the rookie to arrive, standing in that dark alley close to the docks. And almost as soon as the thought crossed his mind, the guy appeared. Turk sighed, shaking his head slightly; the things he did for money, imagine that. Him, a teacher! It wasn't as if he particularly cared about his students, that was true, but he would teach the guy what he needed to know to operate in this new world.

If he didn't, the new guy would be caught, sooner or later, and that money would come out of his pockets, so at least he was motivated.

"You're late," he complained, when the guy was close enough to hear.

"There was a–"

"I don't wanna know," Turk interrupted. "You arrive in time or you're out."

The guy nodded fast. Well, at least he was open to the idea of learning new things. If everything went right, he probably would be able to teach him a thing or two.

"Hi, I'm Robb–"

"No names!" Turk interrupted, looking frightened to the sky for a moment. "Never say names out loud!"

The guy, Robbie, seemed confused about why he was being yelled at. Fucking rookie! Probably freshly arrived from some hick town like Smallville or something, with absolutely no notion of the dangers of New York. Superman was a worldwide hero, a menace to criminals everywhere, but he seemed especially fond of New York for some reason. How complicated was for these guys to understand that he could hear everything?

Robbie was still frowning; Turk sighed.

"Look, kid, if you're smart, you're gonna learn some stuff tonight," he said. "Rule number one: no names. Better yet, no talking at all. Voices call undesirable attention of people we really don't want here."

"Who?" Robbie asked.

Was this guy for real?

"Him!" Turk exclaimed, pointing up frenetically. The guy was still frowning. "You-Know-Who up there!"

"Voldemort?" he whispered.

Motherfu–Turk was beginning to realize this guy wasn't the sharpest tool in the shed.

"Think about what I'm saying," Turk said, slowly. "Who is the one who can fly and listen to anything, anywhere?"

Robbie actually had to think for a couple of seconds, but then he exclaimed: "Super–"

Turk lunged and closed his mouth before he could speak, pushing him against the wall. There was a long moment of silence, as the guy watched him with wide eyes.

"Never, ever, say that name," Turk threatened.

He had no idea if the stories were true and Superman would actually appear when his name was spoken, but he wasn't in the position to try. All he knew was that damn alien could listen to cries for help from all over the world and he most likely would respond to his name; that was something they really didn't need right now.

The rookie nodded as best as he could, with Turk still holding his head, so he released him.

"Is it true he appears when you say his name?" Robbie asked, his voice low.

"Don't know, don't really wanna try," Turk retorted. "Now let's go, we're already late."

Saying this, he began to lead the rookie through the dark alley, moving towards the docks. Contraband was harder and harder to hide these days, with all the new tech, the laws and Superman, but of course it still happened. While there was a need for illegal shit, there would always be new ways to transport said illegal shit.

The cargo they were waiting for, however, wasn't exactly illegal, though, it was just avoiding taxes; it was too risky to deal with that nowadays and Turk didn't want to go back to jail. He had even turned down the offer to traffic some women a few days ago, even with the outrageous money the Russians were paying; he had got into trouble with Superman back then for trying to kidnap some junkies for the Mutant Factory, he would stay the hell away from that kind of thing from now on.

Good thing he did, because the guys who accepted the job were beaten up by some Masked Vigilante and arrested; as if they hadn't enough problems with Superman, now they had a new guy on the loose.

Turk led the rookie inside the docks, avoiding the main entrances, making his way through the containers. Guards and cops were paid to look the other way when a new cargo arrived, but it was best not to take any chances; sometimes people just happened to be in the wrong place, at the wrong time. And, of course, not everyone could be bought. Apparently, Superman's goodness was contagious, because less and less people were afraid of the mob these days.

That was actually the case that night. There was one guard who didn't take bribes and he happened to be the one working; Turk raised his hand and stopped, hiding in the shadows as he watched the guardhouse. Back then, something like that would be easily solved, but the order from the "upper management" was to not call attention and bodies dropping all around did just that. So they would have to wait a few minutes until the guy left and then get to the cargo.

Somehow, however, the rookie didn't get the memo, because when he saw the reason why they stopped leaving the guardhouse, he drew a gun.

Again, Turk jumped against the guy, pushing him down and taking the revolver from him. The fight did a bit of noise and the elderly guard stopped for a moment, but probably decided it was just the wind. Turk waited, on top of Robbie, until the guard left.

"What the fuck is this?!" he whispered, pissed off, swinging the old revolver in front of Robbie's face. "Where the hell did you get this?"

"It's-I got it from my pops," Robbie answered, frightened.

"Rule number two: no fucking guns!" Turk snarled. "What kind of imbecile are you, kid?! Do you even know how loud this shit is? Do you know how fast You-Know-Who can get here if you fire a gun?"

Another change in this brave new world: guns were useless. It took criminals a while to understand this. Sure, you could use them to shoot a fucker or two, but then what? Probably before you even had the chance to shoot a second time, Superman would already be there. A super-fast, bullet proof, superpowered alien that could take entire gangs down in a matter of seconds and wait for the police to arrive.

Guns weren't power anymore, they were just a very loud one-way ticket to prison.

Turk wasn't one to use guns, it wasn't his style, but he did use to sell them. Nothing big or exceptionally dangerous, but he had his clients; except that business was pretty much dead now. Not only people learned that firing a gun, anywhere in the world, would bring Superman on their heads, Superman himself had hunted down weapon's dealers everywhere and arrested them. Even destroyed a few "legally" acquired guns sold to interested parties, by the government.

Seeing the Big Blue Boy Scout fucking with the government was funny, at least. But that meant Turk himself couldn't sell them either.

When the guard was already far away from them, Turk allowed Robbie to get up; the gun, however, stayed with him. It would go to the sea as soon as they got close enough.

"You don't fire guns," he repeated, hammering that lesson on the kid's head. "Never! That's game-over nowadays! And while we're talking about this, you don't fucking kill! Never!"

"I'm not afraid of killing!" the kid answered, full of bravado, which showed Turk that he was indeed afraid of killing.

