The Chairman

Shannon still couldn't process the events of yesterday.

Her texts to Starlio were still not sending through.

This wasn't the Starlio she knew just months ago.Despite part of herself being extremely pissed off at him,she knew that his behavior was in a way justified by the loss around him.His rage had always been piling up since over a year ago,in fact since the day Conner died,Starlio had been giving himself more and more reasons to kill his enemies.

As much as morally bad that may sound,another part of her doesn't know if stopping him will make things better.Killing...may be discouraged but like what Starlio himself had said,some people need to die in order to stop innocents from getting hurt.

Shannon looked up in the sky,trying to hold in her tears while sitting on a bench outside of Stex Enterprises when a familiar voice called her:"Shannon?Shannon are you okay?"

Shannon looked towards the source of the voice,spotting Angie and Roy both in the distance with bags of snacks in their hands.They didn't know what had happened.To them this was just another visit to their friend to share some snacks and have fun together.Shannon knew better than to push them away as she went towards the gates of the facility,allowing them in.

Angie instantly recognized the pain in Shannon's eyes.

"What happened...?Shannon?"Angie approached her as the clueless Roy slowly started to notice it as well.Shannon couldn't help but hug Angie as her friend approached her.

"You...need me to whack Starlio for you?Did he do something?"Roy offered.

"It's...it's not his fault."Shannon tried her best to hide her tears as she looked down,allowing herself to catch her breath before continuing:"Mason Stex...his father is dead.The Chairman went after us,taking Mason hostage and killed him in front of Starlio's very own eyes.He's now too angry for me to stop him,he's going out there to hunt the Chairman down."

"You have an armor too right?Fly after him!"Angie suggests.

"He locked me out of his armory.Told me to leave the country before the Chairman finds me."

Angie and Roy both paused,slowly understanding the seriousness of the situation.A moment of silence passed when Angie wrapped her arm around Shannon:"Okay...you don't have to do this alone.Roy and I are here,how can we help?"

-

Argus had just received news.

Two more squads of armed men killed by Starlio Stex just in the past 12 hours.Many within the ranks of the Chairman's army themselves are beginning to have doubts about their own capabilities.How the hell is an army of over tens of thousands of people unable and yet sometimes,straight up defeated by a mere 16 year old teenager?

"Leave.I'll report to the Chairman myself."Argus tells the messenger who took a bow before leaving.

Argus took in a deep breath,opening the door to the room the Chairman was in.Two doctors were taking blood samples from the Chairman who had his sleeve rolled back,smoking a cigar and looking barely fazed as needles,being pierced into his skin over and over.

"Break the bad news."The Chairman requests.

"Two more squadrons down.Men have reported that Starlio has been flying all over the city trying to hunt us down.I predict that his stamina would get the better of him in awhile,that is when we can strike back."Argus responds.

"Hm...he may be tired.But his brains...that will never tire.I never thought that a 16 year old would be the one who brings me so much trouble but I guess...life's just like that.Bring the men,get them to rest and prepare for the upcoming battle.We will wait till sundown.We cannot afford to lose much more men,attack if he finds another outpost.Inform me first hand."

"What will you do in the meantime?"Argus asks.

"Study.To win,you have to study your enemy."The Chairman looks down at a file containing information about Starlio Stex,collecting by his men over the past year. The Chairman dismisses Argus who leaves along with the doctors,who brought the blood samples away.

The Chairman opened the file,looking at the history of his opponent.

Poor family....this man...Mason Stex.What a piece of shit.The Chairman thinks to himself,slowly reading through information about Starlio's childhood and strangely,felt a little bit of empathy towards the teenager.

"So...we come from the same place."The Chairman concludes.

-

32 Years Ago.

"Alius!Go with them."

A young 10 year old Chairman looked up at his father,who stood there and watched as several men grabbed his arm,dragging him with them.Alius Fletcher,his real name was ignored by his traffickers who shoved him into the back of a van.

"Man this kid...we're gonna be so fucking rich!"Alius could hear his traffickers from the hood of the car.He remembered making sure than his full focus and attention was on him as whatever they said next might potentially benefit him.

"So what now?We gut him?"

"No!We get his blood haven't you heard?He has some kind of superhuman blood that enhances the muscle fibers of whoever ingests it.Imagine all kinds of drugs we can make with that?!Imagine all the money we will have by the end of just this week."

Alius played the words back in his head.His blood..gutting him?

Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

He had always overheard his parents calling him their salvation,about his blood being one of the rarest substances on the planet...something about his cells being to enhance the muscle fibers of humans.Is that why...?

Alius recalled awaiting the night to arrive.

He was tied up in ropes,a concept that he found...strange.He always found simple things like metal,ropes,chains easily breakable in comparison to others.While his schoolmates struggled with chairs and furniture to lift,for the longest time he had always thought that his peers were weak,people who do not recognize his true strength.

With a simple flex of his wrists,Alius ripped the thick ropes apart like cotton,bursting towards his traffickers and launching his fist right towards the horrified man,his knuckles sinking through the man's flesh,going through his insides and shattering his ribs in an instant as Alius pulled out a bloody fist,the man collapsing on the ground dead.

Alius looked around,scanning his surroundings and recalling his journey here,a map pattern he memorized in his head.

