Brockton Bay has always been a city of edges. The kind where the sea and the land meet with a kind of tired stubbornness, where industry once thrived but now just clings on like rust to iron. If you've lived here long enough, you stop noticing the smell of salt and oil drifting in from the docks. It settles into your clothes, into the back of your throat. It's just part of the air, same as the chill that rolls in off the water when the sun starts to dip.
Once, the docks were alive. Cranes moved day and night, cargo ships lined up like obedient giants waiting to be unloaded. The old families built their fortunes here, steel and shipping weaving the bones of the city together. Those days are gone now. The cranes still stand, but they're silent, frozen mid-gesture like skeletons caught in the act of work they'll never finish. The warehouses are mostly empty shells, their roofs sagging, windows broken or boarded over. Even in daylight, they look like they're waiting for something to happen, though these days, nothing good ever does.
The city spread inland from those docks, and with the work drying up, rot spread with it. Neighbourhoods that used to hum with factory workers walking home at dusk turned into rows of hollowed-out houses, their yards overgrown, their porches sagging. Some still hold families trying to keep their heads above water. Others are just shelters for whoever gets there first. It's easy to tell the difference by the lights. Real homes have a soft glow through the curtains. The others flicker with the hard white of portable lamps or burn with the sudden, uneven flare of a lighter in the dark.
Brockton Bay isn't dead.
It's too stubborn for that.
But it's not living well either.
It limps along, kept moving by people who've learned to make do. Not because they're hopeful, but because they don't know anything else.
Where the economy faltered, others stepped in. There's no need to look hard to see who runs what. Down in the Docks, the ABB's presence is marked with neat, stencilled graffiti, sharp lines, and bright red. Their control is quiet but firm, like the steady beat of a drum. They keep their neighbourhoods clean, at least on the surface. It's the kind of order that only exists when someone with power decides it should.
Up north, the Empire 88 stands like a rotten tooth in the jaw of the city. They don't bother hiding what they are. Their tags are cruder, sprayed across walls in bold white letters. They can be seen everywhere, in schoolyards, under bridges, painted over and then painted back again. Their neighbourhoods are less about order and more about presence. They like people to remember they're there.
Then there are the Merchants, if you can call them a faction. They're more like a sickness that spreads wherever it finds weakness. Their markings are chaotic, smeared, barely legible, the sign of addicts marking territory not because it matters, but because they have nothing else to cling to. They drift through the city like smoke, filling the spaces everyone else forgot about.
The PRT tries to keep a handle on all of this, but "handle" is a generous word. They're here. You can see the PRT's headquarters standing like a polished stone dropped in the middle of a muddy street. Shiny on the outside, a symbol of order, but it doesn't reach far beyond its walls. They run patrols. They respond to calls. They step in when lines are crossed. But Brockton Bay has too many lines, and not enough boots to cover them.
Everyone knows the truth, even if nobody says it out loud. The PRT doesn't run this city. They manage it. They broker truces, turn a blind eye when it suits them, and clamp down hard only when they have no other choice. They walk a narrow path, balancing villains against each other to keep the city from tipping into outright chaos. It's not heroism that keeps the peace here. It's a series of constant compromises.
By the time the sun starts to sink on a cold December evening, the city starts to change shape. The orange light smears across the water like a rust stain. Long shadows stretch down empty streets, pooling in alleyways and under bridges. The temperature drops fast once the daylight starts to slip, the chill off the bay creeping through layers of clothing and settling into bone. The wind picks up, tugging at loose signs and rattling broken windows. Streetlights blink on one by one, some steady, others flickering like they're fighting to stay alive.
High above the city, the sky is a dull, washed-out grey that deepens slowly as the light drains away. Nobody looks up. There's no reason to. The city's problems have always been on the ground. But if someone had looked, really looked, they might have noticed something strange. At first, it's subtle, a faint shimmer in the air, like heat rising off asphalt. But it's December, and there's no warmth left in the day. The shimmer grows, bending the clouds around it like a thumb pressed against the surface of a balloon. The grey begins to warp inward, pulling at itself, as if the sky is quietly holding its breath. No sound accompanies it. No light. Just a slow, deliberate distortion, like reality itself is being folded.
Then, without warning, the fold splits open. It doesn't explode or crack; it simply parts, revealing a depth that doesn't belong to the evening sky. For a moment, it feels like the entire universe is being drawn into that single opening, a silent, yawning wound in the fabric of the world. From it, two figures fall, tumbling silently through the cold air toward the city below.
The sky seals itself behind them as if nothing had ever happened, leaving nothing but the cold grey of a December evening. Below, the city carried on in its uneasy rhythm. The water lapped against the docks. The wind moved through the hollow shells of warehouses. The day was fading, and no one looked up. There was nothing to see except two figures plummeting toward the earth at terrifying speed.
They weren't graceful shapes drifting down like comets, nor glowing lights cutting through the clouds. They fell hard and fast, spinning wildly, their descent so sudden that not even the gulls circling the bay had time to scatter. The first was lean, human-shaped, dressed in white, marked by a crimson emblem across his chest. His limbs cut through the air like blades as he tumbled, the dying light glinting off the fabric. The second was larger, heavier, twisted in into the form of a monstrous silhouette of thick limbs and warped muscle, plummeting as if the sky itself had hurled him down.