"You should be," he replied. "Very much." He pointed up. "You-Know-Who is usually a pretty chill guy, but hurt someone, kill someone, especially innocent people, and he will get pissed. And believe me, you don't want that guy pissed!"

As far as he knew, Superman didn't kill humans. He barely hurt people, even when they actually tried to shoot him. For a while, criminals everywhere took this as a sign of weakness or some shit like that, despite the fact that he had twisted that other alien guy's neck as if he were a chicken; until a bright gang member decided to grab a kid hostage when Superman appeared to arrest him.

Bad idea. The guy didn't even have the chance to threaten to pull the trigger; before he could blink, Superman crashed against him, taking him away from the kid. And the guy found out, in a very painful way, what happened when someone collided against a being called Man of Steel. Broken bones everywhere, broken pride, and an open-season on every single criminal remotely related to him.

His gang was arrested in a couple of days, then his suppliers, his clients and everyone that claimed ties to the guy.

Needless to say, it became a new law in the underworld for criminals that threatened or hurt innocents to be ostracized, even sacrificed for the greater good; that was how afraid they were of Superman. Nobody there cared one bit about innocents, that was true, but hurting them meant career-suicide. If it had to be done, then it had to be done quietly. And that was hard to do when the guy could hear a fucking pin dropping on the other side of the world.

Turk pushed Robbie against the container.

"No guns and no killing!" he repeated. "Got it?"

He didn't know if the rookie agreed just for the sake of agreeing or if he actually understood, but as long he didn't pull shit like that with him, that was his problem.

They waited a few minutes hidden between the containers. The guard that didn't take bribes had just left and his replacement, bought and paid for, had just left the premises as well; the cost was clear. In silence, Turk guided them through the containers close to the sea, the ones that had arrived recently. He took a second to clean his prints from the revolver and toss the thing away in the water; he actually expected the rookie to say something, but he wisely kept his mouth shut.

Double checking the number of the container, Turk began looking for it. He knew it was there, he'd seen it earlier that day, and the guys with the trucks were probably already waiting close by, ready to move the cargo when he called them.

Finally, he spotted it. "Here it is," he whispered, chuckling.

Looking around to check if there wasn't anyone around, Turk opened the container. It was filled to the brim with boxes.

"What are those?" the rookie asked, eyes wide. "Drugs?"

Turk rolled his eyes. It was like he was talking to the wall. How the hell were they supposed to hide a shipment of drugs like that? Never mind Superman, the proper channels would spot shit like that any day of the week.

Not that Superman wasn't a pain in the ass when it came to drugs, because he was. But he decided that destroying the root of the problem was easier than hunting down drug dealers everywhere; he got rid of so many sellers, ripping apart their businesses, all over the world, that the price of the drugs – any drug, really – shot to the roof.

There were still some people brave enough to deal, mainly the Chinese, but Turk wasn't crazy enough to mess with those fuckers.

"No, not drugs," Turk answered, pulling one box down. "Even better."

"Booze?"

"Kid, stop guessing, you're bad at it."

Grabbing a knife, Turk cut the box open. He sank his hands into it, tossing the protective plastic away, and finally fished the object inside it: the latest Starkphone.

"This here, kid, this is the fucking future," Turk said, lifting the cellphone for the rookie to see. "Completely legal, genuine stuff, but made far away from the US, where people don't have to worry about work-hours or minimum wages. And all we have to do, is bring them inside the country without paying taxes. Almost honest work."

The rookie was speechless, staring at the phone. Turk chuckled at the surprised face. Sure, maybe it wasn't as profitable as drugs, guns or even people, but this way Superman wouldn't fly there and fuck everything up out of the blue. It was a crime, yes, but not a crime he would worry about too much.

"We have another cargo arriving tomorrow and then another one the day after," Turk said. "Not cellphones, though."

"What?" Robbie asked.

"Protein. You know, those expensive supplements people that go to the gym take."

The kid just stared back at him, as if trying to understand.

"But… There are drugs hidden inside them, right?" he asked.

Turk sighed, putting the Starkphone back in the box.

"Kid, listen to me. The days we used to smuggle shit like that all over are about to end. Nobody wants to deal with the kind of heat that it brings on their heads anymore, it's not worth it."

"So we are… working? I mean, honest work?"

"We are stealing from the government. We are fucking heroes, if you ask me!" Turk laughed at his stunned face. "Now, help me unload this, the guys with the trucks won't take long to arrive."

Another good night of work, Turk thought satisfied, looking up to the full moon. No cops, no Superman, no Avengers of any kind. All was well in the world.

That was when a Masked Man dropped from the container right on top of him.

"Well, at least today you don't look like you fought an entire warehouse of mobsters," Claire Temple commented, checking his injuries with a clinical eye. "Maybe half a warehouse."

Matt chuckled, allowing her to clean the cuts and bruises on his chest. She was right, though, this time he probably wouldn't even need stitches.

"It was a calm night," Matt said. "I just asked around about the Russians a bit."

He couldn't see, of course, but Matt felt Claire staring at him.

"With your fists?" she asked. "That doesn't make for a very interesting conversation."

"You'd be surprised."

Matt found that criminals had unusually loose tongues when he allowed his fists to do the talking. And since he had important questions to ask, questions that needed to be answered for Claire's safety, Matt had been throwing himself at the problem rather religiously lately.

Unfortunately, before they started to answer, criminals usually did attempt to fight back, no matter how scared and inept they were; sometimes they landed a hit or two. That was why he was there that night, allowing Claire to take a look at his wounds, inside an apartment that belonged to neither of them.

There was a reason Matt used a mask when he went out to punch bad guys. For his own safety, of course, but mainly for the safety of his friends that couldn't protect themselves from that kind of threat, not like he could; he could say whatever he wanted about Stick, his old mentor, but the old man did teach him how to fight and to fight well.

But mask or not, Matt made a mistake. He allowed his emotions to cloud his judgment. He started all this because he couldn't bear to listen to every single crime going on in Hell's Kitchen and do nothing. It was his very own version of Hell. So he decided, when he couldn't take it anymore, that he needed to do something. Thus, Matt started his crusade against crime in Hell's Kitchen.

