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fogwitchoftheevermore · 18 days ago

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very very intrigued by the snippet

what's your esmp s1 superhero au like?

YAY thank you for asking!!

So, there's a lot going on in this AU and I'm kinda using this as a chance to do a master post, so I'm gonna throw everything under the cut. I'm also not gonna get into the full nitty gritty of the plot (HI FUTURE SPACE THIS WAS KIND OF A LIE), just because it is a lot but I will give you the broad strokes of how we cover the plot of Empires!

First things first, let's get to know our heroes/vigilantes/etc.!

The Wither Rose Alliance: A group of vigilantes who have all known each other since childhood.

Gem, code name Sorceress. Gem was born with powers kinda similar to a Green Lantern, where she can create light with a physicality to it. She channels this light through a staff (primarily for aesthetics) and uses it either as projectile weapons or shields the majority of the time, but can use it for whatever she wants. She also has wings by the time our story starts, which were built by Fwhip. Gem and Fwhip are siblings, but when Gem developed powers in her early teens she became terrified of being unable to control herself and drawing unwanted attention to her family or hurting them, so she ran away. She was taken in by ex-vigilante Aello (I'll explain them when we get to the plot) and has been in the business since she was about 16. Her and Fwhip reunited when they were adults and now vigilante together and with their childhood friends Sausage and Pearl. As of the time of the story, Gem is a student and also works at a local library.

Fwhip, code name the Mechanist. Fwhip does not have powers and instead makes his own wings and explosives to fight with. He initially got into the vigilante business because he knew that Sorceress was his sister and he needed a way to talk to her, but it turns out he's an adrenaline junkie and loves it. Fwhip is also a student and is a camp counselor at a summer camp as well (not like, the fun middle of the woods type summer camp, to be clear. One of those ones you find in the city where they bring you to local places for activities.)

Pearl, code name Valkyrie. Pearl has super strength and impenetrable skin. She was the last member of the WRA to get into vigilante-ing, partially because it took her a while to realize she had powers and not just like, particularly notable but still totally human abilities. And then it took Sausage almost getting himself killed one day for her to go "Oh god, these three need all the help they can get, don't they?" Turns out, she also loves it, because it's like the wrestling she does for fun but like... she's not gonna immediately win even she's already holding back because everyone she fights is still a normal person. She's getting opponents on her level here. Pearl works with local park services.

Sausage, code name Warlock. Sausage also does not have any powers. He uses a staff (that Fwhip made him) that basically imitates Gem's powers, meaning it's pretty much a funny looking laser gun. After finding out that Fwhip was a vigilante, Sausage convinced Fwhip to cut him in on the whole thing and they've been partners ever since. Sausage works at the same summer camp as Fwhip, I have yet to decide what he does the rest of the year.

The Codvengers: A rival group of vigilantes who are literally only rivals with the WRA cause the vibes were bad.

Jimmy, code name The Codfather. Jimmy has super strength (which he uses more defensively, unlike Pearl) and can breathe underwater (it's genetic). The Codfather Mask is a magic family heirloom type thing that magnifies Jimmy's powers. Without it on or near his person, he can't breathe underwater and his strength is significantly lesser. Jimmy and Lizzie's parents died when they were very young and they were separated through the foster system. Jimmy managed to hold onto his family heirloom, while Lizzie did not. He now works at the local public pool, which just so happens to be the one the summer camp Fwhip and Sausage work for take the kids to. They are nightmares to him in all facets of his life.

Lizzie, code name Ocean Queen. Lizzie's powers allow her to shapeshift into her full ocean queen form (10 feet tall, blue, gills, big tail, sharp nails, sharp teeth, armored scales). Without the Ocean Orb, her own magic family heirloom thing, Lizzie can still grow the claws, teeth, scales, and gills, but nothing else. She doesn't recover the orb until the story is already in motion, but that whole plotline happens a lot earlier than it does in canon (mostly because things pick up way too much in the middle and end for me to not have her at full power, though I haven't decided exactly when.) Lizzie is Jimmy's coworker at the aforementioned pool.

