King

<infobox> <title source="name"><default>King</default></title>

<image source="Image"></image> <image source="image"></image> <group><header>Basic Information</header> <label>Civilian Name</label> <label>Aliases</label> <label>Gender</label><default>Unknown</default> <label>Death</label> <label>Age</label><default>Unknown</default> <label>Post-timeskip</label> <label>Ward start</label> <label>Relations</label> <label>Family</label></group> <group><header>Professional Status</header> <label>Occupation</label> <label>Classification</label> <label>Unique Features</label> <label>Alignment</label>

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<label>Location</label> <label>Teams</label> <label>Previous Team(s)</label> <label>Base of Operations</label></group> <group><header>First Appearance</header> <label>Worm Debut</label> <label>Ward Debut</label></group> </infobox>Gabriel Maxberry,<ref name=SB2>King: Gabriel Maxberry - Private conversation with Wildbow, archived on Spacebattles</ref> known publicly as King, was the original leader of the Slaughterhouse Nine.

Appearance

King was described as a broad-shouldered blond man. He was half a foot taller than Jack Slash.<ref name=I25>King, tall and blond, unabashed in his nudity.  All nine Kings were broad-shouldered, each half a foot taller than Jack.

Their interaction would be an interesting one.  She'd wondered if she should program King with the knowledge that Jack had been the one to kill him, reconsidered. - Excerpt from Interlude 25</ref>

Personality

Bully per excellence, and was smart enough to get at his victims psychologically.<ref name=SB3e5/> As a cape he was smarter than he first appeared, which he used to his advantage.

King would call his protege by his first name, Jacob, practically purring the word. He considered Jacob a "killer-in-training".<ref name=":1">Interlude 21.x</ref> Weaver believed that he was one of the few Nine members who would immediately report cheating to his superior, rather than seeing it as fun.<ref>They'd been okay with a little bit of involvement on our part.  Tattletale had speculated they would.  There were only a few who were so regimented they would report it to Jack at the first opportunity.  Winter was among them, but she was largely in the dark, here.  Screamer wouldn't fill her in if it meant spoiling the fun.

In truth, the only ones who wouldn't let us get away with this were Mannequin and King. - Excerpt from Sting 26.2</ref>

Bonesaw's clones of King, based on historical accounts, weren't embarrassed by nudity. They were unaware that Jack had been the one to kill them.<ref name=I25/>

He had a habit of murdering young women.^{[citation needed]}

Abilities and Powers

King's power took any physical harm he suffered and transferred it among people he'd touched within the last twenty-four hours.<ref name=26.3e1>Untouchable.  King's power took any physical harm he suffered and transferred it among his pawns.  People he'd touched within the last twenty-four hours.[...]Tyrant here had the enhanced strength each of the two had possessed, the enhanced durability. - Excerpt from Sting 26.3</ref>

This power made him immune to the effects of Gray Boy's ability which is how he was able to get a hold of him.<ref name=SB1>King had a flimsy hold, Jack had a stronger hold. The former Gray Boy was closer to a Labyrinth in full-on powers mode than anything else. Using powers indiscriminately, staying within an area. King was effectively immune to him, and used this to introduce himself and start leading him around. - Wildbow on Spacebattles</ref> However, it was unable to protect him from Foil's charged shots,<ref>Sting 26.3</ref> whose effects he could also not displace.

He also possessed enhanced strength and durability.<ref name=26.3e1/>

This ability and those parahumans he surrounded himself with made him very hard to capture.

History

Background

Gabriel Maxberry was from a well to do family and a star athlete in college occupying the top of the social pyramid. Reaching the top only exacerbated his issues however.<ref name=SB3e5>Panda: Figure I would get my major curiosities satisfied first.

Wildbow: Because in terms of shaping him, it's made him a hedonist. He's used to being unstoppable, he's used to being absolutely, completely in control, and being in control of some scary motherfuckers (in your case, the other careers).

Wildbow: He's smarter than he lets on (Tyrant, by contrast, was a little limited by the hatchet face in him) and he's always been a very, very good bully. In the wormverse, he was top of the heap. Police chief's son, top dog in high school, top dog in the fraternity, top student, top athlete. He found out very quickly that nothing could really affect him.

Wildbow: So he kept pushing limits and finding that nobody would stop him. Terrorizing pledges, going after girls on campus, tormenting professors he didn't like, etc.

Wildbow: But it's lonely at the top (ergo the master power) and he simply didn't know how to continue rising or proving himself when he was already at the top, already proven, so he took to substance abuse and grueling fitness regiments, which ultimately started to kill him. (The brute aspect) [...] and he triggered (in the Wormverse). It sort of settled something in him, resolved an internal dilemma. He found his place, and his focus became something entirely different. Control, securing his place.

Wildbow: He's the king. The only entity higher than the king is God, in the great heirarchy, and godhood... well, that requires infrastructure.

Wildbow: It's not really something he's *actually* aspiring towards, but that's sort of... maybe the general abstract of his thought pattern. [...] Being worshiped, and worship through fear and awe is the sort of worship he understands.

Wildbow: Having guys like Harbinger and Crimson at his beck and call, knowing that he could, if he desired, make them lick his feet. Knowing that -others- are aware that there's this group of scary-as-fuck killers out there and he's the guy in charge.

Wildbow: King in a coconut shell. (nutshell is too small for all that text) - Conversation with Wildbow on the IRC, Archived on Spaccebattles.</ref>

King was the initial leader of the Slaughterhouse Nine. He ran the Nine as a "brute squad" similar to the Teeth.<ref>Crimson was a mainstay of King's era, when he'd ruled the Nine as more of a brute squad, not dissimilar to the Teeth back in Brockton Bay. - Excerpt from Sting 26.2</ref><ref>The first iteration formed twenty years ago. They were a very different group, led by King (mistakenly called Rex in a previous chapter). Jack was a junior member, as was Gray Boy. - Comment by Wildbow on Imago 21.1</ref> He was the one who gave Harbinger his name.<ref name=":1" /> King's immunity to Gray Boy allowed King to recruit him.<ref name=SB2/>

He was killed at the hands of Jacob and Harbinger in 1987.<ref name=":1" />

Legacy

He was largely eclipsed by Jacob.

Post-Timeskip

King was one of the many former Slaughterhouse Nine members cloned by Bonesaw, and served in the Slaughterhouse Nine-Thousand under King's former pupil Jacob. Another instance of him was combined with Hatchet Face to create Tyrant.<ref name=26.3e1/>

A clone of King who accompanied a squad of other Nine clones was captured by Dragon and Defiant using containment foam.<ref>Interlude 26.x</ref>

Golem encountered an apparent clone of King who was actually Jack Slash, disguised by Nyx's power.<ref name="26b">A Hatchet Face, Breed, Cherish and King made their way towards the entrance of the alley. Golem created hands to block their path.
[...]
They tensed, but the King looked over his shoulder at the Cherish, and when he looked up again, he was smiling.
[...]
The illusions collectively shattered as he squashed the head of the ‘Cherish’ against the wall. Nyx.

Which revealed the other three.

Jack. No surprise. Hidden inside King. - Excerpt from Interlude 26b</ref>

It is presumed that all instances were destroyed but not confirmed.

References

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