What he failed to consider was that when someone was pushed, they were bound to push back. And since they couldn't fight him, they chose a weaker target. The Russians, frustrated by his constant interference in their operations, decided to kidnap a child, to force him to appear.

It didn't work as they intended. As soon as the kid and his father yelled for help, there was a booming noise in the sky and Superman descended upon them like a vengeful god, completely destroying their car, their guns and arresting the kidnappers.

But if they failed to kidnap the kid, as intended, the Russians had succeeded at pissing off Matt.

He started all this to help innocents and now an innocent had been put in danger so they could get to him. Matt was furious and that fury had cost him his rationality. He threw himself back in the war against crime recklessly, trying to finish it once and for all and it almost cost his life, when he made the mistake of attacking a warehouse that was prepared for him.

Claire was the one who saved his life, when she found him half-dead hiding inside a dumpster close to her building. She did what she could, being a professional nurse, but before Matt could leave, a Russian enforcer managed to follow his trail to Claire's apartment. Matt confronted him and, luckily – or not, depending on the point-of-view – the guy was put into a coma.

Matt had no idea if the guy would wake up and he honestly didn't care all that much; he didn't kill people, but that was pretty much his only rule when dealing with the kind of scum who saw nothing wrong about hurting innocents. But he was concerned about what the Russian could remember if he ever woke up. If he somehow recalled where he was when he faced him, then Claire would be in danger and Matt couldn't allow that.

That was why she was hiding, temporarily, in her friend's place, when she should be there only to feed the cat. And that was why Matt was so desperately trying to dig up everything he could on the Russians, so he could send them all to jail as soon as possible.

It was easier said than done.

"Matt," Claire began, stopping to clean his wounds for a second, "you are going to get yourself killed if you continue like this. You're not Superman, you know. You need some kind of protection if you intend to fight criminals every night."

"Armor?" Matt shook his head. "It would slow me down too much."

"So will a bullet!" Claire retorted, applying a bandage over one of the deep cuts.

Matt turned to her, a smirk on his face. "You worried about me?"

Claire stared back, pushing his hand so he would hold the bandage while she grabbed the tape. "What if I were?"

"I would tell you that I'm a big boy, and not to be," Matt countered, still smirking.

She was not exactly impressed.

"Right… That's why you keep ending up here," she mocked, playfully.

"Well, maybe I just like the sound of your voice."

"Hmm. So what happens the night you come by and I'm already talking to someone else?"

"Yeah, it crossed my mind," Matt admitted, not exactly thrilled by the possibility. He put his hand in his pocket and fished a cellphone, giving it to Claire. "Here."

"Um, you shouldn't have," she joked, taking the cheap phone of his hands.

Matt chuckled.

"I didn't. The burner's for me. Memorize the number, put yours in. Next time I need to come by, I'll call."

Claire wasn't as amused as he was by that.

"By 'come by', do you mean stumble in, bleeding to death?" she asked.

A guy was found half-dead inside a dumpster once and suddenly people thought this would become a habit. He was still rolling his blind eyes when Claire tossed him his shirt; he grabbed it before it hit his face.

"Yeah, something like that," he answered, putting it on.

"You're gonna get yourself killed," Claire said, again. "You really gotta easy up."

Despite being a tad annoyed, Matt was truly grateful to have someone caring for him that much. Especially someone who knew what he really was. Very few people knew about his abilities and it was nice to not have to pretend to be helpless. He might've not liked to put Claire in danger, but he didn't regret meeting her, not for a second.

"No, I can't, not yet."

"I can take care of myself, Mike," Claire exclaimed.

For a split second, Matt almost forgot that Claire didn't know his real name. Talking to her was so easy that he sometimes didn't remember they weren't exactly old friends. He didn't really like to think about that.

"It's not just about you," he said, deciding to just ignore that. "It's a little more complicated than that. You ever heard the name Wilson Fisk?"

Unsurprisingly, Claire shook her head. "No. Who's that?"

That was a very good question. Just a few days ago, Nelson and Murdock, the law firm he built with Foggy, had been approached by a nameless representative of a company named Confederated Global Investments. The guy, a smooth talker full of confidence, told them that they represented a consortium with diversified interests in the privet sector, both domestic and international, and that from time to time they scouted the landscape for promising talent to put on retainer, such as them.

Matt didn't even need his abilities to know that was all bullshit.

The company was a subsidiary of a holding company, of a loan-out to a holding subsidiary and on and on and on… It was a front, nothing more, nothing less. And even though the company's check cleared in about two seconds, they were a lot more worried about what they wanted Nelson and Murdock to do.

More accurately, about who they wanted Nelson and Murdock to represent.

A hitman. A psychopathic hitman named John Healy that had killed – allegedly in self-defense – a man called Prohaszka, by repeatedly smashing his head with a bowling ball. He showed no remorse, no emotion whatsoever after the deed and it took them barely a second to realize what kind of monster they were dealing with; the kind that Nelson and Murdock shouldn't represent.

But Matt needed answers. He needed to know why that hitman was hired to kill Prohaszka, a known mobster. He needed to know why Confederated Global Investments was paying them to represent the man. He needed to know who was behind that company. Because whoever it was, they were moving into Hell's Kitchen to do something big.

So they represented John Healy and managed to free him. And when Matt confronted the man, forcing him to give him the name of his boss, John Healy, a man capable of killing without feeling a single thing, became so desperately afraid that he chose to ram his own head through a piece of metal rather than live with the consequences of giving out Fisk's name.

Matt could barely understand how someone could inspire that much fear, but whoever this Wilson Fisk was, he was probably the one behind the Russians, behind Union Allied and the man who tried to kill Karen Page, behind all that was wrong in Hell's Kitchen.

"Just a name someone gave me," Matt finally answered, with an indifference he didn't feel. "But there's no public record, nothing on the internet, not one mention of Fisk."

"Maybe whoever gave you his name was lying," Claire guessed.

"I would've known if he was," Matt said.

"How?"