Joel, code name Militia. Joel can manifest clones of himself that work as a hivemind. These clones don't live for too long (not more than an hour) and disappear when killed, but they are strong and will die for him. Joel works at a local art gallery and he and Lizzie are together but probably not married in this AU.

Pix, code name Phantom. Pix has a life drain power, the more he drains from someone else, the stronger he gets. He can kill people with this power, but never does (except for the one time. We'll come back to that.) Pix is a graveyard keeper cause it's on the nose.

And then our miscellaneous "not on a team" crew!

Katherine, code name Empress. Katherine has healing powers as well as plant manipulation. She can move plants to make them do whatever she wants and grow them at extreme speeds. Katherine works at the Sunflower Café, a local haven for superheroes, vigilantes, and villains of all kinds where they all agree to not start swinging on each other (mostly cause they're all in civies). This also means Katherine has gleaned everyone's secret identities and just hasn't mentioned it to them. Katherine is technically a government sponsored hero, but she hangs out with vigilantes a bit too much for the government to be her biggest fans.

Shrub, code name Wolf Spirit. Shrub can talk to plants and animals and also has a pack of wolves who hang out with her all the time. Do NOT worry about how she hides them from her city landlord, I did not think about it that hard. Shrub is an investigative journalist who also volunteers at the local animal shelter. Shrub is a vigilante.

Joey, code name Alexandros (this is open to change, though, I'll be honest). Joey has the basic elemental powers (fire, earth, air, water) but can only utilize elements already around him. Admittedly, this is not that much of a drawback, it just means he doesn't get to show off the fire that often. Joey is a photographer and one of Shrub's coworkers. Joey is an anti-hero vigilante for a lot of the time, the rest of it he's a villain.

Scott, code name Fractal. Scott has ice powers. I don't know what you wanted me to say. I also gave Scott a coffee shop job (different one than Katherine though) mostly because I think the image of him as a kinda bitchy barista is fun. He's also the only government sponsored hero who is actually into the government thing.

Xornoth, code name the Demon (not very creative, I know, but whatever). Xornoth has the power to give people hallucinations and can manifest and control the corruption tentacles we see in canon.

NOW! THE PLOT! THAT WAS A LOT SORRY!

The world of this AU is one where superheroes have existed for a long time. Our Emperors are the latest generation, and the last generation (made up of some OC characters, one of whom I mentioned above, who are here cause I really like them) shows up periodically. Notably, Aello (real name Pi, they/them, mostly human but has wings, ex-vigilante/villain), Refuge (real name Thorn, he/they/she, can make shields and punch good, one of the two owners of the Sunflower Café, ex-hero), and Snapdragon (real name Meringue, any pronouns, plant manipulation, ex-vigilante, other owner of the Sunflower Café and Thorn's spouse). Before them, however, there was a slightly older generation that featured Alinar and Cohnal. Alinar was a hero, Cohnal was a villain, both sponsored (and DNA manipulated to get their powers) by Aeor and Exor respectively.

Aeor and Exor used to run the aforementioned superhero division of the government together, but they eventually got into a massive blowup argument about their methods and morals that resulted in Exor splitting off to do his own thing, which was pretty much exactly what they were doing before but Illegal this time and less bogged down by rules. Exor began experimenting on normal humans to see if he could create an artificial superhero, thus creating Cohnal. This had been what the argument had been about, and Aeor's objections were a lot less moral and a lot more "there are rules about this", so when push comes to shove, Aeor's willing to use his government funds to do the same thing and create Alinar to fight fire with fire.

