The Dapper Vigilante

Police officers stood over a woman's corpse, alongside the coroners trying to investigate how the woman seemingly died. The body was found where it lay, inside of a dark alley, nearly missed by those passing by beneath Khonshu's moon.

"Looks like there was a struggle. See her fingernails." One of the officers pointed at the skin beneath the girl's fingernails, seemingly the skin of the person who shot her once in the back of the head.

"Might be another sexual assault case. Likely killed her and dumped the body here." a different officer stroked his chin as he spoke.

"Look at her clothes though... she seems like a sex worker. Could've been her pimp or whatever. Would a rapist kill her execution-style?" the first officer asked, looking at the woman's scandalous dress, heels, and jewelry.

"Good evening gentlemen." An Englishman's voice could be heard behind the officer, prompting them all to jolt in surprise while others drew their weapons. They turned around to see Mr. Knight standing at the entrance to the alley, wearing his perfectly all-white suit and tie which almost seemed to be glowing. He stood with one foot behind the other with a white cane stabbed into the ground in front of him.

"Kain are you an idiot!?" Raziel said from inside Kain's head.

"Silence, Raziel. Just watch." Kain whispered, unheard heard by any of the officers.

"Who the hell are you?" One of the officers asked, just itching to pull the trigger on Mr. Knight as he continued to stand with a confident pose.

"Call me Mr. Knight: the Protector of the Travelers of the Night. That's Knight with a K, by the way." the moonlit, dapper vigilante proclaimed. "It would appear to me that you are in need of some assistance."

The officers all looked around at each other, wondering why this strange British man was speaking to them as if this were some sort of game to him. "Are you crazy?" one of the officers asked, immediately compelling Mr. Knight's pure white gaze to lock onto his soul.

"I prefer the term... unconventional. I suggest you never call me crazy again." Mr. Knight spoke with a serious tone. Being called crazy wasn't something the man beneath the mask, Kain, appreciated. He was a hothead, and that word was the key to lighting his fuse.

"Mr... Knight, sir?" one of the detectives in a suit in tie spoke. He was an older man, having a mixture of grey and black hair on his face and head. He seasoned, though it was clear that his glory days were far behind him. "You spoke about assisting us. How exactly do you plan on doing that?"

"With Khonshu's guidance, I will be able to do your jobs for you. That is if you allow me to." Mr. Knight's confidence compelled some of the officers to believe him. They didn't know who Khonshu was, but considering the fact that men in iron suits fly through the skies with teenagers that shoot webs from their wrists, this wasn't too far-fetched.

"Get the hell outta here you-" one of the officers, a doubter, started to speak, only to be interrupted by the greying police chief.

"Okay, Mr. Knight. Show us how to do our job then." the lead detective was willing to see what Mr. Knight was capable of. He knew that sitting around a body with no real clues wasn't going to solve anything. He knew that he was powerless to truly make a change, despite being one of the few men in the force who actually cared about that kind of thing.

"You've gotta be kidding!" both the doubting officer and Raziel said the same thing at the same time before the officer looked to the detective with a scowl on his face. "You're just gonna trust this guy?"

"Watanabe has Spider-Man. I don't see why us working with this Mr. Knight character would be any different." the detective replied.

"I see at least one of you has a brain inside of those thick, swine skulls of yours. Allow me, Mr..." Mr. Knight trailed off, never having gotten the detective's name.

"Detective Flint." the officer revealed his name, getting a nod from Mr. Knight himself.

"Pleased to meet you, Detective Flint. This shouldn't take long." Mr. Knight approached the body and knelt down in front of it, glaring at her face with a bullet hole blasted through it.

"What the hell are you doing? Are you an idiot?" Raziel asked from within the body.

"Silence, Raziel." Mr. Knight spoke aloud, compelling the officers to look at each other with confused glares.

"Khonshu, I understand that you have the power to request guidance from a spirit whose body was slain beneath your moon, yes? I would like for you to bestow that power onto me." Kain looked around, he knew Khonshu was watching but he didn't know where.

Khonshu chuckled before appearing directly next to Mr. Knight, crouching down next to him with his moon staff in hand. "You have done your research, haven't you, Kain Walker?" Khonshu was impressed. He had planned on informing Kain of this regardless, but he wanted to sit and watch first to see what he'd do.

"I have. While the imbecile was too busy reading fantasies, I continued diving deep into your lore. Please, ask this spirit to guide me." Kain requested.

"What!? You only care about researching what powers you'd get! I actually research the nuances and history of all Egyptian gods, including Khonshu. I know about the spirit guiding, I just forgot." Raziel tried to defend himself, but he was utterly ignored.