"Heartbeat," he answered simply, extending his hand to take the burner back.

"Right, of course, heartbeat," Claire said, sarcastically, giving him the phone back. "So what, you're just gonna go out there punching whoever you can, hoping to find somebody who knows this Fisk guy?"

"Well, apply enough pressure, someone will break," Matt said, putting his mask on. "Sooner or later."

"What happens if the 'someone' turns out to be you?"

Matt was already getting up to leave, but he could sense that Claire was truly worried about him. He stopped and went back.

"Claire, I'll be fine," he said, touching her shoulder. "The streets are not so dangerous anymore. Not after Superman."

"Oh, is that why you come back here nightly, looking like you've been through a grinder?" she said, ironically.

He decided to ignore her tone. "But no bullets," he said, simply. "Do you remember the last time there was a shooting in New York?"

"Yes, last week!"

"A shooting that claimed lives," Matt corrected himself, fast.

This time, Claire didn't answer so fast. "Well, no, but I'm sure these guys still have guns."

"Of course they do, but they know that if they use them, it's game-over. There are still a few idiots here and there, but those are not the guys I'm dealing with."

"No, you are dealing with the crime bosses," Claire replied, sighing. "It's just… I'm worried."

"I know you are," he said. "But trust me, Claire, I'll be fine. And in no time you'll be safe, back into your place."

"Back to work," she corrected him. "I can't stay cooped up anymore, I'm going crazy." He laughed. "I can't believe all these guys are still out there. I mean, how can they work with Superman flying all over?"

Matt faced her, incapable of seeing her face, but sensing her all the same. It was true that Superman was changing the world and what he'd done for the safety of Hell's Kitchen was amazing. He couldn't even remember the last time he heard gangs fighting, robberies, people being mugged at night or worse. And it wasn't only in New York, but the entire world.

Entire Crime Families were arrested, corrupt politicians were exposed, murderers, rapists, drug dealers, weapon's dealers, warlords, criminals all over the world were facing, for the first time, punishment for what they did. Just the other day, hundreds of pedophiles around the globe had been arrested, when proof of what they did, of the material they had, was given to the police forces of several countries, hacked no doubt by Superman, even though his name wasn't mentioned by the cops.

Finally they had someone to fear and the innocent had someone to save them.

But Super or not, he was one man. And criminals were adaptable like rats. Now they were confused, lost, but sooner rather than later they would learn how to commit crimes again. Some of them had already learned. Those were the ones Matt was facing right now.

"Tell me, Claire, why do we have to take our full course of antibiotics?" Matt asked, suddenly.

"What?" Claire asked, completely confused.

"Why do doctors say people have to finish the full course of antibiotics?" Matt repeated. She still didn't answer, looking shocked at him. "Humor me."

"Well," she started, still not sure why he asked that, "the reason doctors recommend their patients to finish the prescribed dose of antibiotics is so there isn't a risk of any bacteria surviving. Some people stop as soon as they feel better, thinking they are cured, but while most bacteria have indeed been killed, the most resistant ones are still there. And without competition from the others, they'll reproduce and infect the patient again, but this time the patient will have a whole lot more resistant bacteria than before…"

Claire stopped talking, finally realizing why Matt asked her that question. She widened her eyes.

"Criminals in Hell's Kitchen are just like that," Matt said. "Right now, Superman is dealing with most of them, but the strongest, the most resilient, will hide and survive. They'll avoid the storm. And when there is no more competition, no one between the city and them, they'll be back, stronger than before. And Hell's Kitchen will fester." Matt opened Claire's window. "That's why I need to see this through."

And with a last nod in her direction, Matt jumped out.

All the talking ended abruptly when James Wesley entered the room. He stopped for a moment, looking at the people inside. The one that was doing most of the talk was an elderly man dressed in an expensive suit, a man named Leland Owlsley, the one responsible for moving and hiding most of their money. By his side, visibly annoyed by all the chatter, were the Russian brothers, Anatoly and Vladimir Ranskahov; he couldn't help but to notice that Anatoly was bruised, as if he had taken quite the beating recently. On the opposite side, standing regally, was the menacing figure of Nobu Yoshioka, leader of the Yakuza branch on New York, gazing at him with his watchful eyes. And finally, sitting on the only chair in the room, was Madame Gao, holding her cane, the very picture of a frail Chinese elder lady; despite her appearance, she was probably the most dangerous person in the room and in Hell's Kitchen, save perhaps his own employer, and everybody there was quite aware of that.

"Finally!" Leland exclaimed. He made a grand gesture of pointing to the room they were in. "Look at this place! Look at all that mold! Another hour down here and we'll begin grow that stuff in our lungs. The good news is that we are already so beneath the earth that we don't actually have to pay for being buried if that happens."

Leland was, of course, exaggerating, but surprisingly not by much. It truly was a dirty, old room, Wesley agreed, but it wasn't like they were there without a reason.

"Can't we ever meet in a nice place?" Leland continued to rant. "Freezing on top of a skyscraper under construction and now the Devil's basement? Can't we compromise and get something in the middle? You know what, by this point I think I actually prefer the skyscraper, it's easier to breathe."

"Do you want to discuss our business in the sky, really?" Wesley asked, raising his eyebrows. "We might as well invite You-Know-Who to sit with us."

The old lawyer sighed, but didn't say anything else about the matter. He knew, as everyone there also did, that the reason they were meeting underground was to avoid eavesdroppers. Specifically, one eavesdropper that tended to fly around in a blue suit. The last thing they needed was for Superman to hear about their plans.

"I apologize for my tardiness," Wesley said, bowing his head to Madame Gao, "especially to you, Madame Gao." She accepted the apology gracefully. He turned to the Russians and extended a folder to them. "I brought something for you two."

Vladimir grabbed the folder, looking into his eyes with an annoyed gaze that told Wesley exactly how much he was pissed off with him; he couldn't help but to smirk.

"Leland finalized the paperwork yesterday," Wesley explained, as the Russian brothers browsed the folder. "Prohaszka's holdings in Kitchen Cab have been acquired and transferred via a third party to Veles Taxi. Your distribution infrastructure has just doubled."

