Morals of a Villain

Chapter 1: An Introduction

Damon swirled the wine in his glass absently, as he was apt to do when he was irritated. The maps and graphs spread out on the table in front of him were not displaying what he wanted to see, and that was always rather bothersome. Especially when it came to the sort of enemies who had been troubling him recently. 
It wasn't that he didn't like his opponents; In fact, he usually found them quite humorous, specifically when they were attempting to overthrow him in their silly fashions that always led to a blood bath and the feeling of a job well done. It was just that they had some ridiculous ideas of what a hostage negotiation was. To Damon, such a thing would have been easy to define; it was the exchange of a person or object that someone or other decided was valuable, in return for something that the person who had it desired. It was quite simple. The only thing separating it from a regular deal or exchange was that whoever held the thing that was being exchanged had taken it without permission. That was a hostage negotiation. That was the way those sorts of things worked. It had been since the dawn of time. And it wasn't what people were accusing the young Duke of. 
Damon stood, frustrated and disgruntled at his enemy's lack of understanding when it came to the very thing they were supposed to be 'fighting' against. He paced over to the fireplace and stared down at the burning logs, biting his lip to keep himself from getting too mad about this. It wasn't the first time someone had painted him in a bad and entirely inaccurate light simply so they could have a reason to fight against him, and he was sure it wouldn't be the last. Such were the ways of war. There was no use getting upset about it, even if he found it unfair that he was continuously portrayed as the bad guy when he was really only a different side of the story. He couldn't reason with people like his enemies; they always turned around to their audiences with the flourish of a magician unveiling their next trick and twisted what he said into evidence that he was evil. It was honestly rather impressive, considering that he had never learned to do the same. There had always been a sort of charm to being able to warp someone's words to your own intentions; a charm he would have loved to find himself capable of using. But he supposed it didn't particularly matter. After all, he already had power, influence, and a silver tongue when it came to speeches and lulling people into his thrall. Even if he wasn't able to redirect his opponent's words to create a bad image of their groups, he was fully capable of making himself look better than them. 
As Damon stood, spacing out and drifting into daydreams of just exactly what he would do to the people behind the latest rumors about him, he heard the door to his study open. He turned, curious and a little confused who would dare to disturb him while he was plotting against his enemies. It was a very important part of his day, and everyone in the house knew not to bother him during it unless it was exceedingly important. "Pardon me, sir." The figure standing at the door said, venturing out of the shadows cast by the woodworked archway to reveal himself as the young Duke's butler. "But our...guest is demanding to talk to you." He said, looking rather disgruntled. "Can it wait?" Damon asked, annoyed at the insistence of these supposed 'heroes'. They were always so pushy and serious about everything, which had a tendency to make playing games with them much more difficult then he would have liked. Kirk, the butler, shook his head. "It seems to be rather important to them. And they are refusing to settle down until they gain your audience." He said, regretfully. Damon sighed, even more annoyed now. "Everything's important to people like them. It would be nice if they could just admit the world doesn't revolve around their stupidly insignificant selves." He muttered, speaking more to himself than to his servant. Kirk nodded. "Agreed, sir." He said, an undertone of exasperation in his voice. Damon rolled his eyes and picked his jacket up off of the chair he had tossed it across earlier that morning, wishing silently that he could have gone just one day without these sorts of interruptions. He had more important things to do then antagonize heroes. In his mind, he had already won this fight; there certainly wasn't anything that his captive could do to get away. It was rather bothersome of them to keep going even now, when there was really nowhere left for them to run. "I'll be down in a minute. Do you think miss martyr can hold on until I've cleaned up in here a bit?" He asked, sarcastically gesturing to the piles of papers and charts scattered across his desk. Kirk shrugged. "She will have to, sir." He said, offering a little bow of respect before he left the room. 
"Such a nuisance." Damon muttered to himself, pulling the sleeves of his white dress shirt down so that his gold and ruby cufflinks peaked out below the cuffs of his brown tweed suit jacket. Why did all his enemies have to be like this? Of course, he understood the need for drama and the fun that came with annoying your opponents. But it didn't make nearly as much sense when it was genuine. There was a distinct difference between screwing with someone's head to get them to engage in a bit of theatrical fighting to fill the time one might be forced to spend with their enemies, and actually thinking a self-riotous rant over right and wrong would do anything other than display just how much of a prick a person was. Fighting for fun was all well and good; but when it started to get real and emotional, that was when Damon stopped having a good time with it. He didn't like emotions. Not the ones that people like his enemies showed. They got in the way of work, and made the whole world much less amusing and rosy than it could be if people just let themselves have a good time with what they did. Damon had experimented with being moral and all that nonsense for a bit of time, and the only conclusion he had drawn from it was that the people he was so often pitted against were the most boring, depressing beings on the planet. There was nothing for them to look forward to when they went into battle, and nothing for them to be happy about other than whatever sort of love life they could manage to conjure up between their war rants and battle rallies. If that was the kind of life a hero led, then he most certainly did not want to be one of them. Perhaps that was one of the reasons he worked the way he did; everyone else seemed absolutely miserable, and to Damon, life wasn't really worth living if there wasn't some sort of fun to be had while doing it. Chaining yourself to an end goal that might never come seemed like the worst way to live, and he was glad that his lifestyle had led him to work in circles that didn't require it. 
Damon gathered up his papers and maps, pushing everything messily into one of his desk drawers. He would attend to organizing it later. Right now, he had to see what it was his guest wanted him for. He hoped it wasn't all that bad, or boring. He had already had to explain to her three times that the best thing she could do right now was stay quiet and keep herself from getting hurt again, all of which he was fairly certain had gone right over her head. It almost seemed like she had a death wish at this point. 
He sighed, checking his reflection in the window behind his desk to make sure that he at least looked decent. Even if his guest was a supposed hero sent by one of his many enemies, he still would have preferred to look half human for her. It was a common gesture of respect, after all, and even if no one could ever bring themselves to repay it, he still would have liked to think that he could set a good example for his 'heroic' opponents. With a final glance at himself to be sure that he was presentable, Damon turned and started towards the room where he was keeping his captive, taking a deep breath as he did so. He hoped this wasn't going to set the mood for the rest of the day.