Excerpt: Confessions of a Combat Waitress

It has been fifteen years since the government enacted the Powered Citizen Ban in Sega City.

Unlike the war on terrorism, or the war on drugs, or anything of the like, this war had a very concrete, tangible enemy which the city worked day and night for years to destroy.

To ask who started the war… now that's a difficult question. One could argue powered terrorist Isaac Romane started the revolution with his terrifying, genocidal ways. He did, after all, gather the largest commune of powered refugees for the police to eventually eradicate.

Or perhaps it was Carson McGregor, a charismatic yet spiteful public speaker who dedicated - and eventually, gave - his life to the oppression of these powered citizens, inspiring Isaac's rebellion in taking these special people to a higher level. His death fifteen years ago inspired hundreds of outspoken individuals to band together in his honor and pick up where he left off.

Then again, both Isaac and Carson seemed to look to a certain Ethan King, CEO of Kingcorp, as their messiah. He did develop and singlehandedly manufacture a serum that could both grant powers and take them away at will. He held his power in multi-million dollar corporation, as well as manipulation of both sides of the war, sending help wherever money could go.

Of course, it could have also been Navi. All three at one point found an ally in her, where other times they have all wanted to destroy her. More brutal than Isaac and more stubborn than Carson, with as brilliant and cunning a mind as Ethan, she strove to maintain peace while holding herself above both powered and non-powered citizens alike, seeking justice through murder of anyone who disagreed with her.

These are the players in my city's recent history - all selfish individuals who hide behind their own twisted facades of morality and justice. All four of them certainly played a part in shaping this city into the mess that it is today, though only one survived long enough to see their legacies - Isaac died a martyr in public at the hand of the police, where Carson was murdered in his own home, and as a nationally wanted woman, Navi likely fled back to her homeworld, wherever that is.

Which leaves Ethan King, who occasionally oversees the distribution of the permanent power suppressor serum (hailed as "the cure") to prisons throughout the country.

So where did that leave me?

As a waitress on the west side of Sega City, of course. My name is Jane Matthews, and I serve breakfast twenty four hours a day at a cozy little hole in the wall diner where some of the nicest and nastiest congregate.