To the victors, the spoils, those were the rules in the underworld. Rigoletto and Prohaszka were the last of the big crime bosses in Hell's Kitchen and what once belonged to them was now theirs. There was something fulfilling in devouring their rivals and acquiring their strength, Wesley thought.

"Tell your employer, we are grateful," Anatoly said, his thick accent as respectful as a Russian mobster could be; his brother was not amused by this in the least, if the scalding look he sent Anatoly was any indication.

Wesley looked at Vladimir.

"I don't think he really cares at the moment," he said. "You were light again this week."

The Russians glared at him, but they knew very well they were wrong; more importantly, everyone in the room knew it as well. Their alliance worked because each one pulled their own weight. None of them were there because they enjoyed each other's company, they were there because as a united front they were stronger.

Madame Gao produced the heroin and the Russians distributed it. That was the agreement. Except that, despite the production continuing normally – which was a feat in on itself, with Superman destroying drug dealers everywhere –, the Russians were not moving the drugs to where they needed to be. And if one of them ceased to be useful, well, they had no business being there.

"We had a complication," Vladimir said, simply.

Wesley looked at Anatoly's bruised face; they all knew what kind of complication they had. The same complication they'd been having for a while now and still couldn't fix it.

"The Masked Vigilante?!" Leland exclaimed, looking to all of them. "You still haven't dealt with this? For Christ's sake, it's not like we are asking you to fight Superman!"

The Russians turned enraged to Leland, but Wesley was the first to reprimand him.

"We don't say that name!" he barked.

Leland raised his hands. "I know, I know, I'm sorry. My bad. There are so many names I can't say that it gets a bit confusing. I can't say his name. I can't say your employer's name. Can I say my own name?"

"By all means," Wesley sighed, tiredly. "Why don't we go back to the skyscraper so you can yell your name to the skies? Maybe we'll get lucky and no one will be listening."

For all his bluster, Leland got very quiet, very fast. Instead of saying anything back, he just pretended to zip his lips shut and throw away an invisible key.

Madame Gao chuckled, amused. Everybody else wasn't – he couldn't tell if the Russians or Nobu was more annoyed by Leland.

Ignoring all that, Wesley turned to the Russians, moving on. "You assured us you were addressing this complication."

Vladimir was visibly enraged at being berated. "Do you know what the Masked Man was asking? This fool who laid hands on my brother?"

"Not my concern," Wesley replied, dismissive.

"It should be," Anatoly said, serious. "He was asking about your employer. By name."

It was only through years of professionalism that Wesley's face didn't show a fraction of the fury he was feeling at that moment. These two incompetent idiots were ruining everything. They didn't have the luxury to make mistakes, not when there was a superpowered alien flying around New York, almost literally grabbing criminals by their necks and throwing them in jail.

Profit was already low with so many of their personnel behind bars. Drugs were extremely risky to make, move and sell. Guns were pretty much a dead business nowadays, since no gang wanted to be caught with them. People trafficking was, as well, almost finished. An empire as big as theirs needed money to keep itself and most of it was coming from legitimate businesses and smuggling, but that wasn't feasible. They needed the drugs to be sold and they needed to do it quietly.

But of course, "quietly" didn't seem to be a word that translated well from Russian.

"All the more reason to settle this," he said, with a calm he wasn't feeling. "You sneeze, we all catch a cold. He's weakened your operation."

"You think us weak?" Vladimir asked, as if challenging him.

"This isn't personal, Vladimir. It's business. Distribution of our product," he said, looking at Madame Gao when he said that, "has been affected, which in turn is causing delays in other ventures. This is not acceptable." Wesley smiled, opening his arms as if he was relaying wonderful news. "Fortunately," Wesley continued, "my employer has agreed to help return you to solid footing."

"How?" Anatoly asked.

"By aiding you in certain duties deemed vital to the continuation of the service–"

"He wants to take over," Vladimir interrupted, turning his back at him as he spat on the ground.

"We value the service you provide, but clearly you need help providing them," Wesley explained, not denying it.

"It's one dude, how the hell is he not dead yet?" Leland exclaimed, suddenly. "Does he have a magic hammer or an iron suit we don't know about?"

The Russians didn't seem to like the question.

"He is not a common man," Anatoly said, somber. "And we cannot deal with him as we normally do, now, can we?"

Which meant gunshots and explosions. That would definitely be a bad move. Sure, maybe the Masked Man would die – "maybe" being the key word –, but Superman would be upon them before they could celebrate. No, the times when they could pull stuff like that and get away with it were over.

Superman changed the rules of the game. Once the man who had the most guns was the strongest, now that man was just the most likely to be sent to jail. Leland was having to do near miracles to keep their money away from the alien's advanced tech – most of their accounting books were literally back on paper, any register they had of their finances and projects kept far away from computers. Money laundering had to be perfectly executed, since there was no room for mistakes anymore.

And it wasn't only the fact that they had to keep themselves hidden, it was the fact that most people weren't as afraid of them as they had been before. Superman gave hope to the weak, the belief that all one had to do was call and he would be there. How can someone intimidate a person when all that was pretty much true?

"We almost had him, not too long ago," Vladimir argued. "Our men almost killed him."

"That was when you tried to kidnap that kid, wasn't it?" Leland asked, chuckling. "Boy, was that a bad move or what?"

If looks could kill, Leland would be already dead.

"The alien interrupted," Vladimir retorted. "What did you want us to do?"

"Maybe not kidnap a child?" Wesley suggested. "I know it probably sounds weird to you two, but there are other ways to solve problems. Your problem is the Masked Vigilante, not the alien."

"Why not solve both?" Vladimir asked, turning to look at him with violent eyes. Wesley didn't like the sound of that. "We all know about the Vulture who makes weapons with parts left from the Incident. I've seen them. I bet they could kill that flying son of a bitch and then we can just deal with the Masked Vigilante as we always dealt with problems."

"Absolutely not!" Wesley exclaimed, immediately.

"Why? Too much of a coward?" Vladimir provoked.