The experiments that gave Alinar and Cohnal their powers were... unstable, at best, and eventually killed the both of them. This was just the first trial, however, and as you might've guessed, Scott and Xornoth are our latest test tube babies. They were both volunteered for Exor's experiments as children and Aeor, upon finding out about this, said "I'm not letting my shit brother have two whole new lab rats" and grabbed Scott for himself. Scott spent the majority of his young life in a lab and has yet to figure out that his childhood was abnormal (this wasn't originally meant to be a metaphor for being raised in a cult but my friend who has given significant input (AND ART WHICH WILL BE AT THE BOTTOM OF THIS POST IF YOU'D LIKE A REWARD) for this AU has brought up the similarities enough that, well, yeah). Scott's only been a "normal" person and part of normal society for like, the last two years. Xornoth has never been apart of normal society and still lives in Exor's lab cause it's a lot harder to make your experiment child a fake identity if you yourself are wanted by the government.

By the time this story starts, Xornoth's done a lot of pretty fucked up shit. Notably, he's killed Shrub's parents because Shrub (who was still living with her parents at the time) was getting a bit too close to whistle blowing on Exor's work and she needed to be... taken care of. This near death experience is how Shrub unlocked her powers and what got her to move into the ambiguous city where the story takes place. Joey's also a new arrival in town, but that's for like, normal reasons.

Other notable events in the plot of empires! I'm gonna try and run through these ones as quick as possible (meaning no nice transitions) because this post is already a lot!

The Dragon: The Dragon is one of Exor's other experiments gone wildly wrong. The Dragon used to be a woman named Marigold who worked for Exor. She was suckered into participating in one of his experiments, but whatever "science" was done to give her powers had some very bad side effects. Marigold's powers are crazy powerful (dragon's breath, huge wings, some sort of magic storm that surrounds her person at all time) and she cannot control them. She's also not really in her right mind. Exor has kept her captive in his lab for a while but by the time the story starts, she's starting to become more of a liability than she's worth. Marigold also has a child named Violet who's being cared for in the lab because she's kinda a loose end, but Violet does not have powers (yet) and is not being experimented on.

Sausage and Joey Go Evil: Exor sees promise in these new vigilantes and heroes that Xornoth's been fighting ever since tracking Shrub to the city and has asked Xornoth to try and recruit some of them to their "cause". Not Fractal, though. Don't worry about why not Fractal, Xornoth. It's not important. Joey is suckered into this in the exact way that he is in canon. To be clear, Xornoth is not into him, but he's willing to lead him on a little bit at the start to get Joey to volunteer for the experiments to give him stronger and new powers (upon going through these experiments, Joey's powers become stronger and he also is able to control and create the corruption tentacles. Joey also changes his name after going fully villain, but this is the only name I have yet to come up with). Sausage is suckered in because he is wildly jealous of his friends who were born with powers and the promise of developing some of his own, rather than having to rely on Fwhip's creations and Gem and Pearl's support in fight. Sausage does not change his code name when he goes evil.

Scott and Xornoth Find Out They're Brothers: By the time this story starts, Xornoth has already begun to be suspicious of Exor and the lab and has been looking into what the fuck they did to him, where he came from, all that. When The Demon starts to cause problems for the vigilante/hero scene of the Ambiguous City, Gem, Katherine, and Scott start working together to investigate the guy's origins and all the things. With Shrub's intel, the three break into Exor's lab and manage to collect some records before getting chased out. Xornoth is suspiciously bad at his job when the three are caught, but that's probably nothing, right? (Xornoth knows Fractal is his brother but is still pretty deep in the brainwashing)

The Codfather Head: One day in the midst of their work rivalry, Fwhip and Sausage break into Jimmy's locker to mess with him somehow (they haven't thought that far ahead) and find the Codfather Mask in his bag. At first, they think he's a superfan or something, but upon further inspection, this thing is definitely real. They have no idea why Jimmy would have this, but Fwhip decides they should steal it. Upon finding out that the mask is missing, Jimmy freaks for obvious reasons. A few days later, Fwhip encounters the other three Codvengers, lacking a notable fourth member, and doesn't restrain from teasing and implying that he knows what happened to the mask. They get into a huge argument and Fwhip agrees to drop the Codfather Mask off in, like, a random abandoned parking lot after getting some sense talked into him about the situation.