"She is already guiding you, Kain Walker. Notice her footsteps beneath you." Mr. Knight then looked down at his own feet, seeing white, almost see-through footsteps leading out of the alley and going west.

"Excellent." Mr. Knight said under his breath before standing back up on his feet and following the spirit's footsteps. The police were puzzled, as Mr. Knight just appeared to be completely delusional due to the fact that he seemingly was speaking to himself the entire time. They couldn't even see Khonshu.

"Where is he going?"

"Hell if I know."

"This guy is nuts."

"Mr. Knight? Where are you going?" Detective Flint asked, watching the man in the moonlit suit walk away.

"Following the woman's footsteps of course. I'll find a way to contact you once this is all done." Mr. Knight continued to walk away, leaving every single officer stunned. "Useless pigs..." he said under his breath before turning the corner out of sight.

It wasn't long before the footsteps led Mr. Knight to the doorstep of what appeared to be some sort of abandoned building, though its exterior was nothing more than a coverup. "Watch and learn, Raziel, watch and learn." Kain spoke confidently before knocking on the door three times.

"What's knocking going to do?" Raziel asked, not seeing the point in it as with their powers, they could easily punch the door down as if it were made of crackers.

"So they'll know I'm coming." As those words left Kain's mouth, he kicked the door down with a single strike, sending the door flying off of its hinges.

Mr. Knight stepped inside, only to find that the place appeared to be completely empty. "Good job, dumbass. They ran off." Raziel quipped, however, Kain scanned the room intensely before quipping back.

"That is the difference between you and I, Raziel. Your eyes deceive you." Mr. Knight noticed footsteps that led to a part of the wall in the back that appeared to be of a slightly different color than the rest of it. Knowing the size of the building, that wall shouldn't even be there as there was much more building to go behind it.

"Remember that video game you used to rot your brain playing before father broke your console? The one with the knights and unfair battles?" Kain asked his other half.

"Way ahead of you. That's a fake wall, right?"

"Precisely." Kain said as he approached the wall and placed both hands on it. He rubbed his hands on each brick before finding one that was different than all of the others. He then pushed the brick inward, causing the wall to open inward like a door.

The door opened to reveal something grand...

"An empty hallway." Raziel said mockingly. "You see the door at the end of it?"

Kain rolled his eyes. "Yes, we share the same eyes, fool. There's music as well coming from behind it. A secret club perhaps?" Mr. Knight stepped down the steps and made his way down the hallway until he reached the door. Before he could knock or bust it down, it opened to reveal a large man standing with his arms crossed.

"Who are you?" the man spoke with a thuggish, Brooklyn-sounding accent.

"Mr. Knight." Kain said, using his toes to lift him up and peer around the man's shoulder. Mr. Knight was able to see dozens of women, either dancing on poles, serving men drinks and food, or being dragged around by leashes like dogs.

He couldn't entirely tell which women worked there or were slaves, in fact, part of him thought even the ones that appeared to be having fun were just doing their jobs and looking the part. "This is fucking disgusting. This must be where those guys planned on taking Layla when they called her merchandise." Raziel's voice was clearly filled with rage upon thinking about Layla being in here, along with all of those other innocent women.

"Wait until you find out where most of these men employ themselves. Any guesses?" Khonshu, leaning against the wall with his arms crossed, spoke.

"Cops." Raziel said.

"Government officials." Kain added.

"Oh, that's only scratching the surface. There's a priest and a few judges in here too. Outside of the typical thugs and crime lords of course." Khonshu spoke smugly as if riling up the boys was something fun for him. Whether that be true or not, Raziel and Kain were furious, though their reasons differed slightly.

"The hell are you supposed to be?" the man at the door asked the dapper vigilante.

"Where's your boss? I would like to speak with the man himself." Mr. Knight's voice was cold, but his lacking height and visible muscle wouldn't allow the man to be intimidated.

"Boss ain't seeing visitors." the bouncer began closing the door, only to have Mr. Knight stop it with his own hand.

"This was not a request, but a directive. Now, tell me, where your boss is." Mr. Knight's actions and words caused the bouncer to chuckle slightly before he stepped out from the doorway and into the hallway with Mr. Knight. He then shut the door behind him as those from the other side who were paying attention looked on.

"Looks like Bubba found himself another punching bag." one of the men, an older-looking one, said as a woman grinded on his lap. The man next to him laughed with a woman of his own on his lap, dancing without any emotion on her face. "Yeah, guess someone didn't get the memo. You get a look at the guy? It shouldn't have been one of ours."

"All I could see was some funny-looking white suit and tie. Definitely not one of ours." before the men could say another word, the door opened once again. However, this so-called Bubba did not reappear. The only one stepping through the door was Mr. Knight himself.