"Think about what you're saying," Wesley retorted. "Do you really believe those guns can kill him? The General," and they all knew he was talking about Zod, "had the same strength he did, plus the advanced tech and look at what happened to him! And you think you can do any better?"

Wesley approached, almost touching Vladimir.

"He is not to be challenged. He is not to be provoked. You think he spares his enemies because he is weak? He spares criminals because we are less than maggots to him. No fancy gun will change that."

For a split second, Wesley was certain Vladimir would strike him, but before he could do anything Madame Gao started to speak in Mandarin; he looked at her immediately.

"Translator?" Leland asked, turning to him.

Wesley ignored him, still listening to Madame Gao; when she finished, he chuckled.

"An apt comparison, Madame Gao," Wesley said, looking at the Russians. "Madame Gao was reminding me of an old story. Humans cannot fight the sea, but they can sail over it."

"And? What does that mean?" Leland asked; as always, he lacked subtlety.

"It means," Wesley answered to Leland, still looking at the Russians, "that the alien is a force of nature. He is the sea. We cannot fight him, beat him into submission, control him. But we can learn how to sail." He smirked at Vladimir. "Forget these guns, use your head. You said you almost killed him? How did he escape? Where did he run to? Maybe you should ask your man these questions."

"He is in a coma," Anatoly said.

"Well, I'm sure we can find something to wake him up, so we can ask him a few questions," Wesley suggested, nodding at Madame Gao; if there was any substance like that, she would know about it. "Anyway, solve this. We cannot keep dealing with these losses forever."

Message relayed, message received; kill the Masked Man or you are out.

The Russians left the room with a last glare and Leland, dying to get out of that place, was right behind them. Wesley was suddenly under the gaze of two pairs of eyes that were capable of making even he nervous; he felt a little bit of sympathy for the Russians right now, because he was in a similar position.

With all the bravery he could muster, Wesley looked at Mr. Nobu and Madame Gao.

"Stark got in the way of the negotiation of the buildings you wanted, but rest assured, I'll deal with it," he said, fast. "One way or the other."

There was a long moment of silence; then, finally, Nobu nodded and Madame Gao smiled.

Wesley breathed relieved and thanked both of them. It was true that they needed their help, but sometimes he couldn't help but to think that things would be far safer if they hadn't to deal with dangerous individuals such as them.

Karen Page was a woman with a mission. And that mission was to bring to justice the people involved in the murder of her friend, Daniel Fisher, the same people who had also framed her for killing him.

It didn't matter she had been freed, pronounced innocent of any crime. It didn't matter that Union Allied, the company where she and Daniel worked, and that was most likely responsible for this, had gone bankrupt. It didn't matter that Karen had been threatened with legal action if she went forward with this. It didn't matter that all that had almost cost her life, when an assassin tried to kill her and the only reason she was still breathing had been because a Masked Vigilante saved her.

Nothing of that mattered, only justice. That was why Karen was meeting with Ben Urich, a legendary investigative reporter that worked for the New York Bulletin, the same reporter that had exposed Union Allied in a front page article and brought the whole company down with the information she had acquired.

"Did you look at it?" she asked, nervous, as they both sat at a table in a small coffeeshop.

The day before, Karen had found Ben and gave him all the information she had on the case, hoping he could help her to find out more about it.

"Yeah, I looked at it," Ben answered, drinking his coffee.

He said nothing else.

"And?" Karen insisted.

"And," he continued, slowly, "it's a story I heard before. Company gets caught in a scandal, files for bankruptcy, then quietly restructures under a new name."

No, that wasn't the story Karen wanted him to focus at!

"They killed Daniel Fisher," she said, leaning over the table. "They tried to kill me!"

And the fact that she wasn't dead was pretty much a miracle. Karen never was a religious person, but sometimes, when things like that happened, she wondered if there wasn't anyone watching over her; then she remembered that, despite the fact that she was alive, innocent people had died and no one had saved them.

Karen's life had changed completely not too long ago. She used to work as a secretary in the financial department at Union Allied, the company that was overseeing the bulk of the government contracts for the reconstruction of Hell's Kitchen after the Incident. The Battle of New York had transformed completely the business, bringing new owners, new grants, new contracts and an almost unlimited stream of money.

And Union Allied had benefited from every dollar of it.

As secretary of the chief accountant, one of Karen's jobs was to coordinate the pension claims for the company, so when she received an email with an attached file called "Pension Master", she didn't think twice about opening it. Except the email apparently wasn't meant for her, because when she opened it, instead of a pension fund, Karen saw only an obscene amount of money.

It was still being designated as company pension and it was being constantly adjusted, money coming in and going out, but it most definitely wasn't the company pension; not with that absurd amount of money.

Naively, Karen made the mistake of confronting her boss, Mr. McClintock, asking him what that file was. Back then it didn't even cross her mind the danger she was in, she was just trying to do the right thing. Maybe her boss was the only one involved, embezzling or something, and it was her duty to do something. He denied, of course, laughed it off, told her that the file was just a theorical model they were screwing around with, but she was sure something was wrong. So she decided to talk to Daniel Fisher, a colleague that worked in the legal department, someone she thought nice. They went out for drinks, she told him what she found and then she blacked out.

Next thing she knows, Karen woke up in her apartment covered in blood, with Daniel Fisher's body by her side.

She had to relax her hands not to break the coffee mug and take a deep breath. They'd killed him because of her. Because she tried to do the right thing. They tried to frame her, managed to send her to jail for a night, and even sent a prison guard to try to kill her during the night, so they could all pretend she committed suicide.

Daniel was married, he had a little boy, and he was killed simply as way to scare her.

If it weren't for Matt Murdock and for Foggy Nelson, Karen would be dead or in jail for a crime she didn't commit. They appeared as if sent by a guardian angel, represented her, got her out of jail and even protected her. It was their first case, but they knew she was innocent and they stood by her all the way, even going as far as giving her a job at Nelson and Murdock.

But they weren't the only ones responsible for her still being alive. The Masked Vigilante of Hell's Kitchen had also saved her.