With that knowledge Alius made his way across the base of the traffickers,his attacks,each punch and strike easily turning full grown men into rag dolls,their bones breaking like a sandcastle would and their flesh being torn apart like a well cooked chunk of meat.

Alius ended the day in an empty building full of corpses and blood.

His parents had sold him off.He was now alone,a 10 year old kid with nothing to his name.Alius was determined to make it big,to prove to his parents that selling him away would be the biggest mistake in their lifetimes as he took whatever cash and money the traffickers got and began to strategize a plan that would carve out the future he would embark on.

To his horror,he was not the only one.

Dozens of other kids all around his age,captured and shoved into cages like livestock.Among them,Alius first met one of his best friends Argus,who was among the kids.Alius knew having the people around him would greatly benefit his life as he freed the kids,who were naturally indebted to him and from there on,offered them several terms.

To create a community on their own,help each other out,find jobs,use each other's income to create the home that they never had.Two things he could use greatly to his advantage:

His physical strength and his genius level intellect.

Alius recalled trying to return to the brighter path of life once.Taking his teenager years towards studying,earning himself degrees in Biology and Law,tried making his way into law once when his university collapsed systematically,it's owners running away with years of his hard earned money and abandoning most of its students.

Falling to another all time low,Alius found himself with almost nothing once again but this time,the knowledge he had gained while still in school proved to be critical in his role to success.

Alius stole whatever remaining equipment his old university lab had and using a random unused warehouse as his lab,the kids that now grew up acting as his crew and said crew,slowly recruiting other abandoned kids over the years,growing from a small group of 16 to hundreds by the time Alius was 21,becoming a powerful gang that the local community feared.

Alius experimented on his own blood.

Studying the unique properties of it and with time and effort,eventually replicated his own blood into doses of injections,the first prototypes of the drug now known as the Ironblood.

With the Ironblood product,Alius and Argus knocked up the doors of dozens and dozens of local drug communities,convincing them to fall under his leadership and in exchange for their partnership,each of them got a small dose of Ironblood,allowing them to double their physical abilities while people he trusted more got better doses of Ironblood that made them insanely significantly stronger than others.

A pyramid of power was eventually established.Local gangs in multiple cities all fell under the Chairman with tens of thousands of men all under his orders.

Alius set his targets higher,convincing talents from the science community and the military to ally themselves with him in exchange for anything from money,power or more.By the time he was 30,he had established the largest underworld empire,completely undetected yet influencing the very movement of society on a daily basis.

Policemen,soldiers,doctors,many of them working for Alius without even realizing it.

The Chairman,used as a name to hide his real identity and other than his closest allies,people working under him only know their boss as simply:The Chairman.

Now.

The Chairman walked out of his armored car with four Ironblood powered guards,walking towards a run down house where several more men were awaiting him.

"How's her condition doctor?"The Chairman asks the man closest to the door.

"Everything's normal."The doctor held the door open for the Chairman to enter the room.An old lady,paralyzed on a wheelchair looked at him with fear as the Chairman slowly walked towards her,taking off his hat and taking a seat on a sofa next to her.

"Hello mother,how's your day?"

"Why...?Won...'t...you just...kill me?"The Chairman's mother looked up at him with fear pulsing from her eyes.The Chairman smiled to himself,signalling to one of his men to pass him a bag and tossed in towards the old lady,who couldn't move in time to dodge it as the bag smacked her right in her forehead.

"Don't be like this mother.I mean...you're my mother right?I have to take care of you.Inside the bag are some cash.Since you and dad liked money so much you decided its worth replacing a son over,here you fucking go."

"We...were...poor....can't raise....you..."

The Chairman stayed silent for a moment before slamming his fist down on a desk next to them,breaking the furniture apart like cardboard and making a loud bang that terrified the old woman,who began shaking in fear.

"Fucking excuses."The Chairman growled.

"Alius...please..."

"I searched for you and father for decades.Not once did I hear any regrets about you selling your son away you despicable witch.Father was lucky enough that he had met death.He did not have to pay for his sins but you....you are still here.This is karma."The Chairman hissed to the old lady's face.

The Chairman turned silent suddenly,giggling to himself creepily.

"Well...how funny do things turn out.I'm rich now....I have countless billions of dollars and thousands of men.I'm sure I'm doing you proud now right mom?"

"You kill....you....murder....disgrace..."

"And you single handedly caused it.Imagine allowing me to grow up in a loving family and teaching me the right values to survive.I doubt you can right?Mother?"The Chairman mocked when Argus entered the building,slowly approaching the Chairman from behind.

"Alius...new report."Argus whispers.

The Chairman got up from his seat,lightly kicking his mother's wheelchair and rolling her all the way towards the corner of the living room."Doctor,make sure she's okay.I need her to live long enough to see all the sins she has indirectly caused."The Chairman ordered as the doctor bowed before attending to the old woman.

"What is it?"The Chairman asks Argus.

"New reports.Another outpost has been taken down.Two tanks were destroyed by Starlio."Argus whispered in his ear as the Chairman clenched his fist:"Looks like we can't wait any longer.Deploy another squadron of Ironblood men.Tell them to hold their positions and wait for backup if they find him-"

BOOM.

"What the hell was that?"Argus looked behind them to see flames,emerging from the outside of the building as he and the Chairman rushed out to see Starlio Stex,in the air with his cannons deployed.

"No need to look for me.I'm right here."Starlio announced.

Next Chapter- Blood for Blood