It was a peaceful night shattered with a bang, violence thundering at the place no other than an abandoned warehouse, infamous for shady dealings and sleeping bears never poked. Anyone daring for a rush of an adrenaline could only venture forth to the start of cracked floors and bloody hacking surprisingly made by only two men rather than a group of gangsters in all-out war.

And yet, it was in such bitterness and triumph that the two men held in this eye of the storm that the danger and damage could only be counted unsurprising, simply unknown at that time to be history-changing.

“So this is how you choose to repay me,” a blond man hissed.

“You are only paying for yourself,” a black haired man narrowed his eyes.

“Why would you take me in?” A black haired man asked with poorly disguised paranoia.

“I am only paying for myself,” a blond haired man responded, unflappable.

The city they lived in was actually more cutthroat than the peaceful facade that has fooled people otherwise turning away from alley screams, bloody walls and closed doors. Caused by a ruling known in the deepest underground, from a noble ancestry with reasons unknown except for pure fear that has kept such a depraved lordship going, with the usual trafficking, slavery and black market done well disguised as always into a megalomaniac business.

It was unsurprising for deals between people only coded as being taken in would happen. More surprising that it is questioned, but there was more amusement to the obvious question than being annoyed at all, as if it were some further confirmation.”

“What?”

But nothing more had been said, and that ignorance would only be answered in due time.

Now, the blonde man spat blood towards the impassive blue tinted black haired man that only uttered back with a sense of finality, even with snake-like green eyes throughly search a night sky’s worth within those clear dark blue eyes as if whatever domino effect and consequences could be found to even figure out any meaning to the actions that had now tinged his disguised base home’s floors red.

Finding the meaning would be the equivalent of finding a single specific star in the very same night sky sighted out of the open windows. Impossible, especially with those dark blue eyes turning almost black. Something the blond remembered, and knew better to provoke now.

“Yes, I’m paying for such an unruly slave, Karter. Who taught you to treat your master that way?”

“You should have known better, Luka, especially being the lord of an entirely untrustworthy world that had always coveted your throne. Even slaves can backstab you.”

In the months ever since the first deal between what would now be understood as product Karter who could only ask questions and buyer Luka who found amusement to curiosity would understand why one’s ignorance only piqued another’s curiosity.

It was the high rise buildings and the warehouses. Those in suits that politely bow and those in rags that shiver from more than cold. It was the whispered and screams of information from the cowed and damned alike.

Karter knew then that he was faced with a lord so high and the reason that he would pay attention to someone like him, someone so informed was simply because Karter knew that there was no way Luka would ever have any information on him, as if he was nothing and nowhere. It was only a lack of even the most basic info that would draw out curiosity from the most informed.

Luka tried to stand up, but Karter was quicker pinning him on the ground while closing the distance with a boot to his back and said, “I thought it would be much harder to take down the crime lord. Now, tell me, where are the keys?”

“To your freedom, my dear slave?” Luka laughed, despite kissing the floor.

“To their freedom, you sicko,” Karter spat, “Don’t even pretend to not know what I’m talking about.”

“Their freedom. Ah yes, the anamolies. Like you, all this time,” Luka looked Karter with an interested glint in his eye when finally shaking off Karter’s hold with a bang from the gun quickly pulled out and shot. Karter had side-stepped but made no move to repeat dominance.

“Superpowered people. Like me,” Karter ammended, accepted and confirmed, continuing with “You couldn’t be satisified in the bloody throne you have to only rise up higher.”

Karter still stuck around, despite knowing the danger Luka possessed. Even knowing such dangerous curiosity would come at risks, even though he could have always tried to escape. Even though he could try to fight against the slavedom.

Because it had always been an opportunity. Because he had woken up from his own nightmarish world, ready to take a new nightmare by storm. Because he had more than anoymity and a blank slate to open up opportunities and seize a new life that his old one did not let. Because he knew that he was more than an empty vessel dictated by others as lesser such as a slave. Because he was actually more from the nightmarish world turned nightmare unexplained and validated to spark curiosity.

It was the craters. The blinding darkness. The dazed people. And the penchant for violence laced with even more desparation. It’s the thrum of power, the need to prove and the weakest in a nightmare past turned stronger in dream present. And steadily unaware about a log listed, oddities noted and that someone else would think same, to combine both worlds together should suspicions actually cone true…

And it was power that begetting power thaat the world held its breath, to nightmare and dreams combine into something else that would eventually make history, even if it will never be explained as in all legends.

Luka had already shakily stood up, gun straight to Karter who stood lazily, not mistakened for a guard let down even with free hands that does not speak great chances when many would know better to not bring anything to a gunfight if they want to have better chances at survival.

But who had been the one laying down on the floor, still bleeding and who had stood before that fallen, in superiority?

The night was not getting any shorter, nor letting this standoff delay any longer in this round two only known to once master-slave and now deadly enemies despite the obvious upper hand one of them had.