There was no sound before they struck.
No rising whistle, no warning thunder.
One heartbeat, the docks were quiet.
Next, the world came apart.
The first impact hit like a bomb. The ground exploded upward, concrete and dirt erupting in a violent spray. Cracks shot out from the point of impact like spiderwebs, racing across the pavement and up the sides of nearby buildings. The shockwave slammed into everything around it, shoving air and dust in a rolling wall that rattled rusted cranes and shattered fragile windows in buildings that hadn't been maintained in years. A shipping container, already perched precariously on a stack, tipped and crashed to the ground with a metallic roar, echoing across the bay.
A split second later, the second figure hit. The follow-up strike was heavier, deeper, like the hammer blow that finishes what the first started. The ground buckled beneath the monstrous shape. A crater opened beneath his body, swallowing the cracked pavement and widening the damage in every direction. Structures already weakened by the first impact groaned under the strain. A half-collapsed warehouse nearby gave way completely, its roof caving in with a hollow, splintering crash that sent a fresh wave of dust into the air.
The twin impacts shook the docks so violently that the water at the edge heaved against the retaining walls, slapping against the rusted metal in waves. Power lines swayed. Loose debris lifted, then settled again in the wake of the passing shock. For a brief moment, it felt as though the city itself had been punched in the chest.
Then, silence returned.
A thick cloud of dust and grit settled slowly over the wreckage, rolling out in heavy layers across the broken ground. It hung in the cold air, clinging to the edges of ruined buildings, drifting through shattered windows and over the empty streets. In the centre of it all, two fresh craters marked the docks, twin wounds carved deep into the concrete. The figures lay within them, motionless for now. The city hadn't seen them arrive. There had been no warning. But their arrival had left a mark no one would be able to ignore for long.
The dust continued to settle.
The wind crept in from the bay, slow and cold, carrying silence in its wake.
The docks were still blanketed in a thick, heavy fog of dust. It clung to the air in a way that muted sound and swallowed light, drifting low over the shattered concrete and broken structures. From somewhere deep within one of the fresh craters, movement stirred.
Superboy pushed himself up onto his hands and knees, the grit of pulverised concrete scraping against his palms. His head rang like a struck bell, a high, thin sound cutting through the muffled quiet. He shook it once, twice, trying to steady himself as the world snapped back into sharp focus. The cold air burned his lungs. Every sound hit him at once: the groan of twisted metal, the creak of a crane rocked loose by the impacts, the faint lapping of water against the docks. His enhanced hearing picked it all up in layers, folding over each other until it became a single, overwhelming rush of noise.
He rose to his feet slowly, shoulders tensing as he oriented himself. Through the haze, his eyes cut cleanly. Dust might have hidden everything from the onlookers scattered at the edges of the docks, but it didn't hide from him. He saw them clearly, half a dozen figures, dockworkers and loiterers, faces smeared with grime, squinting futilely into the fog. Some leaned forward as if to catch a glimpse of what had fallen. Others hung back, hands half-raised, ready to run if whatever had landed decided to come their way. Their fear wasn't loud, but it was sharp, threaded through every hesitant movement.
He didn't have time to process it fully.
The dust behind him shifted, not softly, but violently. A sharp boom split the air, loud and sudden like a bomb detonating at close range. The cloud of debris rippled outward as something massive moved. Blockbuster tore through the haze in an instant, his bulk low and fast, the ground cracking under his feet as he launched forward with explosive force. He didn't need words. The bellow that ripped out of his throat was raw and guttural, a sound more beast than man.
Superboy barely turned in time to raise his arms in a guard, but he didn't manage to brace in time.
Blockbuster's fist slammed into his defence with crushing impact. The blow landed like a sledgehammer against steel, sending a shockwave ripping outward from the point of contact. The air exploded around them, tearing through the docks in a pulse that kicked up dust and rattled what little glass still clung to nearby windows. Superboy's guard shattered under the hit. The sheer force blasted his arms aside and drove into his chest like a freight train. His body launched backwards, lifted off the ground in a single violent burst.
He hit the roof of a warehouse first. His back smashed through rusted sheet metal, splintering beams beneath him as he tore a jagged hole through the structure. The impact sent a shower of broken panels and debris raining down into the building's hollow interior. He didn't stop. Momentum carried him through, out the far side, where he spun helplessly through the air before colliding with the street below.
He hit the road hard. Concrete cracked like thin ice beneath him, chunks breaking loose as he skidded across the street, his body bouncing once, twice, before slamming into the side of a parked car. The metal folded under him with a shriek, the vehicle's frame warping as it was driven down into the fractured asphalt. A web of cracks spread out from the point of impact, the force embedding him deep into the wreckage.
Above, debris from the roof he'd torn through rained down in uneven bursts, striking the ground in a metallic cascade. Dust billowed outward again, rolling down the street in thick, choking waves.
For a brief moment, everything hung in stunned silence, just the echo of impact and the settling of rubble.