The Dragon Fight: Around the same time, Exor decides that Marigold is taking up too many resources and decides he needs to be rid of her. Exor tells Xornoth, Joey, and Sausage that if they can kill her, the resources being used on her can start being redirected towards them, and Xornoth isn't wildly down (but isn't not down either) and Sausage and Joey are both up for it too. They try, but they fail, and Marigold gets an idea of what the situation is and breaks out of the lab, taking Violet with her. The Dragon, as the media starts calling her, is drawn to the presence of powerful magic items, which is a surprise tool that will help us in a few sentences. The local heroes and vigilantes quickly split into two camps: "we need to kill/incapacitate her because she is hurting people" (the Codvengers) and "we need to help her because she's clearly not in her right mind" (pretty much everyone else). Anyways, Fwhip leaves the Codfather Mask where he said he would, but he and the remaining WRA members decide to keep watch over it, because they don't really want it falling into the hands of some random civilian. Problem: The Dragon gets there first. This leads to a huge fight and well... you've watched Empires, you know how this fight goes. This also happens to be the only time Pix has used his life drain powers to fully kill someone, and this messes with him for a while (because he also absorbs a ton of Marigold's memories when she dies, and that's not great for the guy's mental state). In the wake of the fight, Gem finds Violet where she was hidden by Marigold when the fighting broke out and... panics. She panics harder when she tries to approach and Violet sends a magic bolt at her in her fear (Gem eventually calms her down but UH OH). Gem decides to take the kid in because she doesn't really know what else to do, but this also gets a target on her back.

Sausage Goes Good Again: Exor learns Gem has Violet and that Violet has powers and decides that he should probably deal with that. He tells Sausage that he needs to go take Violet back from Gem at any cost, heavily implying Gem needs to be killed. And look, Sausage has been willing to do a lot at this point, but this (combined with the events of the Dragon Fight making him reconsider his role in the whole thing) is too far. So, Sausage decides to do something drastic. He does break into Gem's apartment, as asked, but upon getting in there and getting into a fight with her, he communicates to her the general idea of "I do not want to do this and I need you to help me fake my death" through a lot of coded talk (because he's being bugged) and cocky "The only way to stop me is to kill me" boasting. Gem takes the hint and blasts him in the chest with her powers, simultaneously breaking the bug and stopping his heart briefly. It's fine, she manages to revive him (again with her powers, don't worry about how she makes them into a defibrillator). Gem panics and calls Katherine, because Katherine made a few too many jokes about knowing where to hide a body and Gem is wondering if she might know where to hide a live person. Great news, she does! Her bosses, Thorn and Meringue, are willing to house him in the apartment above the café. This safe house will come back later. After Exor is off Sausage's back (not because he's gone but because he has other, bigger problems now, which we're about to get to), Sausage returns to vigilante work under a new name, Scepter. He also stops utilizing the corruption tentacles that the experiments gave him because 1. it causes him pain to do so and 2. well, it's got bad vibes. He does, however, keep using the enhanced ability-to-withstand-a-hit (a power I know has a better name than that but I can't think of it) to make him into a bit of a tank to protect his friends.