Karter only had to raise his hand, for black holes to swirl around and carelessly thrown towards Luka. Pointing the gun towards the ground, chains shot out instead of bullets, grounding him temporarily to the sucking black hole as Luka steadily hold onto but gravity chose not to be his best friend as unnatural pressure hit his back, bringing him down to the floor once more like an old friend, rewarded with another hacking blood.

(Would it surprise anyone that such powers were once deemed weak? Because they weren’t as powerful as black holes and gravity? For it was once just sucking the light out of the room, or being more heavy handed wildly untamed and yet never landing properly? The nightmare belittled treating what’s seen as all there is to it, but the dream offered imagination and resources called science and imagination to widen up such possibilities.)

The impassive stare Karter had at such antics only incensed Luka further, with gritted teeth to rip the chain off the gun and aim it straight off to the black hole and shatter it like it was just some target practice.

(Because it was not really a black hole, not in the natural sense from a cosmic scale that cannot be otherwise defeated by human means. Because it is a man-made black hole and what is made by man can also be destroyed by man.)

Luka laughed, grim amusement twisting his face when his opponent can dish it out but cannot take any himself.

“Do you think that I will face any danger unprepared? It had been nice thinking that you had the upper hand here, right?”

“Tch, Brenka?” Karter clicked his tongue remembering a truly mad scientist in collaboration with their ‘lord’. Luka only smiled in response, flashing teeth of superiority more up his alley. He circled Karter now, as the other not wanting to feel prey and matching movement with eyes only locked together.

“Why are you even trying to save them?” Luka asked casually, more friendly in mockery to the tense atmosphere, “Those people that thought they were so strong belittling your weaknesses. Imagine how horrified they would think when they knew it was you who would have to save their sorry arses, because they certainly didn’t and wouldn’t treat you the best from what I know with my own acquaintance with them.”

Karter’s gain to newfound power did not diminish his own past, instead bringing it to more focused clarity. Weakness was not tolerated in nightmares, that had been fueled by the commonality with power. With superpowered people known in the world he inhabits now, that would not exist otherwise except for fabled legends and tall tales. Every accomplishment only reminds how far he came from sadistic belittlement worse than the slavery he was treated to now.

“You talk too-“ Karter said, his hands slightest movement stalled by a bullet’s crack when Luka’s own trigger fingers wouldn’t still. The glare Karter sent met its match with Luka’s own, knowing each other’s weapons and unafraid to act against. Even with the warning shot, Luka made no further moves with a smile despite the glare making it so feral.

“Come on, why not indulge me? Like I’ve indulged you all this time?”

Complying a reply, even as Karter bit his tongue how indulgence from Luka was only letting him live.

Because his ‘master’ wasn’t above the sadistic pleasures (boot stomping backs where it was only fair to return favour), belittling those bellow (letting him bow down on all fours ‘like the dog he is’) or even curbing curious indulgences to psychopathy (“Come on, let me see whether you bleed the same as the rest” - was what had been told with a waving knife when he had been suspected as an anamoly long ago).

“How would you even know they would be referring to someone like me? Do I really look that weak to you?” Karter deflected.

Luka clicked his tongue, “Are we still playing this game of suspicion? We are beyond what you wanted to hide from me all along once you knew what would happen would anyone especially me knew what would be in store if I did find out? Too bad your people in the same situation weren’t as smart as you. It would explain why you finally came out of the woodwork explosively like this.”

Karter cussed under his breath and preferred silence. It only invited a delighted hum from Luka, who reinstated his question:

“I ask again, why bother saving them? How long have you even been planning this, to what end?”

To what end? Did Luka meant the rescue, or was it this backstabbing, this power grab? This-

“How long have you always wanted to prove yourself? Because it’s the only reason I can think of for you to bother saving people that treated you less than dirt. Because otherwise such motivation would bypass any risk defying me.”

“What do you know?” Karter asked harshly.

“How would I not know?” Luka countered, “There are very few that can defy me this long, and patterns have dictated that those able to match against me come from the same core despite any differences, because our own beliefs can only stalemate against each other this badly not because they are opposite but because they follow ‘know yourself and your enemy’ and if they are one and the same.”

Luka shrugged casually while Karter did his best repressing the shiver, wanting to shout how different they were. The crime lord and the slave. The torturer and the avenger. The kidnapper and the rescuer. Completely on opposite sides, and yet the grain of truth that even opposite sides can be tarred from the same brush and they make the worst enemies, because it’s those types that can get under your skin this easily.

Karter’s hands moved again, and Luka fired not another bullet but chain that he tried to dodge and failed when it looped aroud his arm, breaking off the perfect circle they treaded. Even when the intermit had been broken, the fight had not yet continued, held back in Luka’s bright eyes wanting to know he was right all along that Karter’s darkening eyes granting rightful refusal.

Neither would have budged on that point anyway, up to the interpretation of the individual.

(Even when there were points Luka would be right about Karter that he refused to acknowledged.)

“You try too hard.”

Karter could only respond that by trying too hard ignoring Luka. Even his downtime was not sacred to Luka, barging in as he pleased but that has always been the hierachy in such master-slave connection to truly be surprised by it.