The reason the ones in control of Union Allied didn't simply kill her, like they did with Daniel, was because Karen made a copy of the file. The plan was to frame her and let her rot in jail, but they didn't count on some inconsistences on the crime scene, nor did they count with Matt and Foggy appearing to represent her so fast. They adjusted and tried to forge a suicide, but that also failed.

So they sent another assassin, a man named Rance – probably the same man who killed Daniel –, when she went back to recover the copied file in her apartment.

Karen had no doubt that if the Masked Vigilante hadn't appeared, she would be dead. But he did. He confronted the assassin, defeated him and took the file to the very man sitting in front of her, Ben Urich. The legendary reporter took that information and wrote a first page article, exposing everything. Union Allied filed for bankruptcy, her boss, McClintock was arrested, and Karen was left alone, since everything she knew was already public knowledge.

But she knew that the true guilty people, the owners of all that money, were still out there. And now that Union Allied had been buried, they were reforming under another company, so they could continue to commit the same crimes. Karen couldn't allow that to happen.

"I'm still a little unclear on one point," Ben Urich finally said, snapping Karen out of her memories. "You say here that Rance assaulted you in your apartment. And a man in a black mask saved your life?"

Karen didn't need to be a specialist to hear the skepticism on his tone.

"Yes," she answered, "but he just… He came out of nowhere."

"And you'd never seen him before?"

"No."

"Stranger things, right?" Urich said, shrugging.

He didn't believe her, Karen realized. She didn't know why that hurt so much.

"Well, what about Rance?" Karen insisted. If he didn't believe her, they maybe he could just take a look at the evidence. "Do you really believe that he just up and hung himself in jail? That guard tried to do the same thing to me. Why don't you ask him?"

"Farnum?" Urich asked, saying the name of the guard. "He's dead." Karen got pale. "Ate the barrel of his gun in his basement. And your old boss, McClintock? Overdosed on pills or some such. You seeing a pattern here, Miss Page?"

Karen felt sick, but more than that, she felt furious.

"Then why isn't anyone looking into this?" she exclaimed.

Ben Urich looked at her as if she were a child. He leaned closer.

"You don't understand how lucky you are," he whispered, staring at her. "Count the angels on the head of a pin and move on."

She couldn't do that, these people couldn't just get away with this.

"So they just shuffle some papers and all this disappears?" Karen said, outraged.

"Wouldn't be the first time," Urich retorted.

"Oh, don't bullshit me!" Karen exclaimed. "A construction company is brick and mortar, literally. You cannot just shift cranes and trailers and office equipment like you can numbers on a page. There has to be a trail if everything is being liquidated!"

Ben Urich kept staring at her, in silence. Then he put his mug down.

"Thanks for the coffee."

Karen could only look, shocked and lost, as Urich got up.

"What?" she asked. "So that's it?

He leaned closer. "Stories like these are built on sources, Miss Page. Credible sources. I did some digging into your, uh… Past activities."

She couldn't meet his eyes, feeling ashamed and small. But somewhere inside her there was still courage, because Karen stared back at him.

"Well, I did some digging too. I read every big story with your byline. The VA Kickbacks, toxic runoff, the Teachers Union Scandal… Hell, you pretty much brought down the Italian mob back when I was in diapers. What ever happened to that reporter, Mr. Urich?

Urich was in silence for a long time, looking down, as if physically hurt by her words.

"He got old," he finally said, "And a hell of a lot less stupid."

Karen could only watch as Ben Urich left, too disappointed to do anything.

Ben Urich walked to the coffeeshop's door, feeling sick in his stomach. Despite what he said, despite what he found on Miss Page's past, he knew she was telling the truth. And she was there, after being framed and almost murdered, asking him for help.

And he was turning his back on her.

There were good reasons for that, Ben told himself. Mitchel Ellison had been very clear about what kind of stories he wanted to print in the New York Bulletin and that wasn't one of them; investigative journalism didn't sell newspapers. Back in the day, Ben wouldn't think twice about disobeying him, but he couldn't risk his job, not when his sick wife needed the money so much.

More importantly, he knew what kind of danger he would be getting into.

Miss Page was right, he was one of the responsible for exposing the Italian mob, for bringing them down, but things were different now. Back then, the crime had rules. The mobsters were ruthless, but there were lines they didn't cross, limits. These new players had no rules, no limits, nothing holding them down. And they were making a move on the city.

Old players were disappearing. Rigoletto, an old Italian mobster, had "retired in pieces", according to his sources. Prohaszka had been bashed in the head with a bowling ball until there was nothing left. Those murders weren't coincidental, they were takeovers.

All that without mentioning the trail of corpses these new guys left behind. In addition to Rigoletto and Prohaszka there were Miss Page's coworker, Daniel Fisher; her boss, McClintock; the prison guard that tried to kill her, Clyde Farnum; the assassin Rance; the hitman that killed Prohaszka, John Healy…

People naively believed that Superman and the Avengers were keeping the world safe and maybe up there, in the skies fighting aliens, it was true. But down there, in the streets, hidden behind shadows and smoke, crime still thrived.

Karen Page couldn't begin to understand how lucky she was to get out of all this alive. She suffered, yes, but compared to what these people could do to her, she was fine. She had her whole life in front of her and if she closed her eyes then maybe, just maybe, she could move on and be happy.

But he knew she wouldn't. He looked into her eyes and he saw himself. With or without his help, Karen Page would try to bring these people to justice. And death would be a kindness if she made a mistake.

Sighing, Ben stopped as soon as he crossed the door. He couldn't allow that to happen. Turning back, he got into the coffeeshop again and walked to her table. Miss Page didn't even notice, too stunned – and probably disappointed in him – to do anything else than stare at her coffee.

Fidgeting with his jacket, Urich got a two-day old New York Bulletin newspaper from his pocket and tossed it on the table, right in front of her. She jumped back, startled.

"If you try to do this alone, you're going to die, Miss Page," he said, being as direct as he could. "I can't help you, I'm too old for that, but maybe he can."