Xornoth Gets Crystalized and Scott's Magic Goes Haywire: Okay, this plot line is like, wildly different than in canon. But basically, after everything calms the fuck down slightly, Gem, Katherine, and Scott find out the truth of what happened to Alinar and Cohnal and draw some reasonable conclusions about Scott and Xornoth. The three decide to straight up kidnap Xornoth to get him free from Exor's control. Good news, they don't really need to kidnap him, because he'd also decided to split around the same time. Xornoth also gets moved into the safe house above the Sunflower Café and man the dynamic up there must be fun. Not long after Xornoth is separated from Exor's lab, however, his powers start to go haywire and he starts to get extremely sick. After a lot of conversations about how insane Scott and Xornoth's childhoods were, they figure out that Scott and Xornoth have both been getting regularly given some sort of serum to keep their powers and their bodies stable for their entire lives, hence Xornoth's Bad Time. Thorn and Meringue contact an old friend to help reverse engineer the stuff, which stops Xornoth from being extremely sick but his powers are still hard to control. Scott also decides to split from Aeor at this point (which means he is ALSO in the safe house. This is around the point where Sausage moves out but again THE DYNAMIC IS CRAZY) and starts using the same serum to keep himself from keeling over, and Gem decides to try to help Scott get greater control over his powers. This is how the drabble from earlier happens! Gem manages to recover enough that she doesn't tell anyone about it for about a week but then she collapses for no real reason in Fwhip's apartment and he and Sausage make her tell them what happened. Gem goes to Katherine to get healed and once Scott emerges from the hole he's hiding in, Fwhip and Sausage beat him up in an alley for a bit until they feel better.

The Rapture: This is also a very different plot line than in canon, mostly because I don't want to decimate this city full of civilians. Basically, all of our heroes are together now (Joey going good again happened at some point but I haven't thought about that plot line too in depth) and are trying to expose Aeor and Exor to the public and also destroy all the tech and science they've been creating. There is a problem, however: Scott and Xornoth have been rogue for long enough that both Aeor and Exor have resorted to trying to modify themselves (because they know people are going to come for them eventually) and are now on par with The Dragon in terms of power, so this is now a big fight and a really bad one. In the fall out, Xornoth, Scott, Joey and Pearl (and maybe Lizzie? Undecided) are all particularly fucked up (like, they have to step away from being a hero entirely because Aeor or Exor gave them permanent breathing problems or chronic pain or whatever) whereas the rest of the crew still does the superhero stuff but not all of them stay for a long time (I think most of the Codvengers step away permanently not too long after) and it’s not like new supers aren’t being born everyday to take up the mantle, they’re not leaving everyone abandoned or anything. Hey, maybe Violet will become her own hero once she's not, like, 7!

OKAY WOW THAT WAS A LOT! Anyways, I promised you a few of my friend @pixlostinatos 's doodles for this AU if you stuck it out this long, so here they are!

Scott and Xornoth after getting out of their respective lab cults. Xornoth goes full goth and Scott dresses like a prep school boy who's never had to dress for himself before cause he's been wearing a uniform his whole life.

Thorn and Sausage talk about the whole "turning evil" thing once Sausage starts living above their place of business.

Scott arguing (mostly lightheartedly) with Katherine about "HOW COULD YOU NOT TELL US THAT YOUR BOSS WERE FAMOUS EX SUPERS SNAPDRAGON AND REFUGE AND ALSO THAT THEY WERE MARRIED AND ALSO THAT THEY KNEW ALL OUR SECRET IDENTITIES BECAUSE YOU KNEW ALL OUR SECRET IDENTITIES"

A 14-ish year old Gem talking to Pi and small doodles of gem and Fwhip in their civies.

#empires smp #empires season 1 #empires s1 superhero au #my writing #HI SORRY THIS TOOK ME LIKE MULTIPLE HOURS TO WRITE UP. I HAD TO GO THROUGH A LOT OF DISCORD DMS TO COLLECT THIS AND IM NOT 100% SURE #THAT STUFF WASN'T MISSED. AND ALSO ITS A LOT.#if anyone wants any more details uh. feel free to ask! because surprisingly there are more!#they're all about like. interpersonal relationships more so than superheroes but don't we all love superhero interpersonal drama?#isnt that half the fun?#wither rose alliance #the codvengers #katherine elizabeth #shubble #joey graceffa #smajor #xornoth #i really dont wanna tag everyone so shoutout to the wra and covengers for your convenient group names

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