“The clean-up mission. A little too clean. If I wasn’t the one who ordered it done, I thought there would have been no problem with the missing people and the natural disasters in the first place,” Luka continued, never bothered by Karter’s silence.

“So?” Karter asked, curt knowing that the faster he moved Luka on, the faster he would leave.

“Missing people, natural disaster. Done a little too cleanly, a little too much. Earthquakes, craters that have been starting to be less like coincidences. To the point it would hide something throughly, never noticed by people who would not try to find.”

Karter’s neutral expression did not even break despite Luka approaching nearer, a point of their relationship that they both understood what had been implied, what was going on and yet neither giving a tug in this cold war of theirs.

“One day you will slip. Stop being unknown,” Luka whispered, eyes agleamed with interest Karter wanted to stay far away.

“You only see what you get,” Karter said blandly, refusing to show anything else.

“Until you decide to show more. After all, you do try too hard,” Luka declared, finally giving each of them breathing room.

“Thanks for keeping things interesting. Keep it up,” Luka finished, and smirked without Karter knowing why until he realized the tug in his mouth and with just a touch knew had been a smile, towards the bastard. It was all that Luka would need to know, and what Karter refused to acknowledged.

A resounding click had reeled Karter towards Luka, caught firmly by the waist and trapped both hands from activating what powers with one unmoving to the side and the other literally chained.

“Really, you should know better a slave could never rise up above their master.”

“I was never your slave.”

“Then pray tell,” Luka’s eyes glinted with amusement, “What would you call the years under someone’s service, at their beck and call with such loyalty?”

“Loyalty,” the word oozed from Karter’s mouth with sarcasm, “If that’s what you want to call bickering, letting you rant and standing up against you more times counted than your own subordinates loyalty.”

“It’s an unorthodox loyalty, but loyalty that mattered to me,” came out Luka’s twisted logic, “You were simply honest, with some stubborn rebellion. Nothing wrong with that,” Luka chuckled, “It can be fun talking to someone like that, until they bear no use to me.”

“Then, why not end it?” Karter defiantly asked, “Have I no more use to you, now that you know? Now that I defied to the point of no return, my tyrant?”

“Because if I am a tyrant, you should know that anyone is only no use of me until I declare it so. Because if you are in my clutches, you should know the greed needed to get at the very top.”

Luka pulled off the chain sharply, cutting off Karter’s wrist and leaking blood pulled close to Luka’s lips and sucked.

“What the hell do you think you are doing?!” Karter used the forward momentum Luka dragged him into further and pushed Luka to the ground, and removed his bloody hand away from the maniac.

“The final ingridient,” Luka licked his lips, “You anamolies were interesting specimens, to the blood that runs into your veins. And out of all of them, despite how weak you think you are, you had always been the most interesting. And if there was one anamoly I wanted to inherit from…”

“It’s the one that I would want to truly conquer over.”

Suddenly, Luka spasmed, loosening Karter’s grip until a wave of energy released from the body and had Karter jumping out of the way even when he tried to hold on and could only see in absolute shock what was happening, until he had to shout:

“What have you become?” Karter’s horror only served to amuse Luka further.

Luka’s snake green eyes became sharper, as his body had scaled over even to his hair ever changing from silky blond to hardened platinum scaling over. The man had turned reptilian but at least keeping his bipedal form and only adding instead of completely transmuting.

Luka was no longer human, not just a criminal and the scum of the earth to become something lesser and more. Such transformation only confirmed that Luka was no idiot, but was sure a fool.

“Do you know what you have done?” Karter’s grim tone continued the demand, this time the one searching through the reptilian like eyes for an answer to insanity. No such luck.

“Maintaining the upper hand. Making sure we truly fight on even grounds. Because no matter what weapons I have, they can be easily disarmed unlike your powers. What’s the matter? Not used to getting the upper hand snatched?” Luka taunted.

“No,” Karter quietly said, knowing his objective had not changed, “Because it doesn’t change that you need to be put down more than ever.”

“I look forward to you trying,” Luka mocked.

“I look forward to you deluding,” Karter countered.

Both of them charged at the same time as the night was nowhere near close to its end.

Writer’s Notes

I was checking out my Canva and lo behold there were non-fanfic covers just waiting to be used. Going through my notebook of cringe was a riot aka wincing moment but looking past that, there’s a lot that ended up being salvageable to cook up this story. Titled lore for the reason while this is certainly not part of my WIPs, it is a small part of the backstory for another. It’s teaching me that even when my ideas and writing have changed from my younger years, it does not mean that I can’t take something away from my own essence across ages. Also a lot more worldbuilding and explanation, maybe because I have the tendency to over-explain or I didn’t think I could throw readers without context about who Luka and Karter were. Damn, one day I will write pure anti-BL, mark my words. I also realized how long this work was compared to others. Geez, I could have done better a bit shorter~ Next time. And I swear that this will not be the end of their story, because yes they have potential! I will 100% explain more what is going on with this pair. I swear!