Following his eyes, Miss Page looked at the newspaper, her eyes moving as she read the article printed on the page. It was a small freelance piece, about a politician taking bribes, but it was a good one – something that had actually made the politician in question lose his job and face charges. But the reason Urich was pointing out that wasn't because of the story or the consequences of it.

It was because of a previous article that reporter had written: the one that exposed the Mutant Factory and all those involved.

"This kid is good," he explained. "He's not me, but he knows what he is doing. Got a good head over his shoulders. If you're going through with this, Miss Page, find him first."

Saying this, before she had the chance to even ask anything, Ben Urich left.

Jessica Jones hated hospitals. The smell, by itself, was enough to make her stomach turn. She had spent too much time inside one and if she never had to step in a hospital again, she would consider herself lucky. Unfortunately, Jessica liked money a little more than she hated hospitals and the man she was looking for had been admitted there recently, if her sources were correct.

And apparently they were, she realized, when she looked through the little window on the door and met Turk Barrett's eyes; Jessica was quite happy to notice that he had the good sense to look scared.

"Hey, Turk, fancy meeting you here," she greeted him, as soon as she opened the door.

By the look on his face, Turk would've tried to run if he weren't currently stuck to the bed, his broken leg raised in the air. Jessica had no idea what happened, but he did look like he'd been run over by a truck.

"Oh, shit, what are you doing here?" he asked, his swollen face turning to her.

"Why, I came to visit my old friend, of course," Jessica answered, sarcastically, pulling a chair closer to his bed and sitting down. "Or, you know, I came to find you, again, so you can pay for your son's expenses as a good father would."

"I'm not a good father," he retorted. "And that bitch is spending way too much for a kid so small."

Jessica rolled her eyes. It went without saying that Turk wasn't a good father, that was why she was paid almost monthly by the mother of the baby to find him and force him to pay child support. Jessica barely remembered how she got that job for the first time – she broke apart a fight between them in a bar or something, she was too drunk to recall –, but it was good for her to have a fixed amount of money every month.

And slapping Turk around until he paid was fun, so there was that too.

"Oh, you don't have to remind me you are scum, Turk, I'll never forget it," Jessica replied. "Now, the money."

"Bitch, do I look like I have money? Look at me!"

Ignoring the "bitch" commentary for now, Jessica did as he asked, her eyes moving from injury to injury. She was wrong, it wasn't a truck, that much was clear, unless the guy pissed off a Transformer, because the marks on his face were definitely from fists. Eyes swollen, broken nose, parted lips, broken hand, broken leg…

"Who the hell did you piss off, Turk?" Jessica whispered, actually amazed by the amount of punishment he took. "What did you do?"

"I didn't do shit! I'm legit now!"

Jessica snorted. "Yeah, a legit criminal. We both know you're a crook, Turk, you don't have to lie to me."

A small crook, yes, but a crook nevertheless. Usually, Jessica wouldn't give two shits about it, but Turk crossed the line when he tried to kidnap people for the Mutant Factory.

"How are you out so quickly, by the way?" Jessica asked. "You confessed to the cops you kidnapped some people, didn't you?"

"I tried to kidnap some people, I didn't succeed," Turk corrected her. "The charges weren't so bad, they let me go with a slap on the wrist."

"Bullshit," Jessica said, immediately. "You were arrested before, the cops aren't that stupid."

"No, but some of them tend to close their eyes when someone waves a bunch of cash in front of them." Jessica raised her eyebrows and he understood immediately what she got from that. "Not me! I don't have money. But the Russians do and I was a valued expert in my line of business. They got me out."

"Were they the ones who did this to you?" Jessica asked.

He snorted; and immediately regretted, because it caused him pain. "Please, this was that damn Masked Vigilante. Son of a bitch caught me by surprise, otherwise I would've fucked him up."

"Sure… Wait, what Masked Vigilante?" she asked.

Turk looked shocked at her. "You didn't hear about Hell's Kitchen newest vigilante? And you call yourself a PI?"

Jessica gave him a fake smile; then poked his ribs.

"Ouch! Damn it, don't do that!"

"What about this Masked Vigilante?" she repeated. "Who is this guy?"

"If anybody knew, he would be dead. That's why they call him 'Masked'." Jessica's gaze made him rethink his level of sass quite quickly. "Look, I don't know much. Nobody does. He's been making life difficult for the Russians, fucking with their cargos, beating everyone with his bare hands. Doesn't kill anybody, but that's pretty much his one rule, from what I've seen. He even put a guy in a coma. You-Know-Who is already putting everyone in a difficult position and this guy isn't helping."

She would love to see Clark's face when she told him criminals in New York were referring to him as "You-Know-Who", but Jessica did her best to ignore that for the moment.

"Why did he beat you?" Jessica asked. "I thought you were 'legit' now."

"I am. Mostly. But he wasn't there for me, he was there because I worked for the Russians before. He wanted to know about them."

"He is gunning for the Russians?"

"He is gunning for everyone, but he has to start somewhere," Turk said.

"Huh… Who would've thought?"

A vigilante beating people up in Hell's Kitchen, going after mobsters with his bare hands. That didn't happen every day. The last person who actually challenged organized crime in New York was Clark, but he was Superman, so that didn't count.

"Anyway, this guy is as good as dead," Turk continued. "The Russians won't forget this."

"Maybe," Jessica shrugged. "Or maybe he will kick their asses too. I mean, look at you. He did a pretty good job. But that doesn't concern me, I'm not here to laugh at you, I'm here to take your money. Pay up."

"Come on, look at me!" Turk exclaimed, again. "I don't have insurance! Do you know how expensive an aspirin is? Cut me some slack, I'll pay next month."

Jessica wasn't listening anymore, she had already spotted his wallet over the nightstand. Ignoring his struggles, she got up, grabbed it, took every single bill she found inside, and forced the leather wallet into Turk's mouth, not very gently.

"You can't stop being a father for a month, Turk, it's a full-time job," Jessica said, turning to leave. "See you next month!"

When she left the hospital, Jessica had already grabbed her phone.

"Clark, you're not going to believe the shit I just heard.