The music continued to blast, the lights continued to flash, and the ladies continued to dance as Mr. Knight fixed his tie and continued on into the underground club. Dozens of eyes were locked on him, including the eyes of some of the dancing girls, the ones serving drinks, and the filthy men using them like animals.

Mr. Knight scanned the room until he spotted an area overlooking the rest of the club. It appeared to be a room surrounded by a strange sort of one-sided glass that allowed outsiders to see silhouettes and not much else. Figuring that the boss must be up there, Mr. Knight headed for the stairs.

As soon as a single foot hit the stairs, Mr. Knight was greeted by more thugs. A few of them had weapons while the others were bare-handed. Feeling no need to use weapons of his own, Mr. Knight simply dodged their attacks and decommissioned them with single strikes.

Once he reached the top catwalk, another guard sprinted at him with a bat, only for Mr. Knight to dodge and throw the man from the catwalk and down onto the dance floor below. The man's body released a cracking sound as soon as it hit the ground, alerting those who weren't aware of Mr. Knight's presence that he was in fact there.

Inside the boss's room, two women could be seen sitting on the boss's lap, caressing his face with artificial smiles as he rubbed on their bodies with his hands. He was an older man, just like most of his customers, having a greying mustache and a buzzcut. One of the ladies pulled the cigar from his mouth before the boss spoke to the lackey in front of him.

"So who was it? Daredevil? Spider-Man wouldn't have killed my guys." the boss looked furious knowing that his men were reduced due to some vigilante. He was even more furious that his lackey had the nerve to come back and show his face.

The lackey, the same young man that Moon Knight spared and told to go spread the word, found himself on his hands and knees telling the boss what he knew. "He said his name was Moon Knight. He was unlike anything I'd ever seen. He wore all white, it was so bright like the moon! I can't do this no more, Boss. Please, just let me go!"

"You think just 'cause you escaped death and begged nicely, that means I'm gonna let you go?" the boss told him before he finally caught a glimpse of Mr. Knight walking on the catwalk through the massive window of his office. "The hell?"

"Oh, God! It's him! It's Moon Knight." the lackey didn't know where to run. If he ran out of the room, Khonshu's fist would destroy him. If he stayed, his boss would likely shoot him.

"Hey, kid. Take this." the lackey looked back at his boss to see him tossing a revolver at him as the boss held one of his own in his other hand. The ladies that were on his lap were then seen cowering behind a couch.

It wasn't long before they heard three knocks at the door.

𝙠𝙣𝙤𝙘𝙠.

𝙠𝙣𝙤𝙘𝙠.

𝙠𝙣𝙤𝙘𝙠.

"I suggest you drop whatever weapons you have aimed at this door." Mr. Knight spoke through the door before kicking it off of its hinges and straight into the boss, sending him flying into the glass behind him and cracking it. The lackey screamed, along with the ladies, as he dropped his weapon and fell to his knees once again.

"You're that kid from earlier." Mr. Knight said, looking at the boy that his other half spared earlier.

Ignoring him, Mr. Knight approached the broken door and the boss beneath it. He picked up the metal door and used it to break the glass before grabbing the boss by the neck and holding him over the certain death drop below him.

"Greetings, all. My name is Mr. Knight. As you can see, your boss is in quite a predicament. My knowledge of such illegal establishments like the one we find ourselves in now is minimal. However, I do know that when the boss parishes..."

Mr. Knight dropped the boss, causing him to fall dozens of feet onto the ground beneath them, cracking his neck and dying immediately upon impact.

"... a new boss emerges. As of now, you all work for me. Ladies, you are all free to leave." Mr. Knight looked back at the teenager cowering on the ground before looking back at the crowd. "If you are below the age of eighteen, I suggest you leave as well. The rest of you, however, you all stay."

Just as Mr. Knight instructed, most of the ladies left, as well as those who were too young to have themselves caught up in this mess.

Watching them flee, Mr. Knight turned around to see that the two ladies behind him did not leave. "You two plan on staying?" Mr. Knight asked. They both nodded before one of them spoke. "We have nowhere else to go..."

"I understand. If you'd like, you two ladies could work for me. I'll need help running this place during the day. I will not treat you as slaves like your previous boss. You will be my confidants. You will be paid of course and I have no interest in using you for your bodies."

"Thank you, Mr. Knight." the ladies then grabbed their old boss's throne and pushed it toward the window. Mr. Knight flicked his suit jacket backward and sat on the throne with his leg crossed against his thigh. He then rested his head on his fist with his arm propped on the armrest, looking down at the club that was now his beneath him with his shining white eyes.

By day, Raziel Zabu was the shy librarian organizing books at Mr. Brooks's Library.

By night, Kain Walker was the boss of what would soon be known as Club Moon.